Talk about life not being fair

Hey... yah live your life. You don't smoke, yah don't drink too much. You get married and are expecting a child. Then God decides to make an example out of you.

Man falls to his death when sinkhole opens in middle of his house

"It's unbelievable," Placer County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman Dena Erwin said. "From the front of the house, it's absolutely normal. Then, in the middle of the house, is this enormous hole."

The victim, Jason Chellew, was on the ground floor at about 9:30 p.m. Friday when the concrete foundation near the kitchen gave way, Erwin said.

Chellew's wife, Pei-Hun Sun, who is pregnant with the couple's first child, was asleep in the bedroom at the time and escaped with no injuries. She called 911, Erwin said.

Rescuers had trouble reaching Chellew because the ground began to shift on Sunday, creating an unsafe situation for work crews.

That's right. The earth opened up and ate him. Out of the blue. Think about that the next time you are jogging or eating your rice cakes.

UPDATE!!!! No one gets out alive!!!! (Well, a couple of people do.)

Man, son, neighbor swallowed by cesspool

April 24, 2006

HUNTINGTON, N.Y. --A 71-year-old man who went outside in the rain to pick up the Sunday newspaper plunged into a cesspool in his front yard, and his son and neighbor were sucked in when they tried to help.

The victims escaped, two with the help of firefighters, covered in raw sewage but not badly hurt.

Andrew Palladino said the soggy ground, soaked by two days of rain, gave way outside his Long Island home: "I walked across the lawn, and all of a sudden I disappeared."

He yelled to his wife for help, and she threw a rope and called their son, Dan, who lives with them. The son said the scene "was like a horror picture."

A neighbor who heard the commotion ran over to help -- but the ground gave way again, swallowing him and the son. The neighbor crawled out and passers-by tried to hold onto the others until the Huntington Fire Department arrived.

Firefighters secured the ground, lassoed Palladino and his son and dragged them out.

I think Bush is to blame.

"Thank You" just doesn't seem like enough

I cannot put it all into words. I am having trouble with normalcy. I try very hard to occupy myself. Heck I even got myself a few hobbies now. However, I feel out of place. I have flashbacks and can’t sleep at night. When I finally get to sleep I am immersed in a nightmare. The memory’s of the environment that nearly killed me more than once haunts me now that I am home and safe. The nights are the worst for me. I am alone and who can I really talk to when its 2am and I’m wide awake? I mean I could wake my wife up but it’s not fair to her if I did this every night. So I just waste away afraid to go to sleep.

What in the hell did I do to deserve this? I nearly died for my country and I’m left to endure this post traumatic stress disorder. I am stronger than this but I cannot defeat it, there is not operation order for this.

Some of the things that suck are as simple as leaving my house. Why? I feel like I might get blown apart from an incoming mortar round. All stemming from when I was in Iraq and the constant incoming we would receive. Going to take a shower was dangerous. And yes, people did get killed while taking showers from incoming.

I'm Ordinary

I'm still trying to get back into posting and actually writing things, so here goes.

I watched Ordinary People last night.

I read the book and watched the movie when I was 15 or 16. Seeing it again at 33 as a parent is whole different thing. When I watched it as a kid I identified with Timothy Hutton's character. (It's really weird to see Archie Goodwin as a 17 year old kid) Watching it as a parent is a wholly different experience than I remember.

This time it was Donald Sutherland that I empathized with. Mary Tyler Moore was overly stilted and I think overacted the part. If you've seen the movie as a kid, watch it again.

Kind of cool story from some hometown folks

I come from a really small town in WI, so hearing stuff like this about people with whom I'm acquainted strikes me as pretty cool.

“I was surprised to hear her voice,” said Capt. Jeremy Holmes, 40th Air Expeditionary Group B-52 aircraft commander. “To make absolutely sure it was her, without throwing out any names over the radio, I asked if there were any Packers fans on the jet tonight. Right away the boom operator said, ‘yeah, the co-pilot is a Packers fan.’ then I knew for sure it was her.”

After flying six hours, the captain positioned his B-52 to take on fuel from the KC-135, his sister, 1st Lt. Jordan Holmes, was co-piloting.

It's still rock 'n roll to me

So I went to the Libertarian planning meeting. Apparently the group I was meeting with is planning some concert at First Avenue to benefit the Libertarian candidate for governer. We went to Keegan's... it was crowded so we went to The Times. It seem their biggest concern was what to call their PAC. They wanted to have an acronym because they're easy to remember. I suggested QWOT. Quixotic waste of time.

I also liked Lay Zay Fair for the concert's name.

Then we went and sang karaoke. It isn't false modesty. I have a really bad voice.

I can't work for a week

I'm going to report, first hand, on inconsequential things going on around the Twin Cities.

Tonight I can report that Figlio's no longer has Jambalya. While most restaurants say something's spicy here in Minnesota, it usually tastes like Heinz 57 as opposed to Ketchup, this restaurant did it right. Apparently there's not much of a market for it.

Tomorrow I will check out a Libertarian planning session.... and hopefully trivia night at Keegan's.

You can't judge a book by its cover

I think it was Jonah Goldberg who once wrote (paraphrasing from memory) that although you can't judge a book by its cover, if you see one with a spaceship, aliens and a woman in a steel bustier, you can make a pretty good guess that it's a sci-fi novel.


Digitial Brownshirt tells us what this particular genius did after being released on bail for car-jacking. Who would have thought?

Words Matter

Spouting off about someone being a "coward and a liar" isn't such a good idea, especially when the guy values his honor, more especially when the guy is Buzz Aldrin. It's been a long time since I've enjoyed seeing someone getting popped in the mouth as much as this.

Thanks to The Officers' Club

Back again

Well, I'm back yet again. I was out of town for a bit, then ill. To further add to the fun, my wife decided to arbitrarily move back into the house after a seven month absence. Just the sort of instability every six-year old needs in his life.

In the meantime I was able to catch The Unit. I'm happy that Dennis Haysbert has been able to take time off from selling insurance to kill bad guys.

The Presidential Double

This is a pretty funny clip from Jeff Foxworthy's roast on Comedy Central.

After seeing that I had to find out who that guy was. It turns out his name is Steve Bridges. When I went looking around his site, I found this:

As usual, the president shows class:

They say everyone has a double somewhere in the world. President George W. Bush on February 24th found his in – of all places – the Oval Office of the White House.

“Is this me?” Bush asked with a wry smile when coming face to face for the first time with comedian/impressionist Steve Bridges. Well, yes and no.

For the past year, Bridges has been doing his right-on impression of President Bush for audiences across the nation. And while he’s not really the president, most people are hard pressed to tell them apart.
...

Although Bridges wasn’t in makeup when he Haney, Manager - Randy Nolen and Publicist - Jim Howard visited the Oval Office, that didn’t stop the president from laughing. Or from giving his candid review of the taped performances he’s seen of Bridges being him.

“He remarked how odd it was to see someone who looks and acts like him. In fact, I think he said it was downright weird.”

That would be “weird” in a good way, however.

“The President said he really appreciated the tone of my material, how it was all in fun and something he’d feel comfortable having his daughters hear.”

Point to remember

I'm pretty sure my "Mr. Mom" stories aren't nearly so funny to people who aren't me, but... I'd just like to say for anyone interested that being woken up at six AM by a screaming, crying, wet, soapy, naked six-year old who decided that was a good time to get up and take a bath by himself is utterly terrifying.