What a good looking couple, right?

Oh, wait, here’s the photo caption:

A state police officer escorts Bobbie Jo Elliott to a Monday night appearance before a district court commissioner, where she was charged with abducting her son in late August 2001.

Appropriately called the “nicest fugitive picture ever” by the City Paper.

What the fuck is with all the “Yay, I’m getting my picture taken!” smiles?

Also – anyone who names their child “Bobbie Jo” or “Mary Sue” or what have you should be dragged into the street and beaten.

Or: The Tale of the Bullet-Riddled Kitty Cat

I’ve spent at least an hour today trying to find a news story I heard about on Live 105.7′s Out to Lunch today, but I’ve been unsuccesful. The story revolved around a nice pet cat that turned into a monster, tried to kill its owners, and was shot – thirteen times – by officers of the Baltimore City Police Department.

I couldn’t find that story. I think Josh Spiegel made it up. Also? “Breaking news, whenever it feels like breaking” is used too much. He needs a new cute ender for his news segments. Anyway, didn’t find that story, did find this story:

Instinctively trying to protect her pets she grabbed Katie in an attempt to separate all of them, and it was then she believes she received the scratch on her arm. She eventually separated them with a garden rake and the invader flew out of the yard and across the street. Carefully Gwen calmed down her beloved pets. She checked them over and determined they had escaped unharmed thanks to their heavy-coated breeding and that she in fact was the only one who had suffered a scratch.

Across the street, the crazed feline immediately attacked another neighbors cat minding its business on its own front lawn. That cat didn’t fare as well as the pets next door and was badly bitten. At this point a gaggle of neighbor were out on the street comparing notes on the poor creature and the fact it had apparently been seen in the neighborhood for days. The question was what should be done? Someone called the police figuring the situation was dangerous and more than a little beyond a wait for Animal Control. Within minutes the police arrived and quickly assessed the situation. The cat, now slinking around the bushes at the front of our home, was shot on the spot. One bang, then another….Dead cat!

But, as I mentioned at the beginning, this was not the end of the story. As pet owners, most of us think that when we have our cats and dogs vaccinated for rabies, that’s it. Not so! The aftermath of this encounter was enormous. First of all, the cat across the street was not up to date in its shots, and they were ordered to put their cat down immediately. The children were devastated; the parents embarrassed and sad that their neglect had caused the immediate demise of their much loved family pet. These precautionary decisions were made before the results of any testing on the feral cat could be performed, and it was days before we heard that the results were conclusive — the cat did indeed have rabies!

“When Cats Go Bad.”

Indeed. Also: why you should never let your cats outside.

USA TODAY:

WASHINGTON (AP) — The FBI warned Tuesday that a computer virus is being spread through unsolicited e-mails that purport to come from the FBI.

The e-mails appear to come from an fbi.gov address. They tell recipients that they have accessed illegal Web sites and that their Internet use has been monitored by the FBI’s “Internet Fraud Complaint Center,” the FBI said.

The messages then direct recipients to open an attachment and answer questions. The computer virus is in the attachment.

“Recipients of this or similar solicitations should know that the FBI does not engage in the practice of sending unsolicited e-mails to the public in this manner,” the FBI said in a statement.

The bureau is investigating the phony e-mails.

The agency earlier this month shut down fbi.gov accounts, used to communicate with the public, because of a security breach. A spokeswoman said the two incidents appear to be unrelated.

Anyone know what FBI stands for? That’s right: Female Body Inspector.

Man, I wish I knew girls stupid enough to fall for that.

When Muppets go Bad.

Hat Tip: Croliver.

I got down to the farm today – yesterday by the time anyone reads this. It was the first time I’ve been to the farm since my grandfather died in November ’03, and it was kind of haunting. The lawn was mowed, that was surreal, – either by the Andersons (who farm the property), or my uncle Bill.

That’s not actually the farm – that’s the farm before the farm. Belongs to the Fultons. Bet you’d never have guessed.

That’s the farm. Tiny, and inconsequential.

See that top box? “Air Mail.” Nobody could say my grandfather didn’t have a sense of humor. Well, they could, but they’d've been wrong. Do you see the little ladder? Man, he thought of everything for those Martians.

Ze farmhouse. Close to a century old, and victim to the most horrible fate known to houses – my grandfather. Seems that back in the fifties it used to have a full second level, and an attic above that. Well, the heating bill was a bit much, so he quite literally knocked the attic and most of the second level clean off, redid the main entry (which used to face the road), and turned the place into the no-flow charming place I knew.

