As you may have heard, P.A. Parenteau missed practice Monday due to illness, requiring a later eval to see if he can play Tuesday in Philadelphia.

Hopefully it's a brief thing, because he's be sorely missed, what with the Islanders already missing Travis Hamonic.

Parenteau, of course, is kind of important. His 36 assists lead the team and are 5th-most in the NHL. He's missed only one game as an Islander, piling up 100 points in 132 games -- yes, producing even when not next to John Tavares. Because we are Islanders fans, we are inherently paranoid. What's keeping Parenteau down?

• 1. He's "sick" in a Philly flu kind of way.
• 2. "Sick" is cover for a sordid, uglier-by-the-day custody battle over Hoppy the Bunny with former roommate and current Hoppy guardian Zenon Konopka. Expect "well placed sources" to leak family court documents to Larry Brooks any day now ... not that the Post would ever splash ink over someone's personal life.
• 3. Just messing with rumor mongering Bruce "Malkin to the Kings" Garrioch, who misuses the word "likely" the way Ed Mangano misuses "new plan."
• 4. He's 28, he's busted his butt to get past year-to-year deals, and now he's gonna get paid. A man can take a sick day.
• 5. Thought it'd be funny to see Brian Rolston skate on the second line with Frans Nielsen and Michael Grabner. Real funny, P.A. Hardy har har.

The news that Mike Milbury He Who Shall Not Be Named was charged with assault at a pee-wee hockey rink spread on the Web yesterday like a topless celebrity photo.

Predictably, Islanders fans were not immune -- we've had four separate FanShots posted and it came up in multiple other threads here. (Note: Before you post a FanShot, check for others linking the same news. Our readers usually post news before we even see it.)

It's natural to have very passionate reactions while processing such news, as it opens wounds from years past and reawakens stress we've tried to bottle. With that in mind, we spoke to post-traumatic stress specialist Dr. Tomas Salosson* for guidance:

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Ed Westfall is a 71-year-old, Ontario-born, Stanley Cup winning former Bruin and beloved ex-Islanders player and broadcaster. Charles Wang is a 67-year-old, Shanghai-born technology entrepreneur, developer and owner of the New York Islanders for the past 11 years.

While it was jarring to see classic Islander Westfall in a new black third jersey from last night's charity unveiling, it was even more jarring to see him mistaken ... for Wang.

We don't typically shame other outlets (except for power rankings or unresearched opinions), but this goof in Puck Daddy's [since-edited] post on the 3rd jerseys was too hilarious not to preserve.

Further research has revealed Bill Guerin is not, in fact, Captain McNulty, and Mike Sillinger -- who like Westfall but unlike Wang, also wore 18 -- is not in fact Sam the Eagle from the Muppets.

This is what hockey looks like when it's played:

1. 1) ...on 1950s conception of what Mars looks like.
2. 2) ...after nuclear meltdown.
3. 3) ...for a hockey card shoot at the Diner's Club (or is it Carte Blanche?*) Centre for Hockey Excellence** in Toronto.

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What happens when you mix the rote process of ordering take-out with the mundane routine of an athlete's post-game interview? Something far more entertaining than either of the above.

This is a creation of Michael* Paul Smith, an actor in New York who is creating an online sketch series through his production outfit, Take It Back Productions. More importantly, he's an Islanders fan (*so one assumes officially changing the spelling of his name to "Micheal" is still in processing at the Social Security office).

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According to NHL executives, the league is looking into MSG+3K's decision to re-air a game it already re-aired this summer, a game that prompted Islanders fans to irreverently organize a "social event" to "bond with fellow fans" while watching the teams 9-3 victory over the increasingly annoying division rival Pittsburgh Penguins.

The game, which took place in February, was re-aired by MSG+++ during the season within a week of its first live airing, and again multiple times during the spring and summer, in a curious attempt by the Cablevision-owned network to appeal to Islanders fans. While the NHL regularly re-airs games on its NHL Network and encourages rights holders to re-air games that NHL fans actually enjoyed, it takes issue with a league member explicitly admitting that its fans enjoyed an event that contained incidents the Kremlin league tacitly formally cashes in on frowns upon.

"We air these games and allow the re-airing of these games for historical purposes only," said NHL deputy commissioner Bill Daly, who is still completing the "How to Banally Button Up like Bettman" series courses in his MBA program.

"We are outraged to learn that fans are actually watching these games for enjoyment of any sort, and it pains us to hear league members enable that enjoyment. That is why we have rerun the Predators 4-1 first-round Game 1 playoff victory over the Ducks approximately 17 times since June."

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Because people are begging for the season to start, we'll imagine it has, with an idea stolen from the refreshingly sardonic folks at Copper & Blue, made possible by the saints who maintain the Hockey-Reference database.

This is a running prediction of (mostly) Islanders milestones that will be hit during 2011-12. And no, don't dare call it a pr*j*ct*n. But some of these are even sincere.

Oct. 8: Picking up where he left off, Michael Grabner scores the 40th goal of his NHL career after Brian Campbell's pinch gets burned.

Oct. 10: After Cal Clutterbuck takes a {cough} "uncharacteristic" run from behind at an Islanders rookie, Matt Martin drills him into next year. Shocked Wild fans complain how dirty Martin is.

Oct. 12: It starts to occur to the Rangers that they just committed nine years to a second-line center who will probably be a third-line winger before the contract is halfway through. No worries. Cablevision be-redden him in 2016.

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Your Major Hockey Publication Columnist walks into the room, grabs pen, and begins:

Ten years, huh? TEN years for a defenseman! Here that team goes again. They never learned from that Alexei Yashin deal and they never learned from that Rick DiPietro deal.

'Cause here those crazy Islanders go again, with a 10-year contract -- to a non-star defenseman, no less. And they're paying him EIGHTEEN MILLION in just the first two seasons alone.

Now granted, it tails off in the final four years to lessen the cap hit and dance around the salary cap (which all NHL teams should do, if they are in the blessed club that can get away with it).

But it's still the same ol' Islanders, and it's why they're never gonna win. Why, I even heard they signed an average Russian goalie for NINE years, at a cap hit over $5.6 million!

Wait ... what's that, you say? ...

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