For them what was wondering.

Peter Pan: This won't do. What's the matter with you? All it takes is faith and trust. Oh! And something I forgot. Dust!

Wendy, John: Dust?

Michael: Dust?

Peter Pan: Yep, just a little bit of pixie dust. Now, think of the happiest things. It's the same as having wings.

Peter Pan: Second star to the right and straight on till morning!

It's not about the Bling

Good morning sports fans all across Canada and in the Allied Nations on the Armed Forces Network and all the ships at sea.

Our gals are about to embark on the last leg of one journey and the beginning of a new one. The end of the road is of course, the Trials, which begin in earnest at 8:30 AM Saturday, Dec. 3rd when our ladies take on the Ontario rink of Joanne Rizzo. The new journey’s direction is yet to be determined but is already guaranteed to be of life changing dimensions.

I well remember that cold January day almost three years ago when Team Middaugh gave notice that they were a major force in the curling universe by defeating the darling of the west coast Kelly Law in the thrilling final of the Inaugural Canada Cup. It was an exciting day and time, the photos were all about the big cheque for $50,000 which marked a major milestone for women’s curling not just for being so large but also for bringing equal rights to women curlers because it was the same size cheque that was given to Randy Ferbey’s foursome for winning the men’s side of the competition. It was a welcome change and it was about time.

However, I thought then and believe even more now that if asked, every member of the team would have forgone the fat cheque for the other prize awarded that day, the honour of being the very first rink to qualify for the Olympic Trials that begin the day after tomorrow. Hands down a shot at being Canada’s Olympian’s in the sport of Curling is the ultimate prize for a competitive curler.

You see, dear sports fans, it is not about the bling, or the rings, or the free Hudson’s Bay retro sportswear, it’s all about the COMPETITION, and their just ain’t no competition bigger then the Olympics. Our gals understand that and God love ‘em, they embrace the challenge with open arms.

An unusual component of the Trials competition is that it stands alone as one where just being there is an enormous achievement. The Trials spots are filled with the best teams in Canada, any one of them fully capable of winning any game on any given day. Consequently, a curious and unusual state exists where the winner of the final game is awarded the biggest prize imaginable for a curler, yet those who don’t finish first, all nine of them, are in their own way champions as well.

I don’t mean the funny labels we paste on folks who come second in these things, “Olympic Calibre”, or “Future Olympian”. I mean that they can be satisfied that they earned their way to the Trials, they showed up and they did their best. That is all anyone can ask and all we can expect. This is a sport, sometimes the rocks roll your way, and sometimes they don’t. All other things being equal, and at this level almost all other things are, it comes down to a tiny slice of indefinable pixie dust of difference, whether it be grit, practice, conditioning, superb coaching or just dumb luck is sometimes just up to the God of Granite.

Fortune favours the prepared however, and our heroes are as ready as good training, great coaching, wonderful sponsors, loving supporters and liberal sprinklings of #9 Pixie Dust can make them.

The next 10 days contain the magic mix of skill, fortune and mental toughness that can lead to a moment that could change their lives forever. We are thrilled to be able to watch, wait, wonder and do our part to cheer on Sherry, Kirsten, Andrea, Sheri, Cathy and uber coach Pat.

So, second star on the right and straight on till morning.

Let’s Roll.


Good Fortune Ladies

Good luck charm am I

Our gals lost a 1 up coming home squeaker to a hot shooting Susan Marby last night and had to tee it all up again today. They put it all together and trounced Carrie Lindner for the second time just to prove it wasn't an accident, they even threw in a 5 end to make the point, and then showed the aforementioned Susan Marby their A game by opening with a 4 end and never looking back. It was over in 7 and our gals come out of Zone 10 on the B side with 4 great games of practice under their belts.

Next stop on the road to the Big Show is in the team's favourite club, St. Thomas CC, sometime in early January for the regional playdowns. But first a little detour to Halifax for a shot at the Gold bling and the pretty coloured rings.

The team looked great today, it really made my heart sing. I also got a chance to say Happy Birthday to Kirsten who turned @& today. She curled like a champion too.

TTFN

Stay away from Draw Poker

Our gals drew the wrong card this morning and have to play the extra game tonight. In the first draw, they came out on top of a spirited contest with old foe Carrie Lindner of the Bradford Curling Club. Coming home 2 up without our gals managed to hang on to squeak out the win. This evening at 7:00 PM the gals take on the bye team of Susan Morby from the Barrie Curling Club.

