The Hockey Hall of Fame: Licking the Stanley Cup

You know where I was this past week? Yes, that's right--I was in Toronto! For the first time in my life, surprisingly. (Well, the first time I can remember. My parents don't seem to recollect whether or not we were in Toronto in the years pre-remembrance, but I'm pretty sure I wasn't based on the lack of photographic evidence. Please--if you know my family, you know there would be plenty of photographs of myself as a baby or toddler pressed up against the Stanley Cup.)

I did visit the Hockey Hall of Fame, on a pilgrimage, if you will. My friends and I were not particularly reverent guests, except for the part with...

...

...the Stanley Cup.

And yes, it was "the real one," the Presentation Cup. The best news: I licked it.

Yes, you can all tell me how disgusting that is, but I was feeling all right since I watched the guy
"sanitize" it about 2.5 seconds before I did, and he was pretty quick to hop on with the sanitizer again after we were done. I mean, people have let their dogs eat out of this thing--among many many other things. (And, for the record, people have had their children baptized in it. Can you imagine? I would be all over that if my husband won the cup--"honey, let's baptize [Child] in the Cup!" and I would say "ALL RIGHT, LET'S DO IT RIGHT NOW." If you can even do that without Papal dispensation, that is. And that child would immediately become my favorite child.)

Anyway, I definitely licked the Stanley Cup, specifically: Dominik Hasek's name. It was a beautiful moment.

The Hockey Hall of Fame, and hopefully Gordie Howe will not strike me down for saying this, is slightly overrated. I mean, it's GOOD, but it's expensive, and there's not an incredibly amount of stuff. It depends how much "watching your friend lick the Cup" is worth to you, or "watching your friend flip out over some player that nobody else cares about." There's a cool replica of the Montreal Canadiens' dressing room, and thank goodness it's a replica because the real one is probably full of STDs considering Jose Theodore used to play there. There's a pretty good display on international hockey. There's some information about the many, many minor league teams in North America. There is not a whole lot of information on the European leagues. It's also not extraordinarily well laid-out. There are some really atrocious films you can watch.

While I was in Toronto I did NOT go to a Leafs game. Here is a short list of Things I Would Rather Do Than Attend a Leafs Game At the Air Canada Centre:

1. Put my head into a bag of live eels.
2. Go to the top of the Sears Tower (being afraid of heights, this one is HUGE).
3. Wash my hair with 100% pure maple syrup.
4. Clean the floor of the Pittsburgh Penguins' showers. With my tongue. On game day. (Like that makes a difference.)
5. Drink an entire bottle of tequila, then write all five of my final exams in one day.

Trade deadline day is coming up on Tuesday. It cannot come fast enough.