Saturday, May 31, 2014

Coffee; Snowden; Stupid Crook; Bicycle Thieves; Food Thief; Facebook; Dow Jones; Burgers; Bomber and Prayer

Another beautiful sunny 70 plus day!  In less than one hour, I'm supposed to be at a Volunteer Appreciation ceremony.  Even though I said I would attend, one look at my Phantom of the Opera face this morning convinced me that I would just scare people if I showed up.  Maybe later, when my eye decides to unstick, I may try to place a big bandage or bandaid over my scarred face and venture out for groceries.


Wait Wait Don't Tell Me:


Snowden:


Somebody on the show said that Mr. Snowden insisted that he had been hired by NSA as a spy because they gave him a secret alias/code name.  (When I was on top of a mountain in Germany, my code name was Barber Foxtrot.  Well, I quickly found out that it was not a secret code name, but instead part of the nomenclature for the van in which I was located, so everybody who worked there would have that  name..  BF in Air Force talk was Barber Foxtrot.)


The High Life:


Starbucks has now served its most expensive drink.. it has 30 shots of expresso and costs $54.75. (My own choice for coffee is Donut Decaf, brewed in my Keurig machine .. cost = 50 cents a cup. .  Once in a while, I'll treat myself to a Dunkin' Donut decaf with lots of cream... cost = less than one dollar a cup.  Coming from Massachusetts, Dunkin' Donuts played a big part in my early manhood.)


Click and Clack:


Today, my favorite PhD-carrying mechanics from Boston mentioned the experience of a famous stupid criminal in that area:


At 2 AM on a dark night in Boston, the criminal in question visited a lumber yard that had some quarter-inch plywood stacked in an accessible location.  He made sure nobody saw him as he lifted 18 sheets, 1 by 1, and carried them surreptitiously to his car.  Having a regular sedan, the only way that he could get away with his loot was to lay them on the roof of the car and steady them with his arm out of the window.


As he drove at about 5 miles an hour, he was happily advancing toward his brother's house a half a mile away, when all of a sudden, a speeding car swerved by him, causing him to slam on his breaks and stop.  Now he could see the pile of plywood slide forward off of his roof, slicing through his hood, cutting into his engine, and lopping off his headlights. 


Baltimore News:


Bicycle Thieves:


The Baltimore Sun has more information about the kids who stole a bunch of bicycles this week.  May I quote:  "About 50 youngsters poured into Druid Hill Park and stole four dozen bicycles Monday evening that city workers had put out for a popular bike-sharing program, authorities said."


These bikes are marked with big black and white stickers.  Twelve of them have already been recovered.


The Ride Around Program  began in 2006.  I am really surprised that it has lasted this long.  I wonder what the New York City version is experiencing. 


Food Thief:


Baltimore's famous Dine and Dasher "criminal", who has been faking seizures for years to get out of paying in restaurants, has finally been sentenced to 5 years of jail food for his last excursions into beating providers out of cash.


In 2013, for example, at one eatery, he ordered Pork Chops, Macaroni and Cheese, Soup, and several drinks.  After consumption, he appeared to pass out.  911 was called and medics put him into an ambulance.   On the way, he confessed and was arrested.  Usually, when this happened, thanks to Public Defenders, he stayed out of jail.. except for a few 18 months stints.. but this time, a judge lumped a bunch of his exploits together so he could give him that mandatory 5 year sentence.


News in the Carroll County Times;


Money Talks:


Billionaire Mark Zuckerberg and wife Priscilla Chang report that they are donating $120 million to public schools in the San Francisco area.  This is part of $1.1 billion in Facebook stock thay had pledged to the nonprofit Silicon Valley Community Foundation.


The Dow Jones average closed Friday at 16,717.17.  I think that this is the highest it has ever been.  Maybe I'm rich. I'd better check.  (yeah.. sure.. ha)


Seltzer time?


Badass Burgers is now serving breakfast food from a truck along route 140 in Westminster, Maryland.  Are burgers breakfast food?  I wonder what their license cost them.  At one time, I think it was in DC, a license to sell anything on the street cost $350,000 a year and there always was a line of people wanting to get one of the few licenses available.   Now.. how many burgers would you have to sell to make one of those licenses profitable?


Bomber


What is different about a suicide bombing directed against Syrian Government troops by someone named Moner Mohammad Abu-Salha?  .. He was an American from Florida.




Prayer


Fellow Carroll Lutheran Village resident, Reverend Lou Piel, wrote about prayer in his monthly religious column.  I liked what he said.. that prayer should be directed to the goals of one's meetings.. just as Reverend Warren Wenger's prayers at the AARP Board Meetings are directed to helping the Board members make decisions for the good welfare of the organization.


I also liked Lou's sentence: "...sometimes we need to hear thoughts or opinions that are different to what we hold dear..."


....................................



No comments: