How long can you go?

You know, the money that I have spent to watch live hockey this season is disgusting.

I'm going to see the Buffalo Sabres play the New Jersey Devils at the Rock tonight, and it marks the third time this season I've been to a game out there. Granted, I'm pals with a Devils fan and several Rangers and Sabres fans, and I have a chronic inability to say the word "no" when someone says "want to go see a hockey game?" But still.

I saw the Penguins destroy the Devils about two months ago, watched the Bruins blow a three goal lead to the Devs last month, that game where they lost Tim Thomas in the the third and Tukka Rask coughed up the overtime goal.

I also flew to Buffalo to watch the Winter Classic last week, sat behind the glass at the Garden to watch the Bruins beat the Islanders last thanksgiving and saw the Washington Capitals face off against the Rangers a few months back. I forget who won that one, I just like to watch Ovechkin skate.

Before I started this blog, I'd really try to make an effort to get to one, maybe two games a year. Now we're only at the halfway point of the season, and I've attended 6 already. That I can remember. Thank God, the Devils are a relatively cheap ticket, (tonight's special offer seat is $30, I think), but I'd say a conservative estimate of the money I've spent getting tickets to live hockey games is around the $600.00 mark, not including travel.

I shudder to think how much I've spent on beer.

Anyway, it is with this in mind that I have decided to hold off on getting tickets to the Rangers and Bruins on my wedding day.

I'm getting married on January 20th in New York City, and there was a bit of a debate as to whether I might duck out with my groomsmen to watch the Bruins play the Rangers for their matinee that afternoon. I dragged my feet on it, mainly because the NHL and NBC wouldn't announce what time the game started.

Also, my future wife might have stabbed me in the neck.

As it happens, the game is going to be broadcast nationally and start at 12:30, ostensibly in time to be well over before the AFC championship game at 3:00.

The wedding starts at 6:00, and there are more than a few Patriots fans in my family not too wild about the timing of that one. I remind them that Bill Belicheck might tell them that to look past the game on Sunday is a bad idea, and they grumble.

Regardless, I'm going to the good-old hockey game tonight to see if the Sabres can drop seven straight.

And then I'm taking a break.

Not from the blog, but from watching hockey.

OK, If the Bruins look great against the Hurricanes tonight, and win four in a row, which they really might, seeing as the Bruins are surging, putting pucks in the net and Carolina seems to be having some struggles in goal, so if they win in dramatic fashion, I may have to watch out this string.

I mean fuck it, I sat through their recent six game losing streak, I can't watch when they start to turn it around?

We'll see. I might take a break. Cause when the playoffs start, that ain't happening.

I get married on the 20th, then leave for a week long honeymoon in a place with sprawling beaches and absolutely no NESN, so maybe that will do for a nice break.

I dunno- how long could you go without hockey?

Right. I hear you, I was there in 2004 too.

But how long could you go if your team was doing well?

For me, I'd say a week, tops.