THIS is TRUE #809: 13 December
This is True
countries, this is the 809th weekly issue of...
THIS is TRUE: 13 December 2009 Copyright http://www.thisistrue.com
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THE IGA CLAN DID IT BETTER: Police patrolling a Seattle, Wash.,
neighborhood heard a man screaming for help. The officer quickly found
the unnamed man: he was impaled on a metal fence post. "The male
claimed he was not being chased," the resulting police report notes,
"but rather he thought he was a ninja and would be able to successfully
leap over the 4'-5' fence." A police spokesman added that "Clearly he
was overconfident in his abilities." (Seattle Times, Seattle Post-
Intelligencer) ...Have you ever met someone who claimed to be a ninja
who wasn't?
JOHN GALT DID IT BETTER: The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's
anti-graffiti detail got on the case when hundreds of buses in the
county were plastered with stickers reading "Who Is John Scott?" After
months of reports, they finally did a "saturation patrol" and caught
the culprit. "The mystery exists no more," said Lt. Erik Ruble. It
wasn't some teen or gang-banger: they arrested John Scott, 73, for
vandalism -- at a felony level because of the damage level. "Up until
this year, the oldest guy we had arrested was 36," Ruble said. Scott
was apparently trying to get publicity for himself and his web site --
where he sold the stickers for $1 each. He is being held on $20,000
bail. (Los Angeles Times) ...Typical spammer ...except that he got
caught.
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JUST ABOUT ANYONE COULD DO THIS BETTER: Anthony Carrazco, 19, was going
door to door in Brownsville, Texas, at 3:30 a.m., police say, trying to
sell something. "He went to an apartment building in the downtown
area," said police spokesman Jimmy Manrrique, until he finally knocked
on the door of a local police officer. "[Carrazco] asked him if he
wanted to buy marijuana," Manrrique said. "The officer said he would be
right back and went to go get his badge and handcuffs." Carrazco indeed
had weed on him, police say: more than three ounces. He was also
carrying a pistol, and was close enough to a school to make the act a
felony. (Brownsville Herald) ...Obviously Carrazco was drunk, not high:
potheads don't have that much initiative.
ZERO TOLERANCE IN REAL LIFE -- CANADIAN DIVISION: Jack Knowler, 61, and
his girlfriend, Bev Rogers, go out on the town every Thursday night in
Bowmanville, Ont., Canada. But they're responsible: they use a car
service so they don't drink and drive. "If we have more than one drink,
we always call the service," Knowler said. They were still arrested,
however, because they waited for the car outside the bar. "It's not a
mixed message," insists Insp. Charlie Green of the Durham Regional
Police. "You can't be intoxicated in a public place. It's an offence."
Their driver arrived at the same time the police did, "but he couldn't
have cared less," she said. "All he said was that they shouldn't have
been hanging around a dark parking lot in the first place." Green said
his officers "take what is basically a zero-tolerance approach to
everything." (Toronto Sun) ...So they can use a designated driver as
long as she drives the car inside. Got it.
WHICH HE THEN HELD TO HIS RESULTING BLACK EYE: "Florida Woman Accused of
Hitting Man with Raw Steak" -- AP headline
DID YOU FIND an error? See http://www.thisistrue.com/errata.html
LAST MONTH THERE was a story that drew a lot of interest (and a PILE of
comments when I posted it on my blog) about a guy in England who was
arrested for "possession of a firearm" when he brought a gun to the
police station to turn it in. I agreed that the guy was a total idiot,
but still: if you're the police and want to encourage people to turn in
weapons in a country that bans them, you don't arrest people for doing
it. And he wasn't just arrested: he was tried *and convicted*, because
under the law the jury had no choice but to do so. It's a sorry case of
institutionalized zero tolerance. The "minimum" sentence: five years in
jail.
Paul Clarke's sentencing was today. In a twist on the concept of
"minimum" sentences, he was spared jail, but.... I've updated my blog
entry with the details and more commentary:
http://thisistrue.com/blog-paul_clarke_and_british_zero_tolerance
You're welcome to post more comments IF your point isn't already
covered. How do you know? Well, you have to read the comments that came
before yours! Don't expect people to read YOUR comments if you're not
willing to read others'.