They play tomorrow at 1:00 no matter what so I may have to run up there and recite the Tea Pot poem which is the only one I will admit to knowing and, curiously, as I have gotten older,resembling.

If you can't read it as is, just clik on the picture on the right and it should show up in a new browser window.

Zones this weekend

STOH Ontario Zones are being held this weekend and our ladies are playing in beautiful downtown Penetanguishene, which I am awfully glad is not my postal address, in what the OCA designates as Zone 10.

There are 5 teams in the Zones this year with two to advance. I am pretty sure that the scores will not be updated at the OCA website but if you take a look at the link attached on say, Wednesday, you may find out the winners.

We will try to post the correct info here as soon as we get it. We may be up there on the weekend depending on the snowfall and if so will post on our return.

I once knew a man in Penetang, (as those in the know call it), who, if plied with enough spirits, would stand in a corner and recite every word of the Robert Service poem, The Cremation of Dan McGee, without stop. Force was then usually applied to keep him from demonstrating his ability to regurgitate the entirety of Mr. Service's writings. 5 teams, double knockout, two days, I may have to look him up and drag him to the rink to help keep the crowd entertained during the breaks.

TTFN

Two more games...

...two more L's to add to the pile.

It seems that our ladies lost a game to Mr. Darryl Prebble and then lost to the high flying team of Pat Duggan. This latter loss may be costly as the Duggan foursome employs our team member Sheri's beau Patrick Greenman as their third/vice/mate. It could be coldcuts for dinner with cold shoulder for dessert for our boy Patrick.

I am sure if you ask the girls this morning they will say that they had 5 good games this weekend and got what they wanted out of this spiel and that is all that counts in the grand scheme.

12 days and counting.

W for our side

Our gals defeated the mysterious squad from www.slotsland.com who, a little bird tells me, is in real life the hardest working guy in curling, Gerry Geurts of The Curling Zone, The Ontario Curling Tour, The Black Book of Curling and more other stuff then I can count.

The ladies won 7-3 and now wait till 6:00 PM to play the second place team from a contest on the A side between Al Hutchinson and Darryl Prebble.

I am asked to elaborate on the details of a 5 ender our heroes scored in their game last night against Brent Palmer but I am sorry to say that I cannot. Wasn't there, didn't hear about it. I will when I can.

Games they wanted, games they are getting.

And practice they did

It looks like our gals gave Team Brent Palmer a 9-0 shellaking last night and right now are playing Team Slotland. I don't think that is actually the skips name as his jacket seemed to indicate some allegiance to a gambling site which I would normally think of as being in Vegas but in today's upside down world it just could be in some former "B" racetrack in small town Ontario where the citizens are encouraged to pay the Stupid Tax. You know, the one that you line up to pay.

In any event, there is no end by end scoring and I guess after last week we should be grateful that we got the results from last night before Wednesday. All I can say is if I hear it, you'll read it right here.

Go Fish Pike Lake

Our gals played Wayne Tuck this morning who strengthened his squads chances by bringing in Mrs. Tuck to play lead. Old friend and all round nice person Kim Tuck, who leads for Team Rizzo and will be in Halifax, did the job and helped Wayne's team to a victory in the opener against our ladies.

We were tied in the rings coming home and Wayne had to throw one to the lid to win the game. He won himself a chance at another game at 3:30 and our gals won a bye until 9:30 this evening. Hardly what you want when you are trying to get in some extra ends against good competition but the ladies promised to go out and throw some rocks on an empty sheet to work on the whole in-turn, out-turn thingy.

We will stay in touch.

Pike Lake

Pike Lake, which may or may not be a real lake, is the name of a popular men's spiel that our gals are getting organised to play in this coming weekend. It is held in Harriston, Ontario, which is somewhere in the middle of my road map where I have a coffee stain but seems to be straight west of Shelburne, (Fiddle Town, home of the Fiddle Championships) and straight south of Owen Sound which is home to the Chi Chi Mon. Surprisingly, the Chi Chi Mon has no connection to a song by Rastafarian Rapper TOK, ( TOK - Chi Chi Man ... Chorus: From dem a par inna chi chi man car Blaze di fire mek we bun dem! (Bun dem!) From dem a drink inna chi chi man bar) but is actually a ferry, [no wings], that ties Manitoulin Island to the mainland in the warm water season.

