This one is just begging for a caption...

Anybody got one for it? Winner will be decided and announced Friday.

I must be doing something right

I used to get a lot of Chinese hits on my sitemeter, then they stopped some time ago. I guess I know why now. Was it something I said, LOL?

Police arrest two in hypothermia death of 9-year-old boy in Salt Lake

Police have arrested two people in the death of a 9-year-old boy who apparently succumbed to hypothermia in a downtown restaurant after being placed in a trash can full of ice water.
Pedro Gaucin-Canales, 36, was booked into jail Wednesday after he told police he and another person put the child in the water at the Melting Pot fondue restaurant, where firefighters found the child dead in the kitchen about 9:30 a.m. Sunday, according to a jail booking report.
Rebecca Hernandez-Velasco, 19, the victim's sister, was booked into jail this morning on suspicion of child-abuse homicide.
Both suspects were employees of the restaurant.

What is wrong with people like that? Can anyone tell me a legitimate reason to stick a child in a garbage can full of ice water? I can't imagine doing something like this to a little kid.

Game in bag prompts airport evacuation

LONG BEACH (AP) — A suspicious item in checked luggage that prompted the evacuation of a terminal at Long Beach Airport on Thursday turned out to be an electronic game, authorities said.

Several hundred people were evacuated from the terminal for about 90 minutes and five arriving aircraft were held on the tarmac until the all-clear was given.

Transportation Security Administration screeners spotted the suspicious item while X-raying a checked bag around 9:30 a.m., agency spokeswoman Jennifer Peppin said.

"It is basically a handheld game board that a passenger packed," she told Fox News Channel.

The item turned out to be a handheld electronic game board in a "raw form" that showed its wiring, she said.

"It certainly was nothing but it certainly looked like something. It had all the wires and components that you would see in an explosive device," Peppin said.

It had wires and electrical components, so that makes it a bomb? How the hell would any of those characters know what a bomb looked like? Has it occurred to any of those people that all modern electronics have "wires and components"? Did anyone notice something called explosives connected to the "wires and components"?
In the meantime, grandmothers still have to take off their shoes, and nail files are confiscated. And they wonder why people think their tax money is misspent.

An award

I have been given an award by fellow blogger Nyx. I am not sure if I can live up to it, but I feel touched that someone considered me to be worthy of such.

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"This award should make you reflect on five bloggers who have been an encouragement, a source of love, impacted you in some way, and have been a Godly example to you.

Five Bloggers who when you reflect on them you get a sense of pride and joy… of knowing them and being blessed by them.”

Here are the rules for this one:

1. Copy this post (meaning the rules).
2. Reflect on five bloggers and write a least a paragraph about each one.
3. Make sure you link this post so others can read it and the rules.
4. Go leave your chosen bloggers a comment and let them know they’ve been given the award.
5. Put the award icon on your site.

The thing about a source of love and being a Godly example isn't really my thing; I am a longtime agnostic, and most of my encouragement has just been the reading of their blogs, rather than active encouragement on their part. They are all people who make me think, and whose words I enjoy reading. With that in mind, these are some of the people who I enjoy reading.
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I think the first one I would have to list is the late Acidman of Gut Rumbles. This was a person who was read by many, and both liked and disliked by a lot of people. He was a prolific blogger, posting several times a day. It was through reading his blog that I first started toying with the idea of posting my own blog. I never got to meet him, but wish I could have done so.

Marko the Munchkin Wrangler is an inspiration to those who value freedom. He writes well constructed posts on politics and life in general, and does some very noteworthy stuff, such as his essay on concealed carry. Definitely a thinking person's blog.

I first started reading GuyK at CHARMING, JUST CHARMING after reading his comments at Gut Rumbles. He has a laid back relaxed view of life (after a couple of rants in the morning upon reading the news), but is not lazy. He manages to stay busy, but doesn't let life push him too much.

One of my first reads in the morning is to check on Tamara's View from the Porch. Reflections on history are common, and usually with a mixture of sarcasm and wit where required. She is always a joy to read, and teaches the proper employment of snark.

