Posts by Ian Oland

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About Ian Oland (@ianoland)
Oland, a 2006 graduate of UMBC's art school, is a co-founder of RMNB and serves as an editor, publisher, and author. During his time with RMNB, he has done features for the Caps' TV show CRL, written a story for the print edition of the Washington Post, and helped first-report the Chelyabinsk meteor in the English language. Oland's favorite blog memories include raising enough money to get reader Ryan Ellis into a NASCAR race with a RMNB sponsored car and holding the Stanley Cup for the first time. Follow Ian: Twitter | Instagram

Caps Beat Isles 7-2

Frederick Lost a Great Man Today. RIP Dave.

Frederick Lost a Great Man Today. RIP Dave.

[Our apologies. The Russian Machine cannot deliver its usual, happy-go-lucky game recap tonight. A dear friend of the staff, Sgt. David Smith, USMC; died this afternoon from injuries sustained during a bombing in Afghanistan over the weekend. Our pal Dave was only 25 years old.]

It shouldn’t take a tragedy to do this, but we are reminded that the comfort and safety we enjoy at home are ensured by a stalwart volunteer military. We offer our continued and profound gratitude to the men and women in uniform.

We promise to return to our regularly scheduled snarkiness tomorrow evening. In the meantime, we hope you enjoyed the Capitals’ 7-2 win over the New York Islanders.

By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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Emily Karol Shares Her Caps Care Casino Experience
Emily Karol Rocks the Mic with Jeff Schultz on the Guitar and Jose Theodore on the Drums at the Caps Care Casino

[Ed. Note: Since the RMNB group members are stationed everywhere in this area except for DC and Northern Virginia, we again had to miss out on an awesome event run by the Washington Capitals. But lucky for us, fan of the Blog, and mini-celebrity of the day Emily Karol was here to bail us out with all the details, photos and gossip. Take it away, Emily!]

Emily’s Summary of the Event

This past Sunday, I was lucky enough to attend the first-ever CapsCare Casino and Auction. Let me preface this piece with telling you, I’m an actress trying to make it in this crazy world and only had enough money for a VIP ticket and nothing else. So sadly, I didn’t bid on any of the auctions and the $50,000 “fun bucks” they gave us remained in my program the whole evening. I forgot to trade it in for the 5 raffle tickets, eh… c’est la vie.

Emily Getting Ready For the Event

Emily Getting Ready For the Event

I booked a room at the Hilton Alexandria Mark Center for the evening. They offered a discounted rate for a huge room if you were with the Capitals and I knew I would not be capable of driving my car the hour it would take me to get back to Annapolis, MD. Anyways, Check-In for the event began at 6pm, with the VIP portion starting at 6:30. I was, of course, fashionably late and didn’t arrive until a mere 5 minutes before the VIP party began. The line was long and the ages ranged from 60’s to 21. (No one under 21 the whole event, there was an open bar after all. Two in the VIP room and four in the casino).

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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BREAKING NEWS: Caps Superfan Horn Guy Follows Us On Twitter, RMNB Finally Granted Legitimacy

To our surprise, the Russian Machine awoke this morning (okay, 1PM) to quite possibly the greatest email he will ever receive since starting this blog a few months ago. It read, simply: “TheHornGuy is now following you on Twitter!” See below:

The Horn Guy Follows The Russian Machine On Twitter

Yes, after multiple failed attempts to get his attention (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6), some soul-searching, giving up, and then trying again, The Horn Guy, el toot de extraordinare, is now following us. Commence celebrating… now!

Why is this important? Why are we so happy? Check out why below the fold:

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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The Russian Machine Happily Presents Anti-Pens Artwork

Look. We’re not going to sugarcoat it, we freakin’ hate the Penguins. A vengeful, angry hate. As a small lad, I vividly remember staying up until 3AM, only to watch Petr Nedved score a 4OT goal against the Capitals (shown below) which subsequently knocked my favorite team out of the ’96 playoffs. Did I cry all night and not sleep? Did I fail a test in middle school because of this?

Ugh. Take it down!

