New2Maine.com

Black Bear hockey is something of a religion in Maine. I am an alumnus of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where the school provost specifically blessed the men’s hockey team during our class convocation (no, I’m not kidding). So when I heard that UMaine was to play my Engineers (no, they’re not the “Red Hawks” and they never will be as far as I’m concerned!) at the Cumberland County Civic Center in January, I just had to get tickets. She picked up tickets more than a month in advance of the January 6 contest and was told that almost all of the good seats were already sold out, so we had seats in the corner behind the RPI goal. Not a bad view, but nowhere near as good as our Pirates seats in November. I suppose the fact that Portlanders wouldn’t have to make the 2+ hour trek up to the Alfond Arena made this game even more popular.

There were many people wearing red in the arena, but I soon learned that most of those were Red Sox- or Pirates-related. We RPI fans were sorely outnumbered, and She and I sat amongst a sea of blue and black. Luckily, we’d just come from church, so we weren’t wearing any RPI paraphernalia. There were several RPI jerseys and hats throughout the crowd—we ‘Tute alumni get around I guess. Next time (if there is a next time—Maine apparently plays a different ECAC school every year in Portland) I’ll wear my RPI jacket with pride.

The game was entertaining, though Maine manhandled the RPI boys a bit, and I think the scorekeeper was quite biased in awarding shots on goal. The 4-2 final score is a bit misleading: the game was 2-1 half-way through the 3rd period. Maine scored its third short-handed on a bad giveaway by RPI deep in their own zone and the 4th was an empty netter when RPI pulled Mathias Lange with 2:20 showing on the scoreboard. RPI scored a junk goal with 30 seconds left, but She and I weren’t around to see it. The “home” crowd was not nearly as raucous as those in Troy, but it was a good time nonetheless. We’re glad we went, and we’ll have to take in a game up north some time to see what the Alfond experience is like. Oh, and Maine’s pep band can play circles around the Engineer band. Sorry, but it’s true…

I hate that I feel like all I write about anymore is the weather, but the drastic changes of the last week deserve to be noted. Less than one week ago, I was complaining about how bitterly cold it was up here in Portland. And then, as though Mother Nature herself is one of my (5 or so) readers, it started warming up. And then it kept warming up. And now it’s freakishly warm for January. We hit 60° F yesterday, and I think today’s high was 54° or 55°. This is January! I wasn’t expecting temperatures like this until April.

I’m not so sure I’ll go as far as to say that this proves global warming, or that humankind is causing it, but it sure does seem to prove that weather patterns are changing. From 3′ of snow in December to 60° F in the first week of 2008 is just not normal. But I sure do enjoy walking the dog when it’s this nice out…

sailor’s delight, originally uploaded by Unlucky Puppy.

I just got an email informing me that Flickr user Unlucky Puppy has added New2Maine as a contact. I went to take a look at her photos and found a lovely photoset from Maine. I thought I’d share my favorite one from the bunch.

She and I both own Subarus. They’re simply perfect for the snowy Maine winter we’ve had so far, and they last a long time if you take care of them. However, taking care of them requires someone who knows what they’re doing. I think we’ve found that someone up here. Her 2002 Forester was due for its annual safety inspection and the clutch has been a bit slippy of late, so we asked around about good Subaru mechanics. Almost universally, the answer we received was to go to Chip’s.

She stopped in to see Chip and make an appointment before the holidays. He said he’d like to give the car a thorough once-over before he started looking at the clutch, so She scheduled last Friday as a day that Chip could have the car, give it a look, and tell us what it needed. About 3 ½ hours after we left it with Chip’s staff, Chip himself called me to go over what the car needed (to pass inspection), what the car could really use, and what the car would need in the next few months. I was very impressed by how thorough Chip was in his diagnosis, and by the fact that he didn’t really pressure me to do anything that I didn’t want to pay for right now.
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It’s tough to tell from this angle, but the mound of snow in the parking lot next door to us is almost as tall as that Volkswagen. And it’s only January 3! We’re gonna run out of room to put the stuff pretty soon. See a couple more shots from my kitchen window in this Flickr photoset.