Baby Takes The Pain Away

I'm sure all the Oiler-watchers out there are as frustrated with our little team as I am right now.
-The team is 2-8 over the past ten games.
-The team defence is looking shaky at best and horrible most times.
-The team has been outscored 34-23 in the past ten games.
-Four of the last ten losses have come to divisional rivals.
-MacT can't decide who to bench and who to sit lately with M-A Bergeron sitting against Calgary and Thoresen sitting for awhile. Jacques and Winchester have been switching off and no one seems to know what to do with Hejda.
-Everyone is screaming for a trade and as this post on another blob (sic) implies there are nothing but great options out there and Kevin Lowe just doesn't get it. How come he hasn't dumped an underachieving player for a star yet?
-In case you don't understand sarcasm, Kevin Lowe probably knows exactly what his team needs and he probably knows it better than all of us blob-experts do. Great puck-moving defencemen aren't exactly growing on trees out there and getting them will require losing someone in return. If we are going to gain a Dan Boyle or a Sheldon Souray, a well-loved Oiler player will be going the other direction. Something will happen. And it might not help.
-The team is losing its tenuous grip on a playoff spot and losing games badly and appearing that they really can't get it together. Then again, every team out there has its own slumps. We are just seeing every bad Oiler game, every sloppy Oiler shift and every crappy stretch of losses through our blue and orange coloured glasses.

So, basically it's one of those times where it is really not a great time to be an Oilers fan. It's not much fun. It's something we do not want to face after such a sugar high of that inexplicable playoff run. We were all reminded of what it is like to once again cheer for an NHL team that everyone else is watching too - instead of a team that is largely ignored by the "hockey world". The thought of sitting out the playoffs this Spring isn't great.

Then the Oilers lose to Calgary on New Year's Eve.

And, really I don't care too much.
Because the cutest baby in the world, my 19-month old Pepper said the word "HOCKEY" for the first time just before the New Year's debacle(that we noticed anyway).

As the game was beginning, little Pepper watched the TV, grabbed her little plastic hockey stick (she saw it at the Dollar Store while the lovely Heather and I were picking up Christmas bits and pieces and didn't let go of it) and said HOCKEY.
OK, she actually says "HAW-Tee" but she says it all the time now when a game is on and I point to the TV or when I grab one of my hockey books and point to a picture.

Heather was not too thrilled. She hates hockey. She even decided, just to spite me, that Calgary is her new favourite team.

The rest of the New Dads out there will understand. It took the pain of the rest of the game right away watching little Pepper, who is learning new words all the time, say HAW-Tee.

This doesn't get the Oilers off the hook.
2007 better start out a hell of a lot better than 2006 ended.