Entries tagged as ‘current events’
I was at a meeting recently where someone stood up and said, “Fall is here, so please remember not to drive through piles of leaves along the road. There could be children playing in them.”
I’ve heard that a hundred times, and a hundred times it sounded like something that grew out of urban legends. On the flip side, we were told as kids not to play in the leaves near the street for the same reason. As usual, this drove me to the internet. Low and behold, SNOPES.COM does not dismiss the warning as a myth, but cites several horrible accidents as proof that playing in the leaves can have deadly consequences.
But there’s a more pressing reason you shouldn’t play in the leaves, particularly not the leaves piled on the street in front of my house. That’s because they are filled with dog poop. Those are the leaves I raked from the backyard over the weekend, and while we try to stay one step ahead of the dogs, it’s tough in the fall. The problem? Their droppings are camouflaged by nature’s colorful bounty. That sounds very poetic until you stroll through the leaves, or worse yet, you spend three hours raking them up. Then nature’s colorful bounty is a stinky, disgusting mess.
So, don’t play in the leaves and don’t drive through the leaves, and for Gods’ sake, wear clean underwear in case you get in an accident.
Categories: Kids · Modern Living
Tagged: automotive, current events, dogs, wisdom
Jack Blake
Jack Owen Blake would be about my age today had Arthur Shawcross not murdered him in 1972. He was ten. Four months Shawcross raped and killed eight-year-old Karen Hill. She’d be 44.
Arthur Shawcross confessed to the murders, but Jefferson County District Attorney William J. McClusky was doubtful about his case and eager for a conviction. So he made an offer: Shawcross would be spared a murder charge and a life term if he’d tell authorities where he had hidden the body of Jack Blake. Shawcross accepted and served 15 years of his 25 year sentence. He was paroled and later went on to kill eleven women in the Rochester area.
Nothing could have saved those two innocent children in 1972, but you’ve got to wonder about DA McClusky. What could have made him think a jury in Watertown, NY wouldn’t want to lock up Shawcross and throw away the key? Instead he got to walk free and murder again.
Shawcross died in an Albany hospital this week, brought there after falling ill at Sullivan Correctional Facility. Unlike his many victims, Arthur Shawcross went the way many of us will go, in a hospital being cared for by people fighting to keep us alive.
There hasn’t been an execution in New York since 1963, but if anyone ever deserved it, it was Arthur Shawcross. And if you think you can explain why a man who murdered thirteen people shouldn’t have been put to death, you’re welcome to try.
Categories: News
Tagged: crime, current events
I try not to fall into any “should have done this” or “could have done that” thinking, but I’m really starting to wonder about passing on the plumbing thing.
My father owned a small plumbing business, and a couple of summers as a laborer convinced me that I wanted nothing to do with it. All I could see from my narrow slice of the world was a pathway that lead to a life in basements and under sinks —but what I didn’t see was the opportunity to be a businessman. My thick teenage skull couldn’t understand that the goal was not to be the guy doing the work, but the guy making the money.
I was reminded of this after the NY Times did the inevitable plumber story after Joe the Plumber became a national celebrity. But the plumbers the Times wrote about? These were successful, Einstein-quoting guys with 4,000 square foot offices running shops where their top employees “clear two, maybe two-and-a-quarter every year.” Yes, the workers, not the managers.
But, no…I had to go work in TV.
Anyway, no point in having regrets or in making the obvious TV career vs. plumbing career crap joke. Life is life and when you get right down to it, it’s just a matter of which end of the pipe you’re looking through.
Categories: Work
Tagged: current events, plumbing
Charles O’Byrne, Governor David Paterson’s top guy, resigned last week after it was revealed he hadn’t been paying his taxes. During a press conference it was explained that O’Byrne suffered from “Late Filing Syndrome,” a little known psychological ailment that prevented him from fulfilling his civic duty. Naturally, this has been widely mocked on the internet. This is very unfair, because in truth there are many obscure conditions that perfectly normal people deal with every day. For example:
Put Off Raking the Leaves Syndrome
Symptoms: Leafy lawn. Neighbors stand in front of house and glare at you.
