So as I said in our off topic thread on Wednesday, my fiancee and I were going to Toronto yesterday to go to the Hockey Hall Of Fame for our first time, and also to meet James Neal and Brooks Orpik at an in-store signing at AJ Sports World in Vaughn.
So now I'm back and I gotta say....the Hockey Hall Of Fame was a blast. My fiancee and I had alot of fun looking at pretty much everything. We must have taken about 100 pictures.
Getting pictures of myself standing in front of the various Mario exhibits, or the display of the stick, gloves and puck that Crosby used when he scored the "Golden Goal" was amazing. 
Of course the other exhibits for Howe, Orr, Gretzky, etc. were great too.
Ditto for that broadcasting pod thing where you try your hand at calling some of the greatest goals in hockey ever. I did all the Mario/Pens ones and as for my broadcasting skills well....let's just say I'm no Mike Lange.
I was truly in awe in the trophy room though. The Hart, Art Ross, Conn Smythe, as well as the rest of the trophies just look so beautifully crafted and immaculately prestine up close. Plus of course we looked for Mario's, Sid's, and Geno's names on these various trophies just to see the inscriptions in person. Was neat. And of course we got our photo (of us together no less) with the Cup. She touched it...I did not.
The Orpik and Neal signing in Vaughn tonight was beyond awesome. Unfortunately due to some undisclosed (and presumably pretty petty) reasons Orpik cancelled at the last minute and as a result his signing with AJ Sports World will (as they say exactly in their own words on their Facebook wall ) "never ever ever be rescheduled." So it sounds like he might have pissed them off pretty badly.
"The Real Deal" Neal came through for us fans though and was as nice as nice could be. He's a very gracious and humble guy for sure. Not wanting to babble, I congratulated him on his goal against Philthy the other night and I wished him good luck for the rest of the season. He seemed genunely appreciative of the praise I gave him and even gave me a extra thumbs up ( right as he was just about to sign for these 2 girls) as my fiancee and I walked past his table to leave the store. He's a great guy for sure. I got two pucks signed by him, one of which I got him to put a "40 Goals 2012" inscription on. And my fiancee got a signed 8X10 photo.
The real kicker though was that my fiancee surprised me by sneaking over to a salesperson (while I was checking out everything else the store had for sale before the signing) and buying me a 100% legit and downright AWESOME 16X20 signed and framed photo of Mario with the Cup. So yeah, it was a great day for this Pens fan!!!!!
So now I'm back and I gotta say....the Hockey Hall Of Fame was a blast. My fiancee and I had alot of fun looking at pretty much everything. We must have taken about 100 pictures.
Getting pictures of myself standing in front of the various Mario exhibits, or the display of the stick, gloves and puck that Crosby used when he scored the "Golden Goal" was amazing. Of course the other exhibits for Howe, Orr, Gretzky, etc. were great too.
Ditto for that broadcasting pod thing where you try your hand at calling some of the greatest goals in hockey ever. I did all the Mario/Pens ones and as for my broadcasting skills well....let's just say I'm no Mike Lange. I was truly in awe in the trophy room though. The Hart, Art Ross, Conn Smythe, as well as the rest of the trophies just look so beautifully crafted and immaculately prestine up close. Plus of course we looked for Mario's, Sid's, and Geno's names on these various trophies just to see the inscriptions in person. Was neat. And of course we got our photo (of us together no less) with the Cup. She touched it...I did not.
The Orpik and Neal signing in Vaughn tonight was beyond awesome. Unfortunately due to some undisclosed (and presumably pretty petty) reasons Orpik cancelled at the last minute and as a result his signing with AJ Sports World will (as they say exactly in their own words on their Facebook wall ) "never ever ever be rescheduled." So it sounds like he might have pissed them off pretty badly.
"The Real Deal" Neal came through for us fans though and was as nice as nice could be. He's a very gracious and humble guy for sure. Not wanting to babble, I congratulated him on his goal against Philthy the other night and I wished him good luck for the rest of the season. He seemed genunely appreciative of the praise I gave him and even gave me a extra thumbs up ( right as he was just about to sign for these 2 girls) as my fiancee and I walked past his table to leave the store. He's a great guy for sure. I got two pucks signed by him, one of which I got him to put a "40 Goals 2012" inscription on. And my fiancee got a signed 8X10 photo.
The real kicker though was that my fiancee surprised me by sneaking over to a salesperson (while I was checking out everything else the store had for sale before the signing) and buying me a 100% legit and downright AWESOME 16X20 signed and framed photo of Mario with the Cup. So yeah, it was a great day for this Pens fan!!!!!
lol. but sounds like an amazing experience nonetheless. pictures at all? Lets go Pens!
) scheduled to be signing stuff from 7:30 PM until 8PM. My fiancee and I got there around 6:30 as we wanted to check out the store, pay for the stuff we wanted to get signed, and get in line to get stuff signed as quick as we could since we didn't know how big of a line there would be or if Neal would leave right at 8PM even if there still would have been people waiting in line. We were out of there by 7:45 PM or so. For all we know Neal could have stayed past 8PM to make sure that everyone got what they wanted signed (especially since quite a few people were pissed at Orpik for backing out at the last minute, particularly the owners of the store), but since we were smart and got our stuff signed fairly fast and left before 8PM...who knows???? 