No, seriously, there was no front door – from the porch, you could enter the parlor (to the left), or the dining room (to the right). Alternatively, you could go to the side and enter through a screen door into the laundry room.

The carport and shed structure attached to the side of the house. Behind those blue doors were my grandfather’s work spaces. Anyone remember that beautiful oak chest in my living room? That’s where it was born.

Beyond the laundry tree things, you can see Bill’s house on the corner of the original property. To the left, you can see part of the ‘treasure shed’, so named because it was stuffed with books, furniture, broken electronics – essentially everything that no longer had a place in the house. This bookshelf came from there.

The long abandoned milk house. Long after it was no longer needed for the purpose for which it was built, it continued to function as a makeshift nursery for the rather substantial feline population.

(Note: I said “Continued”. This was a dairy farm, you think anything short of catching and killing them would’ve kept cats away from the milk? Please!)

This tree – I think its walnut? – has been around forever. There’s an old rusty windchime hanging from its branches. That’s part of the barn behind it.

The side of the barn. Billy Anderson, I think, put that speed-limit sign up originally when he took over farming the land (but if that’s the case, why did it get pulled down?). I can’t remember when there were last livestock around – sheep as little as ten years ago, I’m fairly certain, maybe cows too? – but as a little kid I can remember a big rooster, pigs, I think maybe some goats, and of course a whole heck of a lot of cats and kittens.

There was this big orange tabby my grandmother called “Aloof on the Roof” because she would climb up the power box onto the farmhouse roof and stay there. All day. Every day.

Another section of the barn, originally used for milking cows, more recently for random storage. There’s a door – you can’t see it – just to the left of the frame. Through the door, a sharp left, and you’re at the milkhouse.

Both pictures of the same general area. This is where the cows were brought out to be put into a pasture. And, yes, continuing with the theme of “original useage of a cow barn”, that is a Volkswagen.

What good is a farm without a fuel station? Dinner bell to the left.

Continuing with the family tradition of never ever throwing anything away when you’ve got a perfectly good barn to store it in, a tractor that was probably new when George Washington was born waits to rust some more.

What? Don’t all farms have a totem pole? I like the gate without the fence. I can’t remember when all the fences came down, don’t know why no one bothered with the gates. See those windows? That’s the milkhouse again.

What more can you say?

Hunter S. Thompson goes the way of the writer.

So the goal was to build, in Lego, a Colonial Viper.

Well, things don’t always work out as they’re supposed to …

You can view the gallery here.

The creative juices needed to be expressed, and since I’ve been enjoying sci-fi’s new “Battlestar Galactica”, I decided to build a Colonial Viper.

No, I haven’t finished – will I? I dunno.

I’m not happy with the cockpit area (but I love the hinged canopy), but I think the nose and red-trim really captures the feel of the Colonial Viper Mark II.

Image from Galactica.TV.

Over at A Fool’s Fate, Linda of Broadsheet makes a disparaging remark about the cleanliness of my desk. Actually, I made the remark, then she jumped on the ‘Snay is messy’ bandwagon.

Well, here you go Linda, my desk, in all of its “no mold” glory!

I’ve mentioned this guy Ogre before. He’s supposedly training to be a manager at my part-time job. I say “supposedly” because he’s been training for three months.

To run a shift at a pizza shop.

Which is like, the easiest job ever.

After three months of training for a position which quite clearly he is incapable of handling, Ogre gets his first unsupervised shift tomorrow morning (thank god I ain’t working).

I first managed a pizza shop years ago, for Domino’s corporate in Columbia. See, I bought a new car, and didn’t want to put a lot of miles on it. So I said, “Hi, can I be a manager?” And Scott, the district honcho, said “Sure, you start Monday.”

So I started managing on Monday. The shift manager was there to help me and show me the ropes. Tuesday night, at about ten, the shift manager shrugged, tossed me the store key, and said “I’m off to fuck my boyfriend. You’ll be alright.”

Contrast this to Ogre. It takes this jackass a full minute to make a large pepperoni pizza. Given three jobs to do one afternoon, it took him a full four hours (without customer interuption) to complete. He stares at the makeline monitor for a minute before beginning to make pizzas, and usually tops those pizzas incorrectly; he never repeats customer’s orders to them, usually meaning that part, most, or all of their order is wrong wrong wrong; whenever a comment is made to him, he will never allow it to brush off his shoulders when he could, instead, abandon whatever task he was trying to accomplish, and confront you directly.

