#Early Education New Lynn

[grace-preschool]

Grace Christian Community Preschool is committed to providing a safe and stimulating learning environment for your child. With a passion for quality care, we have designed our facility with the best possible resources for your child, including healthy food and toys. We encourage the growth and development of your child, in a safe and secure environment.

[ckret2]

i’m admittedly obsessed with music/have music as a special interest so this question has been on my mind for quite some time now - if Bill (from your goldilocks fanfic) were to listen to any music, or have any particular music taste, what would it be? Any particular songs in mind that he likes? ( <—totally not looking for more/new songs to listen to hahahahaha…sweats)

half of me thinks he’d like 40s/50’s/60’s music (thanks to the vera lynn reference in the fic, but also bc he sings it in-show), but the other half of me wants him to like musicals (heathers, in particular) - i can’t explain why lol

alternatively, if you’ve answered smth like this already, i’d love to know what songs you enjoy/listen to!

Have a post about his tastes and a hideous-sounding playlist! And it even held up in the face of TBOB.

The only difference in my headcanons is that I said the peak of his his tastes centers on the 60s and I subsequently found an interview where Alex confirms Bill's tastes do indeed range from about 40s~60s; but I just got out of another fandom where everyone headcanoned a character is into 40s music ranging into the 50s and I'm pretty burnt out on The Most Popular 40s Jazz That Everybody And Their Grandma Knows so I still personally prefer to focus on the 50s for him lmao.

In fic he makes a reference to a band called Mysterious Mo's Average Joes; I imagine them as an in universe equivalent to Question Mark & the Mysterians, except more obscure.

Specific to my headcanoned music tastes of Bill from my fic rather than just Bill in general: coming in his tastes are all the same, but hanging around Mabel has given him an expanded palate for boy band music and kids music, although on the boy band front he prefers dance-y songs over ballad-y songs and on the kids music front he has to steer through a minefield of cheaply-produced 80s cartoons that use synthesized music to save cost on an orchestra.

So far, nothing else has happened to change his tastes.

Although eventually Robbie's introducing him to emo.

I listen to too much music for the question "what songs do you listen to," it's like asking "what words do you use" lmao, lemme look at my recent activity. Lately I've been getting into She Hates Emotion and the new albums by Zeal & Ardor and Fleshgod Apocalypse; I've been slacking in my metal education on learning the difference between black metal and death metal (I usually focus on symphonic metal & neighboring genres) so I'm looping back to the basics to learn more there; big fan of Saltatio Mortis's new album; I've been listening to the deeper cuts & newer material of mainstream early 00s alt rock & nu metal bands (Shinedown, Stone Sour, Staind) to see what I've been missing out on beyond their radio hits; and in general the past few months I've been trawling through playlists of classic 80s goth, dark wave, synth pop, & aggrotech to expand my library there. Very excited for the new Linkin Park lineup, love their new vocalist so far and it's heartening to see them releasing new material. Not so excited by the new Nightwish album, it has the nightwish sound but not the spark. This isn't even an accurate representation of my full musical tastes, I've just been really into metal recently. Current favorite bands of the last few years are Alt-J and Ghost. I listed some of my favorite albums on this post. It's too bad you can't just link your Spotify liked songs without sticking them all in a separate playlist—oh hold on I have a songs I can sing playlist, it's perpetually incomplete on top of being 3-4 years out of date but it's a starting point.

[girlactionfigure]

THURSDAY HERO: Anita Pollitzer

Arrested For Picketing The White House

Anita Pollitzer was a women’s rights activist and leader of the suffragette movement of the early 20th century. She was instrumental in the passage of the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, granting American women the long-denied right to vote in 1920.

Born in 1894 in Charleston SC, Anita’s parents were Eastern European Jews whose family fled the old country because of antisemitism. Anita’s keen intellect and creative mind were evident at an early age, as was her charismatic personality. She was raised in a traditional Jewish home and as a teenager taught Sunday school at Kahal Kadosh Beth Elohim, the oldest continually active congregation in America.

After graduating from high school, Anita moved to New York to attend Teacher’s College, where she majored in art education and became friends with photographer Georgia O’Keeffe. When Anita saw some of her friend’s charcoal drawings in 1915, she was so impressed that she took them to her friend gallery owner Alfred Stieglitz. Stieglitz and O’Keeffe later married and became one of the most famous artistic power couples in American history.

Anita wrote a book about her friendship with O’Keeffe, A Woman on Paper, that wasn’t published until 1988, long after both women were deceased. Book reviewer Lynne Bundesen said, “it is a book that tells you that the voices of the most independent, far-seeing women of the times, the pioneers of women’s rights and visions talked to each other as gushing, enthusiastic, eager and confused schoolgirls straight out of the Victorian era – as they may not have talked with their men.”

Around this time, Anita became involved with the movement for women’s suffrage. Incredibly, seventy years after Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s Women’s Rights Convention in 1848, American women were still unable to exercise the most basic right in a democracy – the right to vote. Anita joined the National Women’s Party (NWP), a political organization formed in 1916 to fight for women’s suffrage. Anita became a party organizer, traveling all over the United States to advocate for her cause. Her friendliness, charm, and reasoned yet passionate arguments for her cause helped create a groundswell of support among both women and men for a constitutional amendment to guarantee women’s right to vote. She spoke to everyday Americans, as well as state legislators and was very successful in bringing her cause to the forefront of public conversation.

In 1917, Anita was a leader of the Silent Sentinels, also known as the Sentinals of Liberty, a group of women from the NWP who picketed outside the White House to protest President Woodrow Wilson’s lack of support for suffrage. They held signs saying “Mr. President, how long must women wait for liberty” and “What will you do for woman suffrage.” This vigil lasted two and a half years, through blizzards and heat waves, and pioneered the “silent protest” activism strategy. During this time, the women were constantly harassed, insulted, bullied. Anita, a visible leader of the movement, was arrested but remained undeterred from her mission.

The protests worked. By 1918, President Wilson supported the federal amendment. It still had to pass Congress, and Anita became a feminist legend when she befriended Congressman Harry Burn of Tennessee and convinced him to cast the deciding vote for the amendment, which passed in 1920, enfranchising 26 million American women.

Anita married press agent Elie Edson in 1928 and they lived in New York together for almost fifty years. Elie encouraged his wife’s activism, and after the 19th amendment passed, Anita continued working with the NWP. She lobbied legislators to pass laws ensuring women’s property rights and ban unfair salary practices. Anita traveled to Europe to use her experience to help women there organize for equal rights.

Elie died in 1971, and soon after Anita suffered a stroke from which she never recovered. Anita Pollitzer passed away four years later in New York City.

For her passionate work to enfranchise 26 million American women, we honor Anita Pollitzer as this week’s Thursday Hero.

[grits-galraisedinthesouth]

In Memory of Miss Patricia Dickson 🇺🇸

November 12, 1965 — September 18, 2024

Dear Miss Patricia,

My heart is broken and my eyes are filled with tears hearing the sad news that you passed away. I've been thinking of you almost every day since the election and now to learn that you went home to heaven back in September of this year (2024) just breaks my heart. I'm thankful you are Home Free but sad for those of us who were touched by your beautiful smile and your common sense commentary. I have fond memories of stories about your life experiences. For example, you shared how your wayward nephew came to live with you and he came home with news that his teachers/school administrators were "afraid of you." 😂

Thank you for sharing your beautiful spirit, for your service to our country, and for your fearless truth teller videos. We learned from you and you made us feel like we knew you. May God comfort your loved ones and may your memory always be a blessing. Looking forward to meeting you in heaven. Well done good & faithful servant. 🇺🇸👑

Condolences

"Patricia Dickson was born to the late John Reddick and Anna Studivant in Paris Tn. Patricia’s parents transitioned early in her life, therefore she was blessed to have been adopted by the late Frank and Daisy Dickson. Patricia transitioned from this life on September 18, 2024, at Maine General Health in Augusta, Maine. Patricia loved school as a child and was very active with all school functions. She moved and finished growing up in Covington, Tn. Where she attended and was a faithful member of Collins Chapel CME Church. As a young girl Patricia wanted to become a minister and throughout her life she studied and took courses towards her goal. Paticia graduated in 1984 at Covington High School. Then she went on to further her education at the University of Tennessee at Martin for a year. Before restructuring her career path by enlisting into the Army for 10 years. Then I decided to change branches and enlist in the Air Force for an additional 11 years. For a grand total of 21 served and dedicated years. Patrica retired from the Air Force military base in 2009. She was so passionate about her work. She continued to work with the military as a civilian in Logistics Manager for the next 11 years before finally retiring in July 2023. Patrica always had dreams and the drive to complete as many goals as she could before departing from here. During her life work, she studied at World Harvest Bible College, received a Associates Degree in Business at Riverside Community College, a Bachelor Degree of Arts in Psychology from Chapman University, and a Master's Degree in Business Administration and Management, with a Minor in Organizational Leadership from Brandman University Patricia leaves to honor her memory is her beloved sister Dweellia Henslee of Paris, Tn, devoted brothers Bobby Jones of Louisville, Ky, George Studivant of Nashville, Tn, Randall Dickson and Thomas (Diane) Edwards of Covington, Tn and her aunt Ruthie Porter of Paris TN. Her legacy extends to her nieces, nephews, and wide circle of family and friends. She preceded in death her birth parents and adopted partners, brothers Isaiah Studivant, and Lorenzo Studivant, sister Jackie Strickland."

[compacflt]

question: how do you find your research/sources? yours and dancing disasters' icemav fics are so inside baseball i love it, but how do you go about doing research?

