A couple of weeks ago, when we were out skating, I saw a group of middle-aged men play a game of shinny at one end of the big ice. What really caught my eye was the fact that they all, every one one of them, wore helmets.

Back in the 1980s when I was a kid, people wore just cool sweaters, and nobody wore a helmet playing shinny.

We didn’t wear helmets when we went sledding, or skating, or for bike rides, either.

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It’s funny how some small things from the past stick to mind when, especially in retrospect, there’s nothing really truly special about that particular moment. For me, one of those moments came in a road hockey game in the backyard of our apartment building in Helsinki.

I didn’t usually take the sticks I used in real games to road hockey games, because I wanted to save them, but that one Koho had the perfect blade for me, and it made my wrist shots better than ever. And I thought I’d need my best shot in the game that awaited.

Well, it wasn’t really a game, it was just me and one friend, my best friend, taking turns shooting, and being in goal. Armed with just hockey goalie’s gloves, but no shin pads, the best bet would have been to shoot low, but who wants to shoot low when you can go topshelf?

Especially with a good stick.

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One winter day nine years ago, I walked four blocks from our apartment to the restaurant where I was supposed to meet a young Finnish hockey player named Tuomo Ruutu. He was 20, had just turned 20, and he was one of the most-sought after prospects in Europe. He played for Helsinki IFK, but had been drafted by the Chicago Blackhawks in the first round, ninth overall in 2001, and he was expected to sign with the team and leave Finland after the season.

I was meeting him for an interview, but not just any old interview. It was my first assignment for The Hockey News, (one of) the most respected hockey publication(s) in the world.

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Yesterday, on my way to the gym, I thought I saw a 50-krona bill in the snow on the pavement. I stopped to check - of course - and realized that it was, indeed, a mustard yellow bill with the singer Jenny Lind on it. I quickly picked it up, and then, before slipping it inside my red mitten, I looked to my left and to my right, to see if somebody was watching me.

I’d like to say I did so to find the poor old lady who had dropped it so I could return it, but that was my second thought. That did come before “I can’t believe my luck!” My first thought, though, was: Who’s pulling my leg?

Now, I’m a joker. I sometimes tell a joke, although I can’t seem to remember very many of them at the same time so I mostly do puns, wordplay, and sarcasm. In fact, I monitor my development in Swedish by seeing Wife’s reactions to my puns. Ten years ago, she used to say she’d heard my puns before. In third grade. These days, I seem to be making 7th grade puns.

My Dad, on the other hand, is a prankster. He’s the kind of guy who hides eggs in other people’s pockets, or sticks pepper inside a chocolate bar.

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