would it make a noise and if it did, would anyone south of Boston give a shit?

Wednesday, Commissioner Gary Bettman announced the cancellation of the 2004-2005 NHL season. As if everyone didn't already know that was the case.

Shame on the NHL and shame on the players' association for not getting a deal done, but I put much more of the blame on the owners as this "negotiation" came down to the wire.

I understand that the league was losing less money by not playing than it would have by having a season this year. I also understand that when push came to shove, the players gave in and accepted a salary cap. Okay, the sides were about 7 million per team apart, but couldn't they just say "alright, let's split that in half and play hockey?"

I mean Holy Christ people, two kids arguing over 10 bucks would work it out that way. Why is this any different? The NHL's primary goal was to get a salary cap approved by the players, and they finally did. And what did the NHL do when that momentus event occurred?

They left the negotiating table.

Gary Bettman is a mindless troll and the professional sports commissioner equivalent of Joe Hazelwood and this lockout / strike / cluster fuck is the reef.

The first thing that needs to happen is that Bettman and Goodenow (the players' association rep) need to be fired, deported, flogged, tarred and feathered and finally forced to pay for four tickets plus a program, four dogs, four beers, and two cokes and parking to a game at an NHL arena for every day of the next season so they understand what the fans go thru to see a hockey game.

Then, all current contracts need to be voided by the end of the season in 2006. That means no team would own any player, and the owners would be free to sign whomever they'd like using the "fiscal restraint" they all droned on and on about all year. That way, they'd only pay as much as they could afford...right?

Wrong.

Those douchebags would end up overspending like every professional sports owner because they can't control themselves. If Mr. Iginla or Heatley were free agents, for example, owners would bid each other out of their minds, then they'd be left with not enough to get a competetive team.

While the business model in the NHL was certainly flawed and the owners needed help, they really needed help to protect them from themselves. And the fact is that without that help, the owners would follow the same path that got them where they are right now anyway.

The biggest issue is this, however. Very few people give one hot shit whether the NHL plays another game ever, let alone this season or the next one. For every crying Canuck there are 1,000 or more others who say "No hockey? Huh...didn't even notice."

And the last television network interested in carrying hockey (ESPN) may opt out of televising the NHL next season, meaning that all of the teams would be in HUGE trouble, because no TV = no league. Period. Atlanta lost the Flames 25 years ago because, despite full houses every night, it's TV revenue that pays the freight and the Flames had no tv contract. Imagine an entire league with no TV contract. Hell, Major League Soccer and the WNBA DO have a tv contract and no one gives a shit about them.

I'll say this for the NHL, when they screw up, they screw up huge.

Congrats guys. You will forever be known as the generation that killed professional hockey in North America. That'll look GREAT on your resumes.

At our place, we had food ready around kickoff, and the neighbors had a balls out party complete with homemade goalposts, penalty and review flags for all of the guests, an outdoor projection system and outdoor heaters, and a trainload of food and a cop.

Well, the cop was a friend that dropped in on duty and was killing time (poor choice of words maybe) until late in the game or after the game when alcohol intake combined with poor fiduciary decisions and even dumber wagers result in domestic disputes, fights, and much much more.

Anyway, Sunday night was also the night before signups to get Lauren into pre-school in the Fall. Now, I don't know about where you are, but in our neck of the woods, getting your kid signed up at a good pre-school is akin to signing them up for youth baseball.

I had heard horror stories, so we decided that Molly would drive by the church Sunday night and check the list for availability and times. It turned out that the three day 3-year-old class had only four openings. (Actually, when it came time to register, I found out that there were only three slots for this class, but I digress).

She got home, and as we watched the second quarter of the SuperBowl, we discussed what our options were. We had already discussed the idea of going up there and getting in line at 3am, but now I was having second thoughts.

Several discussions later, it was decided that I would finish my last SuperBowl adult beverage, shower, pack and head up to camp out around 9pm.

