Once upon a time there was a female brain cell that by mistake happened to end up in a man’s head. She looked around nervously but it was all empty and quiet. “Hello?” she cried, but no answer. “Is there anyone here?” she cried a little louder, but still no answer. Now the female brain cell started to feel alone and scared and yelled: “HELLO, IS THERE ANYONE HERE?”

Then she heard a voice from far, far away: “Hello, we’re down here…”

from IEH

The Mississippi RiverKings of the Central Hockey League have added two more players to its roster leading into training camp. The team announced today that it has agreed to terms with forwards Darrell Stoddard and Steve Slonina. Stoddard will be returning for his third season with the RiverKings while Slonina will be entering his fifth pro season after playing all but two of his career games in the ECHL. These signings bring to 15 the number of players that the RiverKings have signed for the upcoming season. Training camp opens October 8 with the season opener on October 19.

Slonina, 26, has played 263 professional games, scoring 63 goals and assisting on 71. He has played the past four seasons in the ECHL with the Gwinnett Gladiators (2003-2004); Toledo Storm (2004-2005); Stockton Thunder (2005-2006 and 2006-2007); Greenville Grrrowl (2005-2006) and Charlotte Checkers (2006-2007).

“I had some good conversations with Coach McCelland earlier this summer and he had a lot of good things to say about the organization,” Slonina said. “I talked to guys I know that have played or are playing in the CHL and they had good things to say as well.”

The native of Abington, MA spilt last season with Stockton and Charlotte. He started the 2006-2007 campaign with the Thunder and had ten goals and 17 assists in 55 games. Slonina was traded in early March to Charlotte, where he collected three goals and three assists in 17 games. He has registered two 20 goals season in the ECHL, 20 in 2003-2004 and 22 in 2005-2006.

“I see myself as very a versatile player who can play any position,” Slonina stated. “I was a defenseman up until college and have played some defense in my pro career too. I can also be gritty and score goals. Anything that is asked of me, I will do it.”

Slonina, 5-foot-11, 195 pounds, began his pro career with a two game stint with Lowell of the AHL in 2003 which followed a four year career at Division I UMass-Lowell. In college, Slonina totaled 23 goals and 36 assists in 132 games. He was the River Hawks’ second leading overall scorer during his senior season of 2002-2003 behind current Colorado Eagle Ed McGrane.

“One of the things I am very excited about is going to a new league,” Slonina said. “I will have a chance to play in different rinks and cities, as well as meet new people.”

Stoddard, 25, will be entering his third pro season and third with the RiverKings. Last season, the Red Deer, Alberta native scored 13 goals and had 18 assists in 58 games. In the RiverKings’ postseason run, Stoddard scored the overtime game winning goal in game five of the squad’s Northern Conference Semifinal victory over the Bossier-Shreveport Mudbugs.

Darrell Stoddard skating with my favorite hockey player

“I struggled a bit in the playoffs in the scoring department, but I was glad to get that big one to allow us to move on,” Stoddard said. “I am looking forward to coming back, knowing that we are working on going even further in the postseason this year.”

Stoddard’s two-season totals with the RiverKings are: 31 goals and 42 assists in 118 games. Prior to arriving in the Mid-South, he was the 2001 Royal Bank Cup (Canadian National Junior ‘A’ Championship) MVP, a three-time Alberta Junior Hockey League All-Star and an ACAC first team all-star in his one season of college hockey at South Alberta Institute of Technology.

“My first two seasons here (with the RiverKings) were great,” Stoddard said. “We improved as a team from my first season to my second and we plan to continue that trend this season.”
RIVERKINGS SIGNED PLAYERS FOR 2007-2008
Cody Blanshan D
Ryan Campbell LW
Aaron Davis C
Louis Dumont (vet) C
Ryan Held C
Ryan Kindret F
Derek Landmesser (vet) D
Jason Lawmaster (vet) D
Steve Makway D
Brian Mullally D
David Nimmo C
Dan Riedel F
Steve Slonina RW
Darrell Stoddard RW
Chad Woollard (vet) F

Check out this great bit over at Gizmodo about Trekstor’s decision to name one of their latest mp3 players the iBeat Blaxx. I’m just amazed that they’re shocked by the way the name was received. Did no one there say the name out loud? Geeze.

Arthur Davidson, the inventor of the Harley-Davidson motorcycle, died and went to heaven. At the gates, St. Peter told Arthur, “Since you’ve been such a good man and your motorcycles have changed the world,
your reward is, you can hang out with anyone you want in Heaven.”

Arthur thought about it for a minute, then said, “I want to hang out with God.”

St. Peter took Arthur to the Throne Room and introduced him to God.

God recognized Arthur and commented, “Okay, so you were the one who invented the Harley Davidson motorcycle?”

Arthur said, “Yes, that’s me.”

God said, “Well, what’s the big deal in inventing something that’s pretty unstable, makes noise and pollution and can’t run without a road?”

Arthur was apparently embarrassed, but finally he said, “Excuse me, but aren’t You the inventor of woman?”

God said, “Yes.”

