(12/6)
Yesterday (Fri.) afternoon, I once again returned to Princeton, this time to catch another team nicknamed the "Tigers", Colorado College (located right near the U.S. Air Force Academy and its hockey program, in fact, in Colorado Springs), visiting - the start time of the game alone was honestly just plain weird, given that it was still "light" outside; the rink staff "showed off" the newly-upgraded lighting a little bit more right before the game, actually using a little bit of "color-changing" to light the ice surface in, first, the "red/white/red" of the Canadian flag, obviously followed by the "red/white/blue" of this country's flag, and, while I'm on the subject, yes, Princeton always does that, since just about as many of the players on the visiting squads happen to be Canadian, let alone the "home team", so that, to me, seems like a nice little "nod" to the many contributions Canada has made, particularly in that sport up until now!
The actual game, though, started with Princeton getting credited for all the shots on goal during the opening minutes, despite C.C. "pinning" the Princeton defense deep a few times early on, along with more than a few penalties each way then; Princeton would indeed get "rewarded" for its more persistent pressure early in the game roughly halfway through the opening 20 minutes courtesy of a mini-"breakaway" that just caught the C.C. defense "napping", and allowed for the slightest of crossing passes for an easy tip-in goal to open the scoring on the evening; after that, though, C.C. slowly recovered in the "shot department", and, naturally, ended up tying the game on what ended up being the first of multiple rebounds surrendered by Princeton's defense, then had another similar chance go its way only a couple of minutes later to suddenly lead on the scoreboard; the "shot totals" would remain just about even the rest of the way, and, as such, C.C. kept said 2-1 lead after the opening period!
After the intermission in which there was actually a little bit of a "disco party", of sorts, for a few seconds right near the end of said intermission, again, courtesy of the brand-new lights inside Princeton's rink, a few more penalties got called, followed by C.C. doubling its lead on, you guessed it, yet another rebound opportunity that slipped just far enough away from any of the guys wearing white, with the fourth goal for C.C. arguably being the "softest" of all of them, with a very long-range initial shot also getting poked loose in front before getting put in the net, although that goal ended up getting reviewed by the officials (for the possibility of it having been offside a few seconds prior to the goal) for so long that there was actually some French-language rock music played inside the rink briefly; the shots were still largely "even" by then, albeit increasingly in favor of Princeton, except things kept going the other way on the scoreboard, as C.C. padded its lead once again with barely a minute remaining in the period, by which point in time Princeton's defense didn't even bother giving up a rebound chance in front, making it a 5-2 C.C. lead after the middle 40 minutes!
(12/26)
Also, this Christmas brought about some "last-minute" updates to the news within the retail industry, including even more news from Kmart/Sears, and a broader "look back" at trends in recent years:
(First off this time, easily the biggest bit of retail news this Christmas was Kmart/Sears (well, specifically Sears) selling off the DieHard auto parts brand it had owned for decades to Advance Auto Parts, leaving only Kenmore now as an "exclusive" brand within the company; it was said that CEO/chairman Eddie Lampert had already tried to sell off all three of the company's "most famous" brands (Craftsman tools; DieHard auto parts; Kenmore appliances) under the "old" Kmart/Sears, but, obviously, now, said "leader" only managed to sell off one brand under both the "new" (DieHard, to Advance Auto Parts) and "old" (Craftsman, to Stanley/Black & Decker tools) Kmart/Sears operations this year, while the Kenmore brand might very well, at this point, end up "going down with the ship", so to speak, once the day finally arrives on which all remaining Kmart/Sears locations start closing...)
(two "post-mortem" articles on Blockbuster Video, now reduced to just a single location worldwide, from thousands back in the 1990s)
(basically, "Macy*s, Nordstrom, Target, or 'other'?")
(how online and physical retailers alike have vastly sped up their shipping times for orders, with even the "pharmacy duopoly" of CVS and Walgreens getting in on that act...)
(apparel looks to have particularly been hurt by retail's "slow-motion collapse" in recent years...)
(I know I (half-jokingly) called CVS and Walgreens the "pharmacy duopoly" earlier, but it seems that what few Rite Aid locations remain now have given the company a financial "lifeline" recently!)
(Lastly this time, at least on the retail front, Macy*s and Wawa both had their card processing systems breached in recent months; suffice it to say, now, hopefully you didn't use any cards at any of those locations recently!)