I just read a lot & google stuff I don't know & am curious about. not that hard to start learning. and in terms of reading I've been interested in military history & milfiction my whole life. mostly related to the US army, actually--im extremely new to naval history and naval literature; all of that interest was driven by top gun. I've also been fortunate enough to visit a lot of the places I write about--ive been to Pearl Harbor a couple times & San Diego MANY times, for instance, and I've toured a few aircraft carriers and military bases. I've also finally bitten the bullet and kinda shifted my career path towards aerospace, so I've been learning a lot just by working in the aerospace & defense sector/spending a lot of time with people who do.

that's obviously not to say that I am somehow Educated in all this stuff. im pretty open on this blog about me being young & naive & wrong much of the time about how the real world works. so, you know, a lot of shit I just Make Up according to my preconceived notions of the military & the world.

here is my recommended military/navy reading list, some fiction and some nonfiction.

someone also asked recently if I had read anything good in the last 6 months--yes!! three new additions to my reading list: a) Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk by Ben Fountain. So goddamn good. If you have to read only one novel about the Iraq War, make it this one. It's more about America than it is about Iraq. b) Redeployment by Phil Klay. This one is a collection of short stories about Marines in Iraq, written by a USMC vet, talk about inside baseball. Crazy amounts of jargon in here, basically a "to-google" list. won the national book award which idk if it deserved, but it's good. c) No true glory: A Frontline Account of the Battle of Fallujah by Bing West. currently reading this one, really well done so far, talks a lot about how fucked the US strategy was in Iraq with Fallujah serving as a metonymy/case study for the war itself.

again... this is all mostly close-quarters-combat (infantry) literature, I really am not that interested in the navy/Air Force that much outside of top gun lol

though I did recently remember that in early 2022, before I was into top gun, I read "Wingmen" by Ensan Case, which is actually a gay US naval aviator romance set in WWII published in 1979! it's really authentic and kind of sad, obviously, since it was a 1940s navy gay love story published in 1979. I don't actually think Wingmen influenced how I wrote wwgattai or how I think of TG/TGM but I just remembered that I read that book in February 2022 and going "oh my god they were wingmen" so maybe you might find that book interesting.

[morbidology]

It was the 21st of March, 1998, and 23-year-old Amy Lynn Bradley, her parents, Iva and Ron, and brother, Brad, left their home in Petersburg, Virginia, for a week-long Caribbean cruise on the Rhapsody of the Seas. Ron had won the cruise as a performance reward from a company he represented, Illinois Mutual Life Insurance Co.

Amy was a 1996 graduate of Longwood College. She was a star athlete; she ran track and played basketball for Providence Middle School. “She loved the game. She worked real hard. She was very intense. She just seemed to be excited about life,” said her basketball coach, Diane Dockus.

Amy graduated with a degree in physical education and aspired to be a teacher. Unfortunately, however, Amy never got the chance to reach her full potential when tragedy struck during their family vacation.

In the early morning hours of the 24th of March, Amy was partying in the cruise ship’s dance club with the band, Blue Orchid, Brad and new friends she had made on her Caribbean getaway. At around 3AM Ron woke up and realised that Amy and Brad still weren’t back in the shared cabin. He pulled on his clothes and went to the disco and walked them back to the cabin.

The trio sat on the balcony for a while before Brad and Ron went to bed. Amy told them she was going to stay up on the balcony for a little while longer as she was feeling somewhat queasy. The fresh air on the balcony would do her some good, she thought. The last time her father saw her was at around 5:15AM; she was asleep on the deck chair on the balcony. There was a pack of cigarettes beside her and the sliding door was closed.

Ron awoke an hour later to find that his daughter was no longer on the balcony. He noticed that the cigarettes were gone and the sliding door was open. Following her disappearance, a peculiar photograph would emerge....

𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐞:

[readyforevolution]

GREEKS GOT THEIR EDUCATION IN AFRICA

From 1900 to 1100 B.C., a great civilization reigned over what is now present-day Greece. The Mycenaens created works of art, established trade with other nations and lived in great cities. And then suddenly, mysteriously, the Mycenaean culture collapsed. Greece fell into darkness.

Nomadic tribes came from the North to where a bustling, urbane civilization once stood. Trade ceased, and Greece turned inward. For 500 years Greece stood silent, in what historians now call the Greek Dark Ages. And then, almost overnight in historical terms, a new dawn broke over Greece. Homer created his epic poems the "Iliad" and the "Odyssey," emphasizing honor and virtue to his new countrymen. Trade resumed, once separate city-states united into a democratic republic. Classical Greece was born.

­Where did this meteoric rise to prominence come from? Scholars attribute much of Greece's development to its internalization. For 500 years it was peacefully allowed to redevelop itself, astoundingly without any outside threats. But the loftiest of the pursuits of the Greeks would not have been possible were it not for another nearby civilization, one that was established millennia before even Mycenae was founded. The culture was called Kemet. You know it as Egypt.

The civilization that built the Sphinx, raised the pyramids and built the world's first library also produced the world's first physician, created geometry and astronomy and were among the first to explore the nature of our existence. And they passed their knowledge along to the Greeks. Modern people, in turn, have benefited greatly from this early education.

It's well-documented that classical Greek thinkers traveled to what we now call Egypt to expand their knowledge. When the Greek scholars Thales, Hippocrates, Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato and others traveled to Kemet, they studied at the temple-universities Waset and Ipet Isut. Here, the Greeks were inducted into a wide curriculum that encompassed both the esoteric as well as the practical.

Thales was the first to go to Kemet. He was introduced to the Kemetic Mystery System -- the knowledge that formed the basis of the Kemites' understanding of the world, which had been developed over the previous 4,500 years. After he returned, Thales made a name for himself by accurately predicting a solar eclipse and demonstrating how to measure the distance of a ship at sea. He encouraged others to make their way to Kemet to study [source: Texas A&M].

In Kemet, Hippocrates, the "father of medicine," learned of disease from the previous explorations of Imhotep, who established diagnostic medicine 2,500 years earlier. This early renaissance man -- priest, astronomer and physician -- was described as "the first figure of a physician to stand out clearly in the mists of antiquity" by the British medical trailblazer William Osler [source: Osler]. In Kemet, Pythagoras, the "father of mathematics," learned calculus and geometry from the Kemetic priests based on a millennia-old papyrus.

None of this is to say that the Greeks were without their own ideas. On the contrary, the Greeks appeared to have formed their own interpretations of what they learned in Kemet. Nor did the Greeks ever deny the credit due the Kemites for their education. "Egypt was the cradle of mathematics," Aristotle wrote [source: Van Sertima]. But one could make the case that the Greeks also felt that they were destined to build upon what they'd learned from the Kemites.

The Kemetic education was meant to last 40 years, although no Greek thinker is known to have made it through the entire process. Pythagoras is believed to have made it the furthest, having studied in Kemet for 23 years [source: Person-Lynn]. The Greeks seem to have put their own spin on what knowledge they'd learned.

Plato's education may have expressed it best: The Kemetic Mystery System was based upon a wide array of human knowledge. It encompassed math, writing, physical science, religion and the supernatural, requiring tutors to be both priests and scholars.

References

1. James, George G. M.,(March 3, 2010).Stolen Legacy: The Egyptian Origins of Western Philosophy". Kritike: An Online Journal of Philosophy. 3 (2): 167–170. doi:10.3860/krit.v3i2.1536. ISSN 1908-7330

2. Bowman, Alan Keir. 1996. Egypt After the Pharaohs: 332 BC–AD 642; From Alexander to the Arab Conquest. 2nd ed. Berkeley: University of California Press

3. Ellis, Simon P. 1992. Graeco-Roman Egypt. Shire Egyptology 17, ser. ed. Barbara G. Adams. Aylesbury: Shire Publications, ltd.

[therecordconnection]

Ranting and Raving: "Free as a Bird" by The Beatles

When I was a little boy, the first CD I was ever handed from my father was The Beatles 1967-1970, the blue compilation album that contained all the most important stuff from their later years. The Beatles were the first band I ever fell in love with and the first band my father and I ever bonded over. His favorite album was The White Album, his favorite song was “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” (he was a big Eric Clapton fan unfortunately, and always a sucker for a good lead from him) and I genuinely believe he had a rule that if that 2004 Rock n’ Roll Hall of Fame performance of the song came up on his Facebook timeline, he had to stop whatever he was doing and watch it. You know the one. The one where it’s Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, Steve Winwood, playing together and Prince absolutely tears that song a new asshole by playing one of the most rippin’ solos ever. That one.

Anyway, My classic rock and entire musical education began with Beatles albums. They were also the stars of the first musical disagreement I ever had with my father. His favorite Beatle was George, mine has always been Paul. We always agreed on one thing though: we both preferred the later years of the Fab Four to their earlier years. We loved when the Beatles would get weird and play with wackier ideas. The early hits did nothing for my old man. That’s why I always gravitate more to that 1967-1970 time when I go back to them. He instilled a love for the strange and adventurous in music. He also loved every song George Harrison got to have on albums since everybody wanted to talk about Lennon/McCartney so much. He loved music history and always looked for the songs people didn’t talk about much. In a way, he’s been a big inspiration on this series, where I talk about songs I don’t think people talk about much.

There’s been a lot of talk about the Beatles lately, mainly because there was a lot of hype around the recently released “Now and Then,” the final unfinished John Lennon demo that the Beatles worked on when Paul, George, and Ringo reunited for the Anthology in the mid-nineties. If you want my honest opinion, “Now and Then” really isn’t that great. I can see why George wasn’t super into it back in the day and I get why it wasn’t finished back then. The finished production feels a little too artificial and cobbled together. It still feels unfinished and feels like it has no idea where it’s going or how it wants to end. It’s very clearly something Lennon only had a sketch of and clearly a song McCartney felt he had to finish in order for him to truly get closure on both the Beatles legacy and his songwriting partnership with John. I don’t begrudge anybody who loves it! If you do, that’s great! I just couldn’t connect with it. The song I’m going to talk about today isn’t a universally beloved Beatles song, so I get fighting for an underdog that people don’t fully vibe with.

My father didn’t live to hear “Now and Then.” In recent days, I’ve wondered what he would’ve thought about it if he had.

My father’s life ended on November 3rd, 2023, but he wouldn’t be taken off life support until the 11th. He never got to hear that final Beatles song. In the days that he’s been gone, I’ve found myself listening to all those old Beatles tunes I used to listen to with him and remember all the good times I had. The White Album has been on repeat a lot.

But most of all, I’ve listened to “Free as a Bird” on repeat. I’ve found a lot of comfort in it through these darker days.

