It’s official! Hockey season is officially on as I’ve witnessed my 1st live hockey of the season. My family and I made the 4-hour trek to Grand Forks ND over the weekend to visit some family. We attended the Wild’s practice session on Sunday with roughly 1500 Wild fans from the Grand Forks area at the lavish Ralph Engelstadt Arena, home of the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux.

I will be recapping the event shortly, complete with photos and a video or two. I would have had it up tonite, but I got totally caught up playing NHL 09, and suddenly it’s 1 AM. Typical.

My family has just finalized logistics for an impromptu road trip to Grand Forks this weekend. My wife is from Grand Forks, so we have family there. So that means I will be in town for the opening of Wild training camp at Ralph Engelstadt Arena. Sunday's practice is open to the public, so check back Sunday (or Monday) for a full report!

The Wild Bloggers are back at it, musing about Wild hockey in the Wild Blogosphere Podcast. In this preseason epsisode, we discuss the Wild's free agency wins and losses, depth at each position, and unavoidably speculate about Marian Gaborik's impending fate as the face of the franchise.

Click the button below to listen! And as always, please leave your feedback so we can improve the product!

Slightly off-topic here, but regular readers know that I have an addiction to EA Sports NHL video game series. Well, NHL 09 comes out on the 11th, and the demo just came out for Xbox Live. I'm already hooked. 

So my earlier post was cut short by Adriana waking up. So here it is, 4 hours later, and I can finish my post. Thus is life with a 7-week old. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Actually, I didn't have much of a point for my earlier post, but luckily something surfaced since. The Wild will be unveiling a mascot on October 5th. My 1st reaction was an eye roll, that mascots are lame, and I was glad the Wild chose not to have one - this bites. As I think about it now, I understand why they want to do it. The Twins have been very successful with TC Bear, and he grows on ya. And the biggest reason, Adriana will have something to identify with when I talk about the Wild. She'll probably be excited to go to hockey much earlier than without said mascot. It'll give me various stuffed animals with Wild logos to buy.

So, my final conclusion is OK, I can deal with a mascot. As long as next year they don't bring in ice girls.

So I'm sitting out on our deck, under about the most gorgeous weather we've had all summer. Adriana is napping (for at least a few minutes longer) and I'm enjoying a cold beverage....

TO BE CONTINUED...

I'm feeling a strong urge to post soon! Parrish gone, PMB resigned, schedule released, alot has happened since Adriana was born. That said, I'm getting hockey fever. I planted the TV on NHL Network a few nites ago and watched the Top 10 Playoff Goals of the 2003 Playoffs. Bruno's series winner v. Patrick Roy was #2. Makes me excited to see Bruno again this year.

We're a month and 5 days out from training camp opening in Grand Forks. So consider this your teaser promo. Wild View from Section 216 will be returning shortly.