Eso

1. I don't really know what we have in the way of rivals. Maybe New York or DC because we seem find ourselves battling in the standings? Vancouver because they're geographically closest? Chicago because they traded me? 2. Would be pretty wild to win 11 straight to end the season, so I'm going to say no, unfortunately. 3. Phil "The Rock" Johnson, he gets me. 4. Was hoping to be a point-per-game player, above 50% in faceoffs, and a plus player. The plus/minus goal is the only one I achieved. 5. My money had been on Perry, but since I am filling this out late in the week it was Thornton that took the crown. 6. Don't tell the Calgary fans, but I am really not a fan of country music.

1. Man, I feel like we're playing good team games but just not getting the bounces. Maybe we need to juggle the lines a little bit, but I feel like we have the pieces right now to be in the postseason. We do take too many penalties though. 2. Are we finally going to be allowed to bring strippers on the team jet? 3. In real life I am wearing low-end CCM skates, and currently using a Warrior twig. My favourite stick ever was a Bauer Supreme P88 (Kane curve). 4. I like to take a deep breath and look out at the glassy smooth ice, then take a look to at the people beside, because they're the ones I'm playing for. 5. I want to say Prout to make a "small hands, small ****" joke, but it's gotta be Chris Foley, that dude is tiny. 6. Head-fake then explode into a sprint. Even if the defender doesn't bite, there's a good chance they're going to be in a 50-50 position with where you might be able to turn the corner on them or else make them take a penalty.

As per my intoxicated suggestion for VHLE teams, here is a jersey concept for les Coqs du Nice, or as we say in English.... the Nice Cocks. #imsosorry

1. https://vhlportal.com/vhl/78/VHL78-57.html Down 4-1 against the defending champs and top team in the league Seattle Bears, claw our way back and win in the shootout. 2. I just did a list of team location/name/branding/colour schemes a few minutes ago. I've been doing weekly podcasts for my main point tasks lately, and thought I'd do a written one this time around. 3. We're good right, and we're still growing. Our window is just opening, and should stay open for a few seasons. 4. Same as now: no lust for glory or personal stats whatsoever, just want to play for a fun team. 5. Not at all. Still just want to have fun with good people. 6. "Voting Steve Eso into the Hall of Fame? You guys are even more drunk than I am!"

Well, with the excitement over the impending creation of the VHL Europe league, and this week's double media theme week being focused on the VHLE, I thought I'd take a stab at creating six ideas for teams for the new European league. I've always felt that, in all the sim leagues, I'm in, I like it when the the teams are a little bit low-key and silly - sort of like Minor League Baseball in America, with teams like the Lansing Lugnuts, Akron Rubberducks, or Albuquerque Isotopes (which are in fact named after an episode of the "The Simpsons"). So much like my preference in sim leagues with North American cities I think it's fun to get away from the New York, Los Angeles, and Chicagos of the world, and instead put teams in Milwaukee, Tulsa, or Tucson, those sort of "second/third tier" cities. So for a European league, I want to stay away from London, Paris, Barcelona, Vienna, and instead focus on some smaller but still well known cities. It was tough to narrow this down to only 6 teams - I would have loved to have several divisions - maybe an Islanders division with four teams in England, Scotland, Ireland, and Iceland, a western division with teams in Spain or Portugal, France, Switzerland, and Italy, a central/east divsion with teams in Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, and Poland, and a Nordic division with teams in Sweden, Finland, Russia, and either Denmark or Latvia. But alas, I had to narrow it down a lot more than that, so here we go: The Glasgow Golden Eagles Primary colour: gold Secondary colour: grey Hailing from Scotland, the Golden Eagles will likely have the hardest travel schedule of all the VHLE teams, although it is still fairly tame compared to North American travel distances. The golden eagle is the national bird of Scotland, and I wanted to choose a logo and theme that was not related in any way to crippling alcoholism. Runners up: Edinburgh Pipers, Manchester Weavers Les Coqs de Nice Primary colour: maroon Secondary colour: blue Sorry-not-sorry, but I had to do this. As I was Google Maps'ing around France, going "Hmm, Toulouse? Marseille? Lyon? Monaco? How about Nice?" and then I looked up what the national animal of France and found that it was the the humble rooster. Put that at all together, and in English what do you get? The Nice Cocks. Runners up: Porto Pescadors, Monaco Millionaires The Lucerne Hammers Primary colour: white Secondary colour: blue Named for a polearm used by Swiss soldiers a few hundred years ago, which I totally didn't learn about the existence of while playing Dungeons & Dragons as a kid. Runners up: Geneva Goats, Stuttgart Shepherds The Pilsen Lagers Primary colour: green, like the hops grown in the region Secondary colour: gold, like the beer that they are used in Named for the style of beer that was popularized in this city that has now spread to become the most popular style of beer in the world. Runners up: Innsbruck Olympians, Krakow Coal-Miners The Sarajevo Roses Primary colour: Grey Secondary colour: Red The most "political" of all these teams, that Sarajevo roses are a type of memorial in that city that commemorates the lives of those lost in the Bosnian War when Sarajevo was shelled. Runners up: Zagreb Martens, Kiev Nightingales The Tallinn Wolves Primary colour: Purple Secondary colour: Black I am almost went with Eagles/Falcons/Hawks/Raptors something like that to go with the English homonym Tallinn/talon, but the wolf is the national animal of Estonia and I also think that a wolf's head logo on purple with black trim would look kind of badass. Runners up: Kaliningrad Falcons, Bergen Sailors Well, there you have it. I'm excited to see what locations, branding, logos, and colour schemes of the actual VHL Europe teams are once they are unveiled, because I am almost certain that they will be better than the things I've come up with. Like 675-ish words

https://open.spotify.com/episode/1CFQ06reH6RskAzUYID5mO?si=PUYRlDrQSqqQwySV6Ld4dw I recorded this 15 minutes ago. I've already forgotten what I talked about.

