What a miserable gobshite I’ve been!

I have allowed my glorious blog to lapse into oblivion. What a horrible tragedy.

Joyriding to History 101

I think Rhode Island is slowly turning into bizarro America…Ok, turning into may be an understatement.  Since its conception, Rhode Island has always been a little…different.  Smallest state, first to declare independence, last to ratify the Constitution, johnny cakes, etc.  I mean, what’s up with James Woods?

Two young men, ages 15 and 16, were arrested earlier for stealing a car.  Ok, that’s pretty standard.  However, the two stole the car in a successful bid to make it to school on time.  Which leads me to wonder what the punitive measures are for tardiness and/or truancy in Little Rhody.  Most kids who steal a car are doing it to get as far away from school as possible – bombing down to the border to become dive instructors in Tijuana or something.

Apparently the cops had a problem with their chosen method of consummating their compulsory attendance duties.  A classic case of damned if you do, damned if you don’t.  Steal a car, get to school on time – that’s a paddlin’.  Late to school – that’s a paddlin’.  Avoid the problem entirely and skip – that’s a paddlin’.  You get the picture.

Anyway, bizarro America.  Right.  Who in their right minds steals a car and then drives to school! ?  If you’re going to steal a car and take it to school, at least make it a Porsche and pick up the ladies in the school parking lot.  Not that I would advocate car theft…But if you’re going to do something stupid, you may as well go big or go home.  Which is why we have the Darwin Awards…but that’s another topic entirely.

Scared Straight

Pre-PS – I’m well aware of the gigantic lag between this post and my last one…

Leave it to Australia to bring to the forefront the real reason a young man probably doesn’t want to find himself incarcerated. Here in the states (and this program is presumably a world-wide thing, I wouldn’t know) we tend to focus on the “scared straight” tactic of carting inmates into our schools or wherever to yell and swear at troubled kids in an effort to scare them from committing crimes that would end them in jail /runonsentence. An Aussie court has taken a different tack, however, warning a young driver of the “big, ugly, hairy strong men…who will pay a lot of attention to you – and your anatomy.”

The young man, a 19-year-old with a rap sheet that includes charges of failing to stop at a police alcohol checkpoint and driving without a license, was making his third court appearance for driving charges. He was given the warning and prohibited from driving until 2013 and shipped off to Van Diemen’s land is required to perform 150 hours of community service.  Excluding fellows like Grant Balfour, it’s obvious they either don’t know how to count down under, or don’t play baseball…It’s supposed to be three strikes and you’re out, not four.

At the very least, this is a new frontier on the war against crime (we’re already fighting intangibles like terror, drugs, illiteracy, hunger – why not crime?).  The prospect of a big, big strong man with hairy knuckles paying meticulous attention to me and my anatomy would certainly be enough to make me pull over at that alcohol checkpoint.

New Campaign signs

Might make a good Christmas present, I suppose.  Or a fine collectable years down the line.

Chalk one up for the good guys

Nine out of 11 Peruvian faith healers agree – Obama is the man for America.  Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, onward to November 4th!