1 Burst results for "Nith River"

Spittin' Chiclets

06:08 min | 1 year ago

"nith river" Discussed on Spittin' Chiclets

"For $20 off your first purchase. In terms of play, and now enjoy the great one, number 99, mister Wayne Gretzky. Guys, we did it. We got the white whale. We gonna be tied them down, we have them hostage here at the four seasons in our room, but on a serious note when you're so generous with your time, it's been a pleasure working with you at TNT. And obviously I also got to thank these guys because without the spit and checklist podcast, I probably don't even get the chance to get to meet you and now work with you. Folks, the great one. And normally we start outweighing by listing all the accomplishments, but I think that would waste about half of our time here. We get to we only got an hour. The way it's going will be one lesson about a year and a half. We could. So thank you so much for joining us. And the way we do it here on the spit and chick was podcasts is we usually start out all the way at the beginning and how this wonderful career of yours started out and came to be. Oh my gosh, well, first of all, it's a pleasure to be here. I'm not great in social media, I'm just sort of finding my way, but my kids have been watching you guys forever. So that's all I hear at home is the spitting chick clit. So from their point of view, this is a great honor for all of us to be part of it. So I'm excited. For me, you know, I was like, everybody else in Canada, you know? It's one of those things we all started to grow up with a hockey stick in her hand and a pair of skates and, you know, you start playing because you love it and that was no different than any other kid that was in Canada who loved the game. And I started playing a young age, I got a pair of skates from my uncle that were hand me downs and didn't look back and the greatest game in the world and I was lucky enough to have a great passion for it. At what age were you on the pond in the backyard? Was that the first time you ever skate out? Two and a half, but it wasn't in my backyard. It was actually, there was a river that went through my grand folks house in just outside of brantford air Ontario, and it went through their backyard, the nith river, and it would freeze, and that's where I first started skating, but we only went there on weekends because my dad worked at bell telephone 8 to 5. So it was Saturday, Sundays I would skate all day. And then my dad started taking him to these local parks that had outside rings. And then as my dad says out of necessity, he built a rink in the backyard so he could stay inside the house and watch me through the kitchen window so he wouldn't freeze at the time. So both the age of four, four and a half, 5, my dad started building a rink in the backyard. I always get a kick because my mom used to say the early December and my dad would say, Phyllis, you got to go over to wilco. You got to go get me a sprinkler head, and my mom would say, you're going to go get your own sprinkler head. They're going to think I'm a complete idiot. Asking for a sprinkler head in the middle of the winter. So they used to wait for my dad and December they'd always hold one back for him because he knew he was coming in around early December so at night he would just turn the sprinkler on and go back and forth and that's how he built the ice rink. And I got one quote here. It's not God given its Wally given. I'm sure, without your old man, none of this came off. No. It was so special. Loved hockey, loved kids. He had two minor hockey tournaments in my hometown, boys and girls. And there would be three days long, I guess, and he would go there, and he would sit in the arena from 8 o'clock in the morning till 8 o'clock at night. I went home a few years ago when he was sick, and I went to see him, and it was just after Christmas. And I said, look, I'll go to the rink today. I'll go handle your chores. And he just, he was so sick, he couldn't leave the house. And so I went over the arena and oh my goodness, they said to my brothers, they said, dad did this ten hours a day. I said, I'm here an hour. I've had enough. It was so funny because as I walked into the arena, this coach, like a 7 year old team, he goes, hey, mister Gretzky, you talked to my team before the game. I said, no, I'm the wrong guy. He goes, no, no, no, just go in there and say whatever you want. And I said, trust me, I'm the wrong guy for you to speak to your 7 year olds. I'll get a picture. Say a few words, whatever you want, and I said, okay, so I went in there and I said, welcome to brantford and it's a great city. You're going to love this tournament. And I said, and remember, you're 7. It doesn't matter if you win or lose it's how many goals you get. It's like a coach looked at me and I said, I told you. I'm the wrong guy. It's 7 years old. Just go have fun who cares if you win or lose and I remember we always we had good teams in Bradford. We had guys that Greg Stefan who played in the NHL, Jimmy Burton was up and down, land hack born, for a little town of 60,000 people and we'd always play oshawa in the finals of tournaments and voluntarios. And we could never beat them. They were a better team. They were bigger, they had more kids to draw from. I think Australia was like 250,000 people. I remember one day it was like 11 years old was driving home after a game and we lost game 5 and in the finals and I said to my dad, I said, I just don't understand it. We can't beat that team. He goes, that's the best coach hockey team I've ever seen for 11. They play their positions well. And he said, I'll never forget. He said, but there won't be one kid on that team that ever makes junior a hockey, let alone the NHL, because they have no imagination and no creativity. And years later, 5 of us were playing major a and I remember looking at my dad going, how would he know that when we were all 11 years old? But he had a feel for the game and he just said, you got to be creative. You got to go out there and be your own person, especially ten, 11, 12. So they were playing systems instead of just going out there and having fun. And the thing I read about your dad is just how important he was in terms of you learning the skill of thinking the game. Like the old story of he threw it in the corner and he'd show you where to go where it was going to end up being. Is that kind of how you remember it? Yeah, and he'd say it's like a pool table, you know, when you hit the white ball and you know the angles and you got to play angles and be creative and get ahead of where the puck's going to be, not where it's been..