The most exciting thing that happened in March was our hockey team’s trip to the USA Hockey Women’s Senior C National Championships in Rochester, NY.  We obviously didn’t do super-well but OH it was fun! We’d have done way worse if our goalie Renee hadn’t been on; thankfully, she was really on, scores notwithstanding. My big excitement of the tournament was getting two assists. I very rarely get points in games, so to bust out and get 2 in the national championship tournament was thrilling. Amy got a goal in our last game, so the Brooks women definitely represented for the Storm.

We also went to the Women’s Frozen Four (NCAA hockey championships) at Agganis Arena at Boston University. Neither of the Minnesota teams made it to the championship game, so I was FORCED to cheer for Wisconsin in the finals. It wasn’t too hard to do that once I got over the whole Big Ten rivalry thing.

The other fun news is that I started playing indoor soccer. Amy finds it highly entertaining when I pick up sports that she already knows how to play (and she plays soccer well – less of a spaz than she is at hockey!) But after the first couple of games, she stopped laughing. There’s a lot I like about indoor soccer: there are the same number of players on the field as in hockey; there are boards like in hockey; playing defense is really similar to hockey (except that screening the goalie is less of a problem since a soccer ball is a tad larger than a hockey puck); and the field is small enough that I can run up and down it a couple of times before I want to die. There are a few things I still don’t like about soccer: my left foot is useless; and, I can’t run into people. That second one has been bothering me a lot, since my hockey game has gotten more physical in the past year. In soccer I really have to remember this mantra: You may NOT squish the opponent like a bug on the boards!

April’s been a mixed bag so far.

Bad #1: Work is very challenging. People I know and like have been affected directly.

Good #1: Last weekend Amy and I followed a trail that we’ve been on parts of before, but this time we took a different turn. We ended up a couple of miles away from home, on the Sudbury Aqueduct. It was really quite lovely and I hope this weekend is nice enough for us to do it again (and go farther this time).

Bad #2: Maggie came home from a “walkabout” yesterday with pieces of smellllllly dog crap stuck in the fur on her back. So I had to give her a bath. (I think the first part is what’s bad, she thinks it’s the second.)

Good #2: MacHeist 3! It was my first time participating in any way, and will not be my last. Besides, I got a ton of really interesting software which I can’t wait to use. So far I like World of Goo, Overflow, Typinator, Acorn, Little Snapper, and PhoneView. I want to use SousChef some more, and figure out how to use WireTap Studio and BoinxTV. But the real killer app for me (pun totally intended) is The Hit List. I struggle mightily with to-do lists and how to manage them – apparently that’s what this does really well. I’ll report back when I know.

I’m hoping the rest of the month looks more up and down – a planned hockey tournament trip up to Burlington, VT should be just what the doctor ordered!

How was YOUR March? How’s your April so far?

• Holly and Libby finished scraping and priming two of the three other side of the house that still needed scraping.
• I painted most of the south side of the house and about half of the front of the house.
• I picked veggies at the farm, including 10 pounds of tomatoes!
• And Clark trimmed and removed about 7 or 8 smallish diameter trees, a couple larger trees that were overhanging the neighbor’s pool, and the big arborvitae that was trying to take over the northeast corner of our house.

Yeah, as you can probably tell, Amy’s sister and her husband came down Saturday and Clark went to town with his chainsaw. He actually came back today and finished up all the stuff he couldn’t get to yesterday. While I know we needed to do a lot of this trimming and tree removal, it still pained me. What pains me more is that we’ve got two HUGE other trees that need to come down behind the garage because they’re dying and dropping branches. Yowza. It’s gonna be nekkid back there!

Photos eventually – I’m too pooped to pull out the camera cable…