There are some strange things that happen in your late 20s. On one hand, you think you’re too old to be getting an occasional zit, and on the other, you feel you’re too young for the occasional grey hair. Although it’s true that people have been calling me an old man since I was 17, I really felt that it was exaggerated for the most part. That was... Until Sunday morning when I had — what I consider — my first real ‘Old Man’ moment.

I’d gone to McDonalds and saw they had a sign for their new mobile app. I wasn’t sure what it was supposed to do, or why I would need it to order fast food, so I inquired about it. What I heard, was the dumbest thing I’d ever heard. Apparently, it lets you order your food before going so that you can sit at the curb and let the employees walk it out to you. I didn’t see how that would be anymore convenient that just using the drive-thru, nor did I view this as an efficient improvement.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with technology if it does something useful, or makes my life easier in any way. I use skip the dishes weekly, I have a robot vacuum and a robot mop that I won’t be returning at any point, I enjoy one remote controlling every appliance in my house, and you can not convince me that a remote start isn’t necessary. That stupid app though? That’s not convenient, useful, or even a new way to get fast food. That’s what A&W used to do back in the stupid ages. You’d park, someone would come out on roller skates, take your order, and then wheel it out for you. It was dumb then, and it’s dumb now.

Now that you’ve read that, you know the state of mind I was in when I went to 7-11 immediately after McDonalds and they asked me if I had their app... I didn’t even want to know what it did, I just lost my sanity for a moment and told the teenager behind the til about how back in the day, we didn’t need these goddamn apps to get a Lotto-Max and a gas station corn dog. We’d just go to the store, ask for what we wanted, get it, swipe your card and be done. Nowadays you’ve got these damn kids walking around staring at their phone all day being so reliant on technology that they’ve started accepting things that are slower and less efficient as useful just because there’s an app attached.

When I got home, I had quite the moment of self-awareness. 27, man, it’s a weird age.

Incidentally, I wonder if anyone in the Oilers organization has these moments of self-awareness. Scheduling Fan Appreciation Night on game 77 probably seemed like a good idea at the time, if we’d clinched the playoffs, I’m sure this would have gone over quite well. Unfortunately, that is not the case. This team has been out of the playoffs since November, and other than a few small spurts, it’s pretty much been a disaster start-to-finish. To top it all off, the Oilers came out, got a 3 goal lead and then pissed it away with enough force to melt all the snow that happened to cover the city today. I’ll give a bit of detail on how it happened, if only, to celebrate Connor McDavid.

1st Period:

The Oilers get off to a really nice start. Just three minutes into the game, Matt Benning dumps the puck in, Sergei Bobrovski mishandles the puck straight to Connor, he passes it to a wide open Ryan Nugent-Hopkins who puts the puck in the net before Bobrovski could get back. With that, Connor McDavid hits 100 points.

There it is. Two consecutive seasons of 100 points. That’s one hell of an accomplishment, and regardless of how the team has done this year, the captain should be extremely proud. I don’t typically include gifs in games like this, but 100 points only happens once per season for this man.

We could hardly celebrate 100 points though, because there was a really ugly incident 10 seconds later. Connor and Zach Werenski run into each other and take down linesman Steve Barton. His head hits the ice hard, and he’s eventually stretchered off and taken to the hospital. I’ll link a gif of it here, but it’s pretty tough to watch.

Two minutes after that awful incident though, Connor hits 40 goals. He comes in with the Nuge, takes a pass from Nege, goes in alone and scores on the backhand. It was an excellent goal and it looked as though the Oilers were going to give the fans something to be proud of on fan appreciation night.

A few minutes later, with the Oilers on the Powerplay, Drake Cagguila makes it 3-0 with a nice wrist shot. The assists were from Leon Draisaitl and captain Connor. If you’re keeping track, that gives McDavid 102 points on the year. So far.

So the Oilers were up 3-0 half a period in, and the NHL decided that in light of fan appreciation night, the Columbus Blue Jackets would be forced to forfeit the game and that’s all she wrote. Oilers win a quick one 3-0.

Notes:

• Connor McDavid is the best player in the NHL. He scored 3 points in ten minutes and ended the game.
• Cam Talbot was perfect in recording a 10 minute shutout.
• I’d like to see more out of Milan Lucic but he only saw the ice for a few minutes.

Editor: You can’t just make up endings the way you want. Tell the readers what happened.

Patrick: Ok, fine. The Oilers got scored on a few times and went into the 1st intermission tied.

2nd Period:

I’m being told I have to tell you about this, too. So the Oilers came onto the ice tied with the Columbus Blue Jackets at 3 after one, and left the ice down by 3 after two.

I’m not telling you more than that. I appreciate my fans here more than the Oilers appreciate there’s at the arena. As a result, this is all you need to know. Ok, fine, I’ll add that Cam Talbot got pulled after the 5th goal and now Laurent Brossoit is in net.

Also, Tomas Vanek got a hat-trick. Yes, the same Vanek that the Oilers should have signed in the summer.

3rd Period:

See, I don’t think you really want to know about this either. I guess the Oilers only let in one goal this frame, so that’s a step in the right direction. This time I’m holding firm.

Non-revisionist Notes:

• Connor McDavid is still the best player in the game. Hart trophy or not, there’s no question, he is the only reason the Oilers aren’t gunning for a 30 point season.
• Cam Talbot was good of late. In the Past 20 games he’d been posting his career average numbers — something to expect next year. But tonight, it really wasn’t going for him. We’ve seen that happen way too much this year. Completely unacceptable.
• The Oilers allowed seven straight goals on fan appreciation night. It included blowing a 3 goal lead and it wasted a 3-point performance by the game’s very best. It’s an absolute disgrace.
• I bet you were starting to get annoyed while reading the introduction and me not talking about hockey, I bet you’ve done a 180 on that.
• There a 5 games left, if you’re still watching the games now, we both know very well that regardless of you claims of being ‘done with it’ you’re going to tune into the last five as well. It’s an addiction. It as its ups and downs.
• Incidentally, I’m starting to think that my ripe old age of 27 doesn’t have much to do with my occasional grey hairs. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’d never found one of those silver bastards on my head until this season.
• Again, this is fan appreciation night.
• This season, it can’t end soon enough.