“Well,” said Arthur, “professional to professional, you have some major design flaws in your invention:

1. There’s too much inconsistency in the front-end protrusions…

2. It chatters constantly at high speeds…

3. Most of the rear ends are too soft and wobble too much.

4. The intake is placed way too close to the exhaust…

5. And the maintenance costs are enormous!”

“Hmmmmm, you have some good points there,” replied God, “hold on.”

God went to His Celestial super computer, typed in a few words and waited for the results. The computer printed out a slip of paper and God read it.

“Well, it may be true that my invention is flawed,” God said to Arthur, “but according to these numbers, more men are riding my invention than yours.”

And check out PCWeenies.org for more like this one.

1. If you ask me technical questions please don’t argue with me because you don’t like my answer. If you think you know more about the topic, why ask? And if I’m arguing with you…it’s because I am positive that
I am correct, otherwise I’d just say “I don’t know” or give you some tips on where to look it up, I don’t have the time to just argue for the sake of it.

2. Starting a conversation by insulting yourself (i.e. “I’m such an idiot”) will not make me laugh, or feel sorry for you; all it will do is remind me that yes, you are an idiot and that I am going to hate having to talk to you. Trust me; you don’t want to start a call that way.

3. I am ok with you making mistakes, fixing them is my job. I am not ok with you lying to me about a mistake you made. It makes it much harder to resolve and thus makes my job more difficult. Be honest and we can get the problem resolved and continue on with our business.

4. There is no magic “Fix it” button. Everything takes some amount of work to fix, and not everything is worth fixing or even possible to fix. If I say that you just need to re-do a document that you accidentally deleted 2 months ago, please don’t get mad at me. I’m not ignoring your problem, and it’s not that I don’t like you, I just can’t always fix everything.

5. Not everything you ask me to do is “urgent”. In fact, by marking things as “urgent” every time, you almost ensure that I treat none of it as a priority.

6. You are not the only one who needs help, and you usually don’t have the most urgent issue. Give me some time to get to your problem, it will get fixed.

7. Emailing me several times about the same issue in the same day is not only unnecessary, it’s highly annoying. Emails will stay until I delete them, I won’t delete them until I’m done with them. I will typically respond as soon as I have a useful update. If it is an urgent issue, let me know (see number 5).

8. Yes, I prefer email over telephone calls. It has nothing to do with being friendly, it’s about efficiency. It is much faster and easier for me to list out a set of questions that I need you to answer than it is for me to call and ask you them one by one. You can find the answers at your leisure and while I’m waiting I can work on other problems.

9. Yes, I seem blunt and rude. It’s not that I mean to, I just don’t have the time to sugar coat things for you. I assume we are both adults and can handle the reality of a problem. If you did something wrong, I will tell you. I don’t care that it was a mistake, because it really makes no difference to me. Don’t take it personal, I just don’t want it to happen again.

10. And finally, yes, I can read your email, I can see what web pages you look at while you are at work, yes, I can access every file on your work computer, and I can tell if you are chatting with people on an instant messenger or chat room (and can also read what you are typing). But no, I don’t do it. It’s unethical, I’m busy, and in all reality you aren’t all that interesting. So unless I am instructed to specifically monitor or investigate your actions, I don’t. There really are much more interesting things on the internet than you.

Wow, first the use of the replay, and now there’s technology so advanced the NHL feels it doesn’t really need goal judges. And of course, if the NHL says that teams don’t have to provide seats behind the goals for judges, the money makers are going to capitalize!

From FanNation

Changes for NHL goal judges
Posted: Sunday August 26, 2007 08:57AM ET

Visitors to NHL games around the league this season likely will notice a significant change in the stands behind each net. Teams have been granted permission by the league to relocate the two goal judges’ positions, opening up some prime seat locations in the loge. But the displaced judges won’t be out of work. Most of them will move, plungers in hand, to the press box. If that takes them too far from the action, they’ll be positioned elsewhere in the building, perhaps at the Zamboni entrance.

And from Waiting for Stanley

Goal judges going the way of the dinosaur
I guess the goal judge can press a button from a remote from the press box to turn the light on after a goal is scored, but really, the goal light may as well go extinct as well, unless it is flashed after a video review shows a goal. But the refs and video make the calls now for the most part.

And according to the Philedelphia Inquirer, looks like the Flyers are definitely going to jump on this opportunity.

NHL verdict goes against goal judges
Luxury seats for fans will displace them at the Wachovia Center.
By Tim Panaccio
Inquirer Staff Writer
When the NHL instituted video replay in the 1991-92 season, the idea was to help the referees determine whether a goal had been scored.

Few probably considered that it might make goal judges all but obsolete. Yet improvements in technology have achieved just that.

This season, all goal judges - who used to sit directly behind the goals - will be moved to the press box or similar locations depending on arena configurations.

The Flyers, like many clubs, are about to capitalize financially on the relocation by converting the goal judges’ boxes into luxury seating.

Work crews have redesigned the boxes at the Wachovia Center into 12 “goal judge seats” that consist of two rows of three seats behind each goal.

The new leather seats are deeper than other seats and have waiter or waitress service.

But there’s a hitch. The seats are packaged with the lease of a suite for both Flyers and Sixers games. A midlevel suite and six goal-judge seats would cost $225,000, according to Shawn Tilger, vice president of marketing and communications for the Flyers.