Listening to WIP on the Internet at my desk and they just replayed the Lauren Hart/Kate Smith "God Bless America" duet from last night's game. Remember all that stuff I said a couple days ago about it not hurting as much this time? Well, that's history now. Damn you, Kate Smith.

Inside the Mind of a Maniac: Live Blogging the Flyers vs Sabres - Game 3 in Philadelphia*

5:50pm: Laptop - check. Water - check. Remote (for throwing) - check. Mute button for homerific Sabres announcers, who will comment on the Philly fans' lack of class at least 5 times tonight - check.

6:05pm - The Sabres' announcers just mentioned how glad they are that BJ Umberger is back in the Flyers' lineup. Uh...who?

6:08pm - Brian Savage! Shorthanded! And with speed! It has to hurt when you get beat by the very thing you've been busy flaunting.

6:30pm - The Flyers are still taking stupid, undisciplined penalties. This needs to stop if they plan on making this a series.

6:42pm - "The Flyers are going on the PECOOOOOOO Power Play!" Things like that make me homesick.

6:45pm - Three Flyers penalties in the first period. Not acceptable. Still, the game's tied at one and the Flyers looked better than they have in weeks.

(1st Intermission)

7:08pm - I'm always confused as to why people could have such hostility against teams that don't win. I mean, why do the Cowboys really hate the Eagles? It's not like we've ever won anything of importance. I always assumed I hated the Devils so much because of how they always seemed to have the Flyers' number during the years when they were holding Stanley Cup parades in their shitty parking lot of a city. (Still bitter? Maybe.) But now - the Sabres. Suddenly, I think I understand.

7:14pm - PETER FORSBERG! Off the skate off Jay McKee! Buffalo Announcers: "They couldn't catch up to Forsberg."

Oh sweet irony.

2-0 Flyers. First lead of the series.

7:15pm - Penalty to Buffalo. PECOOOOOOOOOOO...well, you know.

7:19pm - Watching Chris Drury, I can't help but still think, as I did that day, that the Avs made a HUGE mistake trading him. Did they ever recover from that? The kid is a winner in the post season. Silly, silly trade.

7:21pm - I'm sure I'm jinxing something, but I'm proud of the way the Flyers fans are behving tonight. When the game started it was so loud in the Wachovia Center that the Sabres' announcers couldn't hear the whistle. Even after the Sabres goal, the "Let's Go Flyers" chant was louder than ever.

7:27pm - PETER FORSBERG!!!!!!!!! 3-1 Flyers. Thanks for the Power Play. Hey Lindy, why are your guys playing like idiots?

7:29pm - Pominville with a wide open net and he fanned on it, never really getting a shot off. What a shame.

7:36pm - "And the classy Philadelphia faithful boo him (Dumont) as he leaves the ice. This building - I swear - the only way they'd be happy is if he left the ice in a hearse."

(How predictable - that was "Philly fans are classless" comment #2 if you're keeping score.)

So, as Umberger sat on the ice bleeding from his mouth and unable to move, it was classy how the Sabres continued to show him being flattened on the jumbotron? Interesting.

7:38pm - Deep breath. And maybe a beer.

(2nd Intermission)

8:09pm - Sabres announcers are still wetting themselves over Jay McKee's open ice hit when Tim Connolly puts the puck past Esche. Defense should have had him covered. Not entirely Esche's fault there.

8:10pm - Finger hovers over mute button. I despise silence, but it may very well be welcome at this point.

8:11pm - My boyfriend, a Stars fan with no vested interest in either of these teams, just walked into the room. "These announcers are really annoying." No kidding.

8:13pm - I can't relax with a one-goal lead. Can we quadrulple shift Forsberg at this point?

8:15pm - Buffalo appears to have all the momentum at this point. Can someone please hit Tim Connolly? Seriously - it's Tim Connolly.

8:16pm - Another Flyers penalty - this time it's Nedved. Where's my defibrilator?

8:19pm - Penalty on Nedved. Another one. There's one thing I hate as much as the Flyers losing games, and that's making Lindy Ruff look like a smart man. Doesn't happen often, but when it does - ouch.

8:24pm - Another! Penalty! This time, to Peter Forsberg. Oh! But wait! "Oh, no, it's to Roy," mumble the Sabres announcers. Could it be for diving? Could it? Yes! It's for unsportsmanlike conduct. What a glorious turn of events. The Flyers have got to capitalize if they want to put this game away. A one goal lead with 5 to play is not what anyone would call "safe."

8:27pm - Gagne is one hell of a playmaker. But sweet jesus - he is still is not able to finish by himself. Get rid of Forsberg and he's back to being a 20 goal scorer.

8:30pm - Nedved loses the puck at center ice. He's having an atrocious game.

8:31pm - It's TIM CONNOLLY! You do not let him skate right into the net!

8:32pm - Two minutes to play. One goal lead. Flyers can't keep the puck out of their zone for more than five seconds. Perhaps this offseason they can learn to play the full 60.

8:33pm - Seriously. I need Maalox.