(1/6/2020)
This past weekend, I visited MSG, and N.Y.C. generally, for the first time in a decade (the 2020s) other than "the 2010s", on a warm night (which made things a little awkward heading into the arena, admittedly, although I did hang around just a bit longer than usual after the game, mostly within Times Square and surrounding neighborhoods; there's a Modell's Sporting Goods location there that's somehow still open in "liquidation" mode, which has been the case for months now...) duringwhat's been a warm start to the decade overall (albeit not quite as warm as 2015/'16, unfortunately...) - Harvard and Yale happened to be the participating teams on this occasion, after having previously faced off at MSG in 2014 (Yale 5, Harvard 1) and '15 (Yale 4, Harvard 1); prior to those couple of years, the teams hadn't met there since the 1970 edition of the old "ECAC Holiday Hockey Festival" held between 1961 and 1977; their entire history in the "Big Apple", however, longer than any of the many famous movies/plays/etc. set there later in the 20th century, dates all the way back to the beginning of the aforementioned 20th century, when the teams met at the old St. Nicholas Arena, an old boxing/hockey/wrestling venue, stretching between W 66/67th Streets between Columbus Avenue and Central Park West in Manhattan, currently home to ABC television (Channel 7 WABC; ABC News; etc.)!
Pre-game, there was a little bit of confusion suddenly created by MSG staff, as the 200-level seats of the Garden had suddenly gotten closed due to a claimed "lack of sales" necessary to even open said seating level; personally, I ended up going from section 211 (a "center-ice" section), to section 117 (another "center-ice" section), through two MSG "ushers", finally, to section 120 (definitely not a "center-ice" section)!
The game started in Harvard's favor, albeit with Yale not getting enough "credit" in terms of "shots on goal", at least in my opinion, early, along with a devastating "hip check" at one point - it would be one of the first couple of penalties of the game, though, that would allow Harvard to open the scoring, with a "man advantage" caused by a little bit of "headhunting" by one of Yale's defenders being converted just seconds into said "advantage" situation for Harvard; that goal would provide the only scoring in the period, though, as Yale kept things close early...
The first intermission of the game actually featured a special "mini-game" as part of a series of them in support of "environmental awareness", for lack of a better term, featuring many hockey hall-of-famers and other "celebrities"; the teams split up into "blue" and "red" teams over the course of 10 minutes, with the "blue" team winning said "mini-game", 2-1, before the "regular" first intermission took place!
Harvard notched its second goal early in the middle frame, withstanding a potential tripping situation right before then - after review, the Yale defender behind the net right before said goal was determined to have fallen on his own, keeping that goal on the scoreboard as originally called, while Yale still tried to keep things "tight" defensively, which, as you'll come to find out, didn't last, but Harvard did add another goal roughly halfway through the period to make it 3-0, by which point things were suddenly even more "wide open" for the crew in "crimson" red/white, and Yale started getting "testy" defensively, at least; as Yale still didn't quite "break" then, however, that would be the margin by which the period would end!
The final 20 minutes only saw even more scoring on Harvard's part, though, especially after the game became 4-0, as the fifth goal came immediately after a brutally-timed turnover by one of Yale's defenders, nobody in "navy blue" stopped a "zipped" cross-ice pass for 6-0, and Yale's goalkeeper just plain tripping over his skates led to the 7-0 goal - the "festivities" in the long-standing collegiate rivalry still refused to end by then, though, as a stoppage with barely a minute and a half remaining in a game that had long since been decided in favor of Harvard saw Yale's, by then, clearly frustrated, goalkeeper "froze" the puck, then started throwing punches at the Harvard forward who looked like he had just "slid" into him; after a few penalties got assessed in the aftermath of said "fracas", Harvard officially took its convincing 7-0 trouncing of Yale back to suburban Boston!
On a few more personal notes now:
(A) I found my middle school yearbook a few months ago;
(B) our previous (LG) washing machine started leaking a few weeks ago, after only a couple of years, forcing us to replace it last weekend, and getting a new one (Samsung) installed this one;
(C) I recently got these, which are a little more "high-top"-esque than most sneakers, albeit as a "backup", of sorts, to these things I purchased a year ago;
Also, our next-door neighbors recently adopted this "ginger" orange cat, and he's already tried to sneak into our place - once, over Christmas, when I caught him on our back porch - since then, he's appeared a few times in front of our place, and then again on the porch, mostly leading to our dog chasing him away, which I'm afraid might have caused her to start limping, possibly having pulled something in her back legs in particular; he's also had a few encounters with a stray black-and-white cat in our neighborhood recently; most of which have consisted of the black-and-white cat "jumping" him before he's sprinted back to the side door of our neighbors' place...
Also, I'm planning on knocking out as much "uncharted territory" here by visiting as many of the malls in this state in the "foreseeable future" (albeit usually in warmer weather), including possibly visiting both the Menlo Park and Woodbridge Center malls on the same day, again, most likely during a "warm" time of year... While I'm on the subject of retail, I might as well also mention this!
