champions!

After a series that should have ended much sooner, the Red Wings have finally won the Stanley Cup!

Game 6 (which also happened to be the final game) took place on Wednesday night. Unfortunately, this was the same day that southern Maryland was experiencing severe thunderstorms and tornadoes. Despite the inherent dangers of such weather, I was more concerned with weather or not we had power and cable television at home so that I would be able to watch the game. Our power and cable never went out. If it had, I would have dragged Robin out to watch the game at a local sports bar, which would have been ok, but not as much fun.

After arriving at home after working all day, we found that the storm had knocked down a fairly large tree and was nearly blocking the entrance to our place. We had to climb over a few branches, but it wasn't a problem and the tree didn't cause any damage to the house. I snapped this picture with my camera phone (which is why the quality isn't very good).

That night, after the victory, I shaved off the playoff beard I had been growing for the past couple of months. I'll post before and after pictures once I get them off my camera.

The next day, I made plans to travel to Detroit for the Stanley Cup Parade. I had never been to one of the parades before and after talking with a few fans who had been to parades before I decided that it was an event that I couldn't miss again.

Robin and I already had plane tickets to fly into Detroit on Friday afternoon for a wedding, so I worked to switch my ticket to early Friday morning. This was an easy process, until I accidentally switched Robin's ticket to Friday morning instead of my own. I noticed the switch immediately and called Northwest and had the flights switched again (they were understanding). Since the tickets were purchased by Robin, I pretended to be her (thank god she has a name that can be androgynous) and I had no problems, but it still scared the crap out of me.

My parents picked me up from the airport Friday morning and we headed to the parade. It was fantastic. I loved being there with the other 1.4 million Red Wings fans who attended. The parade was just a big party and the fans and players were all excited to be there. Robin gave me a hard time for taking around 100 pictures, but it's an event that I probably won't get a chance to attend again and I wanted to make sure I got some good shots. I'll post a few once I get them off my camera.

Picture updates to follow. Until then, enjoy this picture of the Wings' captain, Nicklas Lidstrom, hoisting the most coveted trophy in sports.