The Tulsa Forum by TulsaNow

Hockey collection at http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/collections/72157615053452503/ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/collections/72157615053452503/)

Full photo set at http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/sets/72157629138248608/with/6803190116/ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/sets/72157629138248608/with/6803190116/)

You can click on a photo to see a larger version on my flickr site.

(http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7053/6806157500_75043298a7.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806157500/)
ZC03_19460301_640x427 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806157500/)

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ZC03_20014001_640x427 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806161556/)

(http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7036/6806162724_c3b2eaa9c7.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806162724/)
ZC03_20050201_640x427 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806162724/)

(http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7040/6806169008_1d8580c4a0.jpg) (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806169008/)
ZC03_20464201_640x427 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/les_stockton/6806169008/)

I guess I don't 'get' hockey.  Reminds me a little of Rugby if it was played by a bunch of girls who wear protective gear so they don't get hurt...


(Ducking now to avoid the thrown things....)

Sorry...just had to do that...could not resist the forces of evil.  Actually kind of like hockey (played it in school in Iowa).

You ever seen a hockey player get cut by a skate?  Bet that don't happen in rugby.

I think rugby players and hockey players are equal amounts of tough.  But hockey players, especially goalies, have to be a little crazy in the head to put themselves in the way of a six-ounce, vulcanized frozen rubber projectile coming at them of speeds up to 110 mph.

Oh, and here's a skate accident from earlier this year (Edmonton's Taylor Hall took a skate to the forehead during pre-game skate, in which he wasn't wearing his lid).

(http://i.thestar.com/images/62/0c/fa9961884d66829095ec95e2ef1e.jpeg)

Rugby is a tough sport.  I really enjoy watching it.  However, to be fair, hockey players play with sticks and projectiles that can go into the eyes.  Rugby players don't have that.

I watched 'Invictus' last year and learned alot about the sport.  I got more heavily into Aussie Rules Football after I got digital cable for the first time, but that was a little confusing.  Even more so than rugby.

I try to shoot all the Tulsa Rugby home games, if I can.  The Tulsa Buffalos Austrailian style football team are getting ready to start their season too.  Both are super fun to watch.

The school would flood the outdoor basketball court with water in late fall, it would freeze, and then there was skating and hockey until spring!  I've been cut on several occasions by skates rushing by.  Nothing so serious as to take off a finger or anything.  Luckily.  One of my friends had a skate go right over the top of his hand and got a bunch of stitches.  (The skate was raised in mid step, so wasn't on the ground.)  Still was pretty impressive to a bunch of 11 year old boys.  Except for him.  He was more impressed after the stitches were done, though, so it was all good.  Still, with all that, 'ya gotta have sharp skates!

Baseball was pretty brutal when I was a kid.  8th grade (Whitney Junior High), we were in gym class - white t-shirts and shorts.  Some of the guys (on the baseball team) wore their shoes during class.  One slid into home, somehow hooked another kids face with the rubber cleat at the top of his nose.  Pulled that nose right off and left hanging down the front of his face.  Strange sight to see him with nose hanging down in front of his mouth.  Coach grabbed someones shirt and held it back in place until they could get him to the hospital.  Again, stitched back on and everyone had great stories.  Healed up well.

And yeah, we played full on bb guns war, too.  No eyes were lost.  And the snowball fights were done with snowballs wet with water to turn them to ice.


That guy almost got a Mensur scar...

You neglected to mention skateboards without pads or helmets, bicycles without helmets, cars without seatbelts and no carseats for the little ones.  Gym class was wonderful.  I fell off the still rings in gymnastics.  Got run into in touch football by someone 50% heavier than me.  I couldn't walk straight for a week.  It's a wonder any of us survived.

Pads?  Helmet??

My skateboards were a board with an old pair of metal strap on skates disassembled and nailed to board.  By the time I could afford a store bought, was too old and was saving for a car.  Had to get my own stuff...still have the baseball glove I bought for Little League.  Cost me about $4.50.  We were the LA "Angels".  T-shirt was about half a buck, so that was pretty easy.  One of the best ways to earn big money at that time and place was gathering earthworms at night and selling them to bait shops.  Made a lot of money that way - probably 20 to 30 bucks a year.  And yeah, that's a LOT of worms at about a nickel a dozen.

The kids car seat was an arm from the driver across your chest, if you were lucky enough to be the one sitting in the middle of the front seat.  Everyone else was on their own.  We rotated seating so everyone would at least get some occasional protection. 

I made my first skateboard in a similar manner.  The Electrical Engineer (to be) in you used nails.  The Mechanical Engineer (to be) in me used screws.  We must have had a glut of skateboards early as the price dropped from about $5 to $1 for a store bought one with those fancy Roller Rink composition wheels.  Those wheels stuck a lot better than the steel wheels but still wouldn't ride over a pebble like the later polyurethane ones would.

I just strapped the roller skates on and played hockey on parking lots.  Back then, I didn't use pads either, but then again, kids are stupid and don't have to earn a living doing that.  And by the time I played ice hockey, I had the full gear but that was only because of sponsors.

The sport is what it is for a reason.  The safety gear exists because of what they've gone through for over one hundred years of the sport.  Rugby is a different sport and can't be compared.  The closest comparison would be lacrosse, and oddly enough, they use pretty much the same gear.  Helmets, pads, sticks.

And hockey has a vulcanized rubber projectile that can travel over 100 mph and break bones when it hits.  You gotta have pads.

In rugby, the only way you have of dislodging the ball or stopping a player from running past is to tackle, grab and drag, or whatever.  In hockey and lacrosse, you can use the stick.  The hits can be severe, just as in rugby, but the difference is that since on ice skates, the speeds can be faster.  You gotta have pads and helmets.

I just intuitively knew that a 16p nail, driven through and clinched was stronger than a screw....that and I couldn't afford screws, but had some old 2x4's laying around with nails in them.  Removed, then hammered them straight to use.

I'm fairly sure, but not 100% positive, that I used 1/4-20 machine screws with countersink heads, washer and a nut.  We had them in dad's hardware collection.  Driven through and clinched nails.... talk about butt ugly.   I kind of remember using a 1x4 and putting a bit wider piece of plywood on top.  Again, pretty much stuff we had around.

Building it was at least half the fun.  I know for a fact that the scrapes, cuts and bruises weren't all that much fun.
Overall great experiences.

1/4 x 20 would be much stronger than the 16p.  We had picture hanging #6 and 8 that we could find - hence, the nails.  Very ugly.  The steel wheels on the skates kind of overwhelmed the nails in the boards.  When the 1 x 4 or 1 x 6 broke, went to 2 x 4 - couldn't find plywood in right size.  Only plywood around was high grade furniture ply (walnut, cherry, etc) so couldn't get hold of that for a skateboard - went into furniture.

Thought I'd post a thread on Tulsa Rugby.

http://www.tulsanow.org/forum/index.php?topic=18789.0 (http://www.tulsanow.org/forum/index.php?topic=18789.0)

Cool!  There is something fascinating about it.