Parachute Club

Yesterday my daughter again asked why I didn't do something useful with my time. Talking about my "doing something useful" seemed to be her favorite topic of conversation. She was "only thinking of me" and suggested I go down to the senior center and hang out with the guys.

I did this, and when I got home last night, I decided to teach her a lesson about staying out of my business. I told her that I had joined a parachute club.

She said, "Are you nuts? You're almost 72 years old and you're going to start jumping out of airplanes?"

I proudly showed her that I even got a membership card.

She said to me, "Good grief, where are your glasses! This is a membership to a prostitute club, not a parachute club."

"I'm in trouble again, and I don't know what to do... I signed up for five jumps a week," I told her.

She fainted.

Life as a senior citizen is not getting any easier, but sometimes it can be fun.

AFTERBURNER

Fitzy Goes to the NFL Draft

Friday Babe

Charity Hodges

What's Going to Happen Next

via The Daley Gator
Intruder With A Baseball Bat Vs. Texas Man With A Shotgun…

I'm not sure why this is so hard to understand. While uniquely designed for destroying baseballs, a baseball bat at approximately 2.75" in diameter and no more than 42" in length, should never be used as an offensive weapon against, let's say a properly armed resident holding a shotgun in your face.

A man in Midland, Texas shot and killed an intruder who attempted to break into his residence on Tuesday night, the Midland Reporter-Telegram reports. The intruder was armed with a baseball bat.

Selecting Sequester Cuts for Maximum Pain

The Boston Bomber Edition
Top federal defender is representing accused Boston Marathon bomber, but furloughs may pose issue
SOLUTION:
AG Holder: No furloughs at Justice Department

Boat for Sale

in Watertown

It has a few Bullet Holes and some Blood on the interior but other than that it runs just fine.

We'll Shut Down the City and Hunt You Down

via FB Friend Brenton

Friday Babe

Allison Waite

Got Chechens?

Someone tell Putin we've got a pair of his Chechen Crotch Crabs Loose here in Boston. Ah ... One has since reached room temperature. Sorry this could not be helped.
Surviving bombing suspect identified

WATERTOWN, Mass. (AP) - Two suspects in the Boston Marathon bombing killed an MIT police officer, injured a transit officer in a firefight and threw explosive devices at police during their getaway attempt in a long night of violence that left one of them dead and another still at large Friday, authorities said as the manhunt intensified for a young man described as a dangerous terrorist.

The suspects were identified to The Associated Press as coming from the Russian region near Chechnya, which has been plagued by an Islamic insurgency stemming from separatist wars. A law enforcement intelligence bulletin obtained by the AP identified the surviving bomb suspect as Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, a 19-year-old who had been living in Cambridge, just outside Boston, and said he "may be armed and dangerous."

Two law enforcement officials told the AP that Tsarnaev and the other suspect, who was not immediately identified, had been living legally in the U.S. for at least one year.

In Boston, still on edge over the attack on the marathon, and its western suburbs, authorities suspended mass transit and urged people to stay indoors as they searched for the remaining suspect, a man seen wearing a white baseball cap on surveillance footage from Monday's deadly bombing at the marathon finish line.

"We believe this man to be a terrorist," said Boston Police Commissioner Ed Davis. "We believe this to be a man who's come here to kill people."

Authorities urged residents in Watertown, Newton, Arlington, Waltham, Belmont, Cambridge and the Allston-Brighton neighborhoods of Boston to stay indoors. At least a quarter of a million people live in those suburbs. All mass transit was shut down, and businesses were asked not to open Friday. People waiting at bus and subway stops were told to go home.

All modes of public transportation were shut down, including buses, subways, trolleys, commuter rail and boats, said Joe Pesaturo, spokesman for the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority.

The suspects' clashes with police began only a few hours after the FBI released photos and videos of the two young men, who were seen carrying backpacks as they mingled among marathon revelers. The bombings on Monday killed three people and wounded more than 180 others, and authorities revealed the images to enlist the public's help finding the suspects.