I never asked my father what he thought of “Free as a Bird.” There’s a chance he probably never even heard it. He rarely listened to any music from the nineties so I’m not sure if he was aware the surviving Beatles even reunited for that. I choose to believe he liked it, if it was indeed a song he heard. I’ve connected with that song much more than I have with “Now and Then.” My father, who I’m named after, became a father when I was born on April 10th, 1995, thirty-five years to the day that the infamous headlines of “Paul quits the Beatles” appeared and signaled that the band had officially broken up. It would be a few more months before the world would get to hear a new Beatles song post-breakup. That was then, this is now. There’s a new Beatles song one more time. The saying is true: Everything old becomes new again. 

My father is dead. So it goes. John Lennon was also dead when the Beatles finished “Free as a Bird.” So it goes. But despite John’s vocals and piano only being available on a cassette tape, I really think Jeff Lynne’s production brings a warmth to the song and makes John sound as if he’s there in the room with them. If it was made under ordinary circumstances, you’d have every right to call his vocals here “low quality,” because they are. However, since a tape and 1994-95 production technology was all Lynne had to work with, what he pulled off is superb. There’s a haunting quality to John’s vocals that I’ve always loved with this song. It’s always felt like a final message from him. The melody of the song is one of John’s sweetest and the way he sings the chorus has this breathy, relaxed quality to it that makes it sound like you’re simply gliding through the air. The way he holds that first word (“Freeeeeeeeeeeee”) and lets it fly and maintain altitude is just beautiful. It’s the song where I think John sounds his most relaxed, which might be due to him just recording his part by himself, just him and his piano. The other three Beatles assist with adding warmth to John’s vocals by providing the same harmonies the Fab Four were loved for. 

The song itself doesn’t have a ton of tricks up its sleeve. The entire song really can’t have too many, considering it’s forced to be built around the bits and pieces that John provided. But man, what bits he did provide work really well. Paul’s added line of “Can we really live without each other?” hits different these days (my answer when it comes to my own grief: yes, we can, but it’s gonna be a tall order.) George’s slide guitar throughout the song and his solo near the second half are simply wonderful. A song like this doesn’t really need a lot of tricks, you mostly listen to it because the vocal melody is so sweet and because it’s all the Beatles together one more time. I always loved Paul’s idea of stitching in part of “Come Together” and strange recordings being played backwards. When the song came out, Paul joked that he did it “to give all those Beatles nuts something to do.” That’s a classic John “The Walrus was Paul” Lennon move right there and it’s a fitting tribute to his songwriting partner’s humor.

Even without the other three Beatles, the demo by itself is still a beautiful little piece. John sounds so calm and peaceful on it. It’s melancholy, but it’s hauntingly beautiful and reflective, just as all of John’s best songs were. He captures in one single verse how it feels to find peace with both yourself and the world around you. If you want to hear somebody besides Lennon take a crack at it, Adrian Belew and King Crimson performed it during their THRAK tour in November, 1995. The recording I have linked was done five days after Anthology 1 came out. It was a song that was fitting considering they were playing in New York City, John Lennon’s home for the last years of his life. I imagine members of that audience were hearing the song for the very first time. Interestingly, Belew doesn’t play the finished one on Anthology 1, he’s doing the demo version. He omits the lyrics McCartney added and sings the ad-libs John sang on the demo. You can hear the audience laugh, which is kinda rude, but I think they only did that because they thought he genuinely forgot the words... except, he didn’t. 

It’s a fitting tribute song, whether you’re thinking of Lennon and the Beatles’ story or you’re thinking of somebody close to you. For me, I suppose the reason this song has stuck with me in recent days is because I imagine this is how my father feels, now that he’s no longer in pain. He gets to sleep for as long as he would like. You could say that he’s now...

Free as a bird It's the next best thing to be Free as a bird Home, home and dry Like a homing bird I'll fly As a bird on wings

Whenever I have to face the death of someone I love, I choose to think of death as a release, especially if the days leading up to it were filled with sickness, which was what my father faced. The last few years of his life had him deal with CoPD, diabetes, blood pressure issues, and whatever else decided to stop working one day. I suspect my father was in more pain than he let on, but he never let any of us worry for too long. If there’s any comfort to be found in a situation as hard as losing a parent unexpectedly (because he was never in such ill-health that we worried he was knockin’ on heaven’s door) it’s that you can rest knowing that your parent isn’t in pain anymore. They’re freed from it. When I see birds hanging around now, I like to imagine that one of them will always be my father, watching over me from up above. John Lennon was killed young. He was only forty years old. My father died young. He was only fifty-five. There was so much still left to do and so many things left to see and experience. Since I’m named after my father (He and I always felt the need to point out that I’m not a junior. I have a middle name, he didn’t) I suppose that means I’ll have to carry on his name and experience all the things he didn’t get time to get around to. I can only hope I succeed and make him proud.

I treat “Free as a Bird” as a eulogy song for him, because I think it reflects who my father was. He was a man who lived fifty-five wonderful years of life on his own terms. He lived the way he wanted, did the things he wanted to do, loved and laughed the way he wanted. He’s always been free as a bird and his death––in the most positive light I can find––is just another way to freedom.

My father could be a stubborn curmudgeon sometimes, but more than anything else, he was a man who loved with his whole heart and devoted himself to the people around him. He spent his entire life giving love to his wife, his children, and anybody else around him who called him “friend.” He made the days brighter, made the laughs louder, and devoted himself to making sure everyone in his life had what they needed, no matter what. He knew that one day he would leave this Earth for the next adventure and so he spent his days making sure everybody around him would be taken care of when it was time for him to go.

I love you, dad. I always will. May heaven’s light shine on you and let you soar the skies forever... free as a bird.

And in the end  The love you take Is equal to the love you make

[agirlwithbigdreamsforher]

CHAPTER 30

THE NANNY: CHAPTER 30

Pairing: Andy Barber x Annie Johnson (OFC)

Summary: Working and single parenting is not easy. Andy needs to find a nanny for his son Jacob. Annie, an education degree student at Lasell University, comes to their lives just in time for the big changes in Andy’s life.

Warnings: None, I think. Cursing words, maybe, I don’t even know anymore.

A/N:  FINAL CHAPTER. Thank you to everyone who read this! Any mistakes are my own.

Disclaimer: I do not give permission for any of my works to be copied, used, translated nor reposted anywhere else but here on this blog. Do not steal what you didn’t work for. Minors and ageless blank blogs don’t interact with me or my works. Reblogs and likes are always welcome. Thank you for reading this work of fiction.

Word count: 1924

GIF not mine, if its yours, please let me know to give you credit :)  

                                     ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

“The businessman Donald Cox has passed away today in his house in The Hamptons.” The news anchor said on TV, “He was 85 years old and was one of the richest people in New York. Apparently he died due to complications with the lung cancer he had been fighting for a year now.”

“Ammm Andy?” Annie said.

“Yes, honey?” he said not leaving his sight from the papers he was reading.

“Do you know any Donald Cox?”

“Everyone knows him. He is rich.” He said again not looking at her and Annie took off the papers out of his hands, “Hey, I’m working.”

“I know! Look!” She pointed the TV, “Donald Cox died. Is he related to Laurie?”

Andy was listening to the news anchor praising the many charities Mr. Cox supported during his life when his phone rang.

“Hey, Lynn. What’s wrong?”

“Just to let you know, tomorrow we won’t go to court.”

“Why?”

“Apparently one of Laurie’s family members passed away, so they asked for a couple of days before we continue with the process. You know they have to arrange the funeral and all.”

“Who died?”

“His father-in-law,” Lynn paused, “Donald Cox.”

“Yeah, no. Tell them we have no problem. But I have to see you tomorrow.”

“See you at the office.” Andy hang out the phone, and dial a different number.

“Who you calling?”

“Hey, Neil! I’m sorry, I know is late, but I need you to do me a favor.”

“Sure what you need.”

“Are you still friends with the secretary at Davis and McCarthy? In New York?”

“Yeah, of course. Why?”

-------------------(     )----------------------

Wednesday morning, Andy arrived to the office at 7 a.m. and Lynn was already there.

“Was it really necessary to come to the office this early?” Lynn said as she yawned.

“Yes! I believe I already know why Laurie wants Jake, I just need to corroborate a few things. I ask Neil to ask for some things in New York. He should be here in a couple of minutes.”

They walked into the office and 10 minutes later, Neil came in carrying a tray with 3 coffees.

“Please, tell me you got it.” Andy said

“I got it!” Neil said proud of himself.

“Got what?” Lynn said as she took a sip of her hot beverage.

“The will of Mr. Donald Cox.” Neil said.

“Why? And how did you get it?”

“It was very easy, it’s of public record and I happened to know a person or two at the office of Davis and McCarthy.” Neil turned on his computer and opened the file.

“Why exactly are we looking here Andy?” Lynn asked.

“What is the name you want me to look for?” Neil asked.

“Michael Cox.”

“Ok gimme a second.” Neil began to read in silence. A couple of minutes passed by, “To my youngest son Michael, I leave you the company you had been working on since you graduate from college, remember that the rest of the heritance, 50 million dollars, will be given to you and your wife when you have a child, male or female. Use this money to build something on your own. I wish I were alive to meet my future grandchild, I’m sure they will be as smart and eloquent as you and my lovely daughter in law are. And lastly to Laurie, my other daughter-in-law, I leave her the house in Manhattan where she and my son live, along with one of the houses in The Hamptons.”

“Wait! Do you think Laurie knew about this?” Lynn asked Andy.

“It’s the only reason I can think of for her to want Jake. She could arrange to give Jake the Cox last name so that way they can get the money.”

“You better be right about this, because if you do, Jake will be all yours.”

Four days had passed and they were at court again. Annie, Sharon, Mark, Seb, Anthony, Pam and Neil were there to support Lynn and Andy.

“This is very Legally Blonde, but without the pink stuff.” Sharon said and Seb giggled. “Are we voting who gets to keep Jake? Go, Andy!” Sharon said a bit loud and clapped.

“SSHHHHH!” The deputy at the front said giving her a hard look.

“No,” Neil said, “we just listen and wait for the judge to decide.”

“That’s not fun.”

Laurie arrived wearing a black dress followed by her attorney. Everyone took their places and waited for Judge Choi to take his place.

“Good morning, everyone.” Judge Choi said, “This is the last day before we give the verdict over the custody of Jacob Barber. Lawyer Canavan, do you have any more witnesses for today?”

“I would like for Mrs. Cox to take the stand again.”

“Very well, we already here anyway. Mrs. Cox please.”

