War Memorial, Syracuse, NY. April 2011. Canon S95.

My wife recently purchased a Groupon for 50% off tickets to our local AHL team, the Syracuse Crunch against her hometown Binghamton Senators. Two ice-level seats, two hot dogs, a shared soda, parking, and a free Jon “Nasty” Mirasty bobble-head for only $26.50; what can I say, I’m a cheap date.

Our wonderful evening was full of life lessons, such as:

- Sometimes the drunken hockey hooligans sitting behind you aren’t actually drunken hockey hooligans; sometimes they’re just Australian tourists.

-When you & your wife are featured on the ‘kiss cam,’ the police sergeant in your section won’t be impressed unless there’s tongue involved.

-All of Syracuse’s goals were brought to you by bread.

-The “Hanson Brothers” impersonators should prolly lose some weight to be more believable; especially in a building where parts of ‘Slapshot‘ where filmed.

-It isn’t awkward at all to have a bobble-head night for a fan-favorite player that your NHL affiliate unceremoniously demoted and then traded away.

But it was refreshing to see, on a night that the Crunch were celebrating perhaps their most beloved enforcer ever, the current team remembered how to toss the gloves and play some Syracuse style hockey.