The images released by the FBI depict two young men, each wearing a baseball cap, walking one behind the other near the finish line. Richard DesLauriers, FBI agent in charge in Boston, said the suspect in the white hat was seen setting down a bag at the site of the second of two deadly explosions.

Authorities said surveillance tape recorded late Thursday showed the suspect known for the white hat during a robbery of a convenience store in Cambridge, near the campus of MIT, where a university police officer was killed while responding to a report of a disturbance, said State Police Col Timothy Alben. The officer died of multiple gunshot wounds.

From there, authorities say, the two men carjacked a man in a Mercedes-Benz, keeping him with them in the car for half an hour before releasing him at a gas station in Cambridge. The man was not injured.

The search for the vehicle led to a chase that ended in Watertown, where authorities said the suspects threw explosive devices from the car and exchanged gunfire with police. A transit police officer was seriously injured during the chase, authorities said.

In Watertown, witnesses reported hearing multiple gunshots and explosions at about 1 a.m. Friday. Dozens of police officers and FBI agents were in the neighborhood and a helicopter circled overhead.

Watertown resident Christine Yajko said she was awakened at about 1:30 a.m. by a loud noise, began to walk to her kitchen and heard gunfire.

"I heard the explosion, so I stepped back from that area, then I went back out and heard a second one," she said. "It was very loud. It shook the house a little."

She said a police officer later knocked on her door and told her there was an undetonated improvised explosive device in the street and warned her to stay away from the windows.

"It was on the street, right near our kitchen window," she said.

Yajko said she never saw the suspect who was on the loose and didn't realize the violence was related to the marathon bombings until she turned on the TV and began watching what was happening outside her side door.

State police spokesman David Procopio said, "The incident in Watertown did involve what we believe to be explosive devices possibly, potentially, being used against the police officers."

Boston cab driver Imran Saif said he was standing on a street corner at a police barricade across from a diner when he heard an explosion.

"I heard a loud boom and then a rapid succession of pop, pop, pop," he said. "It sounded like automatic weapons. And then I heard the second explosion."

He said he could smell something burning and advanced to check it out but area residents at their windows yelled at him, "Hey, it's gunfire! Don't go that way!"

Doctors at a Boston hospital where a suspect in the marathon bombings was taken and later died are saying they treated a man with a possible blast injury and multiple gunshot wounds.

MIT said right after the 10:30 p.m. shooting that police were sweeping the campus in Cambridge and urged people to remain indoors. They urged people urged to stay away from the Stata Center, a mixed-use building with faculty offices, classrooms and a common area.

The suspects' images were released hours after President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama attended an interfaith service in Boston to remember the dead and the wounded.

At the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, Obama saluted the resolve of the people of Boston and mocked the bombers as "these small, stunted individuals who would destroy instead of build and think somehow that makes them important."

"We will find you," he warned.

In the past, insurgents from Chechnya and neighboring restive provinces in the Caucasus have been involved in terror attacks in Moscow and other places in Russia.

Those raids included a raid in Moscow in October 2002 in which a group of Chechen militants took 800 people hostage and held them for two days before special forces stormed the building, killing all 41 Chechen hostage-takers. Also killed were 129 hostages, mostly from effects of narcotic gas Russian forces used to subdue the attackers.

Chechen insurgents also launched a 2004 hostage-taking raid in the southern Russian town of Beslan, where they took hundreds of hostages. The siege ended in a bloodbath two days later, with more than 330 people, about half of them children, killed.

Insurgents from Chechnya and other regions also have launched a long series of bombings in Moscow and other cities in Russia. An explosion at the international arrivals hall at Moscow's Domodedovo airport in January 2011 killed at least 31 people and wounded more than 140.

