Saturday, November 12, 2011

Doggone! Pooch eats couple's $1,000 cash stash

One Florida family unwittingly helped serve a very expensive meal to their dog — $1,000 in cash — and then forced the pet to cough it up.

"I just think this is hilarious," the dog's owner, Christy Lawrenson of St. Augustine, Fla., told WJXT in Jacksonville, Fla on Friday.

She laughs now, but it was a different story two weeks ago.

"My husband and I are trying to pay off my car, and so every time we save $1,000, we just take it to the bank and we just put it in the account," she told the Jacksonville station.

This time, she took the cash, paper-clipped it and left it in an envelope on the counter, she said. The couple then said goodbye to their dog Tuity, a Labrador Retriever/chow/bulldog mix, and left for work.

When her husband came home for lunch, the envelope was gone and he saw shards of $100 bills strewn across the floor. The rest, including the paperclip, was in Tuity's stomach, she said. Lawrenson told WJXT that her husband induced the dog to vomit by feeding Tuity hydrogen peroxide. "I took the money from the vomit and put it in a bag and saved it for him because I didn't want to puzzle it back together. It was still not real to me even though I had dug through vomit all afternoon," Lawrenson said.

They pieced $900 back together, but the last $100 bill had one too many serial numbers missing, she said.The couple sent it to the Department of Treasury with a letter of explanation. "I didn't really see that one coming, and I guarantee we'll keep money away from him for now on," Lawrenson said.

Loo Rider–a poop powered bike, Drug Cartel tries to silence the internet, and Boy born at 11:11 on 11-11-11 to vet on Vets Day

News photo

         Good Morning Humboldt County!

What a morning…it’s beautiful outside. Still and warm. Birds calling out greetings. It’s a perfect day for you to have stopped by. Grab a cup of hot coffee and a seat and make yourself comfortable. I’ve got a few short reads for you to start your day:

Loo Rider: bike will get you where you want to go

Toilet Bike Neo, a three-wheeled motorcycle with a toilet like seat, is not a people "poop-powered bike" as reported by Huffingtonpost and other English-language websites, toilet maker Toto Ltd. said.

Toilet Bike Neo, the sole purpose of which is to advertise Toto's environmental activities, is powered by biogas fuel made from livestock waste (can you say cow shit?) and household wastewater. The trike carries two tanks containing biogas behind a toilet lid.

Mexican drug cartel tries to silence Internet

Mexico's hyper violent Zetas drug cartel appears to be launching what may be one of the first campaigns by an organized crime group to silence commentary on the Internet.

The cartel has already attacked rivals, journalists and other perceived enemies. Now, the target is an online chat room, Nuevo Laredo en Vivo, that allows users to comment on the activities of the Zetas and others in the city on the border with Texas. Already, three apparent site users have been slain, and a fourth victim may have been discovered Wednesday, when a man's decapitated body was found with what residents said was a banner suggesting he was killed for posting on the site.

Boy born at 11:11 on 11-11-11 to vet on Vets Day

Jacob Anthony Saydeh won't have any trouble remembering precisely when he was born. A U.S. hospital says Jacob entered the world at 11:11 a.m. on Friday — 11-11-11. And to make the Veterans Day birth even more remarkable, the boy's mother is an Air Force veteran and his father is serving in the Air Force.

It's the second child for Staff Sgt. Christopher Saydeh and his wife, Danielle. They are a third-generation military family.

Time to walk on down the road…

Friday, November 11, 2011

Veterans Day reflections : what does this holiday mean to you?

             Good Morning Humboldt County!

C’mon in and have a cup of hot steaming coffee with me this chilly Fall morning. Have a seat and share a few moments with me on this holiday. It’s always been a special day for me as my father - a Marine in the South Pacific during WWII - also served this country. As a veteran (Army/Vietnam) I’m honored to have served. What does this day mean to you? Please feel free to comment below.

On Veterans Day, Americans cheer newly returned veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan and honor them with parades. Jobs would be better.

Veterans who served since 9/11 have been hit particularly hard. The unemployment rate for them is 12.1%; the national rate is 9%. The hardest-hit group is male veterans ages 20-24. One in three are jobless. The problem may get worse as more men and women return from Iraq and Afghanistan. The White House projects 1 million will enter civilian life in the next five years.

