I shared this with Lawrence on Saturday, and he was amused (in the “WTF?!” sense):
“Georgia man sentenced to 20 years for bombing woman’s home, planting python to eat her daughter”.
In case you were wondering: 20 years. Federal time, so there’s no parole.
(Also on the “WTF?!” front, a very quick review of David Lynch’s “Mulholland Drive”: pretentious navel-gazing crap.)
Paul Morantz, lawyer.
He specialized in “taking on cults, abusive psychotherapists and self-proclaimed gurus”.
…
Synanon and Mr. Dederich were known for using violence against their enemies, even in minor run-ins. In 1977, a group of Synanon thugs pistol-whipped a truck driver who had cut off their vehicle on a highway. Mr. Dederich even kept an elite squad of enforcers that he called the Imperial Marines. Mr. Morantz would become one of their targets.
On Oct. 10, 1978, he met with police officers to discuss next steps against Synanon, then hurried back to his home in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood to catch the Los Angeles Dodgers and the New York Yankees play game one of the World Series.
As he walked in the door, he reached his left hand into his mailbox. As he did, he noticed a dark, lumpy shape. He didn’t have time to pull back before the object, a four-and-a-half-foot diamondback rattlesnake, bit him on his wrist.
He survived the bite. Two Synanon members were charged with attempted murder. Mr. Dederich was charged with conspiracy to commit murder.
Two videos on unrelated topics today. One short-ish, one admittedly long.
Short-ish: This is an episode of the old “True Adventure” TV show called…”Serpent Cult”, about snake handling religion in Kentucky. I possibly could have put this in last week’s travel entry, but it didn’t feel right there.
I actually kind of like the host’s introduction. When was the last time you heard someone on TV say:
Long (about 70 minutes): “Raid on the Northfield Bank: The James-Younger Gang Meets Its Match”.
I wanted to link this for two reasons:
1. There’s a pretty good movie that the Saturday Night Movie Group watched not too long ago: “The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid”, which you can find on YouTube with a carefully crafted search or on Amazon (affiliate link). I don’t believe it is exactly historically accurate, but…
2. Massad Ayoob in “American Handgunner” actually devoted an “Ayoob Files” column to the “Great Northfield, Minnesota Bank Robbery”, concentrating on the role of armed citizens.
(I have also read, and can recommend, the book Ayoob cites: Shot All to Hell by Mark Lee Gardner. (Affiliate link.))
This is your yearly reminder: if you use the Amazon search box on the right hand side of the page to buy stuff, I get a small kickback.
Said small kickback, as you all know, goes to purchasing toys for crippled orphans supporting this blog, mostly by enabling our purchases of Robert Ruark and Jack O’Connor books, along with other crap in general.
(Speaking of Ruark, I’m reminded that I have two historical notes coming up back to back before the year is over. One of those should be of some interest to Lawrence…)
(And speaking of Lawrence, I would be remiss if I did not note, as I do every year, that books from Lame Excuse Books make fine presents for the holidays, especially if you have SF or horror fans on your shopping list.)
I believe I recommended Amy Alkon’s Good Manners for Nice People Who Sometimes Say F*ck
Another book that was loaned to me by a friend, and that I’ve almost finished – I will be purchasing my own copy, so I have no qualms about recommending it – is Susan Cain’s Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
I don’t see a shipping date for Archer Season 6
cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra cobra
Edited to add: Also. If I’ve managed to irritate you, please consider supporting the fine folks at Popehat through their Amazon link instead.
Also also: I haven’t given them any money, but I’ve always been kind of fond of the HouChron‘s “Goodfellows” program.
Also also also: the Reason Foundation is having their annual fundraising drive. And they will accept bitcoins, too.
(I love the “Citations for public urination” graphic that goes along with this article.)
I’m a little surprised this one hasn’t made FARK yet: local police find an unresponsive man in a car. He had bite marks on his wrist, and there was a non-venomous snake (and other animals) in the car. Man dies.
