Superstitions and IPB

Superstitions used to be the name of the game at Stately IPB Manor. No muffins on game days (getting around this was easy -- just call all muffins "puffins"; the hockey gods are apparently really easy to confuse); no orange food during the playoffs (when your college staple is Kraft mac 'n' cheese this is harder than it sounds); Schnookie must be out of the room for the team to score (good for Devils fans, bad for Schnookie). However, something happened to change all this. Driving up to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals, when the Devils were playing Anaheim, we saw something we'd never seen in almost 20 years of living in the road kill capital of the world -- a road kill duck. We both knew then not to worry, that clearly the hockey gods had already chosen a winner. But we also both learned that what we do, what we eat, where we sit during games, won't change the outcome. The outcome has been woven into the tapestry that is hockey eons and eons ago up on the mythical Mount Hockey. While this duck omen may have cured us of superstitions, it's left us with a reliance on seeing signs. An oyster delivery truck on the highway can only mean Patrik Elias is having a big night. The number 5 appearing on a fortune cookie fortune must foretell lucky things for Colin White. A flock of Boston terriers being walked along the sidewalk portends goals aplenty for Jay Pandolfo. Obviously, these signs never turn out (except for the duck) but at least we can be eating muffins and mac 'n' cheese while we auger.