Explosions Hit near Finish Line of Boston Marathon

UPDATE:1602 ~ 22 Injured, 2 have died of their injuries. UPDATE:15:42 ~ Many Injuries Reported, Some Severe. Windows have been blown out in busineses several stories high along the 600 block in the Copley Square Area. One witness has reported seeing several packages outside the doors of 671 Boylston Street just before the explosions.

BOSTON (MyFoxBoston.com) – An apparent explosion has hit the finish line area of the Boston Marathon. Witnesses reported hearing a loud explosion near the finish line just before 3 p.m. There appeared to be blood on the ground near the finish line. Video from Skyfox showed a number of emergency crews in the area tending to victims. Reuters was reporting that the Boston Marathon headquarters were in lockdown. It was not immediately known how many people were injured or the extent of their injuries. Click refresh on this page for updates as more information becomes available. Read more: http://www.myfoxboston.com/story/21982342/apparent-explosion-hits-near-finish-line-of-boston-marathon#ixzz2QYquZ6u9

Friday Babe

Simone Villas

Almost Off the Grid

Except for 1000 or so Burglaries, Breakins and Thievery
Maine hermit, living in woods for 27 years, caught

ROME, Maine (AP) — Authorities say a man who lived like a hermit for decades in the woods of central Maine and may be responsible for more than 1,000 burglaries has been captured.

Police say 47-year-old Christopher Knight was arrested last week while stealing food from a camp in Rome.

Authorities on Tuesday found the campsite where they believed Knight — known as the North Pond Hermit — has lived for 27 years.

Sgt. Terry Hughes of the Maine Warden Service, who arrested Knight last Thursday as he left the camp with $280 worth of food, tells the Morning Sentinel ( ) that Knight told him he was the second human being he has spoken to since 1986.

Knight is being held on $5,000 bail at the Kennebec County jail on charges of burglary and theft.

The Iron Lady has Died

Rest in Peace Lady Margaret Thatcher

Friday Babe

Malia Jones

Boire Field Air Traffic Control Tower to Close

Sequestration. Making Sure it Hurts the Appropriate Demographic.
The Obama Effect.
Nashua is located in Southern NH with easy access to all major New England area business hubs. It takes $1000 a day to keep this tower operational. Folks that use this airport are the same folks that create jobs all over New England.

For Grins I'd like to see the per day tally of the latest Obama's Spring Break Extravaganza.
Just Sayin.

UPDATE:

The Nashua Airport Authority says it has signed a month-to-month agreement with Midwest Air Traffic Control Services, the company that runs the tower now, to help pay for controllers and other expenses.

NECN LINK

Home Based Gun Shop Remains Operational in NH

Weare zoning board: Garage-based gun shop can keep operating

Weare NH - The Weare zoning board ruled unanimously last night that a residential gun shop at the center of an ongoing neighbor dispute can continue to operate because the “reasonable” time period for appeals on it had passed.

The board heard public testimony at its meeting last month as to whether the business, which is owned by Michael Stevens, meets zoning code criteria for a proper “home-based” business. A neighbor, Al Provost, filed an administrative appeal last fall contending it does not.

But the board postponed a ruling last month on the case, explaining that it needed time to confer with the town’s attorney to see if it even had the authority to make a ruling, since the business appeared to have been in operation since at least 2009.

Speaking last night, board Chairman Jack Dearborn said that he had received more definitive evidence since the March meeting that the town had approved the shop’s existence at least once in 2009, which indicated to him that the window of time for an appeal had passed.

“If the neighbors didn’t like it in 2009 they had a reasonable amount of time to come and say that,” he said. “This is an issue for superior court if it gets beyond the reasonable period for administrative appeal.”

Stevens has also operated a commercial firing range in his backyard in the past, but he was ordered by the town administrator in December to cease that activity until he acquires a site plan review for it. The ruling last night does not impact that order.

More at the LINK ... Mostly though it's The Plaintiffs Lawyer Whining about the Decision.

Bubba's Hover