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For a good read about Veterans try this:

          “Building on the Dignity of each Veteran”

by Ken Smith

“The Department of Labor (DOL) has a “Homeless Veterans Reintegration Project” that is operated out of the office of the Assistant Secretary of Veterans Employment and Training. 

Currently the position of Assistant Secretary is vacant, so the Deputy Assistant Secretary (DAS) of DOL-VETS , who is a good guy named Junior Ortiz runs the agency.”

Here’s another good article:

Honor a Veteran; Understand PTSD -

By P.J. Skerrett, Editor, Harvard Health

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I’ll never forget those men I served with in Vietnam. Some never came home. Some did, but forever changed. They’re all ghosts now. Once vibrant young men. I was 19 years-old when I did my tour in 1970. Now I’m 61, but the same heart beats in this chest as that 19 year-old kid who survived chaos.

Why me? Part of me never left that land where bad things happened. I hear that young man’s gasps of horror at the sight’s he witnessed. The sights that would forever change him (me). I remember…

Time to walk on down the road…

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Thursday, November 10, 2011

A thought - How about remembering veterans year round ?

          Tomorrow is Veteran’s Day.

Today, a 35-year-old military veteran shot himself in an Occupy Wall Street encampment in Burlington Vermont. I don’t know why. I just know that these young Iraqi and Afghan veterans are coming back with PTSD in bigger numbers than my fellow Vietnam veterans. Multiple employments play a part in that sad statistic.

Over in Oakland, news has come out that a second Iraq war veteran was injured in a conflict with police after Wednesday's general strike. 32-year-old Kayvan Sabeghi was taking part in protests earlier in the day but had left to go have dinner with a friend in the evening hours. He was walking home, down 14th Street near Frank Ogawa Plaza, when he encountered a protest faction and a line of police who would not let him pass, despite his being able to see his apartment from where they stood. He asked repeatedly to be allowed to pass to go home, but he ended up getting beaten by police with batons so severely that he suffered a lacerated spleen. He was hospitalized, but remains in good spirits. Meanwhile injured Marine vet Scott Olsen released a message urging everyone to remain non-violent in the face of police brutality. [ABC 7, Tribune]

Although flawless counts are impossible to come by – the transient nature of homeless populations presents a major difficulty – VA estimates that 107,000 veterans are homeless on any given night. Over the course of a year, approximately twice that many experience homelessness. Only eight percent of the general population can claim veteran status, but nearly one-fifth of the homeless population are veterans.

Roughly 56 percent of all homeless veterans are African American or Hispanic, despite only accounting for 12.8 percent and 15.4 percent of the U.S. population respectively. About 1.5 million other veterans, meanwhile, are considered at risk of homelessness due to poverty, lack of support networks, and dismal living conditions in overcrowded or substandard housing.

My point in sharing all this information with you is that if you want to really honor a veteran…don’t wait until Veteran’s Day. There’s many ways to help year around. Locally, here in Humboldt County we have North Coast Veterans Stand Down every year. There’s veteran organizations nationwide helping other veterans that you can support with your time or money.

Two women arrested in santanic sex ritual stabbing, Nixon unplugged, and Kawasaki disease may be blowing in the wind

Image: Rebecca Chandler, 22

                            Good Morning Humboldt County!

It’s another beautiful morning outside. A deer is nibbling on the wildflowers near our front porch. It’s still and warm. The birds are greeting one another happily. In the midst of all this it’s just another day when good things and bad things happen. Grab a cup of coffee and a seat and I’ll share three stories reflecting other realities.

Two women arrested in satanic sex ritual stabbing

Two women were arrested in Milwaukee this week after a man told police they had bound and stabbed him hundreds of times in a sexual encounter that "got quickly out of hand."

Rebecca Chandler (pictured here), 22, of Milwaukee is in jail after an 18-year-old man endured 300 puncture wounds when their sexual encounter "got out of hand," a police affidavit says

'Nixon unplugged': Secret Watergate testimony unsealed

Richard Nixon's grand jury testimony about the Watergate scandal that destroyed his presidency is finally coming to light.