Case in point: Friday night, when Steve asked Ross and Ogre to join him in the back. Ross is opening driver Sunday, but has been trained as an “emergency backup” shift manager in case Steve or Greg are out of town – and this is also why Ross was scheduled to be opening driver tomorrow. This was the backup plan, according to Steve – should things get busy (not likely), and Ogre was unable to keep up with the order volume, Ross would switch to inside, and Ogre would go on the road.

This is a sensible precaution, for any person new to the pizza buisness, or to the idioschincracies (I know, I spelled that wrong, but fuck you, you know what I mean) of an individual store. Had I been in Ogre’s shoes, I would’ve said: “We shaln’t need to implement Plan B, boss.”

Ogre, on the other hand, started screaming: “IT ISN’T EVEN SUNDAY YET AND ALREADY YOU THINK I’M GOING TO FUCK IT UP! FUCK YOU, MAN, WHAT THE FUCK?”

Yeah, Ogre, what the fuck?

He keeps saying, “I got this job in a week, I could get a job at another pizza shop in a week.”

Yeah, well, he got fired from Michael’s Pizza in Hereford, fired from Papa John’s (AFTER A WEEK!), and it really baffles the imagination that he hasn’t been fired from here yet. I don’t understand why he thinks the job of management will be easier somewhere else, but shit man … it won’t be.

Stupid arguments are fun, yes?

Here’s the argument:

I say that Baltimore is in Maryland, but Maryland is not in Baltimore.

They say that Baltimore is in Maryland, and that Maryland is in Baltimore.

My arguement is that this is physically impossible. The state of Maryland cannot fit within the physical confines of Baltimore.

Amazon.com has the new trailer for “The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” on their front page. And after watching it, I wanted to wet myself in excitement – but I didn’t, because I did laundry last night*. And y’know, I think it would be fair to say that I’m more excited about this movie than I am about the new Star Wars film.

Anyway, don’t panic, and uh … man, those Vogons are fugly.

Oh, yes – *ahem* – I hope the movie faithfully captures Marvin’s “big head” complex. Hah-hah-hah. Oh, bite me.

*Early this morning, if you want to be technical about it.

How do those stories start? I wish upon a star? Once upon a time? A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away …

Well, pick one.

So, once upon a time, there were two men. And they delivered beer in one of those big trucks with beer logos along the side that make beer lovers drool and dream and run off the road. Of these two men, one drove and unloaded the truck. It wasn’t a great job – he didn’t drive a BMW or vacation in the Hamptons – but he had a nice little house and a Harley in the garage.

The junior man, the “helper”, dreamed of having his older partner’s job – the money, the ‘toys’, the bragging rights: “Without me, you wouldn’t have your alcohol.” It wasn’t quite clear what his job was, only that “helper” summed up the job responsibilties.

So one of these days, the two men made a delivery to a liquor store in an upscale northern Baltimore County town. The senior man packed the truck in the alley behind the store, and began unloading it. We’ll never know exactly what happened, except that while he was inside the store, someone asked the junior man to move the truck. “See, you’re blocking my way in, see?” he was told.

The junior man wasn’t allowed to drive the truck. He didn’t have his license, or perhaps he didn’t have the specific license required to drive that type of truck – the story, as related to me, was unclear. In any case, it was clear he had no experience behind the wheel of the behemouth.

So while the older man was in the shop, the junior man – trying to be nice and not wanting to appear “unable” when presented such a simple request – move the truck? easy! – jumped behind the wheel, released the parking brake, and engaged the clutch.

Perhaps the truck moved too quickly. Perhaps he expected it to respond like his old Firebird, or his grandfather’s twenty-year old pickup. We only know one thing: his foot did not find the brake.

The truck jumped forward, out of the alley, and across the lane seperating the strip mall from the postal office. Here the truck (and I say truck because I don’t believe the kid behind the wheel had much control over it, and it was probably all “Yeah, I can kill my human masters now, if possible!) made a right hand turn, demolishing two postal jeeps as it turned, rose over the island (taking the hedges with it), and plowed into the drycleaners’ shop.

I think the drycleaner is going to get a break on his rent this month.

Today is Valentine’s Day, and I forgot to get a girlfriend.

Again.

Dammit.

I went past Walmart today, said “What the hell?” went in and bought this.

I then went to work, put the yellow one together, and flew it around the store making laser noises. I felt somewhat childish, but Matt was leaning out the backdoor shooting his paintball gun at the dumpster, so at least I was in good company.

When I came home I thought about playing “Lego Man in Land of the Giant Cats”, but Tippy gave me one of those ‘try it, jackass’ looks, so I decided against it.