Sadly, It’s not just one singular event that has scarred me this bad. The Caps have lost in the playoffs to the Penguins 7 of 8 times including last year’s horrible Game 7 which Peter wrote about last night, and mentally I’m just completely jacked up because of this. Maybe the players aren’t. But I am. I remember 2 years ago, I went to see a Caps Pens game at the Verizon Center. What happened? The Caps jumped out to a 4-1 lead (scored the first three goals) and lost to them in a shootout 5-4. Did I start wildly punching a Verizon Center chair in anger when Crosby sealed the game with his shootout goal? You bet I did. Did I boo him everytime he touched the puck because I thought the NHL was giving him preferential treatment over Ovechkin? Damn straight.

Well now since I’m considered an adult (barely), it’s time to be more mature. However, that does not apply to our readers. A few days ago, I asked our fans to send us their Anti-Pens artwork, and boy did they respond. Below the fold, check out some of what was sent out way. Remember, laughing and trying to humiliate our opponent is meant to be a therapeutic way of letting out our anger. And no, this probably isn’t work appropriate – so beware!!!!

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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T-Shirt Tuesday Part III: Be A Part Of The “inSEMINation”
inSEMINation T-Shirt

Our last t-shirt of this crazy four t-shirt day (see our 3 new Bruce Boudreau T-Shirts below) is a doozy. And by doozy we mean terribly inappropriate and probably should never be worn by anyone ever. Seriously. Leave our website, we’re awful people. Like we didn’t even make this one in kid’s sizes for fear someone in a Maryland Private School might be expelled. But sadly, there is an audience for this type of trash, and the Russian Machine must abide.

So with that positive introduction out of the way, we bring you our newest t-shirt, appropriately titled the “inSEMINation.” Available in Men’s and Women’s sizes. Where did we get this idea? Why did we even make this? Well, obviously the Russian Machine is partial to his fellow Russian Superstars on the Capitals. So when anyone says something glowingly or creative about one of our players, we must act. Immediately.

During the Capitals 5-3 beatdown of the Flyers, Heather Blumburg blurted out this beauty of a tweet to celebrate a goal by Alex Semin, which immediately got our attention. We were so impressed, we created this t-shirt in less than one hour after we saw it.

As a side note, yes, the Capitol building shown here is meant to be a phallic representation of where most of Semin’s most ardent supporters reside: Siberia Washington DC. And yes, we considered putting a white 28 above the dome, but it was just too distasteful distracting from our typography on the bottom.

So for those girls in College who want to party and impress their current hockey-loving boyfriend with your knowledge of hockey and the human anatomy, this shirt’s for you. And no, I’m not eagerly awaiting the “Stay Classy, @russianmachine” tweets when I sign back online onto Twitter. Sigh.

By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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T-Shirt Tuesday Part II: The Gabby Series
Bruce Boudreau WTF T-Shirt

If you’re Bruce Boudreau, you’re livin’ large. You’ve got a Book Deal, a budding acting career, a Bobblehead, a Jack Adams Trophy, and the two-time NHL MVP on your team. How could life be any better? It’s hard to say.

But realistically, even with all of those luxuries, you’ve still got some problems. BIG problems. Like your GM just signed a guy barely playing NOW to a two year contract, you watch your team get beat up every fight it accepts, and your number one goalie has been out half the year with a multitude of weird, crotch-related injuries.

So if you’re feeling like Bruce is feeling after your “other” star winger gets whistled for another offensive zone penalty in the third period, then protest along with Gabby, and buy our WTF T-Shirt, available in Men’s and Women’s Sizes. Also available in Blue and White in Men’s and White in Women’s.

Protesting bad ice, a flat beer, or a nasty breakup with your girlfriend after you find out she’s cheating on you with the Capstronaut, has never been easier – or more stylish with this tee!

Want to see the rest of our Gabby T-Shirts in this series? Take a look below the jump.

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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T-Shirt Tuesday Part I: People AND Dogs Love Our T-Shirts
The first dog to ever sport a RMNB T-Shirt

Yes Fido, you are suffocating in Awesome!

Another T-Shirt Tuesday is among us my friends. And this week I learned something that I never thought I’d know: How a dog looks in one of my T-Shirt Designs. Wow. The look in his eyes says it all: Please kill me now! I’m suffocating in Awesome!