And it seems like his venomous cobra snake may be on the loose. (Hattip: Lawrence.)
(Huh. I didn’t realize that Frederick Forsyth won an Edgar for “There Are No Snakes in Ireland”. That’s not a bad story, but I like “The Emperor” from the same collection a little better.)
Edited to add:
You know what this means, folks. If Animal Services isn’t actively searching for it, it’s up to the rest of us to be on the lookout. Get that Taurus Judge out of the gun safe and load it up with snake shot! Fun for the whole family! At least, until someone gets bitten…
Edited to add 2:
Crews with the city will begin an organized search for the @Austin_Cobra Friday morning at 8. http://t.co/OlH5cl1IvZ pic.twitter.com/OMwvVBXCrh
— KXAN News (@KXAN_News) July 16, 2015
Oh, thank God. They’re going to start an organized search. I was afraid they’d be engaging in a disorganized search.
(Hattp: the Austin Cobra Twitter. Hattip on the Austin Cobra Twitter to the great and good Joe D. in the comments.)
Not much going on, but I rarely get a chance to use the “Snakes” and “Reptiles” tags. So:
Obit watch: Evan S. Connell, Jr., noted novelist and historian. (Son of the Morning Star: Custer and The Little Bighorn
Looking at site stats this morning, I noticed that my ThinkPenguin endorsement seems to be getting some traffic. I thought I’d bop over to their site and check: yes, they have the new dual-band wireless N USB adapters available. And to tell the truth, I like the design of this adapter better than the one I have.
Earlier this week, I commented on the death of Mack Wolford. Lauren Pond, a photojournalist, had been working with Rev. Wolford for the past year as part of a documentary project on the Pentecostal snake-handling religion. Ms. Pond was at the service where Rev. Wolford was bitten, and sat with him and his family as he died. Some of her photos, and her thoughts about what happened and her obligations, are in the WP.
I don’t want to mock the death of Mack Wolford. I was not raised in the Pentecostal snake-handling tradition, nor does it fit in with my personal religious beliefs. (As I recall, there is a Bible verse that says something to the effect of “Don’t test God.”) But I do respect folks who have those beliefs and act on them; I don’t think they are crazy, but are trying to relate to God in their own way, and more power to them.
However, I do think his death is worth noting, not just for the odd factor, but also because it gives me a chance to talk about Jeremy Seal’s The Snakebite Survivors’ Club: Travels Among Serpents
This had the potential to be an interesting book, and about half of it is. The chapters on snake hunting and snake bite survivor hunting in Africa and Australia are quite good. Unfortunately, his chapters set in India seem oddly disengaged from the rest of the book; I’m not sure why, but they don’t seem to fit.
And while he has an interesting story to tell as his through line through the chapters in America (backsliding snake-handling minister decides to end his marriage through rattlesnake; unfortunately, his wife survived her bites, and he’s doing time), he has a typically British condescending attitude towards America (and especially the American South) that I found annoying.
If you find a copy of this for $3 or less, I think you might get that much entertainment out of it. Otherwise, I’d suggest skipping it. I haven’t read it, but this Whit Gibbons
Edited to add: Added a link to a review of Salvation on Sand Mountain: Snake Handling and Redemption in Southern Appalachia
People having too much fun with headlines:
1. “Burmese pythons turn Everglades into a buffet”. There’s also an interesting FARK thread based on a similar article from another source.
(As everyone who has a senior citizen in the family knows, you try to get to the buffet around 3:30 so you can pay the lunch price, but still get the stuff they put out for dinner starting around 4 PM.)
Edited to add: In the same vein, this Reason “Hit and Run” entry, which links to this Jonah Goldberg piece:
2. “USAF’s Big Penetrator Needs to Be Harder”. (Hattip: Shall Not Be Questioned.)
Making it harder sounds like a good thing, but perhaps they also need to add more thrust. Maybe a rocket assist?