Ok, it's World Championship time. Taking off early on Wednesday, ready for a few weeks of hockey.

As ready as I'll be.

The Finnish league has its awards gala tonight. I'm there. Not blogging.

Here's my latest blog entry on nhl.com.

Hopefully, Avery’s initiative is an inspiration to other NHLers, wondering what to do when there’s no need to hang around the rink anymore. And, well, here are a few suggestions for internships that might be a great match.

Read it here or after the jump.

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Today, at the coffee shop, there was a lady in front of me getting a cup of coffee. She turned her purse upside down looking for small change, so that she wouldn't have to charge her ice cream and coffee on her card.

I heard her mumble about having it in there somewhere, and told her that I had the ten krona she needed.

"I have it here, if you need it," I said.

"No, no, I'll just put it on the card," she replied, and waved her VISA.

"Thanks, anyway," she said.

"Sure," I said, and put the coin back into my pocket.

It was probably the "if you need it" that did it.

Here I am again. Me and the babies. And their mothers of course.

This is the number one mother-baby cafe in town, and the town is Helsinki.

Only, this time, it's also a grandpa-dad-son-grandson cafe.

Here's a piece I wrote for The Hockey News a couple of months ago but forgot to post here. Anyway, this is Victor Hedman. Don't worry, you'll hear that name again in the future, many times.

Click the image to get the pdf.

Back in the rowdy 1990s, I worked at the Canadian Embassy in Helsinki, helping Canadian companies to find business partners in Finland. Sounds glamorous, I know. And it was. Oh, those forestry seminars in Brussels. I wish I could tell you about them but it's still too early for that.

Anyway, working for Canada was great. They even made me an honorary Newfoundlander after I passed the initiation rite: drank screech and kissed a cod. In that order.

Can't wait to see what it takes to become an honorary Quebecer (or Quebecois).

Cough, cough. Dusting off the old archives again. The Bruins took the Habs to Game 7, so I'd better get this one out while I can.

Without further ado: "Maybe not this year, but Koivu will return to glory" on ESPN.com in May, 2006.

HV71 took home the Swedish championship last night.

It would take a leap of faith and a lot of courage to call Johan Davidsson’s playoff beard and moustache cool. Yes, that style was cool in the 1620s when d’Artagnan and Arhos, Portos, and Aremis were involved in the English-French intrigues, but maybe now is not the time to bring it back.

Here's my take on that.

Yes, the World Championship tournament begins in 14 days.

And don’t forget, every May, the World Championship gives thousands of hockey fans a nice excuse to travel around the world, mostly in Europe, see some great hockey, paint their faces in their national colors, and enjoy life.

Click the image to get my take on the tournament in this week's Hockey News.

And another nod to William Goldman:

Nobody knows anything.

In two weeks, I'll be in Quebec City, getting ready for the World Championships, and I'll turn this blog into a World Championship blog for about three weeks.

Ovechkin fever is raging in Russia. I spoke with a couple of Russian fans today.

"I've been an NHL fan since 1994 and I try to follow it every possible way. I read NHL.com, TSN and ESPN, I even followed the Ducks run to the Cup in 2003, but back then, it was impossible to watch the games at home, and the only place to see them was a fancy sports casino," Shelestenko says.

Here's the story.

Here's something to give us hope:

Watts figures, if you rewound the world to 1982, Madonna would likely remain a total unknown--and someone else would have slipped into her steel-tipped corset. "You cannot predict in advance whether a band gets this huge cascade of popularity, because the social network is liable to throw up almost any result," he marvels.

So, keep your head down, your underwear on top of your clothes, and work hard. Maybe the word-of-mouth will make you a star.

Here's something a little special. Audio.

A few weeks ago, I met with Doug Shedden, the Canadian head coach of Team Finland, for a story I wrote to a magazine that's going to be out soon. Since the story is going to be in Finnish, and I only used parts of the interview, I thought it'd be a) OK and b) interesting for you to hear some of that interview now.

