Merry Christmas!

I'm in the middle of a seven hour wait between flights as I sit in Edmonton on my way home from vacation in the Dominican with family.

There's some hockey talk below. If you care or not here's some pics I snapped near the 19th latitude....

This is the way to spent the WHL break. One of the nice beaches at the resort located on the North coast near Puerto Plata.

Completely crazy local Dominicans. Here a group of kids are entertaining the tourist with some waterfall cliff diving. It was pretty amazing stuff.

Our resort the Bahia Principie. The food was great, everybody was super friendly. It's a four star resort and I would definitely recommend it. Wow.

Me and my sister Nancy hanging out on one of the excursions into some of the small towns and villages.

Swift Current Indians latest prospect. I was trying to so some recruiting for my buddy Joe Carnahan and the Tribe. just looks like a ball player doesn't he? 20000 pesos and a one-way ticket was the asking price. Darlin tells me he can play left field and pitch too. Give him a call Joey! As much as I tried, he wouldn't sell me his hat.

Here's a cave we found when we rented some powerboats and got after it on the Atlantic.

My diva of a niece Tianna. The little four year old packs a wallop. She never shys away from a camera. Ever.

One of the local kids we were giving treats to on our excursion. Look at the great forum he shows while running alongside our jeep at 40 km/h. Nice catch.

It was a good time but it's nice to be back on Canadian soil. You meet people from all over the world at a resort like that. It's funny, as soon as you tell them you're from Saskatchewan automatically their reaction is "oh the Roughriders!" It's our province's identity no doubt. A few Canadians knew of Swift Current for similar reasons. There first words were "oh yes, the Swift Current Broncos". All the more reason why this team and franchise means so much to us.

Honestly I didn't think of hockey, or the broadcasts of anything while I was down there. It was nice to get completely removed for awhile. I'm hoping the players and the staff did the same thing over the break.

The Broncos get back at it Friday night at home against the visiting Medicine Hat Tigers to begin a weekend home-and-home series. Last year the Broncos used the first weekend back from the break to play some of their best hockey. We will see what they have in store this year as they look to turn the tides after limping into the break.

A couple of injuries has me concerned. Cody Eakin didn't play a game on the swing because of a concussion. He should be good to go barring any setbacks over the holidays. Another injury was R.J Larochelle who took a shoulder to the face in the final game against Seattle. Not sure on his status.... I hope he's ok but I don't have a good feeling on this one. He's had some problems in the past. We will hopefully get an update on Friday's broadcast.

The Broncos play the Tigers for the third time this season. The Broncos have won both previous meetings 7-2 in the 'Hat in September and 3-0 at the I-plex in October. The Tigers finished off strong into the break and aren't missing any of their top players due to World Juniors. How did Tyler Ennis not even get an invite to the selection camp? He's a clutch performer and big game player. He would have been this year's version of Darren Helm.

Well that killed about half an hour. It's back to my least favorite game... the airport sit n' wait.

Take care, see you all back at the rink Friday.

Jon