From NHL.com

Quote:Every hockey player can remember where their love affair with the sport started.

For most, the spark was struck on the nearest body of water to their homes. As soon as the cold descended and the pond, lake, river or even cow pasture froze solid, the neighborhood kids drifted over with skates and sticks thrown over their shoulders looking for some action. They were rarely disappointed, finding legions of like-minded souls strapping on the blades and gliding around the ice waiting for a game of shinny to break out.

It was there -- on those frozen expanses -- that the players became hooked on the speed, grace and excitement of the game, chasing pucks all over the frozen surface.

There were no boards to constrain their enthusiasm, no coaches to dampen their creativity, no stats to feed their ego. Rules were a matter of efficiency, not a stringent set of decrees laid out in a technical rulebook. All of that, not always for the better, would come later for those that moved on to organized hockey

Allan Watt, the vice president of marketing and communications for the Edmonton Oilers, remembers those early hockey-playing days fondly despite being more than a half-decade removed from such simple pleasures.

That's why he is not surprised that Saturday's Heritage Classic at Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium -- the first outdoor game in the League's 86-year history -- has become the biggest story of the 2003-04 NHL regular season. The game will pit the host Edmonton Oilers against the Montreal Canadiens in a type of atmosphere that each of the 56,169 fans will intuitively understand, having experienced a similar scenario in their own childhoods. As a result, there were more than 70,000 requests made for the 7,000 tickets available to the general public.

"From the time when you're a kid in Canada -- wherever you live in North America where snow flies and you can make a rink, or you go for Christmas and your dad takes you out and he turns you loose and you're gliding on this thing, there's some magic in that," Watt said. "The thought of seeing multi-millionaire hockey players skating around outside playing for real points has captured something, and that's about as simple as I could put it."

In Edmonton, the sounds of skates scraping against the hard outdoor ice and the shrieks of excitement from kids -- and the not-so occasional adult, echoing across the prairie is the soundtrack of winter. It runs from the first freeze of late October until the ice finally melts well into the new year.

"Playing outside, playing hockey outside, you can do it at minus-20 Celsius, and you're still OK because you're outside and people do that here," said Watt. "People go to the lake and scrape it off and skate around on it and it's quite cold. We all grew up doing it and it was brought home again when the Oilers played in Montreal this past week.

"All of the Montreal Canadien players in their dressing room were saying we can't wait to get there because no matter where we're from, Kirkland Lake (Ontario) or Timmins (Ontario), we all did that.

"We all went home from school, put away our homework, lied to our parents and said we got it all done, and played hockey every chance we could. Despite the fact that we had never played an organized game outside, we still played it outside."

For sure, though, the stakes will be a little different come Saturday at Commonwealth stadium.

NHL players will be battling for NHL points. There will be referees and coaches keeping control of the game. The players will be decked out in snazzy uniforms instead of a motley assortment of sweaters and parkas. Millions of fans watching on television for the usual Saturday night Hockey Night in Canada telecast on CBC will join the sell-out crowd at Commonweath Stadium to watch the action -- by far trumping the knot of frozen parents usually on hand for the local outdoor contests.

But, the spirit of the undertaking remains unchanged despite the fancy trappings.

"It's the nostalgia of it all, the thought of playing outdoors," said Montreal defenseman Sheldon Souray, who grew up in Elk Point, Alberta, about 155 miles east of Edmonton. "It's like having an old car for some guys.

"I think the kids today get spoiled with so many indoor rinks and rec centers with four sheets of ice in one complex going up, but some of my best memories are playing on community-league rinks, with mitts on under my hockey gloves, scraping the ice every 10 minutes.

"I played a game on a little outdoor rink a couple of years ago for fun where it was 20 below. I loved it."

Souray's sentiments have been echoed by the Edmonton players for the last month.

"The fans and people throughout northern Alberta are all excited about the game," said Jason Smith, the Oilers' captain. "It's been in the media and a topic of conversation around here since the start of training camp.

"I haven't played outdoors since tyke hockey, you know 6 or 7 years old. But that doesn't mean anything, you know. This does mean something. It should be interesting, that's for sure."

Aside from surely being interesting as the novelty that it is, it will also provide a looking glass back into the game's roots, a reaffirmation of the love affair that for so many began on the frozen ponds of their childhood.

Quote:Makoto Yamashina, son of the founder of Bandai, has spoken out against the recent sale of Bandai stocks to Nintendo. According to Yamashina the sale caused significant friction at the Bandai board of directors. Yamashina was against the sale and refused requests from Bandai CEO, Takeo Takasu, that he sell a large portion of his own shares to Nintendo. He states that he argued against Takasu at Bandai board meetings and questioned the timing and motivation of the purchase.

In an interview with Japanese news magazine Sentaku, Yamashina voiced concerns that Nintendo's stake in Bandai may hurt Bandai's close working relationship with Playstation manufacturer Sony. Additionally, he claims that Bandai is currently considering a stock buy-back program and suggests that Bandai should merely have bought back the 2.7% instead of allowing Nintendo to purchase it.

Nintendo now owns 2.7% of Bandai, while Yamashina owns 5.2%. The UFJ Bank, with whom Nintendo worked to acquire its shares, owns a further 6% of Bandai's common stock. If Yamashina had agreed to sell the 2% that had been requested of him, Nintendo would have owned 4.7%. Already, Nintendo and UFJ's combined 8.7% is thought to be the largest single voting block of Bandai's widely dispersed shares. Despite only owning 2.7% of Bandai, if Nintendo is working with UFJ towards a strategic takeover of Bandai, they are actually in a very strong position to do so.

According to the article in Sentaku, "industry insiders" agree with Yamashina's suspicions that Nintendo and UFJ are in fact attempting a takeover of Bandai. It should be noted that Takeo Takasu moved to Bandai from UFJ in 1996. Unlike in North America, it is extremely rare for the heads of Japanese corporations to have not been with the companies for many many years first. Ironically, it was Yamashina, then CEO of Bandai, that recruited Takasu.

Go on! Pick one!

Give it up for Jean-Pierre Jeunet!!

*claps*

They're coming out on DVD tomorrow! So go out and buy a copy and maybe CN will release some of their other series on DVD along with the rest of the episodes of Aqua Teen and Space Ghost.

I say we tell which movies we've recently shelled out dough to see at the theater, and our opinions there of.

Elf:Awesomely cute, funny movie...saw it twice, and Will Ferrel is in it!

Matrix Revolutions: Worst. Ending. Ever.

Scary Movie 3: Funny, but oh-so-poorly made. Worst script I've seen in years.

After a lengthy recession, I'm on my GC again, after buying Medal of Honor: Rising Sun. Who, if any, of you got it too? It's a good, fun game, but mind numbingly short (8 levels?) and you can beat it in one afternoon, (albeit a really long afternoon). Share opinions, if any, and if applicable.

Best respects,

~Darunia S. Goron, Esq.

...is too friggen long :D. Look what it does to the "Jump to forum" menu down below! Can't we just dedicate this forum to the almighty Semnat?

In this thread you can talk about anything you want, so long as you don't turn it into a stupid argument.


Hahahahahaha. I give it 7 posts.