G'morning (or afternoon?) and thanks for bearing with us on the new design. Lot of cool stuff, a few bugs, but on balance I'm pretty pleased with new abilities in United so I hope you are too. (Admittedly, some of the features will really show themselves when we have an actual regular current of news and games to cover.)

Anyway, here are things to read, laugh about, gawk at, or generally discuss while we wait for the NHL and NHLPA to stop acting like the NHL and NHLPA:

• Islanders-related: Catching up with Billy Harris, Part 1 and Part 2. The trade stings as much as you'd think it would.
• Lockout: Effect on Philly | Effect on the media behemoths who bought the Maple Leafs | Deadspin does its help-a-friend primer | The Wild got run off the ice by a figure skating coach | As if to slap us, the league and PA will meet Friday to negotiate "non-core economic" issues. Great. Make sure to lobby for resurrecting the Concorde for road trips.
• Lockout antidote: Who's up for some EHM sim hockey fun with fellow LHHers?
• Oh, and the deal on recalling junior stars if the lockout ends, which we discussed last week: Apparently NHL teams had to submit a list of two or three guys. So you know Ryan Strome is on there. (Indeed, the all-knowing Bob McKenzie says he and Griffin Reinhart are.)
• Here's one view of the top 30 prospects for the 2013 NHL Draft [Hockey Prospectus]
• In which Katz blunders his way into a relocation threat like Mario in K.C., except with an Edmonton agreement already in hand and plenty of public money already committed: CBC on the Oilers' threat | Copper N Blue with takedown 1, 2 and 3 | mc79hockey has at it | We also had FanShots here and here, so thanks for continuing to post those through the new design
• ESPN did its ... week 1 Power Ranking? Time for Mike (ICanSeeForIslesAndIsles) to get to work!
• You remember Manon Rheaume, the female goalie Phil Esposito used in a Lightning exhibition? I do. Backgrounder here, some fun quotes here. One quote from the time that didn't make the cut: Brendan Shanahan remarked after the game that she had nice eyes peering through that mask. It wasn't a jerk-man type thing; it was a not-used-to-seeing-pretty-female-eyes-through-the-mask type thing.
• If you like Battle of California, prepare to cry.