Hockey

Why in the world would you expect a Canadian blogger not to have a hockey tag?


  • Saint John NB Set For Major Midget Atlantics

    Saint John NB Set For Major Midget Atlantics

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    For Immediate Release

    April 1st, 2009

    Saint John NB Set For Major Midget Atlantics

    Saint John, NB- The Tournament committee and host team Saint John Vito’s would like to welcome the participants in this year’s 2009 Atlantic Major Midget Regional Championships this weekend at the Lord Beaverbrook Rink in Saint John NB.

    This year’s host team the Saint John Vito’s will be joined by the Hockey New Brunswick provincial title winning Moncton Mark’s Work Wearhouse Flyers after winning a 4-0 series against the Vito’s. Joining the Flyers and Vito’s from the NB-PEI Major Midget Hockey League will be Hockey PEI ‘s Cornwall Superior Sanitation Thunder, after their 4-0 series with the Charlottetown Mark’s Work Wearhouse Islanders. Representing Hockey Newfoundland and Labrador is the St. John’s Fog Devils after a 4-0 series win in the Newfoundland & Labrador Major Midget AAA Hockey Championship over the Tri-Pen Frost at the Bay Arena in Bay Roberts. Finishing off the list of the list of contenders is the returning 2008 championship team Cole Harbour McCain Major Midgets representing Hockey Nova Scotia. The McCain’s had one of the closest final series with a 4-1 series against the Halifax McDonalds Major Midgets. The tournament kicks off Thursday, April 2nd at 1 pm with the HNL Fog Devils against the HNB Flyers. The second game will feature the HPEI Thunder against HNS Cole Harbour Major Midgets at 4 pm. Then finishing off the evening will be HNL Fog Devils against the Host team Saint John Vito’s. The Opening Ceremonies will be held at 7:30 pm prior to the HNL vs. Host game at the LBR.

    The Atlantic Major Midget Regionals will determine the Atlantic Region contender to the Telus Cup National Midget Championship to be held at the Selkirk Recreation Complex in Selkirk / Winnipeg, MB from April 20-26.

    Additional event information can be obtained at the official tournament website, www.majormidgetatlantics2009.ca.

    Hockey Canada ’s Atlantic Regional Centre
    125 Station Street
    Saint John NB E2L 4X4
    acoehoc@nbnet.nb.ca
    Phone:  (506) 652-2263
    Fax:      (506) 652-6641


  • Tournament Committee Welcomes Participating Teams

    The Tournament committee and host team Saint John Vito’s would like to welcome and announce the participants in this year’s 2009 Atlantic Major Midget regional this weekend at the Lord Beaverbrook Rink.

    This year’s host team the Saint John Vito’s will be joined by the Hockey New Brunswick provincial title winning Moncton Mark’s Work Wearhouse Flyers after winning a 4-0 series against the Vito’s. Joining the Flyers and Vito’s from the NB-PEI Major Midget Hockey League will be Hockey PEI’s Cornwall Superior Sanitation Thunder, after their 4-0 series with the Charlottetown Mark’s Work Wearhouse Islanders.

    Representing Hockey Newfoundland and Labrador is the St. John’s Fog Devils after a 4-0 series win in the Newfoundland & Labrador Major Midget AAA Hockey Championship over the Tri-Pen Frost at the Bay Arena in Bay Roberts.

    Finishing off the list of the list of contenders is the returning 2008 championship team Cole Harbour McCain Major Midgets representing Hockey Nova Scotia. The McCains had one of the closest final series with a 4-1 series against the Halifax McDonalds Major Midgets.

    The tournament kicks off Thursday, April 2nd at 1 pm with the HNL Fog Devils against the HNB Flyers. The second game will feature the HPEI Thunder against HNS Cole Harbour Major Midgets at 4 pm. Then finishing off the evening will be HNL Fog Devils against the Host team Saint John Vito’s. The Opening Ceremonies will be held at 7:30 pm prior to the HNL vs. Host game.

    The Atlantic Major Midget Regionals will determine the Atlantic Region contender to the Telus Cup National Midget Championship, to be held at the Selkirk Recreation Complex in Selkirk / Winnipeg, MB from April 20-26.

    Additional event information can be obtained at the official tournament website, www.majormidgetatlantics2009.ca.