I first discovered "Scully" at Skywriter about a year ago, I think. She does serious writing that flows easily, it evokes images and memories, and makes me wish I could write that well. A combination of intelligence, education, and experience, her posts are always good to read. She also has a subtle, almost dry sense of humor when commenting that can be hilarious.


There are a lot of reasons to read the people listed, these are just a few of my reflections on them.

Make Al Gore cry...

Want something that will go anywhere, and have a carbon footprint the size of a T.Rex?
You might need one of these:




A Humvee that converts to a boat in 5 seconds, and has the global warming people wetting their pants in even less time.
I remember something like this in a couple of James Bond movies, but this is even cooler.

A little music to make things go better...

Popped a few tunes into the playlist; seems to make me feel better after a bit. Everybody familiar with the top ten in the list?

"Coming into Los Angeles" by Arlo Guthrie
"Crippled Crow" by Kris Kristofferson
"Strangers in the Night" by Frank Sinatra
"Yakety Axe" by Chet Atkins/Mark Knopfler
"Here For The Party" by Gretchen Wilson
"Hungry Like the Wolf" by Duran Duran
"Summer Nights" by Marianne Faithfull
"Nothing Is Easy" by Jethro Tull
"You Talk Too Much" by George Thorogood
"When the Levee Breaks" by Led Zeppelin

I tend to listen to odd combinations; lower in the list I also have stuff by Vivaldi, Hank Williams, and Miles Davis.

I've been expecting this

Since the Parker case has been submitted to the SCOTUS, the Brady Bunch has gone into hysterics again. I just got this in an email this morning:

District of Columbia Mayor Adrian Fenty announced this week that the District will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review the decision in Parker v. District of Columbia — an assault on D.C. gun laws and one that could threaten every city's gun laws.

The U.S. Supreme Court could decide in about three months whether they will hear the case and each month brings a tidal wave of work for the Brady Center to defend our nation's gun laws. We must be geared-up to fight this battle. Simply put: we need your support today!

Please click here to make a tax-deductible commitment of $25 or more. Your gift today will help us prepare for the incredibly large amount of work that needs to be conducted to hold off this assault on our nation's gun laws.

You'll recall, in a 2-1 decision this past spring, a federal Appeals Court overturned Washington D.C.'s long-standing restrictions on handguns based on a twisted view of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, while ignoring more than 60 years of precedent — a decision that endangers America's gun laws coast-to-coast.

This battle — to its very core — is the most important battle we have ever waged. We need your help today to save America's gun laws by building a strong Brady Gun Law Defense Fund.

Your tax-deductible gift of $25 or more today is critical to our success!

We must prepare for a long hard battle. So much of what we have worked for in the past and everything we're currently working on could be destroyed by the heinous decision of right-wing activist judges who chose to ignore more than 60 years of precedent in order to help the gun lobby accomplish in the courts what it has been unable to accomplish in Congress.

Notice how they don't waste much time panhandling for money? And distorting and lying (as usual)? These bozos are so predictable. If they would even try to give some semblance of truth, rather than the ridiculous drivel that they spew into the media. I need another cup of coffee to get the bad taste out of my mouth after hearing from them...

Couple accused of starving infants while playing video games

RENO, Nev. (AP) -- A couple authorities say were so obsessed with the Internet and video games that they left their babies starving and suffering other health problems have pleaded guilty to child neglect.

The children of Michael and Iana Straw, a boy age 22 months and a girl age 11 months, were severely malnourished and near death last month when doctors saw them after social workers took them to a hospital, authorities said. Both children are doing well and gaining weight in foster care, prosecutor Kelli Ann Viloria told the Reno Gazette-Journal.

Police said hospital staff had to shave the head of the girl because her hair was matted with cat urine. The 10-pound girl also had a mouth infection, dry skin and severe dehydration.

Her brother had to be treated for starvation and a genital infection. His lack of muscle development caused him difficulty in walking, investigators said.

Michael Straw is an unemployed cashier, and his wife worked for a temporary staffing agency doing warehouse work, according to court records. He received a $50,000 inheritance that he spent on computer equipment and a large plasma television, authorities said.

I can't imagine any normal parent deliberately neglecting their child, but to play video games? Makes me feel like beating the living shit out of them. People with those sort of priorities have no business having children. I just hope the despicable assholes have a very miserable time while in prison.

