Bryan Strawser

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Archives for August 2004

122 Arrested on First Day of Protests

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The protests are off and running at the Republican National Convention in New York City – and this promises to be quite a different show than the protests in Boston – where only twelve people were arrested. Already, in New York, more than 122 people have been arrested according to today’s New York Times:

Thousands of cyclists rode through the streets of Manhattan last night in an anti-Republican, pro-environment display of bike power that ended in more than 100 arrests by the police after the ride blocked some streets.

Despite tension over police warnings to obey traffic laws against blocking traffic and running red lights, the cyclists – numbering 5,000, the police say – did just that in a meandering course that started at Union Square and wound its way to the West Side, Central Park, Midtown and the East Village.

As of 11 p.m., Paul J. Browne, a police spokesman, said that officers were still processing people who were detained, but that he expected more than 100 people to face charges, mainly for disorderly conduct.

The arrests, two days before the convention starts, seemed to herald a busy period for the police, who must patrol a stream of demonstrations large and small, several each day. The police on Thursday made 22-convention related arrests, more than three times the number during the entire Democratic National Convention in Boston.

Tomorrow is the huge anti-war march by United for Peace and Justice.

May we live in interesting times….

IPD to Arm Officers with M-16s

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The Indianapolis Star is reporting that Indianapolis PD will arm their officers now with M-16 rifles that have laid in storage since last year:

Longer-range rifles that the Indianapolis Police Department has had in storage since last year will be in officers’ hands possibly by November, department officials said Thursday.

The announcement follows criticism from IPD officers that they regularly face criminals who have more firepower, although officials say their announcement was not a response to those complaints.

The criticism increased after IPD Patrolman Timothy “Jake” Laird was gunned down Aug. 18 by a Southside man firing an SKS-style assault weapon from more than 150 yards away.

Indianapolis Police Chief Jerry Barker said Thursday that the 218 rifles, known as M-16s, will be given to officers as the weapons are modified and as officers are trained to use them. He said training would occur at a range at Camp Atterbury in Edinburgh, a military base about 45 minutes south of Indianapolis.

About time….

Filed Under: Law

Grumble

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My old car dealer had Wi-Fi in their waiting area. Now I’m at Silko Honda in Raynham, MA giving the hybrid it’s first health checkup and some fresh lube.. and there’s no wi-fi here.. It’s just not right! 😉

The Black Dog and Heather, Interrupted

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For nearly two years now, my daily blog reading has included Heather Armstrong’s classic Dooce and her husband’s equally entertaining Blurbomat. Through the lens of a blogger, we’ve seen Heather and Jon move to Utah, get fired, find a new job, buy a house, remodel a kitchen, have a child, and struggle with the black dog of depression.

Now it looks like the dog is back and isn’t going away:

I wish that I could tell you that the reason you won’t be hearing anything from me in the next several days is because we’re right on the verge of launching the redesign. And we are, I promise, we’re right there, just a few more MT plug-ins and some tweaking on the templates and we may have a new site! But that’s not the reason.

It’s also not because Leta is really cute in her caterpillar pajamas. Or that her face smells really good.

The reason you won’t be hearing anything from me for several days is because this morning Jon is driving me up to the hospital and I’m going to check into the psychiatric ward. I am very scared that if I don’t go ahead and do this that I may experience some sort of nervous breakdown.

As I’ve written before, I’m highly sympathetic to this – not just because I love the Dooce blog, but because I had my own struggles with depression twelve years ago.

I never had to check myself into a psychiatric ward – but I did go through several weeks of counseling and took Prozac for a time. Thankfully, those days are behind me – and I hope I’ve learned enough to not have to ever go down that road again.

While I will miss Dooce in the weeks ahead, I truly hope that this break from the world will prove to be the catalyst that she needs to pull through – we’ll be thinking of Heather and Jon often over here….

The Three Day Weekend ToDo List

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As I see that Tim has posted a list of things to do for the weekend, I thought I’d post my own list for this upcoming three day weekend:

  • Fix Closet Clothes Bar
  • Spackle x2 downstairs bathroom drywall
  • Mow
  • Remove solar lights
  • Return Cable Model
  • Return Router & DSU/CSU
  • Exercise at least twice for 60 minutes or more total
  • Cleanup home office & guest bedroom
  • Laundry
  • Goto Corrs concert (don’t ask)

Much to do!

Multiple Computers

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I am struggling with trying to keep my filesystems straight across my computers – this is something I really have to sit down and figure out how I want to proceed.

Short version of a very long story…

At work I have a directory stored on a networked file system – I also have files on the local drive of my work laptop.

At home I have a directory of files on my Powerbook – and another directory of files on my Powermac Desktop. I also have a home server that handles printing and other stuff in the house – and I store files on it as well. I also rent a webserver for this weblog and those of my friends.

I have to find a way to keep all of this stuff in sync – and have a backup system (for the home computers anyways) that makes sense and is reliable.

Anyone doing anything like this? How do you do it?

This is probably a good Slashdot story – I need to reword this and submit… hmm… perhaps I’ll finally get posted!

NYT: Bar Harbor, Maine

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Last October, in the midst of one of the more stressful periods in my life, we departed north for a four day weekend in Bar Harbor and Bangor, Maine. It was one of the best vacations in my lifetime. I was relaxed by noon on the first full day at Acadia National Park – to this day, one of the most beautiful places that I had ever been.

Today’s New York Times has an outstanding article about some of the great things to do in and around Bar Harbor.

Formerly named Eden, Bar Harbor may well be the perfect New England tourist town. There are the requisite T-shirt emporiums and fudge shops and multiple quality homemade-ice cream joints. There are the tasteful and schlocky art galleries and free chamber music concerts on Friday nights. The architecture consists mainly of “cottages” built in the early 20th century by titans of pre-income-tax industry, but they are not about Newportesque excess as much as bygone elegance. Meanwhile, the honky-tonk water slides, go-karts and minigolf are just far enough away, in nearby Trenton, to make them accessible but invisible. Above all else, though, Bar Harbor is special because a few of those early visitors donated their land and pulled the strings to get 40 percent of the incomparably dramatic and beautiful Mount Desert Island, on which Bar Harbor sits, designated as Acadia National Park. Bike, hike, amble, kayak, rock-climb, horseback ride, lobster tour, whatever — it’s a day tripper’s paradise, at least until the leaf peeping ends around the second week of October.

Bar Harbor is nearly a six hour drive from my home – but it was like flying into a different world.

As I was there in October, it was cold – but not too cold – around 50 degrees. A t-shirt with sweatshirt and jeans seemed to fit the bills without any problem. The fog and other scenery near the ocean was simply fabulous. Tea at Jordan Pond and driving down to Brunswick to walk through Bowdoin College and pay my respects to Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain – a personal hero of mine – are among the many highlights of that trip.

I had hoped to go back this year – or at least up to some area of Maine – but unfortunately the $2,000 I had to drop on termite baiting put an end to that idea.

I have many pictures of this vacation – and some previous blog entries, but I am offline at the moment and cannot link to them. I’ll try to remember to come back and add these in at a later time.