Laurie took the stand and oath.

“First of all I want to say, I’m very sorry for your lost Mrs. Cox.”

“Thank you.” She said in a sober tone.

“I hope your husband is well.”

“He is, thank you.”

“Perfect. Mrs. Cox. We already stablished you left both Mr. Barber and your son 3 years ago. And yet I haven’t figured out why you left your child with a person you claimed could be dangerous.”

“I was afraid of him.”

“Ok, no problem with that. But don’t you think that if Mr. Barber were dangerous he would have already hurt your child?”

“I don’t know, maybe. Or maybe he is a good actor.”

“Why took you so long to come back for your child?”

“I didn’t have the means necessary to do so.”

“Like money?”

“Yes, money.”

“That’s weird, because according to the public record after you moved to New York and started working in the gallery you were getting a substantial amount of money a month. Enough money to come back and fight for your kid. On top of that you married the youngest son of one of the richest men in New York. So why are you coming back now?”

“Better now than never.”

“What do you gain from getting Jake back?”

“I get my son back.” She sniffed, “It’s all I ever wanted to have him back in my arms.” A single tear rolled on her cheek.

“My god!” Sharon whispered, “She is such a terrible actress.”

“Shhh, they gonna kick us out.” Mark said.

“Mrs. Cox, I believe you will gain something from Jake.”

“Like what?”

“I would like you to read this document. First the title and then go to the last paragraph.”

“Objection your honor. Where is this document coming from and why didn’t Lawyer Canavan show it before?” Richard said.

“It’s a document of public record and it was given to us just this morning.” She lied, but they didn’t need to know that.

“I’ll allow it. No more surprises lawyer Canavan.”

“No, your honor. Mrs. Cox, read.”

“Last will Of Donald Cox.” Andy could see the color drained of Laurie’s face.

“Please continue with the last paragraph.”

“To my youngest son Michael, I leave you the company you had been working on since you graduate from college, remember that the rest of the heritance, 50 million dollars, will be given to you and your wife when you had a child, male or female. Use this money to build something on your own. I wish I were alive to meet my future grandchild, I’m sure he will be as smart and eloquent as you and my lovely daughter in law are. And lastly to Laurie, my other daughter-in-law, I leave her the house in Manhattan where she and my son live, along with one of the houses in The Hamptons.”

“Hmmm, so, if you and your husband have a kid, you will be given 50 million dollars. Seems like a pretty good excuse to come back for a kid you never care about.”

“I…That’s a false document. There is no reason for you to have my father-in-law’s will!”

“As I said before, it is of public record, anyone have access to it.”

“I love my son!”

“No, you love money. Your honor Mrs. Cox never care and never will care about his son Jake. She left to have fame and fortune and she succeed, this document shows she is trying to get the kid so she can receive the heritance.”

“Your honor,” Richard said, “We were not aware of that will, I ask you to take that into consideration for…”

“Ok, I’ve heard enough. After many days of…”

“Laurie!” Every turned to see a man standing at the entrance of the court room. “The fuck is all this?!”

Everyone whispered and talked as he walked towards the front.

“Order!” Everyone kept talking, “ORDER!” Judge Choi raised his voice.

“Hi, Love.” Laurie said with a shy voice.

“My father died 4 days ago and you just left New York without saying a fucking word!”

“Mr. Cox!” Judge Choi said.

“Richard what are you doing here?” Michael turned to see the attorney.

“You’re wife hire me.”

“To do what?!” Richard didn’t answer, “I’ll deal with you later. How stupid do you think I am Laurie?! I’m the one who pays the credit card! Do you really thought I was not going to notice you paid for gas and a hotel room here in Newton?!”

“Baby, I can explained!”

“No! We are getting back to New York now!”

“But baby, if we get Jake we can have the heritance.”

“That’s all you care about right? Money?!”

“Of course not baby, you know I love you. But having Jake…”

“I said no! Do you really think I want to have the child of Andy Barber in my home?! After everything you said he did to you, and how you said he forced you to have that child?!” Everyone was shocked by now at the things Michael was saying, “NO! Either we leave now, or I’ll filed for divorce, your choice!”

Michael turned away and walked to the exit. Everyone was staring at Laurie. She walked down the bench and ran to her husband and out of the courtroom. Silence filled the room for a moment.

“Well,” Judge Choi said, “Mrs. Cox is gone. Let’s finish this.” He cleared his throat, “After the many evidences and testimonies presented in this courtroom, I give full custody of the minor Jacob Owen Barber to his father, Andrew Stephen Barber, who had shown to be the best option of parenting for the child.” Everyone cheered at the judge words, “and Mr. Anderson, please let know to Mrs. Cox that she has to come back to arrange the amount of money in child support she must give from now on. Case dismissed.”

Annie ran to Andy and hugged him tight, he had tears in his eyes. She took his head on her hands and gave him a peck on the lips, “Jake’s yours!” Andy just nodded not really believing this was finally over.

Richard walked towards Lynn and gave her his hand and Lynn shook it, “Well played, Lynn.” He smiled proudly.

“Likewise, Richard. Wanna grab some coffee?”

“I need something stronger.” They both laughed, “Hey, Andy.” Andy turned to see Richard, “I’m glad Lynn made you the ADA, I knew you had it in you.” Andy nodded and hugged his former professor. “Enjoy your kid now, I’ll talk to Laurie. We’ll see you soon, ok?”

“Yes, see you soon.”

“Ready to go home to Jake?” Annie asked with a full smiled.

“I’m ready!”

They hooked hands and walked out for the courtroom and went home.

[barnbridges]

marion facts that i need to say or i'll choke on them:

she was born marie therese meeber to single mother april meeber and given up at birth. she's spent the first 10 years of her life at an orphanage in ohio before being picked up by paul and terry barnbridge and adopted as marion lynn barnbridge. she's estrange from both her adoptive parents and their biological children, twins thelma and lucille.

she's exactly 5'2. sometimes she wears heels to attempt to be taller, but usually it's way too obvious anyway.

her original birthday is august 20th 1960, but it was shifted to match that of her adoptive mother terry as april 27th. she doesn't celebrate either.

both at the orphanage and with paul barnbridge she's learned to speak french fairly well. she self-identifies as french-american.

she was homeschooled by terry for the better part of middle school due to perceived "gaps" in her education and the need for childcare for the two younger children. she went to a girl's only highschool.

she's applied to hampden at the urge and with the financial support of her adopted uncle robert, himself an alumn with an undergrad in english. her application was an essay on the merits of close family adoption and adoption trauma.

she absolutely picked up kleptomaniac tendencies from the scarcity of childhood, and then sort of... it runs in and out of her life. she's never fully "cured" of it, in spite of trying in college. . yes she's pickpocketed francis before. it's not as much about needing things or even wanting them, it is a means of asserting control over a situation and emotionally grounding herself. yes she definitively made bunny's kleptomaniac tendencies worse and he hers lmao.

she's met bunny shoplifting at the food king and then again in shoplifters anonymous. neither of them really went after being introduced, but she's lecturing him constantly from the pamphlets.

she knits and plays the keyboard. piano is not something she really mastered in any meaningful way, but she's Passable at it and mostly enjoys listening to it.

she genuinely loves children and working with them, in spite or because of her own childhood, depending on the day. she can be perceived as harsh or disciplinarian, but rarely beyond what would be academically appropriate.

the infamous rika thalheim's been her freshman year roommate at durbinstal, and her major was dumbassery pottery. by her junior year ('82-'83) she roommated with a dina hammlinger in roxburgh.

writes exclusively using inkjoys and markers. most commonly outside the classroom, she's using purple gel pens. was an early adopter of block letters, even as a certified baby boomer, because of the educational value.

spends her weekends working overtime at the center unless busy.

acquired a rescue rabbit named caesarion with bunny himself off a farmer's market in new haven during the summer after freshman year. he's died at 9 years old and she's been a bird-mother since, specifically to parrots. her daughter enjoys rodents though.

[grace-preschool]

Best Childcare in New Lynn, New Zealand

As a leading childcare centre and daycare facility in the New Lynn area, we offer a holistic approach to early childhood development. We work hard to provide a safe, nurturing environment for children aged 0-5 years old. We are committed to providing high-quality learning experiences that inspire children's love of learning, encourage them to be inquisitive and imaginative which develops their social skills and promotes healthy growth and development.

[masquenoire]

Roman didn’t have a lot of friends growing up, at least not inside his social circle. He was too rough, too vulgar for the other socialites to warm to even with his parent’s ‘education’ on how to behave around their sort. He did, however, get along with a few, most notably @babydxhl and @sanguine-salvation, whose company Roman liked enough. @brutalscaled​ was the very first friend he made without his parent’s knowledge, early one spring while holidaying at their country estate. Roman had taken a liking to the scaled boy, preferring his company over the hateful rich kids his parents forced him to befriend. During his teens, Roman would go on to make more friends. One of these new friends was a boy named Garfield Lynns. Angry delinquents at heart, the two got along like a house on fire, committing petty crimes and even acts of arson together. After Roman was caught sleeping with Circe (and summarily disowned), he knew exactly who to turn to and together they burned down the Sionis Estate, their first crime that result in people’s deaths.

[lynferior]

dec 2022 update!

happy new year! this is going to be long and hopefully none of this is too much information to share but i also don’t care. anyways, i think i’m finally sorting everything out after these fuzzy couple of months. i went from being unsure on how to achieve my goals and feeling so discouraged after having my entire life plan stripped away… to rerouting everything i have ever known. but it’ll be fine because i’ll still be able to achieve my dreams and goals, regardless. here are my updates since december 2022!

1. made the decision that i am testing out of high school to graduate early this spring! i also start on campus community college this january to start my general education credits and finish sooner (also saving some money of course), then transfer into a uc. this is a very drastic change from the entire 21c situation but aw come on… if the traditional standard high school to college route doesn’t work for me, then there’s always other ways!