Forgot To Return Your DVD To Hollywood Video Syndrome
Symptoms: Onerous late charges. Spousal disdain.
Neglecting to Put The Garbage Out On Wednesday Night Syndrome
Symptoms: Foul odor in garage.
Didn’t Send Your Mother A Birthday Card Syndrome
Symptoms: Guilt.
Unwise Use of the Internet Syndrome
Symptoms: Embarrassment, possible loss of employment.
Right…so let’s cut Charles O’Byrne a break, shall we?
Categories: News
Tagged: current events
The thermometer says it’s still summer —but the look on everybody’s face screams that the season is over.
But September’s not no bad. In our house back to school and shorter days mean it’s apple picking time. At Indian Ladder Farms the trees are heavy with fruit, and if you go on a weekend afternoon, the rows of trees are busy with people filling their bags with the most beautiful apples you’ve ever seen.
The orchard is an idyllic place when your only picking half a bushel. Spend the whole day out there and it’s a different story. When my father was a teenager in the Bronx, he was sent away to the country with a work crew to pick apples. It was not idyllic. When I told him it was something we did for fun, he said, “I’d rather be dead than pick another apple.”
Today you can get Americans to pick apples for an hour, but not all day. Places like Indian Ladder Farms bring in crews from Jamaica to work the orchards —but not before they post the jobs locally. Only after they can’t find US citizens to do the work may they bring in foreign laborers. I asked an apple farmer about this once. “Local people we hire to pick apples show up the first day…and they never come back.” Have a look at what farmers have to do to harvest their crop. That red apple you’re biting into is wrapped in red tape.
Categories: Modern Living · Work
Tagged: current events, farming
Here’s a little advice: If she gets angry and takes off her shoe? Run.
WEST OCEAN CITY — An Ocean City woman faces assault charges after she allegedly struck a Pirates Cove employee with a shoe, causing injury to his face, and caused a disturbance at the bar with another employee of Pirates Cove on Tuesday. Worcester County Times 9/4/08
BOSTON — A woman was attacked by another woman with a high-heeled shoe and a pint glass in a Nantucket bar over the weekend, according to the Cape Cod Times. Laurie Ray, 36, faced charges Monday of mayhem and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon with intent to maim or disfigure. WCVB-TV 8/28/08
EAST STROUDSBURG –A 22-year-old woman smashed a man in the face with her shoe after he tried to kiss her Friday while she was walking home on Greentree Drive, Stroud Area Regional police said. Police said they found the man, Obispo Lopez-Diaz, 22, of Morristown, N.J., at a gas station on Prospect Street and charged him with indecent assault, stalking, simple assault, harassment and public drunkenness. When police arrived, they saw Lopez-Diaz had an indentation on his face that was ”consistent with being struck with heel of a shoe,” police said. The Morning Call 8/17/08
LINCOLN –A Lincoln woman is behind bars after police say she attacked a man with her high heel shoe. According to witnesses, a 21-year-old man was playing beer pong at a party when Connie Phillips, 22, punched him several times, then hit him in the forehead with her stiletto heel, causing a 1.5-inch gash and knocking him out. KOLN-TV 8/17/08
Categories: News
Tagged: crime, current events, Women
Wild animals are bent on revenge. A few examples:
Moose, Buffalo man collide (I didn’t make up that headline)
CHATHAM–A Buffalo man was seriously hurt when his motorcycle crashed into a moose on the Berkshire Spur section of state Thruway (I-90) in the eastbound passing lane at milepost 14.2, July 25 at 4:50 a.m. Motorcyclist Kim C. King, 39, was airlifted by LifeNet helicopter to the Albany Medical Center from a landing zone set up at the B-2 exit by Tri-Village firefighters. Mr. King was listed in critical but stable condition with multiple broken bones and internal injuries.