Not much of this has anything to do with the upcoming event, which you can reach through the Link on this post, but it is a slow, rainy day and we are in a bit of a lull while we make ready for the main event coming up in just 18 days in beautiful downtown Halifax. Seriously though, the Pike Lake spiel attracts a lot of good teams and our ladies should be able to find some great competition as they continue their tune up regimen and they may also get a chance to work on their dance moves at the Sock Hop which I am sure is one of the highlights of the event.

Now you have the link, the dates and the location and you have also learned something new, I mean, who knew where Buckwheat learned to talk like that?

We will report on the scores and outcome of the Pike Lake Classic as we get the information.

Team Middaugh welcomes a new Sponsor

Team Middaugh is delighted to welcome Scotiabank Group as the newest member of the sponsorship Team.

Scotiabank, purveyors of fine money since 1832, were founded in Halifax on March 30 of that year. It is not known if the Bank's founders were curlers but today's progressive management team is obviously well aware of the awsome loyalty that curling fans demonstrate to those corporations who actively support their beloved game.

The Team thanks Scotiabank for their support and looks forward to a long, happy and rewarding association.

Coming home.....

.....tied without, will get you an early start on your Saturday night dance party more often then not.

It looks like our gals came out on the wrong side of a 5-4 decision this morning. Seems they coughed up a 3 early and fought back to be tied coming home without the granite mallet and the other guy closed the deal.

Next week in Harriston, we rewind the clocks, load up on ASA and do it all over again.


We will be in touch

I've been told .....

..... that I need to restate a few things, so here goes.

I am reliably informed that Team W. Middaugh did not "SPANK" Team S. Middaugh but rather engaged them in a spirited contest which lasted the full 8 ends and could have gone either way and they were dam(ned) lucky to win.

I have also been informed that despite a proper interpretation of the draw as posted, which actually says our gals are playing against Mr. Widdup as we keyboard interface (Real Men don't type, they keyboard interface.) this does not necessarily bear any resemblance to the draw that is being played at Glendale. It would seem that our gals will be competing against someone named Cory Heggestad at 10:30 AM.

In other news, it seems that in the game against Kathy C-Y her team was skipped by Marilyn Bodogh and included Marilyn's sister and another player to be named later so our gals played an extremely talented and experienced team in the first round. Some might say that they were "stacked", but not me. Marilyn is always tough to beat on the ice and impossible to beat in the spirit department. If she could bottle the stuff that drives her Marilyn could be rich as Rockerfeller.

We have dispatched spies, er, make that trained observers, to the Glendale Club to report back when possible on what is really happening and will strive to keep you up to date.

Looks like a cold supper for Wayne

Our gals defeated Kathy C-Y in the afternoon and then got spanked by Wayne's foursome in the Beer Night draw. They now play the renowned Hugh Widdup at 8:30 in the AM according to my calculations and any more coming second will send them home early.

I guess there are a lot of teams that might be happy to just have stayed in a game against the blazing hot Wayne Middaugh Team ver. 2005/6 but I bet our ladies aren't amongst them. I don't think I would want to be carrying the broom bag for Mr. Widdup tomorrow morning.

The event web site is somewhere between slow and useless. Thanks to the Harmark's for the update. We will try to keep you posted.

Golden Horseshoe Classic

Our gals are continuing their quest for challenging competition opportunities as they get closer to the Olympic Trials kickoff coming up in just 22 days.

This weekend it is a men's spiel at the beautiful Glendale Country Club in Hamilton, Ontario. Clik on the Headline or "LINK" below to go to the Ontario Curling Tour website for results and stats. The only other women's team entered is skipped by former World Champion, (with Marilyn Darte/Bodogh) Kathy Chittley-Young. Kathy is a past chair of the BDO event held at Glendale and does a great job for her club.

The team plays Kathy in their opener at 3:45 this afternoon. In what is sure to be a great draw for Beer Night, should our gals win their game they play the winner of a game between former World Champions Paul Savage or Wayne Middaugh at 8:00. Great planning on the part of the cough, cough, "Draw" committee. I suppose it also should be said that it was pointed out to me that they also play each other if they both lose their games.

In any event, it should be great competition, and more importantly, great fun. As always we will strive to bring you the view from Behind the Glass.

Webguy