2. i’m finally getting my own bedroom! i’ve shared one with my younger sister for so long; however, i actually do enjoy sharing with her so i’m pretty upset to not share a room with her anymore. on the bright side though: more space, can decorate it as a desire and i can play my guitar and music as loud as i want :’)

3. i got my first job and a plus since it’s at a boba shop. i can finally live 2018 lynn’s boba shop dreams <3 (tbh i’m just finishing all my little side quests at this point, but hey i want to do what makes me happy so it’s okay)

4. got a new electric guitar! AND it’s a fender (the player series, still good regardless) but oh my god.. huge upgrade from my old electric guitar from the swap meet…

5. saw darlene this winter break! she stayed with our family for like two days in our hotel.. i miss her so much. it was super fun too. we skated, hung out, ate, shopped, stayed up.. i cannot wait to see her again!

6. finally passed my permit test at 16 years old and 11 months... LOL. i definitely do not want to talk about it! but a lot of medical reasons was holding me back from being able to drive but whatever we have (sort of) moved past that. now i estimate around august ish i can get my license hmm.

currently consuming in media… singles inferno s2, yerin baek’s FRANK, valorant, cult’s static, operation: true love, seasons of blossom & reads on the educational system and societal standards.

[xtruss]

Students who organized for formal Black studies programs on campuses were directly, or indirectly, involved in or inspired by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee’s political education and organizing efforts in the south. Photograph: Lynn Pelham/Getty Images

America Has a History of Banning Black Studies. We Can Learn From That Past

— Opinion | US education | Derecka Purnell | 14 February 2023

n the first day of Black History Month this year, the College Board announced significant changes to its Advanced Placement African American studies course. The billion-dollar company made this move after widespread rightwing pushback against the inclusion of liberal, progressive and radical books by Black authors in the curriculum (they have since apologized). The Florida governor, Ron DeSantis, currently leads the fascist charge on banning books and silencing ideas for students and schools. But he has fascist friends.

During the 2020-2021 school year, over 900 districts nationwide suffered “an intentional campaign to restrict or ‘ban’” anything deemed “critical race theory”, according to The Conflict Campaign. These districts represent 35% of all students in elementary, middle and high school. While we should organize to eliminate the elitist, profit-driven College Board from their schools, they ought to fight to introduce, protect and proliferate Black studies on campus.

This is not the first time that politicians have tried to ban Black studies curriculum and social movements education from schools and campuses. These bans have historically come on the heels of Black and multiracial uprisings in the streets. Academic deans and faculty committees have marginalized and ousted professors with radical politics. University and high school administrations are often antagonistic to departmentalizing Black study programs. States cut funding for these programs and their professors while increasing funding for and the presence of policing. But fortunately, such repression has catalyzed resistance that birthed Black studies programs in the first place.

For example, students who organized for formal Black studies programs on campuses were directly, or indirectly, involved in or inspired by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee’s (SNCC) political education and organizing efforts in the south. When SNCC rose to national prominence in the 1960s, they offered a direct pipeline for students from across the country to enter the civil rights movements.

New recruits put their training and organizing process to use during the Freedom Summer of 1964, when the organization, along with the Congress of Racial Equality (Core), welcomed thousands of student volunteers to help organize Freedom Schools, political and popular education programs geared toward oppressed Black residents in Mississippi. Freedom School instructors taught math, history, reading and writing. They also worked with students to study race riots, the origins of inequality and the role of Black people in building the future. The curricula posed various insightful questions, including: will the white community, either privately or through the government, effectively resolve its own indecision on racial questions? Should a few people have a lot of money, should everybody have the same, should everybody have what they need? How should we want to treat other countries? Can we have peace if we keep building bigger bombs?

After the Freedom Summer, many students entered or returned to college to avoid being drafted into the military for war, and at least beginning in 1968, student demonstrations began to explode on college campuses. James P Garrett, who had been with SNCC, Core and the Communist party, was a lead organizer of the Black campus movement that swept the country in the late 60s and early 70s. With his comrades, he helped create the first Black Student Union (BSU) and Black studies programs in the country. These BSU and Black studies programs were educational and political strategies to build solidarity and power among Black and other oppressed peoples. Consequently, the BSU default membership included all Black people on campus, including faculty, staff, community members and other people of color.

The struggle for Black studies was birthed through political education and experimentation. Rather than using African American studies courses as an exclusive class towards preparation for testing, Garrett and his fellow activists organized to raise consciousness among marginalized groups on and off campus, shift university resources to the surrounding Black community and to develop a Black studies program to politicize students to participate in different forms of activism. They helped develop free schools that taught interdisciplinary courses and enlisted instructors to teach.

At San Francisco State University (SFSU), the Black student union and Third World Liberation Front (a collective of various affinity groups on campus) replicated political education and politicization programs from SNCC and the Black Panther party. Off campus, they built relationships with labor and union organizations, facilitated a tutoring program for low-income students of color and ran a breakfast program modeled after the Black Panthers’. Black student organizers even identified potential Black students and lobbied for their admission; upon entry, the BSU put them through a political education orientation as well.

The Black and multiracial coalition continued to push for greater presence to advocate for people of color on and off campus. Eventually, they led a five-month strike against the university that included students, staff and faculty in support of 10 demands that furthered their goals of raising consciousness, building a Black studies programs and moving resources off campus. The university shut down in response to violent clashes between protesters and the police. Garrett even recalls that protesters threw a racist professor out the second-story window of a campus building. SFSU met the students’ demands and created the country’s first official Black studies program.

In her book on the Black campus movement, Martha Biondi explains that most Black students were not “politically active, or especially socially conscious” before their campus uprisings, but they were eventually led to engage in radical study while pushing their colleges to meet their demands. Their politicization process influenced their paradigm, demands, strategies, tactics and outcomes. Through their study, student and staff organizers developed an intimate bond with each other and a commitment to improving Black communities that surrounded the university, even risking and facing backlash, university disciplinary action, arrest, bodily injury and death.

This history is important because it helps us realize that today’s book banning efforts belong to a broader political backlash to the current Black liberation movement that started with the murder of Trayvon Martin in 2012. The ideas and demands that Black people, and all people, deserve freedom from police violence, deserve quality housing, deserve universal healthcare, deserve a world that has different problems from what Dr King identified as the triple evils of racism, capitalism and militarism. It is no accident that these ideas are found in the very same books that prisons ban, including mine. Prison officials, politicians and rightwing pundits target knowledge found in critical race theory because they know that theory leads to action for people who care about love, liberty and justice. They want to stop people from being inspired to fight for better lives.

But they do not have to win. Just as students, teachers and community members rose up against repression in the past, students, teachers and the rest of us must continue the political organizing to keep education radical, free and accessible to all.

— Derecka Purnell is a Guardian US columnist. She is also a social movement lawyer and writer based in Washington, DC. She is the author of Becoming Abolitionists: Police, Protests, and the Pursuit of Freedom

[masterofd1saster]

CJ current events 16feb23

Spartan murders

The mass shooter who killed three students and left five others in critical condition at Michigan State University was identified Tuesday as a 43-year-old local man who previously spent time behind bars on gun charges.

Anthony Dwayne McRae was IDed after he was found dead of a suspected self-inflicted gunshot wound at 11:35 p.m., just over three hours after he first opened fire at the East Lansing campus.

“We have absolutely no idea what the motive was at this point,” MSU Police Interim Deputy Chief Chris Rozman said early Tuesday.

McRae “had no affiliation to the university — he was not a student, faculty or staff, current or previous.”***

McRae was finally tracked down after a local resident called a tip line during the more than three hours he was hunted after shooting up two locations at the school, officials said.***

Records show that McRae was arrested in June 2019 with a suspected loaded firearm in his car. He was convicted and sentenced to up to 18 months, getting released on supervision in May 2021, the Detroit News said.*** https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/13/us/michigan-state-university-shots-fired/index.html

+++

***He was arrested in 2019 for possessing guns without a concealed carry permit, Michigan Department of Corrections spokesperson Chris Gautz told Bridge Michigan on Tuesday.

Court records show McRae was initially charged with a felony in district court but later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor in circuit court. He was put on probation in 2019 and was discharged from it in 2021.

On Jan.7, 2019, a police officer found McRae outside an abandoned building around 1:30 a.m. and stopped him for questioning. McRae acknowledged he had a gun without a concealed carry permit, claiming he brought the weapon with him in “fear for his safety” while out buying cigarettes, Gautz said.

He had four counts of driving while his license was suspended, Gautz said. Court records indicate he had several run-ins with local police for speeding, driving without insurance and other motor vehicle offenses. He pleaded guilty to those charges in Eaton County in 2006 and 2008 and in Ingham County in 2007 and 2008.*** https://www.bridgemi.com/talent-education/michigan-state-shooter-anthony-mcrae-had-guns-charge-run-ins-police

+++  

Some dummy posted a photo with a caption that

read: "#BREAKING: Michigan State University SHOOTING SUSPECT is 21 year old 'Lynn Dee Walker' according to dispatch audio. He is still on the loose and considered armed and dangerous. #ActiveShooter #MSU #MassShooting #MichiganStateUniversity #BreakingNews."***

Walker, a prolific tweeter who often shares his views on politics, posted several times on social media throughout the night as it became clear he was being publicly accused of an atrocity he did not commit.

He wrote: "I am at my house in western Massachusetts reading with my wife, if you see literally anybody spreading this s***, please get them to delete it. I don't ask for much & I have to be subjected to this sort of s*** on your behalf. Help me out here... If you see people posting me, report it, thanks...

"I dont want to stay up all night exonerating myself. Im just disgusted, viscerally disgusted... It's pretty f***** up that algorithmically this has brought me more followers than the good work that I do. God have mercy on the innocent people who are victims of this murder machine... Im being told CNN ran my face on tv? Someone get a screencap of that if that happened."*** https://www.newsweek.com/michigan-shooter-gunman-lynne-dee-walker-wrong-fake-hoax-1781034

***

Oakland, of course

OAKLAND, Calif. (KGO) -- Video showing women who appear to be sex workers soliciting right outside a Catholic grade school in East Oakland is raising concerns about human trafficking in the area.

Parents and city officials tell the I-Team young women, some police believe may be trafficked, are walking outside St. Anthony's K-8 grade school off E. 15th Street in Oakland at all hours of the day.

Vargas called the Oakland Police Department as she picked up her daughter from school requesting officers come by to check the area. Just outside her window, a young girl in black stilettos was seen walking across the street from the school.

"My daughter asked if I liked what the girl was wearing," said Vargas. "I told her don't turn around, don't look. It's not OK."