Bears kill two scientists and lay siege to remote forest base
At least 30 hungry bears have trapped a group of geologists at their remote survey site in the far east of Russian after killing two of their colleagues last week, emergency officials said. The team of geologists on the Kamchatka Peninsula were forced to remain in camp with weapons ready as the ravenous bears - some ten feet tall - roamed around outside. The bears are thought to have run out of their normal diet of fish and smaller animals - and to have turned instead to hunting humans.
Chhattisgarh govt to hunt down killer elephant
RAIPUR: A rogue elephant that has killed eight people and caused widespread damage in Chhattisgarh’s Jashpur district is to be hunted - with tranquiliser gun - the state government announced after affected villagers started a road blockade. Chhattisgarh’s vast northern region, comprising of Surguja, Jashpur, Korea, Korba and Raigarh districts, regularly witnesses cases of man-elephant conflict. Dozens of people have been killed by wild elephants in recent years in the region.
Categories: News
Tagged: current events
In photographs, Maple Ridge Wind Farm is beautiful and beguiling. In person it’s an abomination. When you come upon them straddling rural Route 177 in Lewis County you can hardly believe your eyes. The giant wind turbines stretch as far as you can see on Tug Hill. There are 195 of them. When you see several wind turbines together it is an inspiring sight, but when there are nearly 200 of them it leaves a ravaged landscape —as ugly and out of place as the most unsightly factory. If fact, the towers are considerably worse than many industrial sites, rendering a vast stretch of farmland into a ruined landscape. When I came over the hill and saw them for the first time I had to slow down or else I would have driven off the road. I used to think that the people who opposed wind turbines were cranks —wackos and Luddites standing in the way of something clean and wonderful. After all, look how pretty they are in my pictures. Get out of your car and stand among the monsters and you might not feel that way.
Categories: Modern Living
Tagged: bad ideas, current events
If I pause for even a second near the reading material in Price Chopper, I end up bringing home one of those quickie true crime books. Last weekend I grabbed this cheery volume: Heartless: The True Story of Neil Entwistle and the Cold Blooded Murder of his Wife and Child. I was familiar with the case but couldn’t remember how it ended, so I figured it would provide a few hours of wholesome entertainment. The true crime genre is wildly uneven. Some of it’s great, like Vincent Bugliosi’s Helter Skelter —and some of it’s awful, like Steve Ference’s hilariously bad book about the Porco case, November Memories.
Anyway, here I am with about 30 pages to go and I see this headline from the Boston Herald: Entwistle Defense Rests Without Calling a Single Witness. What?! No wonder I couldn’t remember how the story ended: the story hadn’t ended yet! WTF?! I bought a book with no ending! Remarkably, publisher St. Martin’s put crime reporter Michele McPhee’s book out without waiting for the case to conclude, as it did this week with Entwistle’s conviction. I didn’t bother with the last 30 pages.
It’s easy to hear this story and and call the publisher stupid, but they did manage to get $6.99 out of my pocket, didn’t they?
Categories: News
Tagged: current events
5/26/08 - Written on Back of Napkin
Why’s David Paterson so popular with the ladies? He has a cute glaucoma.
4/23/08 - Dinner Conversation
Zack: If Alex was on death row, would you make him his favorite food as a last meal?
Ann: Did he try to kill me, too?
Zack: No, he just killed someone else.
Ann: Yes.
4/19/08 - Unfinished Blog Post
Getting old. It blows, doesn’t it? I’ve been fighting aging by acting more immature, but the jury’s still out on how this is working out.
Undated - Scrawled on Back of Deposit Slip
Xcuse me? Are you off your meds?
Undated - Folded Up Post It Note
ortho bucks…ipods…needles…eyelids…has mono “i’m not getting mono”…jesus c.s…group discuss…
5/2/08 - Unfinished Blog Post
So Zack whispers to me in church, “That’s cool.” Cool? “Yeah, cool.”
I have no idea what he’s talking about.
“The axe. It’s cool.” What?!
“The axe of the Apostles. You know. They had axes. That’s cool.”
Categories: Uncategorized
Tagged: blogging, crime, current events, Kids, Religion