Here it is. In case you want to throw the file in your iPod and listen to it on the bus, in the car, at the rink, here's the file. This was recorded after a practice so the sounds you hear in the beginning are some goofy hockey players, obviously exhausted after a practice. Enjoy!

Joe Pelletier, a Canadian hockey historian, the engine behind Hockey Book Reviews, Greatest Hockey Legends, and 1972SummitSeries.com and author of Legends of Team Canada and The World Cup Of Hockey recently reviewed Off The Post.

Each online posting is by itself, an experience to be enjoyed in the immediate moment. But when you pick out the best and put it into a book, Pakarinen's contributions become an entertaining and thoughtful archive of the past couple of years. But it also offers so much more.

Read the entire review here, then check out the Off The Post site here. Get yours today!

Three years ago, Kenny Jönsson came to Sweden to play during the lockout. Last night, his Rogle took the step back to the Swedish Elite League. Here's what Jönsson had to say about things in 2005, when his NHL comrades had returned to North America and he stayed with the small club, one step below the Elite League.

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Does everybody love the underdogs?

There he was, sitting by the curb, with a little cup in front of him. Well, sitting is not the right word. He was on his knees, with his arms extended, palms pressed together. He was from Romania, said the cardboard sign in front of him.

I pulled him up and asked him to come with me. I was going to the coffee shop anyway. Here we are now, I'm blogging away, and he, Hristo, seems to like brownies. He's already had three of them, and a huge caffe latte.

But, soon, we'll have to go. I have to go to a hockey game, and he back to work.

I've been talking about winning with a lot of hockey players and coaches in the last two three weeks. The interesting thing is that winning isn't the only thing for them. I find that comforting. When we kick the ball for the first time, or stand in the snow watching others play hockey, it's not about winning, is it?

On that note, let's walk down the Memory Lane, and see if we can't find my first hockey sweater there. Keep reading it below, or here.

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In 1977, I bought my first LP. I took bus number 64 to downtown Helsinki and walked to the pharmacy slash record store across the street from the market. Now, I already had a bunch of tapes at home, but this was the first real record I bought.

It came down to two records: The Happy Days album "Fonzie's favorites" and Elvis's "The Rocking Days." After a long deliberation, I chose Elvis. I mean, he was The King, and even if I didn't know it then, he had the record for most number one hit singles on the Billboard 100 chart back then, 17.

Then, the Beatles topped him, and got 20.

And now, Mariah Carey stepped on Elvis's blue suede shoes when she scored her 18th number one hit.

The Fonz writes children's books. Heyyyy!

Here's a little something I was thinking about today. It's a little story about Ed Belfour whom I happen to like, but who's been a little unlucky recently.

Just two games earlier, Belfour had shut out Mora, Leksand's archirival, some 30 miles from Leksand, and was celebrated as the savior he was supposed to be. In the away game against the same Mora, Belfour had a save percentage of .840 when they lost 4-3.
And then there was the game against Rogle.

Read the whole piece here.

Oh, here's another one.

That would be somewhere after his monstrous 1986-87 season when he scored 93 points in 44 games but before he returned to Karpat and scored 67 points in 28 Division I games. In other words, somewhere during his TPS years when he won four Finnish championships in five years.

Read it here.

Here's my latest from iihf.com:

The regular season is long gone, but let’s look back for just a second and put together an All-Star team, based on the players’ performances between October and March. Drum roll, please... And the envelope... thank you... here we go.

Read it here.

Here's my column from the April issue of Scanorama. Happy landings!

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Another one on nhl.com, this time a little special.

I am ready. Headphones are already on, recording device probably will be ready, all I need now is you people in North America to call me at (718) 395-1775. My fellow Euros can call me at +358 9 2316 5817.
When to call me on Wednesday, April 2? I will be available to talk between 9 p.m. CET (3 pm EST) and 2 am CET (8 pm EST). After that, if you do call, feel free to leave a message, but don’t expect me to answer, I will be fast asleep.

More below or here.

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For those keeping score: I moved to Sweden ten years ago today. Hurra!