Must be feeling a bit nostalgic

Got looking at the playlist I set up today...hmmm. I don't live in the past, but sometimes I get in strange music moods. Some days it's a mixture, other days it's all classical, or country, or blues. Sometimes its rock from a certain period, other times a mishmash. Today seems to be an oldies-rock day.
This is the top ten on it:

"Tequila" by The Champs
"It's Only Make Believe" by Conway Twitty
"Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" by Fifth Dimension
"Jupiter's Child" by Steppenwolf
"Pretty Ballerina" by The Left Banke
"Let's Live for Today" by The Grass Roots
"Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" by The Animals
"Good Morning Starshine" by Oliver
"Kind of a Drag" by The Buckinhams
"Let Me Be" by The Turtles

Anybody else out there old enough to remember these? Any comments on them?

China blames Internet for rise in teen pregnancies

BEIJING--Nearly half of the pregnant teens in China's financial hub, Shanghai, met their partners on the Internet, state media said on Tuesday.

Zhang Zhengrong, a doctor who oversees the city's first-aid hotline for pregnant teens, said 46 percent of the more than 20,000 teenage girls who called the hotline over the past two years said they had had sex with boys they met on the Internet.

A survey by Zhang's hospital found that only 7.9 percent of the parents queried talked to their children about sex, and 79 percent of high school and university students said they got their ideas about sex from the Internet.

When I was a kid, they blamed stuff like this on rock-and-roll music.

Sounds like there are a lot of teenage boys on the internet over there typing one-handed...

11-year-old girl charged with DUI after chase

ORANGE BEACH, Ala. (AP) — Police who chased a car for miles along a highway at speeds up to 100 mph said the driver was drunk, hardly a rarity in this resort town. But there was more: When they looked inside the flipped vehicle with guns drawn, they found an 11-year-old girl at the wheel.

I'm a little curious where her parents are during all this, and whether this is something she does all the time.

Sax Player Boots Randolph Dead at 80

NASHVILLE, Tenn. -- Boots Randolph, whose spirited saxophone playing on "Yakety Sax" endeared him to fans for years on Benny Hill's TV show, died Tuesday. He was 80.

Most people out there are probably unfamiliar with his name, but those of use who are older remember him well. Those who are younger, and familiar with the Benny Hill show, will recognize his "Yakety Sax" that was played during many of the routines. He was well known for work with a lot of country western stars, and will be missed.

Insanity from iCult members

Scene from Fifth Avenue Apple Store:

Good 'ol American capitalism. A sharpie a couple seats down from me sold his spot in line for $250. He had come with his cousins to keep them company with no intention of buying an iPhone. Sensing an opportunity, he struck. The sucker… er, purchaser is now being interviewed by an MSNBC reporter (seen to the left of another salesman).

Granted, the iPhone looks interesting, but is it that important to be the first on your block with one? I think this guy would have done quite well for himself if he was still around.


H/T to SCI FI Tech

"Honey, I've got a headache..."

MIAMI - A Florida man awoke with a severe headache and asked his wife to drive him to a hospital, where doctors found a bullet lodged behind his right ear, sheriff’s deputies said.

The wife, April Moylan, fled the emergency room when the bullet was discovered but later told deputies she had accidentally shot her husband as he slept early on Tuesday.

How do you shoot someone behind the ear by accident while they are sleeping? Sounds like she was a little miffed at him. I'd be curious to know what she used to shoot him. Probably a .22 I'd imagine, but this sort of thing has happened with larger calibers.

High-tech fence on Ariz. border delayed

WASHINGTON (AP) — Technical issues are delaying the completion of a multibillion-dollar high-tech fence intended to reduce illegal entry along the nation's southern border, the government said Thursday.

The first phase of the project involves building nine towers that are dotted along 28 miles of the Arizona-Mexico border, and bracket the Sasabe port of entry.

So the Bronze Age Egyptians were able to build The Great Pyramid of Giza using nothing but manpower and ropes, but a superpower in the Nuclear Age can't seem to build a fence...
Maybe someone should study some Roman engineering to see how it's done.
Sounds like the typical sort of thing we see contractors for the government do; come up with a winning bid, and then find ways to gouge and jack up the price later. Business as usual.
Just my opinion.