Vargas says the women are scantily dressed or in some cases, even naked.***

We spoke with Father Ghebriel Woldai, the pastor for St. Anthony's parish.

"It's not enough," said Father Ghebriel, referring to the overall police presence. "They promised us they will do more presence here."

Father Ghebriel says St. Anthony's has had several meetings with the Oakland Police Department and city leaders over the years to enhance patrols in the area, but they need more help. He says the ongoing solicitation and trafficking has resulted in more shootings between pimps and gang members - even during the day.

MORE: Oakland dental surgeon arrested for human trafficking, offering to buy children for $30,000

"If there is a violent shooting, sometimes we experience those kinds, it scares me a lot," Father Ghebriel said. "We feel powerless... we just pray."

"But, Father, we know prayer alone, isn't going to solve the problem," Sierra said.

"Yes, I know... we start with prayer, but we have to end with action," Father said.

Action from police?

If you ask the Oakland Police Dept. - a new law is making it harder for them to crack down.

"Their hands are somewhat handcuffed," said Pierre-Antoine.

Previously, loitering with the intent to engage in prostitution was illegal. But SB 357, a bill introduced by State Sen. Scott Wiener repealed that law, in part because he found it to be disproportionately targeting transgender women.*** https://abc7news.com/human-trafficking-prostitution-oakland-catholic-school-st-anthonys/12764548/

***

Carj

The El Paso County Sheriff’s Office is seeking witnesses and video footage of a pursuit in which a Fountain police officer fell 40 feet off a bridge.

The alleged carjackers in the pursuit drove the wrong way on Interstate 25 at one point and attempted another armed carjacking at a gas station, the sheriff’s office said in a Friday news release detailing the pursuit. Three people were arrested in the pursuit, and the officer, Julian Becerra, is recovering from his injuries.

Fountain police officers and several other agencies were assisting the Department of Correction Parole Unit on Feb. 2 in locating a known carjacking suspect with active felony warrants.

Officers tracked the vehicle from Pueblo to Colorado Springs, and at about 5:30 p.m., officers spotted the vehicle at a store parking lot near North Academy Boulevard and Platte Avenue.

The carjacking suspects were believed to be attempting another carjacking in the store parking lot, but “because of the reckless actions of the suspect driving the vehicle, officers were unable to safely maintain the visual contact” and couldn’t confirm that carjacking, according to the news release.

A little while later at 7:15 p.m., the vehicle was located again on Interstate 25 heading north toward Fountain and tracked to the area of Colorado 85 and Alegre Circle, where officers confirmed the vehicle was occupied by three people.

Officers attempted several tactical vehicle interventions, maneuvers meant to force a fleeing driver to lose control and stop, but were unsuccessful.

The vehicle drove south on U.S. 85 through Fountain then entered Interstate 25 and headed south in the northbound lanes, according to the news release.***

https://www.denverpost.com/2023/02/10/fountain-police-officer-injured-pursuit-carjacking/

***

Californication

It seems that residents of California’s Mendocino County need to be careful to avoid drunk driving—except after being caught cheating on a spouse. The latest lowlight in Golden State legal history may sound like a tale from the Onion or the Babylon Bee. But the Bee covering this story is the one based in Sacramento.

The newspaper’s Daniella Segura reports:

A husband caught cheating on his wife drove drunk legally to escape his angry wife and lover, a California jury found.

The 60-year-old Ukiah man was caught driving with a blood alcohol content of 0.11%, the Mendocino County District Attorney’s Office said in a Feb. 4 Facebook post. In California, it is illegal to drive with a BAC higher than 0.08%.

After a four-day trial, a jury found he was “not guilty of driving a motor vehicle under the influence of alcohol and not guilty of driving a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol .08 or greater,” the district attorney said.

The Facebook page for Mendocino County District Attorney David Eyster*** https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-two-angry-women-defense-11675981851

***

Nellie has a point

→ Atomwaffen founder arrested for plotting terror attack: The founder of neo-Nazi group Atomwaffen was arrested this week for plotting to attack the power grid outside Baltimore. “This alleged planned attack threatened lives and would have left thousands of Marylanders in the cold and dark,” Maryland U.S. Attorney Erek L. Barron said in a press release. The group of radicals who sometimes call themselves accelerationists (as in, accelerate the fall of modern society) have long argued that electrical grids are vulnerable, and taking them down is a good way to sow chaos. They’re right on both fronts! Accelerationist groups seem to be behind a growing number of attacks on electric grids around the country.

Listen, America has problems; that’s why we TGIF. But if you really, really hate modern America—like, hate it enough to want to shut down Baltimore’s power in February and most likely cause people to freeze to death—I recommend you simply move to a country that might suit you better. Qatar is right there, happy to have you. Iran is beautiful this time of year. Let’s keep the lights on, though.*** https://www.thefp.com/p/tgif-real-housewives-of-the-sotu

***

“Out on bond” is a sign you must change your evil ways

A Houston high school student who tried hiding from police in a school, causing a lockdown, following a police shooting during an attempted robbery was out of jail on bond at the time.

Mahamoudou Sylla, 19, was out on multiple bonds at the time he was allegedly involved in the shooting near Wisdom High School last week.

"He was out on multiple bonds," Andy Kahan with Crime Stoppers Houston told Fox Houston. "The first bond was for evading arrest, the second bond was really serious aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon with three other co-defendants."***

Sylla and two other suspects – John Nsenguwera, 18, and a 17-year-old year teen – were involved in a robbery last week at an apartment complex when one of the suspects allegedly shot at someone. Houston police officers responded and an officer shot Nsenguwera, who allegedly pointed a gun at the cops. He was injured and taken to a hospital with non-life threatening injuries.*** https://www.foxnews.com/us/houston-teen-robbery-shooting-lockdown-high-school-jail-bond

***

W/o 1st Amendment, prayer is a crime

Authorities in the United Kingdom charged a Catholic priest with violating a censorship zone when he silently prayed outside an abortion clinic while holding a sign that said “praying for free speech.”

Father Sean Gough, a pro-life priest stationed in Wolverhampton, England, had also parked his car in the area near the abortion clinic, which is covered by a Public Spaces Protection Order, according to Alliance Defending Freedom International. Authorities also took issue with Gough’s car, which has an “unborn lives matter” bumper sticker on it, ADF said.

*** https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/02/09/priest-punished-for-silently-praying-outside-abortion-clinic-father-sean-gough-adf-international/

***

Wonderful human being

Boston law enforcement announced Monday that an accused fentanyl dealer arrested by federal agents over the weekend is also charged with the broad daylight murder of a 13-year-old boy last month.

Csean Alexander Skerritt, who federal prosecutors say also goes by "Shizz Grimmy" or "Black," was charged through an arrest warrant Monday for the murder of 13-year-old Tyler Lawrence of Norwood.

The teen was discovered with multiple gunshot wounds Jan. 29 at 11:32 a.m. in the area of 119 Babson Street in Mattapan, Massachusetts, where the middle schooler was reportedly staying with his grandparents. He was pronounced dead at the scene, the Boston Police Department said.***

https://www.foxnews.com/us/accused-boston-fentanyl-dealer-charged-monstrous-broad-daylight-murder-13-year-old-boy-evil-intent

***

‘Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it. - Orwell, G.  (1949).  1984. 

Josh Alexander is a 16 y/o student at  St. Joseph’s Catholic High School in Renfrew, Ontario, Canada.  There was a classroom discussion of gender.   “I said there were only two genders and you were born either a male or a female and that got me into trouble. And then I said that gender doesn’t trump biology.”

St Joe’s told him he could return only if he shut up.

“I walked into one of my classes. I sat down and everyone looked pretty surprised to see me there. Within two minutes the vice-principal was in the classroom asking me to leave,” Josh said.

He left the class and “almost immediately I was met with the police.” Josh was put in the back of a cruiser, driven off property and later released and charged with trespassing.  https://nationalpost.com/opinion/catholic-school-has-student-arrested-for-expressing-catholic-beliefs

Hm.  I wonder if Jesus ever said

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,*

because he has anointed me

to bring glad tidings to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives

and recovery of sight to the blind,

to let the oppressed go free,  Luke 4:18.

***

***

Change anything?

Unsurprisingly, another high-profile crime story can be traced back to someone with a long, violent criminal history who probably should not have been out of jail in the first place.

Kendrid Hamlin, the man who attacked Rep. Angie Craig (D-MN) in an elevator in her apartment complex, has a criminal history stretching back to 2015 when he would have been around 18 years old. Hamlin has been convicted of “engaging in a lewd, obscene sexual act,” stealing from a supermarket, entering a woman’s home without permission and stealing her laptop, and biting, spitting on, and kicking police officers.

Hamlin was sentenced to just 35 days in jail after assaulting the officers. His release date was two weeks before he attacked Craig. Hamlin punched Craig in the face and grabbed her near the neck when she refused to let him into her apartment.

The incident was so jarring that Craig and 30 other House Democrats decided to brave the accusations of racism by members of their own party in voting to override the city’s new proposed criminal justice reforms. The D.C. Council was trying to water down sentences for violent criminals even more than the current standards that allowed Hamlin to be out on the streets one month after assaulting police officers.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/another-high-profile-crime-committed-by-a-violent-career-criminal

***

Worth a look

When Nicole Hockley's son was killed during the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012, she joined parents in calling on lawmakers to strengthen gun laws to prevent other families from experiencing such tragedy.

When passing federal legislation proved difficult in 2013, Hockley turned her focus to a more hands-on method to prevent school shootings : student-oriented gun violence prevention.***

In 2018, Sandy Hook Promise developed an anonymous reporting system that allows students to upload tips, photos, or social media posts if they believe someone is harming themselves or others. The reports go to Sandy Hook Promise’s national crisis center — the first nationally accredited anonymous reporting system in the country.

Sandy Hook Promise’s tool kit is responsible for the prevention of 13 credible planned shootings and 93 acts of violence with a firearm as of January 2023, Hockley said.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/patriotism-unity/sandy-hook-promises-pivot-student-intervention-stops-school-shootings

***

Good review of fentanyl

https://www.wsj.com/articles/what-is-fentanyl-drug-opioid-health-safety-explained-11658341650

***

Faster death of despair

A veterinary tranquilizer that can cause serious wounds for regular users is spreading menace within the illicit drug supply.

