Sharpy's Corner: How I Spent My Summer Vacation

(09.02.05) Oh, what an exciting time to be a hockey fan/player, as we are heralding the return of rec league hockey, and it's pale imitator, the NHL. Actually, the return of the 24%-less overpaid millionaires of the National Hockey League is getting me all giddy. Yeah, I missed it, and the lack of the NHL probably reduced my interest in the great game of hockey over the summer months. Mind you, if you had to play defence with Scott Hutcheon all summer, wouldn't you get sick of the game, too? How do you do it, Landon?

Anyway, nobody from the NHL or NHLPA read my page-and-a-half-long solution to every single on-ice problem the NHL is facing these days (click here to read that), but the stuff they did tinker with should be exciting. It's about time they put in shootouts. Now all NHL fans can whine and cry out that a shootout is no way to decide a hockey game - a complaint reserved purely for the international fan for many years (and AHL fans, but then, we never had any of those last season in Edmonton). The Sharps have yet to endure a shootout, or, to use the more colloquial European football term, "penalties", in our brief history. Heck, we only had our first tie game last year. There are Wal-Mart employees who have been paid more overtime than we have.

Also, the NHL has finally followed the ERHL's lead and removed the two-line pass. I predict Martin Brodeur will break Grant Fuhr's record of 15 assists in a season in '05-'06, and will be the first goalie to have a goal of his waved off because he shot the puck from outside that strange trapezoid crease that will be behind the nets this season. Finally, it's also nice to see that the NHL went out of its way to appease the fans of the Minnesota Wild and kept that dreadful no-touch icing out of the game. Races to negate icing calls are to the Land of 10,000 Lakes as NASCAR is to Carolina, and both competitors have an equal number of teeth.

The Yellow Jackets had as bipolar a season as one can imagine this summer in the ERHL, winning their first seven games, then never again for the rest of the year. It's good to see Adam Dickinson leave, too, as his 25 goals in 11 games were just dragging the whole team down. We'll also miss Ernst Gerhardt and Matt Stephens, both of whom are bolting for not-so sunnier climes, but at least Matt will have a mini-farewell tour for the first few games of the season.

Personally, after the Jackets' season wrapped up, me and Bee Sharps superfan Brandi went on a road excursion throughout the American Southwest. Utah, for those who have never been, is Mars. It is the planet Mars. Some truly unbelievable scenery unique to that region, like Mars (I've been there. Twice). Also, there are these strange beings called "Mormons" who water down their beer and wear full body underwear in the middle of the desert. There not so strange on Mars after all (again, been there. Twice).

I also managed to finally get to the bottom of my bootleg....err, I mean my 100% legally obtained version of Photoshop. The results of my sleepless experiments are littered about the newly polished beesharps.com (call it version 2.2, if you must). The hockey cards and pictures have all been redone, the colours match those of our jerseys and, oh yeah, we have a new logo! Typically, if I was in a marketing department, I'd have included some inane press release, rife with such buzzwords like "brand synergy" and "wordmark" and give you an indepth three-paragraph explanation behind the meaning of each wing on Sharpy's back. Fortunately, it's my belief that marketing departments will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes, so, here's my press release for the new logo :

Here's our new logo. I think it looks kinda neat.