Four months after a judge ordered the June 1975 records unsealed, the government's Nixon Presidential Library was making them available online Thursday. Historians hoped that the testimony would form Nixon's most truthful and thorough account of the circumstances that led to his extraordinary resignation 10 months earlier under threat of impeachment.

"This is Nixon unplugged," said historian Stanley Kutler, a principal figure in the lawsuit that pried open the records. Still, he said, "I have no illusions. Richard Nixon knew how to dodge questions with the best of them. I am sure that he danced, skipped, around a number of things."

Kawasaki disease may be blowing in the wind, researchers say

Doctors have struggled for decades to understand why thousands of children a year in the U.S. get Kawasaki disease, a rare condition that can cause serious heart damage if untreated, but is often mistaken for an everyday virus.

Now, a team of international scientists have announced the surprising finding that the answer may be blowing in the wind. The team’s leader, Dr. Jane C. Burns, professor of pediatrics and director of the Kawasaki Disease Research Center at the University of California San Diego, says cases of the disease are linked to large-scale wind currents whipping throughout Asia to Japan and around the North Pacific.

Time to walk on down the road…

Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Stephan King Shines: Author Helps Ease Mainers’ Oil Bills

I have to hand it to author Stephen King, he’s one of the 1% ers who cares about the rest.

It was inspiring to see the author of “The Shinning” cast a helpful light on his neighbors in the real world. Read about how Stephen King is helping ease Mainers' oil bills here.

King’s latest book “11/22/63” is now available. The master of suspense provides a new glimpse of a fateful chapter in history. Read an excerpt here.

Prop 215 supporters protest today at noon, Would you know if the government put a GPS device on your car? and pro basketball season is scuttled

prettypot

                     Good Morning Humboldt County!

Looks like Mother Nature is going to be kind with another sunny day with a touch of hawk wind. Step right in my humble blog, and grab a cup of coffee. There’s plenty of seats to go around. Here’s what I have for you today: imagesCAODXNMA

Prop. 215 supporters from around the state will be protesting the federal government's attack on medical marijuana at the U.S. Courthouse in Sacramento, 501 I Street, today at noon.The protest is sponsored by a coalition of organizations including California NORML.

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Several justices on the U.S. Supreme Court said Tuesday they have reservations about allowing law enforcement to do such monitoring without a warrant

Has the government attached GPS to your car?

Most of us really appreciate the benefits of GPS — except when it's surreptitiously attached to our vehicle by the government. And how would you know?

You wouldn't. That's the point, of course: Feds and police agencies investigating bad guys don't want them to know they're being tracked.

But what if you're not a bad guy? What if you're just ... you?

The Supreme Court is expected to rule before June on the issue of whether a warrant is needed for GPS monitoring. Until then, wouldn't hurt to check your car or ask your mechanic to do so. Just in case.

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           NBA Basketball season probably isn’t going to happen

On Tuesday NBA players’ union team representatives met, rejected the owners offer on the table and said they wanted more negotiations. According to tweets from Marc Stein at ESPN, the consensus at that meeting was to go with the 50/50 split of league revenues the owners want if the owners will give a few more things on system issues.

Then just more than an hour later David Stern went on NBA TV and said the owners were not changing their offer. At all. Neither system or revenue. When David Aldridge asked Stern if there was wiggle room on the owners offer, he replied: “As of Sunday morning at 3 in the morning there was none left.”

Time for me to walk on down the road…

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Good Karma: Man helps motorist who then saves his life miles later

A Canadian man who had just helped a motorist change a tire in western Wisconsin had his good deed quickly repaid when, just minutes later, that same motorist helped to save his life.

According to the Wisconsin State Patrol, Victor Giesbrecht, of Winnipeg, was driving Saturday evening on Interstate 94 about 9 miles east of Menomonie when he stopped to help another motorist change a tire. Patrol Sgt. Michael Newton said that after driving off, Giesbrecht was stricken by a heart attack within a mile or two. His wife, Ann, helped bring their pickup truck to a stop, called 911 and waved her arms for help.

