I am sure that the smilies are likely the last thing on the list of things to do...but thought I would lend a hand. The smilies for this site were designed for a light background, so the have a white halo around them as you can see:

I have taken the liberty of optimizing a set of smilies for a black background that eliminates the halo. Thought maybe you guys would like to replace your current ones with this new set. They look better on black. I have maintained the file names, so you should just be able to overwrite on upload.

Just my 28 cents (2 cents adjusted for inflation)....