Michael Moore's 'Sicko' Leaked Onto Web

I'm sorry, but I find this somewhat funny.

LOS ANGELES (AdAge.com) -- Michael Moore's new documentary "Sicko" has been pirated and is now widely available for download on peer-to-peer content sites like www.thepiratebay.org.

Last week, the Oscar winning director announced that he'd decided to stash a copy of "Sicko" in Canada, in case the federal government decided to impound it over an apparently unauthorized trip to Cuba made during its filming. As it turns out, the hard part won't be getting the film released, but getting audiences to pay to see it now that its available for free.

He made such a big deal out of claiming that the government was going to steal his documentary, and it is pirated from the place where he sent it to be safe.
Whoops...

Bush Continues Push for New Immigration Bill

President Bush today pressed his campaign for a new comprehensive immigration bill, telling an audience of Latino religious leaders that "our economy depends on" foreign workers and calling on Congress to act now before the problem of illegal immigration "grows worse."

You'd think, at this point, they would quit beating this dead horse. Obviously the thing is not going to pass, so quit slapping band-aids on it and toss it out. There comes a time when it isn't worth the trouble to fix something, you need to start over. I don't see why they are making such a big deal out of something that should be simple. Toss the stupid bill in the trash, and start over. May I offer some humble suggestions?

Secure the borders.
Stiffen the laws regarding the hiring of illegals.
Quit giving them citizen benefits unless they are legal citizens or are applying for citizenship.

That should cut down on some of the influx, then we can try to figure out what to do with the ones already in this country.
What we have right now is a bunch of jackasses in Washington DC who are all trying to find some way of declaring an amnesty without coming right out and saying it. You would think somebody in office would care what their voters want. The Democrats want future voters and the Republicans want cheap labor. When you also factor in the clueless media pushing for an amnesty, it's a three ring circus, and all three rings seem to be full of clowns.
Just my opinion.

Don'tcha hate it when that happens...

My ISP had server problems, went down Wednesday, didn't come up until this morning a little bit ago. Will probably take a while to catch up. Not counting spam, I have about 50 emails; that alone should take a bit. Won't be able to catch up on my usual blogs for a while today.

Customer forced at gunpoint to pump gas into suspect's vehicle

A woman filling her car Sunday morning at a Salt Lake City gas station was forced at gunpoint to pump gas into another vehicle.
The victim was at a Chevron station at 875 S. State St. around 10 a.m. when she was approached by two men who had parked next to her, police said. The driver, a black adult, pushed something against her back and told her he had a gun. He then told her to fill up the tank on his newer white Jeep Cherokee.
The victim pumped $15 into the man's vehicle before her credit card reached its limit and stopped, police said. The suspects then drove away.
The passenger was described as male white adult. Cherokee had Wyoming license plates.

So now this person has an armed robbery charge on him when captured; all for $15 dollars worth of gas. Hell, around here that's only about four gallons worth, since gas is over three bucks a gallon.

What a dumb ass...

It's about time...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Nearly two years after federal agents reported finding $90,000 in a freezer in his Washington home, U.S. Rep. William Jefferson of Louisiana has been charged with a global campaign to solicit bribes, obstruct justice and engage in racketeering, Justice Department officials said Monday.

The veteran New Orleans Democrat faces 16 criminal counts, said Alice Fisher, assistant U.S. attorney general in the criminal division.

In addition to the racketeering and solicitation charges, Jefferson has been charged with money laundering, wire fraud, conspiracy and violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

It sure took them long enough to get around to this crook. He should have been locked up long ago.

As you may remember, Pelosi put him on the Homeland Security Committee even after his crimes were made public; so much for the Democratic promise to "clean up Congress". Which just goes to show you can't trust either party; corruption and greed are bipartisan.

I've been memed (is that a word?)

It looks like SpeakerTweaker has gotten me with a meme.

1. Go to the Billboard #1 Hits listings ;
2. Pick the year you turned 18;
3. Get nostalgic over the songs of the year;
4. Pick 5 songs and write something about how these songs affected you;
5. Pass it on to 5 more friends.