At about the same time, the motorists they had just helped pulled up. The Star Tribune reported Monday (http://bit.ly/vrvfEP ) that one of them, Lisa Meier, of Eau Claire, performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on him until emergency personnel arrived. A state trooper and two Dunn County deputies took over and used an automated external defibrillator to help Giesbrecht regain a pulse and resume breathing.

A medical helicopter took Giesbrecht to Mayo Clinic Health System in Eau Claire. He was in serious condition Monday. Newton said if Giesbrecht hadn't helped with the tire change, his initial rescuer may have remained stranded for too long to play a life-saving role.

"If he had been a few more miles down the road and had his heart attack, it could have been a different outcome," Newton said. "It's an interesting turn of fate." He said Giesbrecht had suffered another heart attack about a year earlier. Newton added that Dunn County having an AED on hand "was the tipping point" in saving Giesbrecht's life.

British students to face plastic bullets if things get out of hand

A mass protest is being organized by the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts, which said it expected 10,000 people to join in a march from Bloomsbury in central London to the center of the city Wednesday.

Some activists from the anti-capitalist Occupy London Stock Exchange movement in London said they would join the march, according to local reports.

For the first time ever, British citizens will face plastic bullets tomorrow. The same type of bullets which have caused deaths in past riots in Northern Ireland.

London police authorize plastic bullets if riot erupts at protest

“London police were authorized to fire plastic bullets to quell riots and dozens of letters were sent out to activists warning of arrest for "criminal or antisocial behavior" ahead of planned mass student protests on Wednesday.”

A Tribute to Led Zeppelin: Today is the 40th anniversary of ‘Stairway To Heaven’

I know I’m showing my age, but who gives a damn! I think this song is a classic … I was 23 when it came out…

Ya gotta love it!

Here we are forty years later since the British rock juggernaut Led Zeppelin released their magnum opus, "Led Zeppelin IV."

Rife with flourishes of haunting folk, gritty blues and rafter-shaking rock of the heaviest order, "IV" swiftly became the band's defining album, largely thanks to the epic 8 minutes and 2 seconds of the fourth song on the LP, "Stairway to Heaven." Rock music hasn't been the same since.

Smokin’ Joe loses battle with Cancer, Mom rescues tot from washing machine, and Crosby & Nash to play at Occupy Wall Street

Frazier was small for a heavyweight, only 205 pounds, but fought like a much bigger man with his deadly left hook.

          Good Morning Humboldt County!

It sure is nice to be back home! I’m glad you could make it today. C’mon in and grab a cup of hot Joe with me. There’s so many thing happening in our world that all I can do is give you a brief snapshot – three to be exact – of what’s in today’s headlines. I hope you enjoy them and I’ll see ya tomorrow.

           Smokin’Joe Frazier dies at 67

Frazier, who died Monday night after a brief battle with liver cancer at the age of 67, will forever be associated with Ali.

No one in boxing would ever dream of anointing Ali as The Greatest unless he, too, was linked to Smokin' Joe.

         Mom rescues tot from washing machine

A Washington state woman used a wrench to break the window of a running washing machine and rescue her 5-year-old daughter at a Laundromat in Okanogan. The girl either climbed in or was put in the washing machine Saturday night and it started running even though it had been marked "out of order," the Okanogan County sheriff's office said.

The girl's 29-year-old mother ran to her car, grabbed a wrench, smashed the washing machine door and pulled out her daughter, the Wenatchee World reported. The girl suffered a 10-inch cut on her back and was treated at a hospital in Omak. The hospital declined to comment on the girl's condition.

David Crosby, Graham Nash to play at Occupy Wall Street

Longtime musicians and activists David Crosby and Graham Nash are scheduled to perform a concert at the Occupy Wall Street protest site in Manhattan's Zuccotti Park.

The Occupy Wall Street website says the Tuesday afternoon concert will be an acoustic set of protest songs.

Crosby, a Rock and Roll Hall of Famer of Crosby Stills and Nash fame, visited the park last week.

Time for me to walk on down the road…

It's Time to Pay Up Donnie!

It's looks like there will be some prime real estate going on the market soon in New York City. Convicted rapist and former president ...