One and done

It's funny how much can change in a year. Last August, I could barely wait for the Lightning's hockey season to begin, even using vacation time to take in a couple full days of training camp. This season, it was different.

Rather than hounding three days worth of camp, we limited it to a single morning, traipsing between the twin rinks at the Ice Sports Forum in Brandon. And, as usual, it was Colin who snagged a young lion's share of autographs, finding room for 29 players, including Victor Hedman and Ryan Malone, on his training camp team sheet.

Not satisfied with loading up a team sheet, Colin also got four pucks signed, including ones from former NHLer Adam Oates and St. Louis, as well as the 1,900th of the collection.

I'm thinking, too, that the numerous trips we made for the Bolts rookie camp and informal workouts facilitated the single hounding trip. No matter what Marty St. Louis says, we have all season long.

Other rewards for our efforts:

Tampa Bay's Blair Jones and Paul Szczechura knocked out a couple cards from the 2008-09 Norfolk Admirals team set. Coach Rick Tocchet signed the card for Colin.

Oh, yeah, I nearly forgot. I also added these cards from Tampa Bay's David Hale and Zenon Konopka, who also signed a Portland Pirates practice jersey, as they headed to Friday's morning skate.