  • On-Air Appearances

    Television Appearances

    Guest Appearance: Daytime (Saint John Edition) {Rogers Television}(November 2006)

    Reporter: Too Close To Call “Saint John Sea Dogs’ Mike Thomas Interview” {Rogers Television} (October 2006)

    Reporter: First Local “Hockey Canada Interview” {Rogers Television October 2006)

    Turned Around in Background: Scott Thomas “My Way” Promo {Rogers Television} (2006-2007 season)

    Interviewed at a Stephen Harper Rally: Rick Mercer Report {CBC-TV} (January 2006)

    Sitting in Chair Laughing: Volunteer @ Rogers Promo {Rogers Television} (2005-2006 season)

    Interviewed in Montreal: Rick Mercer Report {CBC-TV} (March 2005)

    Guest Appearance: Municipal Vote 2004 Candidates Messages {Rogers Television}(2004)

    Reporter: Focus NB {Rogers Television} (2002-2003)

    Radio Appearances

    Guest Appearance: Talk of the Town (CFBC 930 AM Saint
    John) (2004)

    Debate Participant: CBC Saint John’s Information Morning
    (91.3 FM) (2004)

    News Director/Announcer: CHSR News at Noon (2002)

    Band Interviewer: CHSR 97.9 FM Fredericton (2002)


  • Final 2 Days in TO

    OK, well the past two days have been quite interesting. On Friday I went to see the Casa Loma, Baldwin Steps, CBC Building, CHUM City and the Bata Shoe Museum. I never thought I would make it to the top of the Baldwin steps I have never seen so many steps in my LIFE!
    The CHUM Building was a pinnacle moment of the day. The CHUM City Store had more stuff than you can believe! It is 10 times the size of the CBC one. The coolest thing about the CHUM City building is the CityPulse24 Truck coming out the side of the building about 15 metres above the ground with the wheels spinning.

    Speaking of the CHUM building, Friday was one of the saddest days I had in Toronto since it was the Last day of Star Trek: Enterprise I was quite impressed with how the series ended it was quite upholding for Star Trek.

    Yesterday I went to see the Hockey Hall of Fame, It was quite impressive and much larger than I had expected. It was quite erie to see to see Bay Street on a Saturday last time I was there on Thursday at about noon I almost go run over by a wild stamped of people. On a Saturday at noon… Dead!

    After the Hockey Hall of Fame I was headed down Younge Street to Front Street to Union Station. Then as a crossed the street to Union Station there was several gentlemen standing on the corner yelling “Need a Ticket?” I walked by and after 15 seconds I turned around and asked him “Tickets for what?” and he was nice and explained that it was tickets for the Toronto Rock game at the Air Canada Centre (ACC). Knowing how much I love Lacrosse I started to run to the ACC. I bought tickets to the nose-bleed section for $25.75 and a Jersey for $199 + Tax and really enjoyed the game. I think a pro-Lacrosse team would do well in Saint John, much better then a Junior Hockey team.
    Following the lacrosse game I went to the Eaton Centre and bought a clip for my Cell Phone and had my hair cut and hi-lighted red. Then I took a walk down Younge St. for some window shopping.


  • TO Zoo

    I don’t know if I will get to the Yorkdale Mall today, but today the plans are to scout out all the major TV studios, the Casa Loma, the Hockey Hall of Fame, Nathan Phillips Square, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto Police Museum, Redpath Sugar Museum, Canada Sports Hal of Fame,, and Old Fort York.

    Here is a funny story from the Toronto Zoo yesterday, at the Polar Bear exhibit the massive bear came out of the water to take a dump, and there was a school class there watching, and they started ewwing like kids do, and when the bear was finished he turned around fast and roared at the kids and scared the living daylights out of the kids one was so scared that she fell on her but and started crying.


  • Making a TV Show

    Note: This article was originally written for Journalism 2023 Journalistic Writing in November 2002.

    The 50th Annual Saint John Santa Claus Parade comes around for another year. This was a difficult production for producer Don Ferguson to organize volunteers. In addition, the float list was only available late on Friday afternoon. Three hours before the parade was to begin, we headed down the hill to set up the equipment. On arrival, we realized the taped introduction had the old TVNB logo and Parade 2001 on it. It was determined that we could just cover it up with graphics, but at about the time the parade was about to start to come down the hill the tape got jammed in the machine and I had about 2 minutes to come up with an alternative. Then the parade went really well until the floats stopped coming down the hill in order of the list and then it was a scramble of; What float is it, type it in, bring it up and take it down and repeat for about forty or so floats.

    After a hard day of work, after the family dinner, many families sit down to feed their brains with hours of Television. For a small dedicated group the night of TV starts differently, this group is not home watching TV they are making it. This is the story of the dedicated group of staff and volunteers at Rogers Television in Saint John. These people come together to get together and have a good time to make community television. One of the part-time staff members is often quoted saying, “This is not working it is a hobby.”

    A typical shoot will begin with the Producer ironing out the technical details, arranging for sponsorships, and going down the volunteer list trying to assemble a crew together. The task of gathering a crew can sometimes be the most difficult task of all. There are three categories of volunteers. The first group are the extremely dedicated ones. This group will sign-up for just about everything that they can. This group is relatively small about a half-dozen or so. The next group is the regulars they are usually quite dependable. The regulars usually have a certain focused interest, like bingo or sports. Then there is the third group that are either always extremely busy, lost interest or do not even remember why they are on the list. This last group is where most of the difficulty in forming a crew comes from after the first two groups are exhausted the producer has to spend hours of trying to get someone from this group interested.