I know that sounds crazy to many of you and you may be right. But we've heard for years how good this pre-school is, and for $175 bucks a month, that's a good deal as well. There was no way we were going to risk not getting her enrolled.

It was to be around 40 degrees, so I took a couple of blankets, two coats, one of those punk-ass watch-cap things OJ wore the night of the murders, two pillows, a 7x9 tent, a cot, a lantern, a couple of books, a dozen waters, two checks, Lauren's birth certificate and medical records and I headed for the church.

I got there and settled in at about 9:05pm. (As I was driving away from the house, I saw New England score late in the second quarter on my neighbor's outdoor big-screen). Settled means coated and hatted, water and chairs set up, and reading one of my three books that I brought.

After what seemed like a painfully long time, I looked at my watch to see how long I'd been there.

It was 9:22pm.

So, I called our friends at Cooley's Pizza to order a small original white pizza minus tomatoes and adding steak. That took about an hour to eat as I sat, read, and went insane.

Oh, I did have to pee during this period, and I was very careful to select a place that was hidden, as I didn't want to be in the local police blotter as "guy arrested for public urination at baptist church."

Molly was kind enough to call me every time there was a change in the game score, and that was nice. On her third call to me, I was in the process of putting on a fleece and with my cellphone ear-bud in, I heard a loud electrical POP and my fifty dollar verizon earbud was instantly shot.

Sigh.

Anyway, it got to be about 10:45pm, and rather than going even more insane, I decided to hit the rack. I spent an impressive ten minutes setting up the tent. If you know me, you know I am not good at shit like this, so taking a tent and it's parts out of the bag and setting it up "my byself" (as Lauren says) is pretty impressive.

I setup my cot and pillows and blankets and lantern and alarm clock and went about going to sleep. And that lasted about an hour or so, until the next campers started showing up.

I awoke around 12:30am as the next car got situated and got their chairs setup next to my tent to be next in line. I was unhappy that I had been disturbed, but I was delighted that I got to hear someone else sigh that they weren't first. They couldn't see my arrogant and smug smile either. This tent thing wasn't too bad.

On my second trip to relieve myself, I noticed the two ladies in the car behind me were awake and watching me. So I made the random walk as though I was doing a county map survey of the property before ducking behind the same structure and wizzing again. Man, was I sneaky. On the way back to the tent, I noticed that these chicks were watching tv on the DVD players in the car. MAN!!! I needed one of those. Of course, getting caught wizzing at the church isn't better than getting caught watching porn and drinking beer there, so I guess not having one was okay too.

I then decided that if they were comfortable in the car, I should try it too. So I got my alarm clock and switched to the car and went to sleep.

For about 10 minutes at a time for 45 minutes, but it sucked so bad, I went back to the tent.

As the evening wore on, I felt like I was trying to sleep near a newborn. I'd fall asleep quickly, but was frequently awakened by whatever was going on outside my tent: doors opening and closing, cars driving by, talking, etc. Every time a car would show up, the person in it would get situated and then ask everyone in line what class they were waiting for, trying to anticipate their chances of getting in as well.

And for the most part, the conversations went like this:

"What crass you try sign you child up for? You not rooking for free day free year oh, all you??"

I laughed the first time. Quietly, but alot. By the tenth time, it was just pissing me off...

At 3am, folks started arriving more frequently and all were asking the same thing of everyone in line...except me. It seems that the windproof shell of my tent, while not soundproof, was my own little fortress of solitude combine with the Hall of Justice. No one was willing to knock on (or shake) my tent to ask me that question.

Finally, at about 5:45am, I decided it was time to pack the tent and take my place in my chair at the head of the line.

Let me say that putting the tent away went exactly how anyone who knows me would expect the taking down of a tent to go: clumsily and slowly.

Finally the tent was put away, so I got some mint gum (white trash toothpaste), my book, two waters and got in the car for a few minutes. That's when I noticed that it was actually 4:45am. It seems that every time I picked up the alarm clock, I'd change the time and I had accidentally set it an hour ahead.

