OT: Around the NHL - Cat Scratch Fever

[Pancakes]

If you are going to drink and drive why would you be driving so recklessly?

Any time I've had a beer or two and I'm behind the wheel I drive like 45 mph in a 55 and think everyone is a cop.

People are assholes. But also when you have had five beers and decide to get behind the wheel I don't think you're thinking rationally to begin with.

I mean, the worst drunk driving offender I've ever seen was a dude I knew in high school and college who went on to become a cop. Used to do it multiple times a week and every time he got pulled over he just showed them his badge and went on his way. I think people would be shocked if they knew how many people drove drunk, not the least of which were cops.

ACAB and all that.

I wouldn't be shocked at all to hear that a cop was being a reckless asshole lol. That's what they do.

Anyways terrible news and I feel awful for Gaudreau and his family. By all accounts a great kid and I'm sure his brother was too. A brutal reminder or how fragile life is.

 

[ThosePuckingPenguins]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1829571326149005813

Think we need to give Hayes some grace this season. Bad enough he lost his brother not too long ago and now one of his best friends.

 

[vikingGoalie]

people just suck, I've been riding motocycles for decades. I always wear all the gear, dress for the slide not the ride, and I always ride like everyone is trying to run me over. haven' been in an accident yet but plenty of close calls, worst one I was pulling up to a stop sign (4-way stop residential neighborhood). car in lane to right turned left onto my street with all 4 tires in my lane, narrowly avoided a head-on by veernig off the road and up on to the sidewalk through a drainage ditch, still amazed I didn't lose traction and go down. I actually did a U-turn and chased the car down (yea I was young, dumb and filled with adrenalin) turns out it's a soccer mom and she had no idea that she almost killed me, just totally clueless and the roads are littered with drivers like that.

 

[UnrealMachine]

Best advice I can give as an avid road cyclist is to always, always run bright flashing lights (front & rear) at all times of the day. At least people are wired to see and respond to flashing lights - so they’ll likely at least be forced to acknowledge your presence.

Not implying that it would have necessarily mattered in this case, but it tends to matter in most other ones. Remember, you are competing for attention against cell phones, tunnel vision, inattentiveness, and just general visibility since drivers are wired to mostly see/respond to what they perceive as threats against them.

 

[Ulf5]

That's just f***ing awful news.

The driver needs to never see freedom again.

As a firm believer in an eye for an eye... tie his ass to a set of railroad tracks.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

Matthew Gaudreau‘s wife is pregnant and due in December Now the kid will never meet their dad because of some asshole.

When I found out Johnny named his son Johnny Jr when reading these reports I just kind of broke down, it's just heart breaking. I was never a fan of how he left the Flames and made out to be something he wasn't, he was always such a good lad and that's all you ever heard and read about him. It still feels kind of unreal really. It's also weird how you can feel this way without ever meeting someone too and Matthew, his brother also gone and his kid isn't even born yet is just so damn tough.

Best advice I can give as an avid road cyclist is to always, always run bright flashing lights (front & rear) at all times of the day. At least people are wired to see and respond to flashing lights - so they’ll likely at least be forced to acknowledge your presence.

Not implying that it would have necessarily mattered in this case, but it tends to matter in most other ones. Remember, you are competing for attention against cell phones, tunnel vision, inattentiveness, and just general visibility since drivers are wired to mostly see/respond to what they perceive as threats against them.

Thing is everyone seemed to be fine avoiding Johnny and his brother. It was an absolute piece of shit human being that was already driving reckless and drunk. At that point it wouldn't have mattered if he had airhorns blaring every few seconds. That asshole was already going to do what he did because he was hell bent on driving like he wanted to cause accidents, two lives were lost because of him and it's unfair because that driver doesn't deserve his.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

You know what would be great right now - If the NHL, TSN, CBJ, Flames, etc all had footage of Johnny and compiled it and sent it over to the family and then EA Sports NHL gets all of the games Johnny was in and sends it to the family in each platform and hopefully the Teams Matthew played for and the School he coached for has testimonials as well. These poor kids are so young they will have family videos and what not but to have videos of the joy that Johnny brought to fans and what it meant to him and to see that side of their Dad would be really awesome.

It reminds me of that lad that had his Dad pass away (myth or not, this story) and he was playing a video game where you see the ghost of the previous best lap and it was his Dad's, that he'd pull up before the finish line just so he can race his Dad any time he wanted to. It might be a myth or it's not, but that sentiment has always been kind of cathartic for me to think about you know?

 

[Tom Hanks]

You know what would be great right now - If the NHL, TSN, CBJ, Flames, etc all had footage of Johnny and compiled it and sent it over to the family and then EA Sports NHL gets all of the games Johnny was in and sends it to the family in each platform and hopefully the Teams Matthew played for and the School he coached for has testimonials as well. These poor kids are so young they will have family videos and what not but to have videos of the joy that Johnny brought to fans and what it meant to him and to see that side of their Dad would be really awesome.

It reminds me of that lad that had his Dad pass away (myth or not, this story) and he was playing a video game where you see the ghost of the previous best lap and it was his Dad's, that he'd pull up before the finish line just so he can race his Dad any time he wanted to. It might be a myth or it's not, but that sentiment has always been kind of cathartic for me to think about you know?

A guy in my hometown had terminal cancer and he had friends all over the world sent video messages to him and someone edited them all together for his kids to see.

The local friends would pick him up from hospital and take him to concerts and stuff and it was all documented for his family to see.

 

[GilbertSeinfeld]

A guy in my hometown had terminal cancer and he had friends all over the world sent video messages to him and someone edited them all together for his kids to see.

The local friends would pick him up from hospital and take him to concerts and stuff and it was all documented for his family to see.

No, YOU'RE crying.

