But I wasn't going to take this lying down. I figured that every day I lasted was one more day of experience that I could put on my resume. H.R. had outlined my employment terms and my probationary period was three months. At any time before February 15th, I could be fired without cause or even termination pay. But if I lasted until then, it became harder to get rid of me.

If they weren't going to train me, I'd train myself. Watching and not being able to ask questions turned out to be a great way to learn. The TV division was like radio on steroids, and there were many more layers of technical guys here. Fortunately for me, most of them belonged to unions, and they didn't really care what Williams thought since he had little power over them. They hated being bothered when a broadcast was going on, but in the quiet times they were more than happy to answer all my dumb questions.

I worked long hours for someone who wasn't actually doing anything, and once I got home, I went to work too. If I got any kind of assignment, I researched the details carefully, because I knew everyone would be jumping on any error. I recorded videos of myself and figured out how I could project better and look more relaxed. I watched broadcasters from other networks to see what I could improve upon. I took April's makeup advice so I could look camera-ready in five minutes. Maybe I did get a break because of genetics, so I might as well stop fighting it and appear attractive on camera. While I wasn't philosophically on board with being the cute sports girl, someday I might get to ask questions that showed I knew the sport and thus dispel some stereotypes at the same time.

One thing that had impressed me about Jimmy was how hard he worked. He practiced and prepared harder than anyone I had ever met, and then he was ready when his chances came. Many players who got drafted in the first round never fulfilled their promise. My opportunity was now and I was going to work my ass off to take advantage of it.

All I did was work. Oh, of course I worked out too; I needed to relieve all my stress. I managed to catch every Organ Donor game and even two practices. They were now in second to last place! And I circled February 15th on my calendar and crossed my fingers. Or I would have crossed them if I had a free moment.

35.

Doggy-style

After only three weeks of "training," Bernie gave up and decided to throw me into the fire. But we both knew I wasn't ready yet and he didn't want to lower our programming quality, so he chose my assignments carefully. Any hockey event that nobody was interested in, I got to cover. Rink maintenance, minor hockey stuff, fundraisers, old-timer tournaments, heart-warming kid stories, crazed fans-I got them all. But never the Canucks, of course, and even important junior hockey stories went to someone else. But since I was taking up part of the salary pool, Bernie wanted content he could at least run during the hours that nobody was watching.

Although we were supposed to rotate and work with different cameramen, I usually ended up with the same guy, Zack McConnell. He was a nice guy, but a stoner who couldn't always be relied upon to perform properly. Luckily, given the calibre of stories we were doing, filming quality was never an issue.

One morning, Zack and I were driving out to Langley in the C2C Sports van.

"Well, Zack, I think this story may be a new low-even for me."

"Coolio. What's shaking?"

"We are interviewing a dog who plays hockey. I have to ask, did anyone actually do these stories before I got here? Or have they been saving them up?"

"No clue," he replied. I wondered if he was stoned right now. If so, I should be driving the van.

"Zack, did you do something wrong to get stuck working with the station pariah?"

"Who's that?"

"Me."

That puzzled him for a bit. "Oh hey, well, I guess it was the video."

"What video?" Talking to him took patience.

"Well, I filmed my girlfriend and I doing it, you know, doggy-style."

"And?" I wanted to get that image out of my mind as quickly as possible. Zack was about 5'10" and 130 pounds of snow-whiteness.

"I accidentally handed that video in, when we were, you know, doing the highlights of the Giants' game."

"And they ran it?"

"Yeah, nobody checked it first. Sandy announced, 'In WHL action tonight, the Giants came from behind to dominate the Cougars, and here are the highlights.' And then they, you know, ran the video."

I was cracking up, and Zack chuckled too.

"You must have gotten a lot of complaints."

"Well, hey, actually that was the weird part, we didn't get any. Probably why I didn't get fired, right? I figured our viewers were the kind of guys who pay to see that shit, you know?"

More likely we didn't have any viewers awake at that time. And I would pay a lot not to see Zack's skinny white butt.

We got to the Langley farmhouse with the canine Gretzky. The whole family was waiting for us: Walter, Dorothy, and Bandit the golden retriever. They were very excited about being on TV.

"Oh, the kids wanted to be here too, but they had to work," Dorothy explained. She had cookies and coffee ready for us, which was very sweet. Zack inhaled the food.

"I hope you're not disappointed, Dot," said Walter.

"Shush up," she said and blushed pink.

"Dot was hoping that they would send Jeremy Ormiston. She thinks he's quite the looker." Jeremy was the top reporter at the station. I could not imagine his expression if he were asked to spend three hours on the road to interview a dog.

"Jeremy has to work the Canucks game tonight," I explained.

"I don't believe we've seen you on TV before, dear," said Dorothy.

Most people who slept at night hadn't. I smiled brightly.

"You'll have to let us know when this will be on, so we can let everyone know."

"Gosh, Dorothy, it probably won't be on during prime time hours. But I will tell you so you can record it."

