Friday, January 28, 2005
Today in History: Jan 27 1945 Soviet troops liberate the Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps in Nazi occupied Poland.
Perhaps more importantly though, Jan 27, 1997: Pat Boone goes heavy metal.
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Link of the day: Cool. Muppets Overtime. Might take a little extra time to load, but it's neat. http://www.joeytomatoes.com/muppetsovertimeoriginal05.htm
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Not So Sucky Band at Bankshots Saturday
Those frustrated bankers are at it again, this time rockin' the house at Bank Shots in Wilmington. From what I understand they may even have a CHICK singing with them this time. The dudes are dragging in their original drummer (some guy named Matt Frost) and even an extra guy on guitars. Like a REAL BAND or something!
So if you are looking for something to do Saturday night and you are blessed enough to be living close to Wilmington, DE, swing to BankShots around 9:30 or so. Sauerwine, the not so sucky band, will play till 11ish and then some other not so sucky band, The Relay, will magically appear to play their version of "music".
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Students Arrested Over 'Violent' Stick Figure Drawings
Two evil children from Ocala FL, aged 9 and 10, have been stopped by police (whew). These two scary children drew "violent drawings of stick figures", and therefore were charged with the 2nd degree felony of making a written threat to kill or harm another person. They were taken out of school in handcuffs.
They had drawn big mean scary pictures of stick figures hurting another stick figure, and were using these pictures to scare the wits out of another child. The kid being bullied by the pictures went to his teacher, who went to the dean, who called the cops to arrest the big mean bully boys.
The well-phrased comment from the police spokesman is as follows: "When an adult or even myself look at the picture looked at it at first I was thinking there is really not much to the picture or I would not be that scared by the picture those children drew. However, we have to put ourselves in his mind and that's the bottom line here. It is his well-being and the way he perceived that picture to be. It actually put him in extreme fear and he was in fear for his life."
Wow. My entire grade school class would have been arrested, I think.
I wonder if kids can still play hangman, or if it offends sensibilities and scares illiterate people.
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At Least One Sane Person in Milwaukee
The Wisconsin attorney general has tossed out the ridiculous suit filed by the kid who didn't want to do summer homework. If you recall, kiddo and daddio thought it violated his rights that the teacher would expect him to continue using his brain during the summer months, so they filed suit demanding that the students be allowed to decide whether or not to do summer homework. (See, some kids have 'demanding' summer jobs as ice cream servers, Rita's employees, camp counselors...no time to think there!)
The atty general said pish posh on this unmeritorious suit and says that Dad and Kid should cough up the money to pay for the court's wasted time.
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Expense Report
If you're going to do a crime, try to make it be in the Netherlands. There, criminals are allowed to claim the cost of their weapons used when robbing places, or claim wear and tear on their vehicles if they're drug dealers who have to drive a lot.
Recently a 46 year old bank robber was able to claim the $3400 he spent on his weapon against the gross proceeds from the heist. Based on that, his fine was reduced and so was his jail time. As the Netherlands' legal folk say: "You can compare criminal acts to normal business activities, where you must invest to make profits, and thus you have costs."
Only hitch: per Gerard Sta, national director of the Office of Criminal Assets: a criminal's costs must be directly related to the crime, and not just day-to-day expenses. "A second condition is that the criminal offence must be carried out,"
Good to know.
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Tuesday, January 25, 2005
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Link of the Day, courtesy of Lord Mutter: http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/P/peoplesbookofrecords/lift.html
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Dating Etiquette 101
Rule #1: Don't rob your date before asking her out.
Local boy Brent Brown, 25, and his buddy Andre Moore, 18, his robbed their New Castle County (DE) pizza delivery wench. Taken by her beauty and poise, not to mention extremely speedy delivery service, Brent called her up on his cell phone to apologize and to ask her out on a date.
Pizza Chick said no, and gave the phone number to the cops. She also picked Brent out of a photo lineup, further sealing his fate.
So now Brent is dateless and arrested and only has some empty Domino's pizza boxes to show for his efforts. So sad.
Brent's official statement: "I'm innocent. I work every day. I have no reason to rob the pizza lady."
No reason, indeed. It's not like it was Papa John's pizza or anything.
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Driving Etiquette 247
Rule # 72: Don't Eat and Drive
Sarah McCaffrey was happily driving down the road in South Tyneside, England, in December of 2003. She was hungry, so she munched on an apple. She held the apple in her right hand as she navigated, albeit not smoothly, a left hand turn. And so her plight began.
Sarah was pulled over by an aggressive cop who THOUGHT she was using a cell phone. When he saw that she wasn't, he still gave her a ticket for eating while driving. Sarah thought that was stupid, so she appealed.
10 hearings later, after review of aerial photos, video from police aircraft, and a police car's video recording of the chewing incident, Sarah's case was decided yesterday. She has been fined $111.80US for her infraction.
The British Police have incurred approximately $24,385USD in trying the case.
Money extremely well spent, to keep the roads safe from fruit eaters.
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Scary Picture Hospitalizes Old Woman
Mrs. Wang was toddling out of the supermarket the other night, and started making her way down an alleyway. Suddenly, she saw what she thought was a wild tiger in her city streets. She screamed. She turned. She ran. She slipped. She fell. Heavily.
As people ran up to assist Mrs. Wang, she pointed down the alleyway stammering" "Tiger, tiger, there's a tiger."
She actually should have stammered: "painting, painting, there's a painting inside that calligraphy and paint shop there."
D'oh!
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Stripping Cops Okay!
In Houston, TX, the cops are tired of the prostitution. So tired, in fact, that they have put a new policy in place to allow undercover vice cops to strip down nekky if that's what it takes to get the john and/or the prostitute. Now that they can strip down to their birthday suits, the cops are having a better success rate, snagging 56 evil doers in November.
I guess that's their equivalent to casual Fridays.
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Riiiiight...
Ian Finlay is such a good citizen. Tired of the police stings that keep catching sexual predators, he went online and pretended to be a predator himself. Then, knowing that the purported 15 year old girl he'd been exchanging drrrrty words with was actually a cop, Ian turned up at the sting to turn the tables. He's extremely upset that the Hempfield, PA police arrested him before he could explain his grand plan.
I think he should sue.
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