Hey thanks for the feedback. Unfortunately I haven't brewed in a couple years. Ever since kid #2 came around I find I don't have the energy to maintain as many hobbies. I didn't name very many of my beers, except my favourite recipe of my own creation (which I ended up brewing 6-7 batches of) was called "Crestview Pale Ale" (the street I live on is Crestview Drive, and I jokingly referred to my garage as the Crestview Brewing Company). Also, I had a 5-tap kegerator setup in my carport. I don't have a garage door or anything, so it none of it was behind locked doors. I also had a shelf with glasses and pitchers in my carport - any hobo could come by and help themselves whenever they wanted. My wife got came home from work one day, and a couple of my co-workers were in there having a pint. She asked where I was, and they said "Eso's still at work."

1. Perry, Prout, or Askarov, take your pick. 2. I like where they're at right now, usually around 3pm pacific/6pm eastern. 3. Not sure where we're at on cap space, but I'm perfectly happy to roll with the team we've got. 4. He's a pretty active and enthusiastic GM, but more than that he's a pretty good dude who's fun to talk to. And a Canucks fan. 5. I think myself and Phil "The Rock" Johnson would be the guys sitting way off in the corner trying to hide our beer cans from the coach. 6. The Bielefeld Cryptids.

Hah, my son is 7. He'd probably love to join sim leagues with me if I'd let him, but he's still pretty young, and I need to have a space where I can be crude and offensive and drunk.

Transaction ID: 20645876051930594 Free Week - used Doubles Week - used 5 Uncapped TPE - used

Guys.... the North American conference is a crapshoot. Seriously, other than the Seattle Bears and Chicago Phoenix at the top of the standings, about as expected, the New York Americans, Calgary Wranglers, D.C. Dragons, Toronto Legion, and Los Angeles Stars are all in an absolute furball in the middle of the pack. Those five teams are separated by only three points, and there aren't any signs of any of those teams starting to pull away from the pack or fall behind, no stratification whatsoever. Selfishly I think I'd look at my own team, the Calgary Wranglers, as the only team in that list that has a positive goal differential, but it's still impossible to predict what is going to shake out in the last two thirds of the season here. This makes it a lot of fun, it makes it so every game is crucial, there are no "gimmes" or meaningless cross-conference games, every point matters here, and I think that speaks volumes to how good the parity is in the league. I'm excited to see if any of the teams can figure out a great strategy or maybe make a key acquisition that will help get them over the hump and into the playoffs. 215 words

Hi folks! Trying to get back in the saddle with the podcasts because I need them teps.

Schneiders? Maple Leaf Foods in shambles.

1. So far I've been scoring at an okay pace. Nothing mind blowing, about the same as I was last season. 2. Feels like I'm still losing a lot more faceoffs than I'm winning. Wouldn't mind a few more "pluses" and a few less "minuses". 3. I'm hearing a lot of negative feedback about it, but I'm all for it. The more the merrier. 4. I'm not sure. Something that celebrates the cooperation between neighbouring European states? The Union Cup or something? 5. This is a tough one. In real life hockey I have good hands but am not super fast. In VHL I am prioritizing puck handling slightly above skating. 6. A little bit worse than expected, but it's still early.

I thought I was done @TMGSosa? In addition to the people on the list in the first post, I took D Chris Hylands and D Cowboy Prout.

D - Cowboy Prout @TMGSosa

D - Chris Hylands @Mrpenguin30 @youloser1337

G - RaRa Rasputin @TMGSosa@Mrpenguin30

F- Groovy Dude @Mrpenguin30

F - Andrew Su @TMGSosa @Mrpenguin30 you are both still up

3. F - Christian Mingle @Mrpenguin30

1. Something maybe to recognize contribution or leadership by a user that is not a GM or head office member. 2. I can't remember, it went into general revenue with all the rest of it. I think I upped defense, scoring, and puckhandling all up by 1 point this week. 3. I actually don't really know the individual awards very well, but I don't see my player ever winning a goal- or point-scoring title. Whatever the equivalents of the Selke or Lady Byng would be more my style I think. 4. I I think dark grey with red sleeves/accents would be pretty sharp and modern. 5. We have a strong group of actives at every position, and they are almost all pretty close together in TPE and regression class. Other than Thornton and Su, we have a have a really balanced attack of guys in the 500-600 TPE range. 6. I guess dressing two defenseman in Madison and Puhovs that are a little bit younger and lower in TPE than the rest of the core is a bit of a knock against us, or else maybe not having very many ultra-high TPE studs at their peak.

Eso is in!

Shit I was also going to talk about the Dungeons and Dragons game that I'm running, after not having played D&D since I was a teenager 20+ years ago. Oh well, next week.

I don't remember what I talked about, but you better believe I talked about it.