We wanted to extend a huge thanks to Reader Courtney for modeling our entire line of T-Shirts and to our good friend DookFn who became the first person to invade Verizon Center with one of our Tees! I mean hell, they’re no Chad Dukes (meaning they know something about hockey), but we’ll take what we can!

To see everyone who has modeled in our t-shirts thus far, please join our Facebook Fan Page and take a look!

Check out all of the new photos below the jump and yes, this is your cue to buy yourself a RMNB Tee and support your fellow starving artists.

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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T-Shirt Tuesday: Girl In Knit Hat Buys Our Shirts, So Does Friend
Elyssa Klopfenstein and Stacey Watkins in Our Mike Green Snubbed T-Shirts

Last Saturday the Caps awesomely dominated the Thrashers in Atlanta 8-1. Not only was there a lot of highlight reel goals, Comcast SportsNet also managed to find a lot of local Caps fans invading the Lower Bowl of Phillips Arena. Who said the Caps don’t travel well?

While on Twitter we even randomly mentioned a few of them:

russianmachine: Backie score because of crazy bouncing puck on crazy terrible ice. #Caps fan in 5th row happy!
russianmachine: Knuble gets goal #2. Russian Machine gets another assist. Crazy lady in knit hat happy.

Elyssa Klopfenstein and Stacey Watkins at the Thrashers/Caps Game

Well, ironically enough, a few days later I got an email from The Crazy Lady in the Knit Hat: Elyssa Klopfenstein. Not only did she shoot me a picture of herself and Stacey Watkins on TV, she told me that she bought a few of our Mike Green – Canada’s Best Defenseman: Snubbed T-Shirts. The even better news:

As soon as our Snubbed T-shirts come my friend and I definitely want to wear ours to a practice at Kettler and see if we can’t snag a picture w/Green in them. He seems like a cool enough guy, and I can’t imagine he wouldn’t also totally love them.

Or as one prominent media member intelligently pointed out to me, he may not want to be seen around them because it could potentially anger the people who control his Olympic chances in 4 years. I guess we’re going to see!! Hooray for social experiments!

Regardless Elyssa, be gentle with @Greenlife52 when you put the shirt over his head. Say please and thank you. Snap the picture quickly. We’ll have the car running out back.

Anyways next Tuesday, we’ll have a brand new shirt in our store, and it’ll be worth the wait – I promise. And yes, our contest is still going on. Get Green to sign your Snubbed T-Shirt with photographic evidence, and you get entered into a drawing for a free t-shirt. Get Green literally in our shirt (or maybe even holding it up with a big smile and thumbs up – my discretion), you get 2 free upper level tickets to an upcoming Caps game.

As for now, please peruse our current offerings and let us know what you think in the comments below: http://russianmachineneverbreaks.spreadshirt.com

Mike Green T-shirt Canada's Best Defenseman Snubbed

By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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Alex Ovechkin Talks About Russia’s Failures in WJC, Defends Nikita Filatov & Discusses His New Role As Capitals Captain
New Capitals Captain Alex Ovechkin (Photo by Heather Mabb)

Caps "Kapitan" Alex Ovechkin (Photo by Heather Mabb)

Fedor Fedin checks in again with a translated article published in today’s Soviet Sport. The article is written by Dmitry Chesnokov and is titled, “When I speak, do not stare at the ceiling!” It refers to Alex Ovechkin and a joke he makes about his new-found Captaincy. Honestly, could there be no greater title to an article? I think not.

In the text below, Ovechkin talks about Russia’s Failures in the WJC, defends Nikita Filatov, and discusses what it will be like as Captain of one of the best teams in the NHL. Let’s go:

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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What It’s Like To Be A Washington Capitals Fan in Russia
Red Square in Moscow, Russia

Surprisingly, It is tough to be a Caps fan in Russia.

Fedor Fedin lives in Moscow, Russia, and he’s a huge fan of the Washington Capitals. Personally, that’s awesome. I love it. But there’s one giant problem, from our collective perspective here in America, we assume that it’s easy following the team overseas. But the reality is, it’s quite the opposite. We asked Fedor to talk about some of his experiences and let us know what it’s really like. I hope this opens some eyes. Welp, take it away, buddy:

Some Americans think following the Capitals in Russia is easy. It actually is quite hard and you are made fun of quite a lot. Here are some of the problems:

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By Ian Oland 13 years ago

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