Hello New York and everywhere else, I'm Bird you're in the Birdcage at Hockeybird.com. Some of you have asked and I'm sure some have wondered what the hell happened around here. Fair enough, I'll attempt to answer that.

There are two parts to the story. The stuff here at the site and then there's the personal stuff. I'm a bit gun-shy about going too deep into the personal stuff as some of you may know, I spent most of my young adult life in the public eye as the Infamous DJ Bird on WLIR in NY and WXXP in Pittsburgh. Being a minor celeb had it's advantages for sure but it also had it's down side. Some of the down side stuff was by choice, some was not. The music biz is not all fun all the time (although it did feel that way at times).

Let's address the site stuff first and then we'll see how much personal stuff I wish to reveal.

Sometime after Hockeybird started we began to get a much larger readership than expected. I was working at an ISP and found myself in front of a keyboard 14-16 hours each day. While the ISP was just a front for our real work (Intel for the US government and law enforcement) I did have plenty of time to update the site and run the boards. In any event, my availability coincided with the rapid expansion of Hockeybird readers.

Lucky for me, I had plenty of help with the site. I won't list them here, you know who you are.....but as the demands of the site increased, so did the quality and quantity of help. For a while there, Hockeybird kinda ran itself. Then some problems for me began. The Intel company I was working for crumbled under the leadership (or lack thereof) of the owner. I should have left after the first missed paycheck but the country was at war and in desperate need of what we did so I thought I could continue and wait the problems out. Bad idea on my part. To this day they still owe me over $100,000 in pay, something I'll never collect on.

My family and I moved to Florida and bang.....the lockout occurred. Sure, we stayed open and covered it but in all honesty, I lost interest. I just want games. I had no interest in debating the issues between the NHL owners and the NHLPA. As the league returned I was re-energized for a short while but that's when other personal issues began to take up more and more of my time.

As I wrote less and less some of the other writers began to write less. None of us are paid here so I couldn't complain at all. In addition, I could no longer monitor the boards.....that once special place devolved into something no longer enjoyable. Don't get me wrong, we still had a ton of readers but the content slacked off a bit and the boards became a mess.

Lucky for all, one of our writers decided it was time to start something fresh and new. It was a brilliant idea and it came just in the nick of time too. Pete Rocha and Rangerland became the new home for many Hockeybird readers and board members. Nearly the same time I was informed that the sever that this site has been on for years was no longer going to be available. Again, thank God for Rocha.

My personal problems got worse. I was fine with the end of Hockeybird after a decade of internet fun. I'm still amazed at how long we did have a "must read" spot on this interweb thingee. Things got so bad for me personally that I mis-read an e-mail and figured that the end of Hockeybird was at hand as of halloween this year. It turned out that there was an ISP change and all I needed to do was update the IP address. Yes, I'm an idiot.

I'm now looking for work and trying to keep the lights on here at home. I have begun to reclaim my computer here at the house and figured that Hockeybird was once a worthwhile endeavor and could be again. That's why your reading this now.

For all these years I've never taken the readership for granted. So, for those still interested we'll begin again. They'll be no messageboards and all the writers have found new homes except me. So here I am, just like it was at the beginning. I am again for as long as you'll have me, a dumb guy with a website.....talking about the NY Rangers and the NHL.

As for the personal stuff, some is not my fault at all, it's just how things go. I have also made some poor decisions and I'll need to address those, those are on me. It's my intention to deal with what I can and that's all one can do. At least I have hockey to watch, right?

So in a nutshell, Hockeybird is back for now. I very much appreciate your support over the years and look forward to seeing you visit here now and again. Tell your friends, we're back.

----}- Bird

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