Sad Island

Boy, I bet NBC hockey commentator (and former New York Islander general manager) Mike Milbury was trying not to slit his wrists last night. After watching game seven of the Stanley Cup finals and seeing Zdeno Chara shake hands with Roberto Luongo at the end of the game my first thought was, 'Wouldn't the Islanders like to still have both of those guys."

If you'll recall, it was Milbury who traded Chara to Ottawa- along with a 1st round draft pick, which turned out to be Jason Spezza (yikes) and forward Bill Muckalt- for Alexei Yashin. How did that work out? Despite playing his last game in an Islanders sweater in 2007 the Islanders will still be paying Yashin $2,204,000 a year till July 1, 2015. What has Chara done since getting off the Isle? Just score 119 goals and 260 assists in a little over 700 games.

Three times a finalist for the Vezina Trophy (2004, 2007, 2011) as the league's best goaltender, Roberto Luongo was drafted fourth overall by the Islanders in 1997. His time with the team lasted exactly three years, as Rick DiPietro was selected first overall in 2000 and Luongo made his escape from New York that same day.

Mike Milbury could have selected either Dany Heatley (2nd) or Marian Gaborik (3rd) who were also drafted in 2000, but instead he went with DiPietro and traded Luongo to the Florida Panthers (with center Olli Jokinen) for winger Mark Parrish and center Oleg Kvasha. Ouch.

What is the difference between Luongo and Dipietro? How about, despite the fact that Luongo only started his NHL career one season earlier, he has more wins (308) than Dipietro has games played (307). Way to go, Mike. Way to go.

Boogie

I just heard the awful, tragic news- New York Rangers enforcer Derek Boogaard has passed away. Apparently, he was found deceased by his family in his apartment. Derek was only 28 years old. He came to the Rangers last summer as a free agent from the Minnesota Wild. Derek played just 22 games before suffering a concussion doing what he does best (fighting) and missed the rest of the season. Since he only played such a short time with the Rangers I can't say I knew that much about him, but what I do know is, whenever the Rangers showed footage of a charity event they had held you could always see a 6'8 guy wearing the number 94 jersey there helping out.

Is There Anybody Out There?

Is there anybody out there that'll represent me? I started sending out letters to agents this evening hoping that somebody, anybody will take me on as a client. Who knows, maybe somebody will be smart enough to make an investment in me.

Che-Check It Out

The first seven pages of 'Paroxysms of Caesars' are up here and you should definitely check them out. Chapter one will be appearing in the next issue of Flying Saucer magazine, coming in July. so be sure to get a copy!

Oh! Now I Get It

Flying Saucer issue #1 is finally done (get it at flyingsaucerproductions.blogspot.com) and Paroxysms of Caesars is coming along nicely, so I've been doing a lot of the social media/guerrilla marketing b.s. that everybody has to do to grab some attention for their project nowadays. And I finally understand why most people have high school kids or college kids doing this work as 'interns'- it is so mind-numbingly boring, time consuming and frustrating. Besides, I'm an artist- I'm not a businessman, I'm not an IT or internet or social media or marketing expert. I should be spending my time creating art, instead of wasting it on this bullshit. Certainly makes me wish for the simpler old days of 1995 when nobody had to spend all their time tweeting about the tweets they read other people tweeted. Seriously. What a waste.


P.S.- Seeing as how I've spent a good deal of time on it, I might as well ask all of you to go join our Facebook page. Follow me on twitter, yadda yadda yadda. You know the deal.

Page One

Here's the first of many pages to come of Paroxysms of Caesars, the graphic novel:

One Wrong Turn

Of the millions of things we all do every single day, a number that is so hard to fathom we couldn't do it if we tried, it is amazing how one little thing can so clearly effect the rest. The metaphor, that we all know, of a butterfly flapping its wings in Central Park causing a tsunami in Tokyo comes to mind.
My one wrong turn has become exceedingly clear the past few months. And God do I wish I could take it back. I'd give anything to have back the life I did before I took the exit that brought me here. I'd rather burn the whole car to scraps than continue riding in it down this path; but life is not a video game where we can hit 'restart', it is not an email we can unsend before the person reads it. It just is. And if yours sucks, then you just have to deal with it the best you can until it's over.
So I think that's what I'm going to do. I'm going to make this mistake of a miserible life end as quickly and as shortly as I possibly can. thank you to all five of you out there that have actually read this at some point in time. see ya on the flip side.