Walter had created a mini-rink in his basement with painted-on lines and two small nets. Bandit had actually been trained to carry a mini-stick in his mouth, but he did most of the puck handling with his front paws. It was very cute to see him moving the puck down and score a goal. I hoped like hell that Zack was getting good video. Last week, when I interviewed this little girl who had raised money for Canucks Place, the tops of our heads weren't even in the frame.

I asked Dorothy and Walter some questions about how Bandit first started doing this, and how they had trained him. I was wrapping things up when she interrupted me.

"Kelly, would you like to play hockey with Bandit?"

"Me?"

"Yes, he loves it when someone gets down on the floor with him. Walter would do it, but his knees are so arthritic."

I checked out Dorothy's knees, they looked fine but she didn't seem inclined to kneel down either. Zack smiled vaguely, but that was his normal reaction to everything.

"Um, okay. What does he like to do?"

"You could play goal," suggested Walter. "Try to keep him from scoring. He loves that."

I took off my jacket and rolled up my sleeves. Was there no end to the glamour in my life?

Walter handed me a mini-stick. Bandit did seem to perk up as soon as I got down to his level and got into position. He started to growl softly and circled the puck away from me.

"C'mon, Bandit," I said. "Show me what you've got."

He came straight in and pushed the puck towards the left side of the net. I flicked out the mini-stick and made the save. The puck hit the far wall and Bandit looked surprised. Well, as surprised as a golden retriever with a mini-stick in his mouth could look. My reflexes must have been faster than Walter's.

Dorothy urged him on and Bandit took another attempt, on my right this time, but I saved that as well. I wondered if I was being too competitive, and I should let the dog score-like you would with a small child. But Walter found it quite funny and laughed loudly.

"Golly, Bandit. Looks like you met your match."

The dog dropped the stick and picked up the puck in his mouth. He eyed me and made a mad dash. Maybe he was trying to go five-hole, but since I was kneeling on the ground there was no five-hole. 75 pounds of dog velocity hit me and knocked me onto the floor. As I fell, my mini-stick came up and whacked him in the nose. Bandit started whining pitifully, and Dorothy dashed over.

"Bandit! Are you okay? Did the mean lady hurt you? My poor baby."

Walter and Zack ran over too. I looked up at them through the mesh of the tipped plastic net. Walter pointed down like a ref. "Goal." And Zack was filming the whole thing.

Any hopes I had that the whole embarrassing ending of that video would not be seen by my coworkers were dashed the next day. As I walked to my desk, someone went, "Woof!" Then someone on the other side of the bullpen yelped.

"Has everyone seen the tape?" I wondered aloud. They all replied by barking. I realized they were all mocking me, but I had seen the playback and it was funny. And if looking like an idiot was a reason to get fired, a lot of people would be in trouble.

I laughed along with them. It wasn't like we were all going to be friends, but I think people were softening. I was working hard and I wasn't afraid to laugh at myself. And after that, my new nickname became Doggy-style. It wasn't perfect, but it was marginally better than BJ.

36.

Blonde Ambition

James

After the game, J.J. and I walked out of the dressing room together.

"Nice game, man," I told him. J.J. had scored a big goal in the second. We had a come-from-behind victory over Columbus, and we now had a four game win streak going. This season was going great.

"Vous aussi," he told me with a grin. "What are you doing now?"

"I'm meeting Astrid, and we're going for dinner. You want to come?"

His friendly expression fell away. "Sorry, Freeze. Can't."

"What's going on?" I asked. Last year we had gone out together after almost every game, but lately he seemed to be avoiding me. "Is something wrong?"

"It's Cherie," he said. "She doesn't like your girlfriend. No, vraiment-she hates her." He shrugged. "Women, right? Mais, I don't want to start any trouble."

"Trouble? They can't sit together for dinner without a food fight breaking out?" He was being a wuss.

"You know nothing of this? There was a meeting for a team fundraiser or something, Cherie had done a bunch of work for this fashion show, and Astrid told her to scrap it because they were doing a wine tasting instead." He shrugged. "According to Astrid, the captain's girlfriend is in charge."

I winced. I really didn't want her causing trouble. Team harmony was important, and I had heard that family feuds could poison the atmosphere. "I'll talk to her."

"Don't do it on my account," he said with a laugh. "I'm only explaining why we can't come for dinner. I try not to get involved."

Astrid and I went out to dinner with some of my teammates and their girlfriends. I liked all the guys on the team, but I suddenly realized that my good friends like J.J., Baller, Mac, and Wheels weren't in the group we socialized with.

Afterwards, we went back to my place. Astrid was sitting in my living room and looking at her phone. She always sat with perfect upright posture. I didn't really want to start a fight tonight, but I figured it was my responsibility.

"Hey, Astrid."

She smiled at me. Sometimes I forgot how beautiful she was, until I really looked at her. Her delicate features and her smooth blonde hair-she looked like the kind of girlfriend I'd always wanted.

"I was talking to J.J. tonight. He said there was some kind of thing with Cherie?"

Astrid's blue eyes widened. "Not really. Cherie had an idea for a very tacky fundraising event, but I recommended that we do something much classier-more in keeping with the image of the Blackhawks."