Xylazine, authorized only for animals, is one ingredient in an increasingly toxic brew of illicit drugs that killed a record of nearly 107,000 people in the U.S. in 2021. It is typically mixed with fentanyl, a synthetic opioid that itself has broadly infiltrated U.S. drug supply, including in supplies of cocaine and methamphetamine. Taken together, the volatile mixing means drug users often don’t know what’s in the substances they take.

Dealers may mix xylazine into fentanyl to save money, federal law-enforcement authorities said. The drug—known as “tranq” among some users—can be purchased at low prices from Chinese suppliers and offset some of the opioid in the mix. Its presence in the drug supply is part of the arms race between criminals seeking to enhance their products and authorities trying to disrupt the market. Public-health authorities are working on ways to monitor the constantly changing drug market.

For users, xylazine can also lengthen a high—with serious risks. The overdose-reversal drug naloxone that can be critical to saving fentanyl users doesn’t work against xylazine. And users can become physically dependent on xylazine in addition to fentanyl, complicating treatment.

Severe wounds are another hallmark. They appear where users inject drugs, and on other parts of their bodies. They start as purple blisters, or white patches of skin encircled by red rings, said Jason Bienert, a wound-care nurse in Elkton, Md. Tissue beneath the lesions can die within hours, Mr. Bienert said. He has had luck treating the wounds the way he would treat a burn victim.  *** https://www.wsj.com/articles/tranq-a-veterinary-drug-is-worsening-the-fentanyl-crisis-a27e7065

***

We fund censorship?

The State Dep’t funnels $200k - $300k to  Global Disinformation Index, a theoretically non profit org.  GDI apparently exists to blacklist and privately censor outlets to the right of Karl Marx.

GDI operates a "dynamic exclusion list" with conservative media outlets. The Washington Examiner confirmed that the outlet is on this list, and GDI has, separately, claimed the 10 "riskiest" news outlets are the American Spectator, Newsmax, the Federalist, the American Conservative, One America News Network, the Blaze, the Daily Wire, RealClearPolitics, Reason, and the New York Post.

However, GDI has ranked the 10 "least risky" as the Wall Street Journal, NPR, ProPublica, the Associated Press, Insider, the New York Times, USA Today, the Washington Post, Buzzfeed News, and HuffPost, according to a 27-page memo.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/restoring-america/equality-not-elitism/disinformation-inc-government-backed-organization-sent-315-000-to-group-blacklisting-conservative-news

***

Mmmm, ok

On Valentine’s Day 2018, a 19-year-old opened fire on students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School with an AR-15 semi-automatic rifle, wounding 17 and killing 17 people, including Alaina Petty, the 14-year-old daughter of Ryan Petty.***

Ryan Petty, the father believes cultivating more law-abiding gun owners and changing the law to allow a supermajority on a jury to recommend the death penalty are two areas of unfinished work.

"If you can't get the death penalty for killing 17 in a school, I don't know what you can get the death penalty for," Ryan Petty told the Washington Examiner, referring to a jury's decision in October last year to spare the shooter, Nikolas Cruz, by recommending a life sentence over the death penalty.

The jury voted 11-1 for capital punishment, prompting anguish and sorrow from victims' family members and blunt calls from Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) himself, who said defendants like Cruz "deserve the death penalty."

Now, the Florida legislature is considering a new law with the backing of the governor to permit a presiding judge to override a jury's recommendation of life or allow capital punishment if at least eight jurors agreed, creating the lowest threshold for issuing capital punishment. The bill, known as HB 555, has so far been referred to the Criminal Justice Subcommittee ahead of the start of the legislative session on April 10.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/parkland-father-wants-to-arm-staff-change-death-penalty-rules

***

It’s People v. Dharmesh Patel, not Neha v.  Dharmesh

The wife of a doctor who drove his family off a cliff last month in California does not want him prosecuted for the attempted murder of herself and their two young children, according to reports.

Dharmesh Patel, 42, was in court last week and pleaded not guilty to three counts of attempted murder when his defense attorney stated that Neha Patel did not want her husband prosecuted. However, Neha Patel told paramedics at the crash site that “he tried to kill us.”

"She said very simply this was not an accident. We do believe the evidence establishes the necessary intent to kill,” San Mateo County District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe told the San Francisco Chronicle.***

The doctor was driving along a narrow oceanside highway near San Francisco when he suddenly took a sharp turn and veered off a cliff. His Tesla landed on a bed of rocks near the surf and had to be rescued by teams that rappelled 250 feet from the road.

Dharmesh Patel and his wife and two children all survived without serious injuries. The family lived in the Los Angeles suburb of Pasadena, where Patel worked as a hospital radiologist.

Chief Deputy District Attorney Sean Gallagher told NBC Bay Area that Dharmesh Patel will be prosecuted regardless of his wife’s wishes.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/wife-doctor-drove-off-california-cliff-doesnt-want-him-prosecuted

***

I know, let’s making pimping legal!!!

A California Republican official bashed a San Francisco lawmaker’s push toward legalizing prostitution and called it a detriment to police who attempt to arrest human traffickers.

San Francisco County Supervisor Hillary Ronen said she supports creating a red light zone to decriminalize sex work and plans to introduce the resolution Tuesday, the Los Angeles Times reported. This comes after police closed down an area of the Mission District to traffic to curb extensive prostitution there.

"What sane person would argue that the solution to human trafficking is to make it easier?” said Assemblyman James Gallagher (R).

“We need to identify traffickers, arrest them, and put them behind bars for a long time, but under California law, human trafficking isn’t considered a violent crime, so traffickers are able to benefit from early release programs,” he said.

Last year Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA) signed a bill that decriminalized the intent to engage in prostitution. San Francisco residents have since seen a spike in such activity, prompting the street closure.

State Sen. Scott Wiener (D) was one of the bill’s authors.*** https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/gop-lawmakers-seek-to-thwart-san-francisco-push-to-legalize-prostitution

Cui bono?  [Cicero used it; not sure who started.] Who profits?  Who loses?

***

Good

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Monday, February 13, 2023 Two Amazon Marketplace Sellers and Four Companies Plead Guilty to Price Fixing DVDs and Blu-Ray Discs

Two Amazon marketplace sellers and four of their companies have pleaded guilty to price fixing DVDs and Blu Ray Discs.

On Feb. 10 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee, Bruce Fish of Hayfield, Minnesota, along with BDF Enterprises, Inc., a corporate entity owned by Fish, admitted to participating in a conspiracy to fix the prices of DVDs and Blu-Ray discs sold on the Amazon marketplace. Victor Btesh of Brooklyn, New York, and three New York corporate entities of which Btesh is the sole or majority owner, pleaded guilty to the same conspiracy on Feb. 9.

According to the plea agreements, Btesh and Fish, along with their four corporate entities, agreed with co-conspirators to raise and maintain the prices of DVDs and Blu-Rays sold in Amazon marketplace storefronts, resulting in those products being sold at collusive and noncompetitive prices. Amazon Marketplace is an e-commerce platform that enables third-party vendors to sell new or used products alongside Amazon’s own offerings. Amazon Marketplace is owned and operated by Amazon.com, Inc. The four corporate entities are the first corporate defendants to plead guilty and the owners are the fifth and sixth individuals in the scheme.*** https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-amazon-marketplace-sellers-and-four-companies-plead-guilty-price-fixing-dvds-and-blu-ray

***

Love this

***

What?  You liked him?

***

Know your country’s extradition treaties

DENVER — A suspect who was originally set for trial nearly nine years ago in a child sexual assault case in Adams County was recently extradited from Morocco, the 17th Judicial District Attorney's Office announced Monday. Patrick McKenner, 52, had been wanted since he failed to appear for a motions hearing in May 2014. Investigators with the FBI and U.S. Department of Justice eventually located McKenner in Morocco, where he was detained by local authorities. FBI officials traveled to Morocco last week to extradite McKenner, who was turned over to the custody of Adams County Sheriff's Office at Denver International Airport on Saturday.*** https://www.9news.com/article/news/crime/colorado-suspect-2013-child-sex-assault-extradited-morocco/73-eac35a0e-2469-4000-9e9d-f6ada8c612ed

***

Cassandra mentioned this concept

***In the private sector, employee vs. employer bargaining concerns the allocation of profits. A private business facing extortionate union demands can relocate or go out of business. A government can do neither. Collective bargaining presupposes adversarial conflict, but in “negotiations” between government employee unions and government, the unions want government to do what government wants to do: expand, using money from a third party, the citizenry. In 2006, New Jersey’s Democratic governor — management — assured a rally of 10,000 government employees, “We will fight for a fair contract!” Who would fight whom?***

Police unions, too, win contracts with thick layers of protections to shield substandard performers from accountability. Of the approximately 2,600 complaints the Minneapolis Police Department received in the decade before the murder of George Floyd, 12 led to discipline, the most severe being a 40-hour suspension. In 2017, a Post report on 37 large cities’ policing found a dismissal rate of 130 officers a year out of 91,000. Seventy percent of San Antonio officers fired for cause from 2006 to 2017 were rehired after contractually mandatory arbitration.

It is quaint that the 1939 Hatch Act bars “political activity” by federal employees, the unionized 25 percent of whom pay dues that fund unions’ political activities. Public sector unions are, Howard says, “a political force unlike any in American history — amassed and entrenched using state power.” These unions spend $1 billion to $3 billion a year influencing political decisions: “No other interest group, no industry, comes close to mobilizing that amount of political money.”*** https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/02/08/public-unions-harm-schools-police-government/ 

***Wed

Lying is bad.  Lying doesn’t make you a hero, particularly when you take money for it.  

Dr. Michael J. Kirk Moore runs the Plastic Surgery Institute of Sandy, Utah.  Apparently, if you gave him $50, he would falsely certify that you had rec’d the covid vax.  The FBI arrested him, and he has been indicted.  https://www.lopmatrix.com/legend-utah-doctor-arrested-for-saving-nearly-2000-people-from-the-covid-shots/

***

Top quality parody

https://babylonbee.com/news/city-legalizes-weed-having-no-adverse-effects-except-making-the-whole-city-smell-like-weed

***

***

Don’t start any wars for us.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tuesday, February 14, 2023  

Four Florida Men Arrested in Plot to Kill Haitian President, Grand Jury Returns Indictment Against 11

This morning, U.S. federal law enforcement arrested two U.S. citizens and a legal permanent resident living in South Florida and one U.S. citizen living in Tampa pursuant to criminal complaints on charges relating to their participation in the events leading to the July 7, 2021, assassination of President Jovenel Moïse of Haiti. Following the arrests, a South Florida grand jury returned a third superseding indictment charging these four individuals, along with seven others previously arrested and charged in the United States for their alleged roles in the plot.

