Celtics vs. Toronto

Another slow week this week, although I went to the Celtics/Raptors game Monday, and it was my sister's birthday on Wednesday. Amanda came with me to the Celtics game, and that's always a good time. The Celtics as an organization put on a wicked entertaining show. The basketball is obviously good, but the clips they play on the big screen, the music, and everything else they do works really well together. I like watching basketball about as much as I like watching hockey, but going to Celtics games is a lot more fun than going to Bruins games.

We didn't do anything for my sister's birthday, although everyone sent her cards. Mine was an e-card, and she hadn't checked her e-mail for most of the day so she was pretty peeved when she thought I had just been lazy or forgotten. I gotta remember to follow that up with a phone call or something next year.

Bruins

This past week was fairly quiet, although on Tuesday I made it to a Bruins game. It was my first (and possibly only) game this season, so I was pretty excited. They played the Minnesota Wild, which is the team we got our backup goalie from, so we were hoping they'd play him. Unfortunately (for him), Tim Thomas got the start. Unfortunately for everyone, the Bs lost 1 - 0. While we were there, we noticed the Wild's logo is much more complicated than it appears at first glance:

Looking closely, you can see the main shape is that of a wild cat or bear, but it incorporates a river, tree line, and full moon, ostensibly of the Minnesota landscape. The "eye" of the animal represents the North Star, an homage to the Minnesota North Stars hockey team.

New Years, etc.

Amanda and I had our two year anniversary this past week, along with New Year's Eve. For our anniversary we went to one of our favorite restaurants in the North End, The Florentine Cafe. We had our third date there, and for some reason we always seem to have really good luck walking in and getting a table without much of a wait.

A few days later for New Year's Eve we went to our friends' house in Mansfield. We knew it would be a  good time, but the drive was a challenge. The highway was mainly wet, but there was a lot of salt, which kept coating the windshield. Of course it was about 15 degrees outside, so my windshield washer sprayers were frozen. I'm always amazed when that happens; it seems like something we would have figured out how to prevent a while ago. We actually had to stop a few times on the way to scrub the windshield with snow so I could see.

Once there we had a great time. Equipped with the safety net that is Alka-Seltzer Wake-up Call, we downed several bottles of champagne, vodka, and High Life. We ran out of champagne flutes, so I was using a Sam Adams beer glass instead. The next morning we hit up Percy's to sample New England's Largest Breakfast menu, and it was absolutely delicious.

This about sums it up:

Note that is a bottle of High Life, and a glass of champagne. Happy New Year.