What Animal Were You In a Past Life?

You Were a Polar Bear

A bit of a loner, you enjoy introspection and solitude
You are a fighter, and you will seek revenge on those who harm you.


What Animal Were You In a Past Life?

Boy gets caught in toy-filled 'claw' machine

Boy gets caught in toy-filled 'claw' machine

Devin Haskin isn't the first little boy to find the inside of a toy machine too enticing to resist.
When the 3-year-old Austin, Minn., boy crawled through the discharge chute of a Toy Chest claw machine at a Godfather's Pizza in his hometown, he ended up on the other side of the glass surrounded by stuffed animals.
Rescuers had to pry the door open to get Devin out, though the boy was in no hurry to leave.
"When we got it open, he didn't want to come out," Fire Chief Dan Wilson said Tuesday. "One of my firefighters had to reach inside and get him. He was happy in there."
Two years ago, a boy crawled inside a toy machine at a Piggly Wiggly in Sheboygan, Wis., and was rescued with the help of a locksmith. Last year, a toddler climbed into a toy machine at a Wal-Mart in Elkhart, Ind. Workers used tools to free the boy.
Wilson said there was a lot of activity at Godfather's on Sunday when the boy got inside the machine. He estimated that 75 to 100 people were in the restaurant when rescuers arrived and that three birthday parties were taking place. But there was plenty of air in the machine and people were taking pictures of Devin.
He said the gap Devin squeezed through was about 7 inches by 9 inches.



How? That's all I really want to know. Not how did he squeeze through that tiny hole, but how in hell could you pay that little attention to your child? It was a 9x7 inch hole. It had to have taken him some time to get in there! Really, you would think the mother would have noticed her toddler was missing. Some (most) people just shouldn't be allowed to breed!

Suspect in downtown shooting charged with murder

Suspect in downtown shooting charged with murder

After police moved a group of arguing people outside a Block E movie theatre about midnight Friday, suspect Derick D. Holliday, 21, pulled a handgun, fired it in the air and started chasing a man who fled on foot, said murder charges filed today.
Holliday, of Minneapolis, fired repeatedly at the fleeing man as he fled through a parking lot by Sixth Street. He missed his target, but a bullet hit and killed Alan Reitter, who was walking with friends by the parking lot.
Holliday tried to enter the Karma Bar, but employees stopped him until Officer Jomar Villamor arrived and arrested him. He was charged today in Hennepin County District Court with first-degree murder, attempted murder and first-degree assault for aiming a gun at an officer.
"This is premeditation because Holliday deliberately fired multiple gunshots as he chased after another person on a crowded street," said County Attorney Amy Klobuchar. "The intent follows the bullet."

Updates in Fatal Uptown Shooting

2 Arrested in Fatal Uptown Shooting

A woman and a juvenile male were arrested without incident about 5 p.m. near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N., according to police.
Zebuhr, 25, was shot in the head about 9:55 p.m. on a Saturday when two males approached him, his mother, his sister and a friend as they returned to their car after having dinner at Calhoun Square. They robbed his mother and reportedly fled in a white car.
The victims didn't resist and did everything they should have in a robbery, police have said, adding that the shooting was an aberration.

Police say Uptown shooter is in custody

A 17-year-old boy and a 22-year-old Minneapolis woman were arrested Monday when the department's Violent Crime Apprehension Team spotted the teenager getting into a car near 33rd and Emerson Avenues N. Police said they are still searching for three more juveniles, one of whom is charged in connection with the death of Michael Zebuhr.
"We are extremely confident that the person responsible for the shooting is the 17-year-old" arrested Monday afternoon, said Assistant Police Chief Timothy Dolan.
Of the five suspects, only the woman arrested is an adult. Authorities have issued an arrest warrant for another juvenile involved, who wasn't identified.


2 arrested after car sought in Uptown case found burning

A burning car that police found in Brooklyn Park turned out to be the vehicle robbers used to flee the scene of the shooting of a man in the Uptown area of Minneapolis.
Minneapolis police had been asking for the public's help Tuesday in finding a white 1994 Ford Taurus with a Minnesota license plate number of GFG 527. About 10 p.m., several people called Brooklyn Park police about an explosion in the 6500 block of 66th Avenue N., said Capt. Greg Roehl. The callers also gave police a description of two people leaving the scene in a car.
A 33-year-old Minneapolis man and a 22-year-old Duluth woman were booked on suspicion of arson. One of them is related to a juvenile suspect who is still being sought in the shooting death.
Minneapolis police Capt. Rich Stanek said police had not been seeking the two people arrested Tuesday by Brooklyn Park police. Investigators are trying to determine if the two are connected to Zebuhr's death. Stanek reiterated that anybody who interfered with the investigation or aided any suspects could face criminal charges.