 

[CheckingLineCenter]

Really depressing news. They were set to celebrate their sisters wedding this weekend.

Yeah man, SW Jersey may as well be like f***in' Kentucky or something. It's nothing but back roads and farms. You could legitimately probably find at least one drunk driver a night if you looked hard enough down around that area.

Middle of nowhere. Just woods, back roads and fields.

one side of family is from Millville a few towns over and it’s very rough neck of woods. Middle of nowhere is apt. A bit nicer where Gaudreau was but still - not surprised about presence of inebriated motorists.

 

[AlphaMikeFoxtrots]

I still can't believe it, a lot sad but mostly furious.

I'm so f***ing tired of how *careless* people are. He *knew* he was in no fit state, but f*** anyone trying to tell him, the most important person in the world, what's safe. He had places to BE, y'all!

These families will *always* be feeling the weight of this loss.

 

[66-30-33]

A guy in my hometown had terminal cancer and he had friends all over the world sent video messages to him and someone edited them all together for his kids to see.

The local friends would pick him up from hospital and take him to concerts and stuff and it was all documented for his family to see.

f*** cancer!

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

I still can't believe it, a lot sad but mostly furious.

I'm so f***ing tired of how *careless* people are. He *knew* he was in no fit state, but f*** anyone trying to tell him, the most important person in the world, what's safe. He had places to BE, y'all!

These families will *always* be feeling the weight of this loss.

And clearly it wasn't just a one time lapse in judgment. The guy got charged for a DUI in the past, but the charges were dropped. So clearly he's drank and drove prior to this incident.

 

[AlphaMikeFoxtrots]

And clearly it wasn't just a one time lapse in judgment. The guy got charged for a DUI in the past, but the charges were dropped. So clearly he's drank and drove prior to this incident.

As has been pointed out, there's NO excuse for it with the abundance of ride options these days.

O TOH, that might require holding back some money from his habit.

These charges at least won't get dropped.

 

[Ogrezilla]

I still can't believe it, a lot sad but mostly furious.

I'm so f***ing tired of how *careless* people are. He *knew* he was in no fit state, but f*** anyone trying to tell him, the most important person in the world, what's safe. He had places to BE, y'all!

These families will *always* be feeling the weight of this loss.

yeah this one just hits hard. Just so stupid and selfish. One impatient f*** just shattered generations of a family to try to get home 10 seconds faster. Drunk drivers make me so so mad. Almost lost my parents to it as a kid. Have lost 3 friends to it. Just f***ing don't drink and drive, it's not that hard.

 

[Rakell67]

The big problem is the justice system is too lenient on these inbred assholes. Screw ARD, etc, first time caught drinking and driving should result in lifetime ban from driving. If they do it once, they'll do it again. Just think how often they drive drunk without getting caught. It's f***ing absurd.

 

[BusinessGoose]

Here is the magic of "suspending" a license for any amount of time...

... Now they're driving drunk without a license

The type of person who clearly disregards the rest of the world, isn't going to start taking the bus

 

[Tom Hanks]

****

https://x.com/i/web/status/1829903254278586659

 

[GilbertSeinfeld]

And there goes the waterworks again.

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

The big problem is the justice system is too lenient on these inbred assholes. Screw ARD, etc, first time caught drinking and driving should result in lifetime ban from driving. If they do it once, they'll do it again. Just think how often they drive drunk without getting caught. It's f***ing absurd.

And that's what pisses me off about these stories, and about these types of individuals like the jackass who killed the Gaudreau brothers. He's been *caught* at least twice for drinking and driving (this one resulting in a horrific tragedy), but there's no chance in hell he hasn't been doing that more regularly. Unless someone argues he was "unlucky" that the only two times he drove drunk, he got caught, then logic says this is a common thing for him.

I'm just tired of "criminals" getting more rights and freedoms than us law abiding citizens. Our lives are at risk because these repeat offenders are given multiple chances to commit the same sort of selfish, heinous acts.

 

[Tom Hanks]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1830077936306676005

 

[Honour Over Glory]

https://x.com/i/web/status/1830077936306676005

Now I need to see Hayes succeed but also see Sullivan fired.

 

[Big McLargehuge]

I'm absolutely furious about what happened. My disdain for this car-centric hellscape only grows with shit like that.


Listen, I went to college in Montana. Fact of the matter was that I, as the 'designated drunk driver' in my group, was one of the most sober people driving on a Montana road at any given time. Sure it's as illegal there as it is anywhere else in the country, but where public transportation isn't a thing, there's 1 or 2 taxis in the entire city, and apps like Uber were years away from hitting actual populated place nevermind Montana...people do it. I always took the way people talked about it as a local joke, but then you find yourself in a pick-up with an authority figure speeding down mountain switchbacks while pounding a Mickey's and...yeah. There are a lot of things I miss about Montana, but drunks having few, if any, alternatives to get home is certainly not one of them. There's more than a few reasons why I just started hosting my friends instead of going to the bars with them once I moved out of the dorms and into an apartment.

That dude had been caught multiple times before, had an open beverage, is in his 40s, and was in a populated region with ride shares available (yeah where it was wasn't exactly populated, but if you're ~30-35 minutes from Philadelphia you're in range of options). f*** him, he's decades beyond knowing better. He just didn't care...and now a family has been destroyed. Just f***ing infuriating and saddening. The thought of passing someone on the right on a road like that...I'd say it's inconceivably stupid, but it's the kind of nonsense that only makes sense after '5 or 6 beers.' f***.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

 

[BHD]

I talked about it with someone the other night, and they were nonchalant about it. Turns out, they have a spotty driving record... I quickly changed the topic, but man... If you aren't upset, then you don't get it.

I'll never grasp why people either don't plan ahead or drive anyways.