The four men arrested in Florida today are: Arcangel Pretel Ortiz, 50, a Colombian national and U.S. permanent resident of Miami; Antonio Intriago 59, a Venezuelan-American of Miami; Walter Veintemilla, 54, of Weston; and Frederick Bergmann, 64, of Tampa.

They made their initial federal court appearances today at 2:00 p.m. in Miami before U.S. Magistrate Judge Lauren Louis.*** https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/four-florida-men-arrested-plot-kill-haitian-president-grand-jury-returns-indictment-against

*** Thurs

Look at the pics

https://nypost.com/2023/02/15/anthony-tony-mitchell-froze-to-death-in-alabama-jail-freezer-lawsuit/

A first responder’s job is dealing with people at their worst.  People who aren’t hostile, abusive, and insane are the exception.

***

The bailiff should fire when ready.

Former MTV star Connor Smith allegedly tried to engage in sex acts with a girl under the age of 15, according to Illinois police.

Lake County Sheriff’s Office issued an arrest warrant for the MTV “Are You The One?” star after he interacted with an undercover officer who was posing as a minor for “several weeks” online.

Smith, 32, sent explicit videos and images of himself before planning a meet-up to engage in sexual acts, police said.

The reality star then drove to meet the minor on Feb. 9 but was apprehended by detectives before fleeing in his vehicle, the press release states.

Smith faces three felonies — traveling to meet a minor, grooming, and disseminating harmful material.

Police said that Smith has yet to surrender as of early Thursday. A judge signed off on a $1 million bond after his arrest.***

In 2021, the troubled reality star was arrested for allegedly raping and assaulting a 16-year-old girl.

The alleged crime began when the teen claimed she provided someone with her address after she saw they were selling a cat via Snapchat, TMZ reported.***

https://pagesix.com/2023/02/16/ex-mtv-star-connor-smith-wanted-for-trying-to-meet-girl-under-15-for-sex/

***

If she just waited, she could have had the tat for free

Jen Shah will be reporting to prison on Friday with some new ink.

The former “Real Housewives of Salt Lake City” star got two new tattoos just days before she is scheduled to start her six-and-a-half year prison sentence for wire fraud.

Shah, 49, got the word “Keiki” — the Hawaiian term for “baby” or “child” — tattooed across the top of her left forearm.

Similarly, she got the names of her husband, Sharrieff Shah, as well as her two sons, Sharrieff Jr. and Omar, inked on the bottom of her right arm.

Jen was arrested in March 2021 for running a nationwide telemarketing scheme which targeted thousands of people, mainly the elderly.***  https://pagesix.com/2023/02/15/jen-shah-gets-two-new-tattoos-before-reporting-to-prison/

***

I get that it was an attempt, but why isn’t he incarcerated at least a little?

A former Cherry Creek High School softball coach has been sentenced to 10 years’ probation after pleading guilty in a child sex crime case.

Paul “Pablo” Severtson was sentenced Monday in Arapahoe County District Court, according to the district attorney’s office.

Severtson was arrested in July as part of a child sex crime investigation connected to a Virginia girl who took her own life.*** https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/former-cherry-creek-hs-softball-coach-sentenced-to-ten-years-probation-for-child-sex-crime/ar-AA17xkym

+++

***In March, local investigators were contacted by the Hanover County Sheriff’s Office in Virginia about a juvenile girl who died by suicide, the news release said. Through the course of the Virginia investigation, authorities discovered that the girl had been communicating with an individual, identified as Severtson, on social media messaging apps.

Through his social media accounts, Severtson passed himself off as someone in his early 20s who was into fitness, 

according to the sheriff’s office. Investigators allege Severston was attempting to persuade the Virginia girl to send him nude images and videos of herself, “which due to her age, would be considered child sexual abuse material.”***https://www.denverpost.com/2022/07/20/paul-pablo-severtson-girls-softball-coach-arrested-suspect-child-sex-crime/

***

Loudon County really wants to hide its shame

The school board in Loudoun County, Virginia, voted on Tuesday night to keep the findings of an independent report on sexual assault private. The report, compiled by the law firm Blankingship and Keith, focused on how the district responded to two sexual assault incidents at Stone Bridge High School in May 2021. The 15-year-old “gender fluid” male student pleaded guilty to counts of rape in “forced sodomy” and “forced fellatio” against a teenage girl at Stone Bridge. The student allegedly sexually assaulted another teenage girl at Broad Run High School while waiting for his first trial.

The school board claimed that it had to keep the repot secret because it would reveal students’ personal data, in violation of the law. John Beatty, a member of the school board, contested this claim, telling The Daily Signal that he made a motion to redact students’ names in releasing the report.

In December, a special grand jury released a separate report on Loudoun County Public Schools’ handling of the 15-year-old “gender fluid” student’s multiple sexual assaults. The grand jury, which Virginia Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares requested in April, consisted of Loudoun County citizens, who heard from over 40 witnesses and perused over 100 pieces of evidence.

The jury’s report states that Loudoun County Public Schools “failed at every juncture….LCPS as an organization tends to avoid managing difficult situations by not addressing them fully.” The grand jury suggested that the report be released to the public so the community might view as much information as possible.***

Mike Smith, an LCPS father, questioned the merit of this decision in a public comment session at Tuesday’s school board meeting. “I understand you want to redact minors’ names, everyone knows that these things [name reduction requirements] happen,” he said. “But what happened outside the event? What happened behind the scenes? What happened behind the scenes is almost scarier than the actual event. It’s just going to perpetuate more.”***

One LCPS mother chided the board for citing attorney-client privilege: “I’m very furious because once again people at this county in this school board are protecting adults….They aren’t protecting children.”

Parents leveled additional sexual assault allegations at LCPS staff. One former LCPS mother, Tumay Harding, accused board members of “hiding behind Title IX” nondiscrimination law and brushing her off after Harding reported a science teacher who allegedly sexually assaulted and harassed her daughter and two of her daughter’s friends.

Harding implored, “I want this teacher to not hurt anybody again.”

She asked the same question thousands of parents around the United States have been asking in the wake of disturbing revelations kept from parents and the public: “As you heard today, two years prior, the same allegations from a girl were hidden from us. What else is being hidden from us?”*** https://www.dailysignal.com/2023/02/15/loudoun-county-school-board-votes-hide-report-male-gender-fluid-student-raping-students-parents/

***

[ultraheydudemestuff]

Union Club

1211 Euclid Ave.

Cleveland, OH

The Union Club of Cleveland, incorporated on September 25, 1872, is one of the oldest private social organizations in Cleveland. A group of many of the city’s industrialists, businessmen, and professional citizens who had originally belonged to the Cleveland Club formed the new group for the purpose of having a place for reading, for discussing the topics of the day, for entertaining and for promoting physical training and education. From the beginning, the Union Club was the center of social and commercial life, the place where the city’s leaders met and mingled with people of accomplishment and culture. Many of Cleveland’s great business and cultural achievements were first conceived and initiated within its sociable parlors and dining rooms.

During its distinguished history, the venerable Union Club has survived several stock market crashes and national depressions and recessions, two world wars, a global pandemic, explosive industrial growth followed by gradual decline, and civil unrest and rioting. Throughout the good times and bad, members saw themselves entwined in Cleveland's history. The 81 founders included such luminaries as William Bingham, Sylvester Everett, William Gordon, Marcus Hanna, Samuel Mather, Henry B. Payne, Amasa Stone and Jeptha Wade. These charter members contributed $600 each to acquire, as the Club’s new home (and first clubhouse), the Truman Handy mansion on Euclid Avenue just west of East 9th Street.

In the early years of the Union Club, the membership roster included U.S. Presidents Grant, Hayes, Garfield, McKinley and Taft. Other notable names included inventors Charles Brush, Caesar Grasselli, businessman William Rockefeller and famed surgeon George Crile. From its beginning, the Union Club was the center of social and commercial life, the place where the city's leaders met and mingled with people of accomplishment and culture. Many of Cleveland's great business and cultural achievements were first conceived and initiated within the sociable parlors and dining rooms.

By 1900, the membership had increased to 500 with a long waiting list of influential people clamoring to join what had become the most selective and prestigious club in Cleveland. Qualified candidates often had to wait as long as 10 years for admittance. The fortunes of the Club coincided with the extraordinary success of the City of Cleveland. With its exploding population and booming industries, the city had become an economic and political powerhouse by 1900. Meanwhile, the Union Club's facilities, which had been spacious and accommodating 30 years before, had become seriously overcrowded and outdated for its growing membership.

On June 25, 1901, the Club was incorporated for profit; it became the Union Club Co. and subsequently purchased the Castle property at East 12th and Euclid Ave. and worked with Cleveland architect Chas. F. Schweinfurth to design and construct a new clubhouse which was dedicated on December 6, 1905. The new clubhouse was built to accommodate the increased membership and remains the Club’s home. With its refined and stately classicism, Schweinfurth's massive building constructed of Berea sandstone was immediately recognized as an architectural jewel in the bustling center of Cleveland, widely admired for its quiet dignity and tasteful design.

On May 23, 1961, the Union Club Co. amended its 1901 articles of incorporation, becoming an Ohio corporation not for profit. The building was added to the National Register of Historic Places on February 15, 1974. In 1983 the first woman, Karen Horn, was admitted as a member will full privileges, allowing women entrance through the front door, use of the marble staircase, and access to the entire club. Mary Lynn Laughlin was named the first woman President of the Union Club in May 2007. On May 28, 2015, Randy McShepard was named the first African American President of the Union Club. On April 1, 2019 the Union Club welcomed the members of the Intown Club, a private invitation-only ladies’ luncheon club as members of the Union Club which grew the percentage of primary members who are women to over 33%. This is iconic as the Union Club till the early 80’s was men-only.