Well, it seems that they're narrowing in on the suspects on pretty quickly. I'm glad to hear it. It's a damn shame that someone had to die before they brought some of our police back to the neighborhood though.

Gift - Leonard Cohen

You tell me that silence
Is nearer to peace than poems
But if for my gift
I brought you silence
(For I have know silence)
You would say
This is not silence
This is another poem
And you would hand it back to me

the great self therapy project, phase one

Okay, although I knew this whole sharing more about myself thing wasn't going to be easy, I don't think I'm quite ready to start putting down current things right now.
I think that I'm going to start with some older stuff, journal entries, poems, and what not. Keep an eye out for some possible introspective rambling at the end!
So yeah, expect to see older stuff mixed in with my more current thoughts & feeling. I'll always post the date on the top, if it's not something current, so that you'll know.

I hope I don't scare anyone away with all this crazy!

Random downtown shooting

Victim of downtown random shooting identified

A bystander was killed late Friday near Block E in downtown Minneapolis, prompting questions about the area's safety.
Police and community leaders said the shooting of Reitter near the Block E entertainment complex was a senseless act, and the death raised questions about safety downtown and led to calls for renewed efforts to stop gun violence in the city.
About a minute after the 11:35 p.m. shooting, police arrested a 21-year-old Minneapolis man, after a foot chase.

Numerous officers had converged on the area in response to a large fight and a report of shots being fired. But Dolan said the suspect has told police that he was not being threatened or assaulted, nor was he trying to defend himself when he began firing shots.
The suspect "just shot into a crowd of people," Dolan said.
Police said multiple shots were fired.

Reitter, the victim, was not involved in the fight. He was struck in the head as he was walking with friends. He died later at Hennepin County Medical Center.

Chris Greising, a worker at the Borders bookstore in Block E, was upstairs right before the shooting, looking at lines of perhaps 200 people outside the theater. Suddenly the crowd started running and screaming, and he heard at least two gunshots, he said.
"It was just sort of anarchy," he said of the people scattering. More than a dozen people started to rush into the bookstore, prompting Greising to call his manager and say, "We need to close now."

I was down there on Friday night. I was at a concert at the 7th St Entry, right across the fucking street. That could have been me. If the show had started on time, we would have been leaving at 11:30.
I think it's about time to start thinking about geting the hell out of here. Once you add this to the random shooting in Uptown two weeks ago, that was just blocks from my apartment. I don't want to live someplace where I have to be afraid to get get shot for no reason just going around the corner for a fucking cup of coffee.

Platypus!

I have no real reason for posting this. I just felt like putting up a picture of platypus.

Gravity

If John was earth, Kyle is water, and Colin would have been fire, does that mean that you will be air, my dearest heart, my twin soul? What does that symbolize for us?
Will you be the one to not only lift me up, but to give me wings? Are you truly the other half of my soul, my balance, my gravity? It certainly seems that you hold my breath in your heartbeat, my heart in your hands.
Are you any less deadly to me than any of the other loves I have known? Or will you become a tornado, breaking me to pieces when I try to hold you to me? Even so, I will reach out to enfold you in my arms, and take the risk that I will be dissolved in your embrace.
Oh how I love you, Irene, my darling, my dearest. I don't know what all this really means, or why it has happened. Honestly, I really don't care.
I just want to be able to hold you in my arms, to kiss you, to protect & take care of you, to make you smile. Just to wake up beside you would be heaven, to be able to touch you.
I have not yet touched you, or even looked upon your face in person, yet I am sure that I can not live with out you.

mist

In the end we are all ghosts here. Screaming to be noticed in voices they never hear.
We become corporeal only when they want to take possession of us. Sometimes pleasant, sometimes distasteful, but almost always leaving us still empty inside. They only understand one way to fill us.
Why is it that men never seem to notice that we spend too much time invisible for our smiles to ever reach our eyes?