FUCK!!! Now I have a whole extra hour to wait.

As I sat in the car, I noticed some more of our local citizenry coming to the front of the line, reading the sign, and then standing in what appeared to be a secondary que, parallel to the one we had all set up the American way using our chairs and our cars.

The woman in the car behind me (the movie watcher) walked up to my car and said something like "you're Adam Berger. Sorry, I didn't mean Nancy's Adam. You're Todd Berger...Molly's husband. Anyway, these folks appear to be claiming our place in line. What are we gonna do?"

I asked, "ummm...yeah, who are you?"

She said "I'd rather not say because I look very different than I did in high school," and as she was walking away, she made a cryptic statement about Sally Herbein, mother of my wife's best friend in high school and...

Dammit! That's Suzy Herbein!! How is that possible? That is so cool!!

So I got out of the car, they got out of the car, and we boldly took to our chairs at our rightful place at the front of the line, and started chatting.

It is now 5am. Suzy and I are chatting about everything under the sun that's happened to both of us since we last saw each other, which was forever ago. We talked about her sister Liz and her family as well. It was great and made both of us feel about 20 again, which was nice.

Anyway, she mentioned that she brought movies, oreos and Yahtzee. CHA-CHING!!

Anyone that knows me knows that I am not only a Yahtzee freak but I am pretty close to a Yahtzee professional. I'd be number one in the world if it weren't for my wife, who is the Grand Master.

So we proceeded to play Yahtzee and blabber on, and then she introduced me to her friend, who lives down the street from me. Unreal.

Then at around 6:30am, another girl showed up, who was a friend of Suzy's and her friend my neighbor because (surprise) she lives on my street as well. Her name is Wendy. She moved in around Labor Day from Arizona and likes our neighborhood because any time they came to look at it, my brother-in-law and I and anyone else around would wave at them. How cool is that?

(By the way, they're lucky they didn't flip us off, or we'd have fired a football at their car, but that's another story for another time).

We also discussed the fact that Suzy was pretty sure it was me (the handsome chiseled looks and Auburn hitch-cover must have tipped her off). She said that they thought I looked crabby (who wouldn't) and that they were laughing at me because of my survery wander, as they knew full well I was going to take a whiz.

The funny part of that is that she had brought a little "potty," and her plan had been to take the potty behind the same building where I was peeing, pee in it, then dump it out right there.

Hey princess, just pee on the ground for heaven's sake. (just kidding, sooz).

I also did my dead-level best to sell Suzy on the house across the street from us. How great would that be having a friend from High School whose family you were always close to living across the street? It would rule. And when that house sells, I want a commission, because I worked harder this weekend selling that house than the agent has since she got the listing.

Around 7am, the crowd was antsy and everyone was tired, and up came Heather to bring me a bear claw, hot chocolate and a Mountain Dew (otherwise known as God's nectar). She also sat in my chair and saved my spot while I drove to the BP station to pee. It didn't seem prudent to be "the guy arrested for peeing at the Baptist church in front of 60 strangers" either.

When they finally opened the doors, everyone else told the staff my story and they were all stunned that I had arrived at 9pm. As I pointed out, while excessive, it also guaranteed my daughter's place in their school, and that was the whole point anyway.

They actually applauded my effort. Literally clapped for me. It was quite nice. The ladies all agreed that this not only bought me an out for Valentine's Day, but quite possibly an "occasion" WildCard out, meaning that if I fuck up on or around another upcoming event, I should get a pass due to this effort.

I agree.

What I would like now is to stay in touch with Suzy and her family and get reconnected with Suzy's sister Liz and her family. They're all good people and we're all way too lazy when it comes to easy friends. (not easy like whores, mind you, but easy as in easy to be friends with).

Hopefully this year will bring about the making of new friends and re-connecting with old ones.

Suzy, thanks for being brave enough to talk to that crabby bastard in the Trailblazer. Beyond ensuring the place my child would begin her steps on the educational path, it made the whole thing worth it.