All things considered

Going into this season, one of my goals was to have more fun. I remembered that hockey hounding was a hobby, not a business, and success can be defined many ways.

When nearly 40 people -- from collectors to dealers to fans (the biggest crowd of the season) -- showed up for the New York Rangers on Wednesday morning, I knew it could have been a frustrating morning. Instead, with Colin in tow thanks to a week off for Thanksgiving, it turned out to be a pretty fun morning.

All told, Colin and I came home after the Blueshirts' morning skate with another 20 autographs, including nine on his team sheet.

Big names, if you want to call them that, to sign Colin's team sheet (made with Microsoft's Word program) were Peter Prucha, Michal Rozsival, Jim Schoenfeld and Fedor Tyutin.

Among other players who signed for us that morning, the cards shown above are, from left, Marek Malik, Prucha and Rozsival. Others signing cards were Marcel Hossa and Paul Mara.

Granted, we missed out on the big names -- Jaromir Jagr, Henrik Lundqvist and Brendan Shanahan. But it certainly wasn't for the lack of effort. In fact, for about five seconds, Colin and I had Jagr all to ourselves.

With a clutch of people surrounding Lundqvist, we peeled off when I spied Jagr trying to sneak out of the hotel. I asked whether he'd sign Colin's team sheet, but he motioned to his coffee. When I offered to hold the uncapped cup of Joe, I sensed Jagr was willing to sign.

Unfortunately, the crowd joined the hunt and began to engulf Jagr. Knowing that our moment had passed, we stepped away from the crush of people. From what I heard, too, someone bumped into Jagr, spilling that cup of coffee on him. After that, it's my guess he was done signing for the day.

Would it have been sweet to snag autographs from Jagr, Lundqvist and Shanny? Certainly. But, more importantly, it was more about spending some time with my son, doing something that we enjoy. I'll take that over three hastily written scribbles any day.

As for the only puck I got that day, keeping alive a three-season-long streak, it belonged to New York's Daniel Girardi, and not Jagr. More than one person, though, commented that Girardi's signature looks like Jagr's scribble from a few years ago.