Archive for May, 2012

Hog update.

Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

A few weeks ago, we asked the musical question:

…how bad was the damage to Petrino’s Harley Davidson Road King?

By way of FARK, we have an answer. The Harley is for sale on a site called copart.com. It looks to be in pretty bad shape; as both the Mobile Press-Register and copart note, the Harley is estimated to have suffered $18,000 worth of damage, but is only valued at $16,000.

En Fuego.

Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

Some folks may have noticed that I haven’t written much about my experiences with the Kindle I purchased a while back.

Well…the screen went south on that one and it is unusable.

I’d held off on replacing it because I have the Kindle reader on my phone, so there wasn’t a compelling argument for me to have a stand-alone Kindle.

At least until Amazon had their sale last week offering refurbed Kindle Fires for $139.

Mine arrived yesterday. I’m still messing around with it trying to get things set up the way I want then, but expect some thoughts on the Fire in the nearish future.

(I actually do still agree with John Siracusa’s summary of the Kindle Fire: “a magical, colorful window through which you can give money to Amazon“. But my plans for the device mostly do not involve giving a lot of money to Amazon; rather, I’ve been loading it up with O’Reilly ebooks and public domain/free content.)

Edited to add: Interestingly enough, the Standard Catalog of Smith & Wesson 3rd Edition is available on the Kindle, and probably works much better on the Fire than it does on the regular Kindles. I’m willing to give Amazon $15.39 for that; Supica and Nahas are essential, but also an awful lot to lug around.

This is intended to enrage you. (#3 in an irregular series)

Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

The lawyer for one of the Fullerton policemen charged in the beating of a mentally ill homeless man suggested Tuesday that it was medical professionals –- not police officers -– who are to blame for the death of Kelly Thomas.

Following the jump is a graphic and disturbing image.

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Random notes: May 9, 2012.

Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

Notoriously anti-gun RINO Richard Lugar went down in flames like a tax-fattened hyena last night. Tam and Roberta X have more.

For the record: NYT obit for Maurice Sendak.

“It’s Baltimore, gentlemen. The gods will not save you.”

Nelson.

Tuesday, May 8th, 2012

Keenan Alex stole a Cadillac Escalade.

Mr. Alex did not know that the car was actually a “bait car” being used by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to bust car thieves.

Mr. Alex also did not know that the “bait car” sting was being filmed by TruTV for their series “Bait Car”.

Mr. Alex was stopped and arrested by LACSD.

In court, Det. Anthony Shapiro said under oath that he read Alex each of his Miranda rights from a card in his notebook before the suspect made incriminating statements, a transcript shows.

But unedited video for the program shows the detective never read the suspect his constitutional rights, including the right to remain silent and have an attorney present during questioning.

Ooopsie. The case against Mr. Alex has been dropped. Detective Shapiro is being investigated by LACSD.

Snark snark aborted snark.

Monday, May 7th, 2012

Prosecutors also showed a Taser allegedly used by Cpl. Jay Cicinelli in the beating of Thomas on a video screen visibly covered in blood.

You’d think that they could at least wipe off that video screen first. But this is California; they do things differently there.

I was going to make a snarky comment that this NYT article on what killed Vladimir Ilyich Lenin didn’t include my own favorite theory. Except that it does:

Dr. Lurie concurred on Friday, telling the conference that poison was in his opinion the most likely immediate cause of Lenin’s death. The most likely perpetrator? Stalin, who saw Lenin as his main obstacle to taking over the Soviet Union and wanted to get rid of him.
Communist Russia in the early 1920s, Dr. Lurie told the conference, was a place of “Mafia-like intrigue.”

Well, darkness has a hunger that’s insatiable, and lightness has a call that’s hard to hear.

Monday, May 7th, 2012

  He went home three years later. He explained no more than to say, “I lived with the Crows for a while. It was sometime before I could leave. They called me Horse.”
He did not find it necessary either to apologize or to boast, because he was the equal of any man on earth.
—”A Man Called Horse”, Dorothy M. Johnson

  Instapundit and other folks have written eloquently about the “higher education bubble”. Other people I know and respect, like TJIC, have commented on ridiculous majors and the ridiculous people who pursue them.

So why did I go back to school? Why did I spend six years and <mumble mumble> dollars pursuing a degree? And why St. Ed’s? I’m not Catholic.

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Headline of the day.

Monday, May 7th, 2012

Dolphins die of heroin overdoses after zoo rave

Obit watch: May 6, 2012.

Sunday, May 6th, 2012

George “Goober” Lindsey.

Obit watch: May 4, 2012.

Friday, May 4th, 2012

Daring Fireball is quoting sources as reporting the death of Adam Yauch, aka “MCA” of the Beastie Boys, aka “Sir Stewart Wallace”, aka “Nathan Wind”.

To be honest, I’ve never been a huge fan of the Beastie Boys, with the exception of two songs. One is “Rock Hard”. And the other? Like you couldn’t guess.

Academic update Spring 2012, part II: If you can make one heap of all your winnings…

Friday, May 4th, 2012

No, really, I haven’t been obsessively checking the university’s website waiting for that last grade.

Once every hour half-hour quarter-hour five minutes isn’t obsessive, is it?

The email from the professor came in at 10:29 AM yesterday, about the same time I was checking the website for the 1×101010 time.

As a reminder, the grade I was waiting on was the one for the big final paper; the “Capstone” project as they refer to it, which is supposed to be a summation of what you’ve learned up to the end of your academic career. At least in terms of ethical analysis, critical thinking, research skills, ability to write prose that makes sense, and maybe something to do with your actual major.

And?

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A roundup of items from the legal beat.

Thursday, May 3rd, 2012

Back in January, I noted the indictment of DC Council member Harry Thomas on embezzlement charges. Thomas pled guilty, as expected, and was sentenced today to 38 months in prison. Guidelines called for 41 to 51 months; his attorney was asking for 18 months plus six more in “home confinement”.

I was going to put this in the earlier post, but I forgot, and it fits better here anyway:

Thirteen people were criminally charged on Wednesday with hazing in the death of a Florida A&M University marching band member who was beaten after a football game last fall.

11 of those charged were charged with felonies. If the charges are proven, I have no sympathy for those charged, and I hope they draw long, hard time.

James M. Woosley, former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) intelligence chief, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to an elaborate scam over several years involving false travel expense reports totaling nearly $600,000.

I’m not sure what happened here: did I miss the story until Balko drew it to my attention, or has it been buried by the mass media? A Google search for references to “James M. Woosley” specifically on nytimes.com and latimes.com turned up nothing: the same search on washingtonpost.com turned up some references to Woosley’s suspension from his post and the convictions of other people in this scheme, but nothing about Woosley’s conviction.