I Thought Tragedies Were Supposed To Come In Threes?

This off season has been unbelievably tragic for the hockey world. Three tough guys passed away, Derek Boogaard who I posted about earlier, ex-Canuck Rick Rypien and one of the most media friendly players ever, Wade Belak. As if that wasn't enough, today an out of date Russian aircraft carrying an entire KHL team along with their coaches and staff went down. Only 2 people survived, and from the sounds of things one of the two may end up wishing he hadn't given the extent of his burns. The head coach of said team, Brad McCrimmon, was an ex-Flame as both a player and a coach, winning the cup with us as a defenseman in 1989. Other notable ex-NHLers include Pavol Demitra, Ruslan Salei, and Karel Rachunek.

I actually ran into Brad many years ago, along with his friend and one time Flames teammate Gary Roberts. Both were retired at the time, though Gary would later stage a lengthy comeback and play many more years in the NHL after his neck healed from a serious injury. Surprisingly enough I didn't meet these ex-Flames in Calgary, or even Canada - but at the turtle farm in Grand Cayman. It was ages ago, but I recall them both being very nice and happily signing autographs. I imagine the piece of paper is still around somewhere at my parents house.

Not a lot has been going on poker wise lately, though I did just put in a 2 hour session which ended up being profitable enough. I made one huge mistake in which I flatted a river PSB from a fish instead of shoving in a spot which was a trivial value shove, missing out on something like 40-50bbs worth of value as I'm sure he was calling. Heavy grinding will resume for Friday and Saturday.

I finished a third playthrough of Persona 3 earlier today (specifically, Persona 3 Portable for the PSP, my second time through that version). I'm sure I've said it many times before on the blog, but it truly is an outstanding game, very possibly the best since the turn of the millenium. It also makes me want to own a Shiba (in honor of canine party member Koromaru), the natively Japanese breed of dog pictured below.



In something of a coincidence, the next game I'll be playing also features a playable dog character, this time named Boney. Best name for a dog ever! I've long wanted to play the sequel to Earthbound (Mother 2 in Japan), which was never brought overseas. Thanks to a fan translation I'm able to give Mother 3 a go, and even better after picking up a flash cart and modifying my DS some, I can play it the way it was designed to be played rather than on an emulator. Well, technically I guess the DS acts as a GBA emulator, but you get my point.