Bleh. Did that just happen?

Had another game tonight where I was into it fun-wise, but not sharp at all mentally, which is what I was afraid of given my mellow mood today.

We had the win with just a few seconds left, but they pulled the other goalie for the extra attacker, and Peed came in and did his deke deke deke shit and then popped it over my shoulder glove side (where else). And actually that was the only shot of the night that I would have felt okay letting in. The rest were craptastic and I should have had them.

I'm so frustrated with my right pad, I could cry. 80% of the time it still flips down under my leg instead of to the front of my leg. Left pad flips up correctly every single time. But I let in two tonight that would have gotten stopped if I had the right pad flipping up properly.

Tuesday night's #1 objective is to figure that shit out and get my right leg doing whatever it needs to be doing to make that happen correctly. I don't care if they hang a hundred on me, I'm gonna get that muscle memory going on the right leg so this stops happening.

If I do it slowly, like when I'm going down to stretch, it flips correctly, but when I need to drop quickly, ugh, it's a mess.

Speaking of stretching, I had pretty good lateral movement tonight, making a few sliding saves but boy am I gonna feel that in my groins and hips tomorrow. Gonna pop some Advil shortly because I definitely overreached the boundaries of my flexibility a few times tonight. Fortunately I made the save each time. I don't mind hurting for a save. :)

Also, apparently the whole Tuesday night locker room deal has gotten around my team, though the story has changed (as stories do) to be that I was asked not to use the locker rooms. Not true at all. Or if someone has asked, no one has actually conveyed that to me. And until they do... I change with the boys. They can either get over it or they can go change in the restroom.

Back to tonight, I was playing around in the garage with a puck and my stick before I left tonight. Barry and Joe talked on the radio last night about there's some trick to launching the puck with a goalie stick. Something to do with the heel of the stick and then saucer it. I don't know. I do everything else so badly, Scott and I have never worked on stick handling, so I'm winging it until I can get some help.

Anyway, I was playing around with this in the garage with the stick I normally use, and it was going pretty badly. So I thought, "Hmm, let's try Anton's stick." I bought one of his at the post-season sale, had it taped up and ready to go, but hadn't used it yet.

So I give the puck a few shots with it and WOW the puck was much more responsive. Immediately, I decided the Anton stick was in the game tonight.

And as it turned out, I did end up having to go out and play a puck that was coasting up the ice with one of the red team's best players in hot pursuit. I got there just a second ahead of him and definitely got a piece of the puck but our sticks got tangled and he was able to kick it past me. He got a shot off but it was way wide and I was able to get back in net while my defense dealt with him.

I hesitated less though and felt the "Power of Dimples" give me the confidence to get out there and try to play that puck. Just glad it didn't go in. Clearly the hockey gods want me to learn to play the puck more and that's why, even when I bung it up, I'm not getting burned.

Anyway, had lots of people saying I played well (though I think the gist was... you started well, but maybe fell apart at the end, which is true), but I never felt like I was playing well. I'm getting better, for sure, but I'm still really bad.

I'm so hungry and tired, even though I don't feel like I worked all that hard. I think it's a snack and then bed for me. I needed to work when I got home but I think sleep is going to win.