Category: Sad

And he will be sorely missed (but here’s the real reason he’s leaving).

Shannon works for a non-profit in the area, and the computers were all stolen from her office (after their office had been broken into already). Needless to say, they weren’t insured, so I said I’d help out. If anybody has ANY computer parts they can donate, get in touch with me (jake at thisdomain dot com), so we can see if we can build at lease some functional computers for them.

I know if I had this last name, I’d have it changed.

I’ll just quote this, and you’ll get the idea:

On Monday, April 26, hundreds of ambitiously pretty young women from around the country lined up outside Renton’s Pure Fitness for the final audition for Season 3 of America’s Next Top Model, the deeply entertaining UPN smash featuring a bevy of model wannabes navigating an eight-week obstacle course of bitchy fags, snarky photographers, and delightfully crazy fellow contestants to become America’s Next Top Model, or at least the winner of the show. As for today’s open-call audition: Not often do this many tall, foxy ladies gather in one parking lot–especially in Renton–and The Stranger was determined to snap a portrait of the day in all its glory.

So basically, these guys went around and harassed all the hot women that were rejected from the competition, and took pictures of them. Link via Waxy.

“World Belly Flop Contest” participant feared dead. The 52-year old man is said to have surfaced a few times, but the man has yet to be found.

They don’t understand the needs, wants, or desires of the other half of Oregon and its population, so they decide to spend some tax dollars, and create an office to study us.

It’s asinine that an office such as this had to be created, but it does. My worry is that this will just reinforce the stereotype that we’re just a bunch of redneck hicks over here, which we’re not.

Now if you’ll excuse me while I go work on my Ford so I can go out in the desert and shoot something full of holes (joking on all counts). Link from Rob.

Comedian/musician Weird Al Yankovic lost his mother and father this weekend in an accident involving carbon monoxide poisoning. He’s posted a message on his website about this, and corrects some errors in media coverage on the tragedy. Via BB.

Patrick Fleming is a good virtual buddy of mine. I’ve worked with him quite a bit on the Free Realty project (basically, just bugging him with ideas for it), and he’s a good guy. And as we all know, bad things always happen to good people.

Patrick’s brother, Charley, went missing on March 21st. Pat’s put up a page for information about what happened (no foul play suspected thus far), and with relevant contacts if you can provide any information at all (he lives in Flagstaff, AZ). If you’ve seen this guy anywhere, please make contact with Patrick as I can only imagine what he’s going through right now — he just wants to make sure his brother’s all right.

Somebody came across an old example I had posted nearly a year ago about zero tolerance striking again. He wrote me with his story:

My name is Adam Liston. I read your article about the 1st grader and have a similar story that might interest you. I am a 12th grader in California, and on my way to the shooting range, I dropped my buddy off back at my high school, and a maintenance man saw my shotgun in my rack in the parking lot next to the school. As a result, the next day at school I was arrested and spent the day in county jail, I now face felony charges for being within 1000 feet of a school, my arraignment is tomorrow (feb 13) and will find out the formal charges. I have been suspended for the last month, and had the last 10 hours of the 30 hour expulsion hearing today. The entire community has been saying to take a look at my case in separate light, due to the fact there was no harm intended and that I’m a good kid. The school is now saying they need to consider “consistency”, because they recently expelled a gang banger for having a pistol at school. This is just the type of bullshit that is evident in the 1st graders case. Feel free to put this story up on your site, I think people would find it interesting how fucking GREAT zero tolerance is. Please write me back with your thoughts on the matter.

The story was covered online here.

Zero Tolerance is overkill in most places. I can understand their reasoning for security, but is it worth panicking people? I remember when I was in high school, I went to a high school full of folks that liked to go hunting. One time, a guy was planning on leaving on a trip after school, so had his shotgun in the window rack of his pickup. The school was evacuated, kid was detained, and suspended. Overkill? Hell yes. While I’m not a big gun person, I would’ve probably felt safter with him having a gun than a lot of folks (and yes, his car was locked, and there was a trigger lock, so you can’t say that “Well somebody else could’ve broken in to his car and go it.”).