8:35pm - Another gem from the Sabres team: "The Flyers are taking their sweet time getting their players out on the ice." Isn't that called home ice advantage?

8:36pm - Simon Gagne empty net goal! Perhaps he can finish. At least, when there isn't a goaltender within ten feet.

8:38pm - Flyers win! Kate Smith strikes again. Let's do it again Friday, shall we?

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*All times are CST

Last night I took a break from being overworked and overstressed and treated myself to a few hours of laughter at the Majestic Theater in downtown Dallas, where David Sedaris was doing a reading and book signing for Arts and Letters Live, a charitable extension of the Dallas Museum of Art.

I'd seen him live a few years ago and of course I own all of his books and CDs, so I knew exactly what to expect. Or so I thought.

I'd always wondered what would happen when Sedaris ran out of wacky stories about his childhood and family; what would he write about next? I got my answer last night, as Sedaris entertained the packed theater with animal tales (specifically, one of a crow and a ewe) and a brilliantly shocking story about an overcussing couple that he described as "kidnapped from a Ralph Lauren ad and placed in a David Mamet play."

Quick sidebar: The funny thing about seeing an NPR-related writer at a fancy theater in Dallas is that it attracts a strangely divided crowd. I'm not sure if this pattern fits at all of Sedaris' readings across the country, but both times I've seen him, the crowd has been the same. Half of the theater was made up of twenty-something indie-rock kids with tortoise-shell frames, colored hair, and beat-up Chuck Taylors. The other half was made up of the type of people I've grown accustomed to seeing around Dallas, but rarely find myself seated with at a social function - the well-dressed fifty-something women with fancy jewelry and perfectly coiffed hair and their bald headed counterparts, dressed in salmon-colored slacks (true story!) and blazers with patches on the elbows. (We counted 12 of these men in the first 4 rows.) If you live in Dallas, you know which people I mean - the people that listen to NPR and fancy themselves as hip intellectuals. The kind who thought Sideways was the best movie of the last 5 years and can now talk in-depth about the differences between a cab-shiraz and a merlot. You know, the kind of horrible, stuffy pseudo-intellectual people who most of us are probably destined to become.

Back to the reading. Before Sedaris launched into the tale of the overcussing couple, he issued a warning of sorts: "I've never thought things counted as vulgar or offensive if they don't come from the author and are just repeated as heard from someone else. Right? No, that doesn't count at all."

He then launched into a story of an overcussing couple, a vulgar cab driver whose favorite term is "fucky-fuck," and x-rated photojournalism. This story, a departure from most of Sedaris' earlier work and perhaps one of the funniest he's ever written, caused several of the perfectly coiffed women and bald-headed men to leave their seats and presumably exit the theater in a huff. I imagined that their friends had told them of a fun little author who wrote a story about a job he once had as an elf in a department store Santaland. They'd bought tickets, hoping in part to be regailed by such harmless tales, and also in the hopes that they'd be seen by their more artsy and charitable friends at such a hip event. I smiled as I imagined the look of sheer horror that spread across their faces as Sedaris described, in detail, the photographs of two lesbians' sexual escapades with a stallion. It was almost, almost, as enjoyable as the story itself.

Normally, it hurts more than this.

In years past, when the Flyers found themselves on the brink of elmination, my condition could most likely have been described as somewhere between heavily depressed and near suicidal. For the last 20+ years of my life, Spring has symbolized the return of warm weather, the arrival of my birthday, and the inevitable end of hockey season along with the realization that someone else would be skating the Cup.

But this year, with the Flyers down 2-0 to the Sabres and in need of a major attitude adjustment and a minor miracle, it's not quite the same. The sleepless nights, the hollow chest, the wistful memories of a remarkable season - they're just not there.

This was a season that seemed doomed from the very beginning. As Keith Primeau sat, dazed, on the ice after a crushing hit by Montreal's Alexander Perezhogin on October 25, we couldn't have imagined that it was the beginning of the end. Primeau, the Flyers captain, tried to play the next few games, but, perhaps fittingly, announced on Halloween that he was out indefinitely, and just like that, the horror show began. Turner Stevenson underwent hip surgery and failed to recover. Kim Jonsson and Chris Therien found their seasons ended early with post-concussion syndrome. Primeau announced he was done for the season and would set his sights on a September return, if at all. Peter Forsberg battled a groin injury all season long. Michal Handzus, Eric Desjardins, Joni Pitkanen, and Simon Gagne all missed lengthy periods of time. Not surprisingly, the Flyers led the league in man-games lost to injury, so the club was forced to lay their fate in the hands of a slew of talented but inexperienced rookies.

The outcome, given those circumstances, was not much of a surprise. The inconsistant Flyers failed to put together a solid run, and as a result, dropped from first in the division to 5th overall in the Eastern Conference. A first-round matchup against the higher seeded Buffalo Sabres, a team that took 3 of 4 from the Flyers this season, seemed like a steep hill to climb given their recent performance.

Of course, I'm not sure anyone expected the abortion that occured last night in Buffalo; a game that was so embarassing that OLN, TSN, and DirecTV quit carrying it halfway through, when they switched to the Rangers/Devils game. The Flyers looked lost as they watched the more-focused Sabres skate circles around them as they put the puck in the net 5 times in the first period.

Now the series moves to Philadelphia, a place the orange-and-black haven't played well of late. Technically, the series isn't over, as plenty of teams have come back from down 0-2 in a best-of-7 series. But for all intents and purposes, the curtain has closed on this Flyers season, and at this point, it's better to look forward than back. For despite all of the nightmares of the 2005-2006 Flyers season, there are lots of positives to take from it.

Beneath the injuries and inconsistencies, this season was an exciting preview of things to come for the Flyers. Highly touted young players like Jeff Carter, Mike Richards, RJ Umberger, and Antero Niittymaki gained valuable experience and showed flashes of brilliance that we're sure to see more of in years to come. Simon Gagne, with the addition of Forsberg, raised his game to a new level, and newcomer Mike Knuble enjoyed the shared success of the top line. If Bob Clarke can obtain one fast defenseman without mortgaging the future of the team, and Keith Primeau, whose importance to the club is monumental, can get healthy, there's no reason the Flyers can't challenge for the Cup next season.

And so, as the sun begins to shine in Philadelphia, pools are uncovered, flowers are planted, and like clockwork, another hockey season draws nearer to an end. But this time, unlike past springs, it is accompanied by a sense of hope and a hunger for the future.

"You motherfuckers thought I was bluffing, didn't you? I told you I wanted to be traded to the West Coast. I told you I had to be traded to the West Coast. I even gave you all winter to find a deal. After wasting time with Theogate, you had the balls to tell me that you couldn't find any takers? I'm David F*$%ing Wells! If you're gonna feed me lies, at least make them believeable.

So now here we are a week into the season and I'm still here in shitty, miserable f*$%ing Boston instead of riding my hog on Hwy 8 in sunny San Diego. Did you know they don't even let me bring my Harley onto the T? What kind of bullshit is that? Not to mention that it's just too damn cold here to wear a wife beater and show off my atrocious tattos.

You think it's funny to f*$% with David Wells? Ooh, you assholes will be sorry.


Oh, and one more thing. Once a Yankee, always a Yankee. Didn't you morons learn anything from my good friend Ramiro? Suckers."

The drinking started before noon, lunch consisted of beer and peanuts, and my arms and nose are sunburned - yes, it was Opening Day and I celebrated by ditching my cubicle for a seat at Ameriquest Field in Arlington, where the Red Sox were taking on the Rangers. It was a perfectly sunny 80 degrees in Texas when Curt Schilling took the mound just after 1:05pm.

One of the many questions surrounding this year's club is how Schilling will look 17 months after surgery and 6 months after the end of a disappointing season in which Schilling finished with a 5.69 ERA. Yesterday, Red Sox fans got a good look at just how dominant a fully healthy Curt Schilling can be. After throwing 117 pitches, 79 strikes among them, Schilling retired to the dugout with a 7-2 lead and the satisfaction of knowing that the previous two injury-riddled seasons in which his mechanics were never quite right are finally behind him. Schilling, who claims he feels as good as his did in the 2002 season, when he was a Cy Young runner up, gave up five hits, two earned runs, and walked one in seven innings.

Another hot topic is how successful the plethora of new guys will be at replacing the fan favorites they have replaced. Though one game is too small a sample size on which to judge, yesterday's game was certainly a good sign of things to come. New third baseman Mike Lowell silenced naysayers with his eighth inning homerun, centerfielder Coco Crisp scored two runs and made a couple of tremendous plays in the field, and second baseman Mark Loretta doubled in a run in the fifth and turned in an incredible at-bat before Papi bashed a homerun that measured approximately 789 feet.

Beer, sun, and Papi rounding the bases - it's officially summer, no matter what the calendar says.
_________________________________

Top 5 Moments of The Game

1. "Chan Ho Millwood, clap clap clapclapclap"

2. The female Rangers fan who thought it was a good idea to talk shit to 60 Red Sox fans before the game. She and her cowboy hat and denim daisy dukes were gone by the 4th inning.

3. Turning Ameriquest into Fenway South with stirring renditions of Sweet Caroline and Dirty Water in section 41.

4. The Mark Loretta at-bat. You know which one I mean. I said it when they signed him, and I'll say it again - this dude is the most underrated second baseman in the league. He's like Mark Bellhorn minus the mind-numbing volume of ill-timed strikeouts. And the pot.

5. The sweet clang of the ball off of the foul pole right above my head followed by the sight of Papi rounding the bases.

______________________________

Last night's Yankees/A's game was only fun for about 10 minutes. Then, Barry Zito bent over and the Yankees made him their bitch, tagging him for seven runs in 1.1 innings. But, the highlight of the game for Sox fans came in the bottom of the third. With Kotsay on first and Swisher on second, Bubba Crosby flied out to center. Damon made the routine catch and then introduced Yankee fans to his noodle arm with an embarassing throw that prompted the announcers to note, "Well, the Yankees certainly didn't bring him here for his arm."

Meanwhile, Boston fans will be seeing things like this for the next few years: