Cheers Winnipeg

Manitobans are friendly folk, it turns out, even if you are wearing a Sidney Crosby jersey at a Winnipeg Jets’ game.  With one lone drunken exception, I was treated well Friday night at the MTS Centre.

I hope I don’t sound disappointed but I was hoping for a lot worse.  I did get into a small back and forth discussion with some young drunk fan who knew absolutely nothing about the Jets, but that was it.

Seated right beside me was a young kid and his dad.  The kid sat on the edge of his seat the whole time.  He wasn’t always watching the game.  At times he would be staring out into the crowd, and one or two times he did turn to stare at me for a little bit.  I guess he’d never seen a Penguins’ fan before.  There was another young kid sitting behind me and he kept asking questions.

To my left was a very mouthy teenager who spoke up every chance he got.  He got a laugh early when he said good save to Pavelec for making a simple play.  None of his other comments were as successful.

I had one or two clever things to say during the game.

When the Jet’s horrible mascot came out, I chanted “Benny’s better!”  That one got a laugh.

When the fans started complaining about the lack of calls against the Penguins I would shout out that it was a conspiracy.  I would also say thank you Gary, from time to time.

After Crosby scored his second goal I turned around to the crowd and asked them if they had seen that goal.  To be honest I thought it was a very nice goal scored by the best hockey player in the world right now.  It got me out of my seat.

There was this one drunken fan wearing a Ladd jersey in front of me who kept politely mocking me throughout the course of the game.  I was an easy target.  There weren’t too many Penguins fans at the game, but I did have a nice brief chat with these two fans who were seated next to the aisle.  The ribbing was good natured and I could tell the Jet’s fan meant well.  We shook hands and did a high five before I left.

There was an older Jets’ fan sitting in front of me and when the Jets’ made it 4 -2 he turned around to get in my face a little.  I just laughed it off and we both thought it was pretty funny.

cheers Winnipeg,

rymr 

ps. i ate a big pretzel at the game.  it was very good. i like big pretzels.