Local Color XVIII+1

Two Standout Items from Today's Sheriff's Hotsheets

The case of the over-attached (ex)girlfriend:

Case # 0215002016 False Imprisonment 02-09-15

Deputy Assigned: Leonard Martinez
Commander Entering: Cpl. Edward Webb Jr.
Location: Don Bernardo(Nambe)
Arrested: Amelia Gabaldon 19 yoa female (Santa Fe)
Victim reported as he attempted to break up with his girlfriend she became upset with him and would not allow him to leave her residence. Suspect blocked her doorway and would not allow the victim to leave. After allowing victim to leave the room, suspect then sat on the hood of victim's vehicle and would not allow him to leave in his vehicle. Suspect was arrested and booked without further incident

The curious case of the unknown unknowns:

Case# 0215001992 Burglary (Residential)

Deputy Assigned:  Deputy Marvyn Jaramillo
Commander Entering:  Lieutenant Joe McLaughlin
Location:  3900 Block, Riverside Drive, Santa Fe, NM
Between an unknown time on Thursday, January 29, 2015 and an unknown time on Friday, February 6, 2015 person(s) unknown utilizing unknown menas gained entry to the rear door of a residence at the location.  Once entry was gained person(s) unknown damaged the interior of the residence.  Person(s) unknown also removed the kitchen faucet and water heater.

(too much) Local Color XVIIAlbuquerque Edition

¡¡¡all these news items in one day!!!

Sunday’s Top Morning Headlines
(from KRQE-NEWS13)

Albuquerque police are looking for the person who shot and killed a woman outside of the TGI Friday’s restaurant. They say he is Ernest Serna, 46, is responsible. He is 5 foot 2 inches tall with hazel eyes. Police say he is armed. He was last seen driving a black 2008 Dodge Ram with the license plate KFX832. It has chrome wheels and no window tint. It was seen speeding away from the scene of the shooting.

Albuquerque police say a 3-year-old boy got ahold of a gun and shot his dad and a pregnant woman. It happened at the America’s Best Value Inn off Menaul in northeast Albuquerque Saturday. A 2-year-old girl was also in the room, but was not hit. The adults are expected to be ok. The children are on a 48-hour custody hold with CYFD. The adults could face felony criminal negligence charges for having a loaded gun near children.

Albuquerque police evacuated the La Quinta near Coors Boulevard and Iliff Avenue because of a pipe bomb. Police found it outside of the building and it took it into the lobby. Officers say the bomb squad was able to detonate that bomb and the case has been turned over to the federal authorities.

Just a couple comments from the peanut gallery here...

1. Finding a Dodge Ram with chrome wheels and NO window tint should be pretty easy here in NM.
2. Why did the police, upon finding a bomb outside, bring it INTO the lobby of the building?

....and.....

You WON'T BELIEVE what happens next!

I was starting to notice that most of the links I click on are actually lists of links to other lists, and that getting to the bottom of the stack was an exhausting process. Then, as usual, a N'Yawker article, The Virologist, 1/5/2015, cleared up the mystery. (It has also generated a sub-trending slew of ClickerBait sub-re-postings, e.g....)

The story follows the founder of a set of internet startups, re-branded, most recently, under the name dose.com/?&redirectfrom=dose.com, which repackages online content with catchy headlines of their own invention on their own sites with ad revenue just a quick-click away. The founder of the company got his start in 1999 with Muggles.net and is summed up, in summary, as saying:

The more awesome you are, the more emotion you create, the more viral it is.

The company's main functions are:

1. Content selection using trend numbers form reddit/twitter/etal;
2. Catchy title writing;
3. Advertising sales.

The (curmudgeonly old media) author of the article on (the excessively awesome) new media success traced one posting down six levels of repackaging to the lowly book's authors, who received no compensation for the making of any content, viral or otherwise.

So. No actual useful information was generated in the making of this multi-million$$ opportunity -- recent round of funding, $8M -- but one of the chief investors enthuses:

I think his stuff is indicative of where digital media is headed.

I call it:

Strip Mining the Zeitgeist

So. What happens next? We believe!

gotta back date this to December 14

Dagnabitanyway...always a day or few late and two-bits short.

Anyway, recently we (should have) celebrated the 70th anniversary of the passing of Lupe Velez, the patron saint of unintended consequences:

....Moral Dilemmas....

 

Basic Setup.

Senator Michele Bachmann is standing on a railroad track eating a hot dog and and making provocative eye contact. A runaway boxcar of illegal immigrant children is heading towards a rail switch. If you divert the boxcar it will not hit the Senator and everyone will live.

What do you do?

What if by not diverting the boxcar everyone lives?

What if not diverting the boxcar causes the children to live but Michele dies anyway?

Or vice versa?

Or not?

Or.

Instead of undocumented children, the boxcar holds cute puppies?

Then.

Rather than Senator Bachman, what if it's Senator Elizabeth Warren?

Eating a vegan hotdog in a gluten free bun?

With or with out the provocative look?

Modulo cute puppies?

Now.

What if it's actually Senator Ted Cruz on the tracks and, instead of cute puppies, it's a boxcar of frozen bull semen?

Or, rather than bull semen, it's the irreplaceable genetic material of all Google employees worldwide?

New Scenerio.

Two trains are on opposite tracks. One holds all the Democratic members of Congress and the other all the Republican members. There is a switch which will cause them to collide resulting in the death of all passengers.

What do you do?

Before or after Jan 3, 2015?

What if, rather than dead, they are all maimed for life?

Or maybe just deep psychological trauma?

To sweeten the deal, what if the Supreme Court is also asleep at the switch where the trains will collide?

Minus Justice Ginsburg who has stepped out for a cup of tea with Senator Warren?

Then....

What if....

Oh never mind.

gratituitous 12.13.14 post

I hate to miss my last chance to log onto a sequential date (in the US and subsidiaries) this century, so here's a timelapse video of the Grand Canyon at high tide two days ago:

To my simple mind the next chance for any kind of rudimentary intelligence test dating sequence will be 5.10.15. See ya then!

Another (very) Modest Proposal

I just read that James Watson is auctioning his Nobel medal -- 1962 Medicine (DNA) -- at Christie's on Dec 4 due to a cash flow problem resulting from some clueless past pronouncements.

It's too late to do anything about it now, but wouldn't it have been grand to do a kickstarter to fund buying it in order to award it to Rosalind Franklin's -- 1920–1958 (DNA) -- heirs?

I know, I know, the Nobel is only awarded to the living. But if she actually beat the W/C/W team to the punch then maybe they didn't really deserve those medals.

always a few dollars short of a load