LONG-TIME READERS KNOW I was a very early anti-spam educator, using this
space to call attention to what a huge problem I thought it would be,
starting in 1996. I take no pride in saying I was right -- spam is now
about 90 percent of all e-mail traffic. And the problems kept
expanding, with urban legends, "phishing", and all sorts of other
horrors (yaknow, life online is a lot like life in general: there are
dark alleys where you can get mugged!)
The page on TRUE's web site holding what became known as my Spam Primer
kept growing, and ended up on its own site. And that site has kept
growing too. This weekend I finally tackled it: some of the individual
"articles" were getting a bit long because they covered several topics
each, so I broke it up more, redesigned the site, and moved it from
hand-coded HTML pages into a content management system to make it
easier to manage in the future. (And yeah: I finally got rid of the
pukey yellow -- spam-colored! -- background.)
So if you have any friends who don't seem to know how to deal with
spam, or just how slimy spammers really are (remember the big Christmas
2004 tsunami in the Indian Ocean? There was a stream of e-mails asking
for contributions to the victims. Not from a legitimate disaster relief
organization, which wouldn't use junk mail to get contributions, but
from subhumans who took the well-meaning "contributions" for
themselves. A dark alley indeed.) Do you have friends who don't know
what "phishing" is, and how easily they can have their bank accounts
drained? Well, send them pronto to http://www.SpamPrimer.com for an
education. And if YOU aren't sure what all the issues are with junk
mail, YOU might want to spend an hour there too! Blog it, Tweet it,
share it on Facebook: every time someone buys something from a spammer,
it generates a million more spams. (Gee: thanks.) We MUST educate
people to not support spam!
o o o
JUMBO JOKE HAS quite a line-up set: on Wednesday it started a Christmas
theme, with some great stuff running every day through the 26th. (Then
it's back to my regular struggle to find something GOOD 2-3 times a
week....) Today's is a cute one: A Christmas Episode ...of the X-Files
TV show. http://www.JumboJoke.com
If you want to get a notification e-mail when a new joke is published
there, by the way, you can: there's a sign-up form at the bottom of
each page. It e-mails you with the premise and a link. If it's
something you've seen, you blow it off and move on with your day. If it
looks interesting, you click the link to see it. Sweet!
NEED A THOUGHT-PROVOKING GIFT, even at the last minute? You can give a
Premium TRUE upgrade, and if you ask we'll even send a gift
announcement on Christmas Eve or even Christmas Day. The regular
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the recipient's name and e-mail address, please), and we'll take care
of the rest. http://www.thisistrue.com/upgrade.html
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BABY IT'S COLD OUTSIDE!
Time to install a fireplace? Or get accessories for yours?
Learn all about fireplaces so you don't look stupid
to contractors and salesmen.
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TOP ON GROXX TODAY: "Drunk Four Year Old Steals Christmas Presents" (tip:
that's naughty, not nice!) Submit stories and vote on what submissions
are best, register for free at http://Groxx.com
PREMIUM SUBSCRIBERS got LOTS MORE stories on Monday: SWAT squad storms
office to find armed man, but what they find is something completely
unexpected. During dragnet of his neighborhood for an escaped felon, a
man decides to dress up as that felon to see if police "noticed" him.
Man let out of jail, but immediately arrested when he steals from the
police. And heads up on a special sale that gives Premium subscribers
first dibs -- you know, don't you, that Premium-only specials can save
you enough to MORE THAN PAY FOR your Premium subscription?! For more
info see http://thisistrue.com/upgrade.html
TEN YEARS AGO IN TRUE: Catholic confessional both manufacturer announces
a special new feature (and you'll just LOVE the tagline on this story!)
http://thisistrue.com/6936 -- and don't forget http://i.thisistrue.com
for a new story every day on your iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, or other
web-enabled phone!
BONZER WEB SITE OF THE WEEK: http://ScienceHack.com -- ScienceHack. A
specialized search engine, ScienceHack only finds videos on a dozen
scientific topics, from Civil Engineering to Math to Robotics, with a
special twist: "every science video on ScienceHack is screened by a
scientist to verify its accuracy and quality."
-- Bonzer Sites archive: http://www.BonzerSites.com
THIS WEEK'S HONORARY UNSUBSCRIBE goes to Robert G. Heft, who designed
something just about every American has "saluted" and virtually
everyone in the world has seen: the current U.S. flag. For the full
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