I'm not good for passing memes to people, but I'll try to do justice to the other parts of it. I turned 18 in 1970.

1. Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head - B. J. Thomas
This one I remember because it was the main song in the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid . The history wasn't very accurate, but the movie is a classic, and a hoot to watch.

2. Bridge Over Troubled Water - Simon & Garfunkel
Had no affect on my life, but I have always liked their stuff, and this was probably one of their best.

3. Mama Told Me (Not To Come) - Three Dog Night
This was a very humerous song for someone in college who grew up during the Sixties. If you have to ask why, you either know nothing about the Sixties, or have never listened to the song. ;)

4. War - Edwin Starr
One of the signature songs of the time; most of us were not big fans of unnecessary war in the first place, and with Vietnam it was sort of personal.

5. My Sweet Lord - George Harrison
This one was very appealing to the Eastern philosophy crowd; my own reaction was more of WTF? Though I am familiar with a huge number of religions and philosophies, I subscribe to none of them in their conventional form, though I do respect anyone's belief as long as they don't try to push it in my face.

I was never a big fan of the "Top Ten" type of music; at that time period I was listening to other stuff. The Moody Blues was (and still is)one of my all-time favorites; I also listened quite a bit to The Doors, Cream, John Mayall, Jethro Tull, ZZ Top, and a lot of classical, jazz, and blues, with a bit of country at times. I tend to be a bit unconventional in my musical tastes.

Vacation was good, but too short

It was interesting spending several days without a TV, radio, or computer. We all need a break now and then.
The trip started on 5/24, we made fair time down to Moab, since the traffic wasn't too busy. The Memorial Day weekend can be quite hectic; it is the traditional first weekend that a lot of people use to travel down to Lake Powell. We spent a couple of days around the Moab area, both out in the deserts, and up in the alpine regions of the Manti-Lasalle mountains outside of Moab. After leaving Moab, we meandered over towards Escalante, stopping at various places such as Goblin Valley. If you saw the movie Galaxy Quest, they filmed the scenes that featured the giant rock creature in Goblin Valley. We stayed in a small town called Torrey, just a few miles north of Escalante, and west of Capitol Reef National Monument. Capitol Reef is always enjoyable to travel back in the gorges and washes, and there are some old pioneer buildings and such there to look at. South toward Escalante, you first come to the Aquarius Plateau, so named because it is the watershed for the whole area. There was still a fair amount of snow on top, but we were only at about 9600 feet elevation when we crossed over, so we weren't in the snow. Did see a bull and a cow elk near the top, but they were heading uphill. We stopped at the small town of Boulder partway down the side of the Aquarius, to see how the progress is going on an Anasazi village they have been excavating there. The place has grown a bit since we were last there, but is still fairly small. Boulder is right at the junction of the Burr Trail and Highway 12, so we took a trip down it for a ways. It brought back memories of backbacking in the back canyons of that are back in the late Sixties. We were going to hike down Calf Creek, but it was so crowded this weekend that we decided to do it another time when there were fewer people. The town of Escalante has grown quite a bit, but there wasn't much there we were interested in, so we stayed out in the back roads away from people as much as we could. We could have used a few more days in both Moab and the Escalante area, but all good things must end, so we got back 5/28.
Below are a few samples of what we saw; there are a few others in my Flickr account that can be reached by the widget in the sidebar. Click to see full size.
1. Balancing Rock
2. Manti-Lasalle Mountains
3. An arch (I forget which one)
4. Part of Goblin Valley
5. Part of the Hogback Road between Boulder and Escalante; the sides drop off a thousand feet or so to the bottom, and it is barely two lanes wide.
6. One of the gorges in Capitol Reef.

Will be absent from the blogosphere for a few days

I have been getting ready to leave town for a few days; I will be spending some time in Moab and Escalante in southern Utah until late Monday; hopefully I will be on the road early tomorrow, so it is packing time. If I get any good pictures, I'll post them either here or at my Flickr account. I have posted some pictures from my last trip, to show you the sort of country we'll be traveling through. Click for full sized picture.
Have a good weekend!

An occasion you don't want to miss

Warning: Vegans and PETA cult members are warned not to attend.