    The volunteers all have some interesting stories that occurred during their years. This group comes from all lifestyles, call centre workers, retired tax collectors, former professional TV people, and car dealers. They range in the spectrum from students to retired. In general, they get together to make TV, not in a deadline setting like a commercial TV setting, but one of just to have a good time and make some TV.

    After everything is in place the producer and graphics person get started doing research and graphic design as this usually takes up most of the preproduction time. Then there is set up, which could be as simple as turning on and adjusting a studio camera and wiring a few microphones. This can also be a daunting task like a hockey game which involves miles of cables to be haled all through the arena and taped down to avoid tripping setting up and adjusting a half-dozen cameras, half-dozen microphones, set up a replay machine, a fibre feedback to the station, and lighting for the dark areas.

    In November is typically a busy month. The month started out with the Kiwanis TV Auction. This is a relatively simple event, to begin with, at the beginning of October J-P Quinn the producer begins with organizing the crew and booking a mobile production truck to come down for the shoot. Then comes the cancellations, of the cancellation, including the Audio, Graphics, and half the camera operators. On the Tuesday in the morning before the auction, I received a call to see if, I would be available to take over the graphics. Only two of us on the list that could do the advanced graphics required for the auction. I really started my job the day before the show. The auction required an animated introduction, over 300 lower thirds, or graphics on the bottom of the screen, and a credit roll for the end of the show. While I was working on this J-P and several volunteers went down to the Trade and convention center to set up.

     Then the long-awaited show day came, it started with setting up the lights, microphones, and phasing or adjusting the colour of the cameras. The show went abnormally flawless. The second major production was the annual Remembrance Day Ceremony this was the worst show I have ever worked on. It started badly by the fact that we could not acquire a mobile for the show resulting in ripping out the rack used for the weekly common council meetings. Since there was, only one graphics computer in Saint John the plan was to send the signal back to the studio by Fibre-optics and put them on there. The first problem was that the computer crashed ten minutes before the event was to start and I forgot to save the graphics. In addition, the fibre feed did not work so they recorded the show on site. When Don Ferguson the producer for the show returned with the tape, we put the graphics, music and taped interviews on the tape. After we finished there was barely enough time for us to rewind the tape. The show looks so awful there was almost no sound and the camera cables were not good enough to see anything but backs of the head.


  • Journal Entry Oct 18, 2002

    Tonight I was filming a hockey game at the Aitken Centre. One thing I noticed is that people will stash their trash into any hole or crevice. Next to the press box, there is a hole in the cement for us to use to feed our camera cables and audio snake through. When I opened the trap door to feed the cables, a pile of trash fell out, enough to fill up two large garbage bags. There were cups from all the big restaurants like Wendy’s, McDonald’s, Burger King, and Tim Horton’s. There were napkins, 6-month-old decomposing food, and several other decomposing goods.


  • Royal Visit

    It is a typical Friday morning in Uptown Saint John. There are a few people sitting around casually chatting to one another. The big issues on peoples minds are focused on what cuts the Mayor and City Council are going to make in their budget, that the one time great Saint John Flames hockey team are having their season opener later tonight, or that tomorrow is the first day of the long-awaited Thanksgiving Day long weekend. In all there is not much thought being given to the fact that in a small city an hour and a half to the north the queen is arriving.

    Earlier as I waited what seemed to be an eternity for the bank to open, an elderly man slowly entered and joined me in the wait. Casually I asked him what was his thoughts about the queen. “She is not of great concern,” he said gasping for air, “There are worse ways for the government to waste money, but I like things the way they are, and I would miss it if it was gone. She (the queen) is a magnificent person.”

    After leaving my table in Market Square, I took a stroll out on to the board walk. Out there I ran into two nice and polite women, who I later found out were Americans from the southern state of Texas. Apparently they had just arrived on the cruse ship, Royal Princess, that was docked down the street at the Pugsly Terminal. “Oh God!, I don’t know about these things but,” the older one said, ‘the current queen is nice, although I don’t know about her successors.”

    When I approached a friendly, middle-aged man on my way down Prince William Street to my old high school he said, “It is not costing us anything, why change it?”

    Questioning the high school students at Saint John High School on a smoke break went no where, many of them following my questions with, “What is a monarch?,” and, “What is a head of State?” This from a school that when I went there was renowned for being the intellectually advanced school in the city. I was puzzled is this going to be another generation of people who don’t really care, who cares is it comes or goes.

    One student that understood the question felt that the queen should be replaced by Jean Chrétien after he retires in the winter of 2004 because, “He’s done a lot for Canada.”

    Later on I ran into another man who felt that like most of the people who it does not really matter if the royalty came or went. He felt that before getting rid of the monarch they should get rid of the Senate. “They both don’t do anything but the queen does not cost a fortune like the Senate does.”

    According to the Monarchist League of Canada the queen does not really cost us anything because we would have to pay for a President anyway if we got rid of her. According to the Parliament of Canada Website the Monarch costs about $1.02 per Canadian where the Senate costs about $6.73 per Canadian.