Some people in Winnipeg want to bring the NHL back up North. I don’t want to sound half baked, but I think it could work, with a new CBA to curb salaries to reasonable levels. Certainly the potential market is much bigger in Winnipeg than it is in Mexico City, which is the next logical place for the NHL to try an expansion franchise.

There’s even a website for the Return of the Jets Campaign with all the information you ever wanted to not read.

I think the NHL will be changed by the CBA talks coming up. I think there will be a labor stoppage, and I think the league might not survive it, to be supplanted by another league or something (if they’re not careful.) I honestly don’t care, as long as good hockey gets played for the Stanley Cup every year. That will happen even if the NHL dies a horrible death. That much history will survive. Won’t it?

Simpson’s quote of the day: “It’s all right, children, just ignore the murderer.” - Ms. Krabapple

I was home sick yesterday. I’m much better today though, I have to say. The weekend was pretty good, though we stayed out too late on Friday and Saturday, which led to a cranky baby. We managed to get the Christmas tree taken to the bonfire pile on Sunday, which was good.

Anyway, I don’t think I’ll be playing Shinny this Saturday, cause I’m still sick, and I don’t like to go outside when I’m sick. Plus, it’s supposed to be fairly cold out, with a good chance it’ll be snowing. I’m such a wuss. Unless I’m feeling 100%, and the weather turns, I think I’ll have to reschedule. Don’t let that stop the rest of you though.

Simpson’s quote of the day: “Why ye mutious dogs. From now on I’ll be requiring hairnets.” - Captain McAllister

I came across one of the reasons that we pay tax in Canada - it’s the National Library, and they have a really cool site called Backcheck: a Hockey Retrospective. The intro was written by Roch Carrier - you know him best for his work writing a piece of Canadian (and Canadien for that matter) history titled “The Sweater.” Anyway, there are a lot of really cool pictures and stories on that site, if you’re into hockey at all.

Second up comes a couple that got sent to my by my brother Dave - both sports news parody sites. SportsGoons has an article about how Saddam Hussein was captured by the Minnesota Wild’s Trap., while The Athletic Reporter has a story about Valdimir Guerrero’s signing titled: Recent World Champion Signs Baseball’s Best Player, No One Cares.

On a less sports related note, I’d been talking lego with Jason and was reminded of two cool sites that I don’t think I’ve posted links to before. Brickshelf has all kinds of Lego info, and scans of instructions and catalogs. Quite cool. If you are in need of lego to build something, you can buy the pieces at all kinds of places, quite ably organized by Bricklink - the Unofficial Lego marketplace.

I feel like all dirty and prostituted, like Dave Chalk for some reason.

Simpson’s quote of the day: “Save me from the wee turtles! They were too quick for me!” - Groundskeeper Willie

Sorry for the lack of post yesterday (and today) but I’ve been busy and haven’t had a chance to do the update that you all so richly deserve.

I do have some good links though, so stay tuned for further details.

Simpson’s quote of the day: “I hope you enjoyed my one-man pie fight, kids!” - Krusty

So, I was browsing my usual news sites, when I saw a mention of Breakey. Apparently the way it works is that you buy a little plastic “key” and insert one into the other, and twist, to see which one breaks. Lather, rinse, repeat. This is mostly an unremarkable toy/game, except for the similarities to a similar game that I remember playing when I was much younger.

I’ve probably regaled some of you with this story before, and some of you have actually done this, so feel free to skip to the Simpson’s quote if you want…

When we’d have hard boiled eggs at Grandma and Grandpa’s farm, we’d have egg battles. Everyone would choose their egg, and then challenge each other to a cracking contest. There was a certain amount of skill in how you banged the two eggs together, and which part of the egg you used as a striking surface. End result was that one egg got cracked, and you ate it. Eventually, a champion would be crowned, and they wouldn’t have to go hungry.

I remember eating more eggs than I really should have, just because I wanted another shot at beating the champ.

Simpson’s quote of the day: “Oh don’t worry Marge. Her idea of wit is nothing more than an incisive observation humorously phrased and delivered with impeccable timing.” - Evelyn

As if to prove my point, 6 of the 7 games yesterday in the NHL went to overtime. Two of them were decided in the extra 5 minutes.

Tentative plans for a shinny afternoon/movie night are for January 24th. The movie on the agenda is “The Pirates of the Carribean.” Times and stuff haven’t been nailed down (nor do I expect them to be any time soon.) Also on the horizon is the second annual table hockey championships, which I think I’m going to tentatively schedule for February 7th. As with last year, I think there will be a lot of NHL Hitz happening then too.

Simpson’s quote of the day: “That’s too funny! I can’t remember when I’ve heard a funnier anecdote! Okay, now you tell one.” - Troy McClure

Erin and I went out to “The Mongolian Grill” for the first time last night. It was pretty good. Though it’s not a new concept, it it a unique restaurant here in Saskatoon (as far as I know) so it was an interesting experience.

To kind of fill you in on how it works - they’ve got a buffet bar with fresh veggies and raw meat - beef, pork, chicken, shrimp, fish, tofu. You take a bowl, fill it with whatever combination of stuff you want, top it off with a combination of some of the 15 sauces, and then hand it to the chef. They cook it up for you, and bring it to your table. Apparently you used to have to pay by weight for your food, which penalizes the bok choy and water chesnut fans of the world for all that water weight, but now it’s “All you can eat” for $14. I made two trips to the buffet, to try out a couple of different sauce combinations. The only caveat is that they’ll charge you $7 if you waste too much food, which is to discourage getting stupid with your last platefull.

I thought it was kind of neat - they give you a bowl of soup to start, and some rice with your meal, then you can just keep going up and giving the chef more stuff to cook as often as you want. The one thing that might have made it a little better would be maybe some sauce combination suggestions. The one that I liked the best was two scoops of ginger sauce and two scoops of sweet & sour sauce.

I figure there are around 4,398,046,511,104 different possible combinations of stirfry, and that’s not even taking proportions into consideration. :-)

Simpson’s quote of the day: “Come see Bottomless Pete, nature’s cruelest mistake.” - Captain McAllister