Scientists discover swimming ants

Scientists discover swimming ants

North Queensland scientists have discovered a new type of ant, believed to be the only species that can live, swim and navigate under water.
The ants nest in submerged mangroves and survive by hiding in air pockets and then swimming to the surface.
Dr Robson says it is amazing that the ants can survive in such a hostile environment.
"We've been doing a lot of studies on their foraging behaviour and there's a lot of things that eat them, so when they're swimming, fish will sometimes eat them, mud skippers will eat them, crabs will attack them," he said.
"It seems a very nasty place to live and we're still trying to work out how they manage to do so."

wierd! and kinda cool

Too much of a good thing?

It seems that for some reason I draw love to me. Powerful, life long love. Love that I have not asked for, or tried in anyway to get. Love that is all encompassing. Love that sometimes I don't necessarily want, at least not in the way it is offered.

My forever unrequited lover, Colin. The one who is also made of fire. That is why it would never, could never have been.
One kiss is all it would have taken. I know I would have been yours, helplessly bound to you. But I know that you would have belonged to me, as surely as I would have belonged to you. So we danced around this, lest we chain ourselves to each other.
It would have been ill fated from the start. I think that you knew it just as well as I did. The fire would burn too hot. We would burn each other to ashes. But oh, how badly I once wanted to let you consume me.

There was John, my first true passion, the one who tried to steal my fire.
You were earth. I had believed you were the rich soil in which to plant my dreams, to nurture and care for me for all of my days. There was just enough soil on the surface to hide the fact that you were really cold, hard rock. Just enough soil to get me to try to dig.
By the time I hit the rocks my hands were already so dirty that I believed I had no choice but to try to chip those rocks away, to discover what was hidden beneath them. I chipped & chipped at the stone. I dug & dug. No longer a furrow to plant my dreams in, but a grave to bury my heart, my soul, and all of my tomorrows.
I dug deeper, and deeper, with my bare and bleeding hands, while you piled stones upon me.. Stones with names like possession (which you called love), ownership (which you called sex), degradation (which you called honesty, or nothing at all), abuse, most often emotional, sometimes physical (these too you called love, or honesty, or sometimes an accident, or a misunderstanding).
I still wonder how I managed to pull myself out of that hole alive. Granted, I had many hands ready to help from the other side, but somehow I still had to dug far enough out to reach for them.
Your love tried to consume me. It almost did too. But I learned the strength of the phoenix, and rose from the ashes, refined by the fire inside of me, ready to burn me alive. You taught me of strength, the price of my soul, and my own self worth. In the end the price of your love was too high to pay. It doesn't mean I loved you any less. Now I can look back with sadness, and even a little fondness. I'm starting to be able to remember the good times.
I learned strength, and pain, and neither were easy. But such important lessons. I learned what I don't want, and who I don't want to be. I think both are as important as knowing what you want, and who you want to be, if not more so.

Kyle, my darling, my ocean. So deep, and endless, and seemingly calm. I know water's violence can be just as fierce, and just as deadly, as fire's hunger, or the weight of stone.
You lifted be up, and floated me away from all that caused me so much pain. You washed over me, cleansing me, purifying my soul and my heart.
So very stable, and so very vast, I am scared that someday I will drown in this calm. Oh, I know you will never do this intentionally, but you'll do it all the same. As you send waves of stability and serenity towards me, they turn into emptiness, and stagnation. Little by little they douse my fire around the edges.
Someday there will be nothing left of me all. Just a little pile of ashes, too soggy to rise from ever again. But so long as I am here, will you ever notice that you have clipped my wings, and drowned the spark in my soul?

And then there is Irene, my wings, the one who is my gravity, who I think will get her own post.

I feel like I'm missing the point somewhere. I have so much love in my life, so very much. What is in store for me, that I would need to draw such love to me?

talking

All I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
all I want is someone to talk to
Is there anybody out there I can talk to?
There must be someone out there
that I can tell everything to
There must be someone who will understand me
somewhere
All I want is someone to be able to tell everything to
All I want is someone I can talk to

perpetual motion

Thoughts on my need to be constantly in motion, in a state of change. After talking to a friend who is the same way.

Maybe it's not an attempt to flee our emotional problems at all. Maybe it's the appeal of the challenge & the adversity. Not in a Goth, depressed, mopey, hold ourselves down sort of way.
Instead for the emotional and/or intellectual stimulation of being challenged. The desire to keep testing ourselves, to be assured that we won't ever be found wanting. To be sure we're still sharp, still alive. Because we are more fulfilled by the things we have to work for, the things won at a cost.
Or maybe I just want to convince myself that what I'm doing isn't unhealthy, that it's not just running away from my emotional issues.