Lastly this time, there's been a bit of a "kerfluffle" in Higashi-Osaka/Minami-Kamikosaka, Japan, between 7&I Holdings, the parent of Japanese 7-Eleven, and the franchise owner of just one 7-Eleven location there got into a bit of a dispute recently, first over the store's customer complaints recently, then over the owner's decision to close the location that usually operates "24/7/365" on New Year's Day; as such, the franchise owner basically went "rogue" in the new year, stripping the cash register that was previously in the store (and installing a "portable" one to replace it), shutting down the ATM, (seemingly) stopping all fresh food deliveries, and discounting all items up to 30% off (so far); judging by the owner's very "brash" and sudden reaction to the news, I'd say I'd personally be more inclined to strip him of his authority there, but, on the other hand, I noticed that one of his main complaints was about hours, which, having been there (to Japan generally, not that specific store), I definitely remember hearing and/or seeing such complaints from many people, so hopefully those employees that 7&I franchisee might have already chased away from his location find new positions A.S.A.P., hopefully with shorter hours, and more off days, and the couple of remaining ones seen in the above articles escape that situation soon!
UPCOMING: the "Connecticut Ice" tournament at the Webster Bank Arena in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Sat. 25 (Quinnipiac v. UConn @ 4 P.M.; Sacred Heart, technically the "host" of said "mini-tournament", v. Yale immediately following), and Sun. 26 (featuring the "consolation game" from Saturday's doubleheader involving the two losing teams in those games, followed by the "championship game" featuring the teams that end up happening to win each of Saturday's games, over said weekend), so, now, as promised recently, after I recapped BU v. Cornell @ MSG, in the spirit of "looking back", are my thoughts on events within this past decade generally:
Technology, such as this, but especially "social media", only increased its presence in society, certainly bringing people together, but, at the same time, allowing what can politely be described as "misinformation" to be spread like wildfire, stoking much more chaos, fear, and hatred, among other ugly sentiments, along with widening the gap between the "perception" and "reality" of just about everything in modern society, which, all things considered, actually sort of seems to have improved ever so slightly in the 2010s, at least in my opinion, although things seem to be getting more "volatile" again now, especially with the rise of new "political regimes" in way too many countries, including some, eerily enough, like parts of Europe and Latin America, that previously toppled similar types of oppressive/tyrannical governmental "regimes" historically; as I've told you many a time now, also, "daily life" has largely shifted online, especially retail, as evidenced by the rise of Amazon/eBay/etc., and the massive collapse(s) of Kmart/Sears, and, to a lesser extent, JCPenney, along with others (Macy's; Target; etc.) seemingly starting to "slip" recently, revenue-wise; so on/so forth...
On a personal note now, well, I "made it" through both my high school and (under-graduate) college years this decade, but slowly witnessed the "social group" I had graduated high school drift apart, little by little, as everybody went off to different places after that, and, personally, I never seemed to "fit in" with any particular "groups" whatsoever in college, whereas I recall (more-or-less) being "friends" with just about every "type" of student before then (H.S.); as such, my health seems to have taken a slight turn for the worse, overall, although I'd say the opposite for this region generally - "development", in general, in the N.Y.C. region has boomed within the past decade, arguably starting with Red Bull Arena in Harrison, N.J. and the billion-dollar renovations at Madison Square Garden between then and 2013; that "boom" around here within the past decade, though, has, thankfully, generally not "correlated" with more negative "quality-of-life" aspects, such as crime rates, and general "decay", with, at least in my opinion, places like Harrison (Red Bull Arena + new condos/restaurants) and Hoboken (proximity to N.Y.C. + continued building/new "nightlife"/etc.), experiencing the biggest improvements, along with a bit of an "honorable mention" to Maplewood/South Orange (not to be confused with the City of Orange, East Orange, and Irvington, all of which, sadly, remain the equivalents in that part of the state as places like Passaic and Paterson around here, or Atlantic City/Camden/Trenton), and, as I personally ended up finding out within the past decade, Montclair (similar to Hoboken/Morristown with "new nightlife"); with even some places that basically got "left for dead" by most people years ago, like Jersey City/Perth Amboy/etc. experiencing quite noticeable "rebounds" in just about every aspect of life in those cities - even the "Big Apple" itself saw record levels of such "trends" within its boundaries in recent years, despite things like the City losing the 2012 Olympic Games to London, and, more recently, Amazon deciding to build its second corporate HQ complex near Washington, D.C.; personally, as I told you a few weekends ago, I'm planning on visiting more "uncharted territory" types of places near N.Y.C. (Maplewood/Millburn/Morristown/Ridgewood/South Orange/etc.), and, to a lesser extent, Philly (Cherry Hill/Collingswood/Haddonfield/Moorestown/etc.) within the "foreseeable future", along with, again, likely returning to downtown Princeton during a warmer time of the year at least once to explore those "downtown" streets more fully!