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Comments:

Patience

Change is good... it brings about character and sometimes tests our faith in God... but sometimes it's just as important to be still and wait on God's direction and his hand to move. That doesn't mean that you're lazy, it just means that you're content with waiting on God's voice... sometimes the still gentle whispers - don't miss them Aeryn.

Patience

Security Flaws Could Cripple Missile Defense Network

Security Flaws Could Cripple Missile Defense Network

"The network that stitches together radars, missile launch sites and command control centers for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) ground-based defense system has such serious security flaws that the agency and its contractor, Boeing, may not be able to prevent misuse of the system, according to a Defense Department Inspector General's report released late last month.
The network, which was also developed to conform to more than 20-year-old DOD security policies rather than more recent guidelines, lacks a comprehensive user account management process, the report said. Neither MDA nor Boeing conducted required Information Assurance (IA) training for users before they were granted access to the network, the report stated.
Because of this poor information security, the DOD IG report said, MDA and Boeing officials "may not be able to reduce the risk and magnitude of harm resulting from misuse or unauthorized access or modification of information [on the network] and ensure the continuity of the system in the event of an interruption."
Stephen Young, an MDA analyst at UCS, said the security flaws could affect operation of the entire GMDS project. "The network is absolutely essential to GMDwithout it, the system can't work."
A MDA spokesman said his agency would not answer any press questions until it responds to the IG report on March 24.
MDA budget documents describe the GCN as a fiber-optic network interconnected with military satellites. These budget documents said the GCN connects the two missile silo sites with control and communications nodes at Fort Greely and Shriever Air Force Base and the Cheyenne Mountain Operations Center, both in Colorado, as well as radars in Alaska and a test bed in Huntsville, Ala."

Gee, this is comforting

Credit Agencies Adopt New Credit Scoring Sysytem

Agencies Adopt New Credit Scoring System

"Consumer Credit Reporting Agencies Create New Credit Scoring System to Simplify the Loan Process.
The nation's three major consumer credit bureaus have created a new credit scoring system designed to make it easier for financial institutions to evaluate loan applications and to give consumers a better way of measuring their financial health.
The credit reporting agencies -- Equifax, Experian and TransUnion -- announced Tuesday (03/15/06) that they're introducing "VantageScore" to banks, mortgage lenders and credit card companies immediately. The new scores will be available to consumers after the lender rollout, probably later this year.
The credit reporting agencies said in their announcement that VantageScore "will provide consumers and businesses with a highly predictive, consistent score that is easy to understand and apply."
In addition to the credit agency scores, some large lenders generate their own internal scores, often using credit bureau data. And many lenders, especially those in the mortgage business, use FICO scores, which are named for the Minneapolis-based Fair, Isaac Corp. that developed them.
Thomas G. Grudnowski, the chief executive officer of Fair, Isaac, said that "for the past 20 years, we've been both cooperating and competing with the credit bureaus ... and that will continue." He added that it could take a long time to establish a competing system.
Dana Wiklund, senior vice president for predictive sciences at Equifax, said that VantageScore "is a new, competitive product to give lenders greater choice, and hopefully greater accuracy, in credit scoring." He added: "The rate of adoption will determine ultimately if the (new) score replaces any in-house or generic scores in the market."
VantageScore ratings will range from 501 to 990. The top end is slightly higher than scores currently in use.
In a separate statement, Experian said the new scores will be grouped on "the familiar academic scale." Experian gave these groupings, with A and B being the best potential borrowers and D and F being the weakest."

Interesting. I wonder how banks and other lenders will start implementing the new system, and how long it will take for it to fully replace the old sytem.

These folks need some family therapy...

Messy Daughter Fights Back By Humiliating Dad

"An exasperated father has discovered to his cost that cyberspace is not the ideal arena for family feuds. Two weeks ago Steve Williams became so fed up with his daughter's messy bedroom that he built a website featuring pictures of his slothful offspring's lair in an attempt to shame her into action.
But the public humiliation proved a short-lived victory. While it did spur his daughter, Claire, into tidying up her room, it also whet her appetite for revenge. With the help of her father's friends, the 20-year-old business student has now set up a rival website that displays photos of him in a variety of compromising situations.
"The boot's on the other foot now, but I suppose I deserve it," said Mr Williams
Despite the embarrassment, Mr Williams said he had no regrets.
Mr. Williams' site,www.shameit.com, has proved hugely popular with disgruntaled families from all over the world. Nearly 40,000 people have visited the site in it's first fortnight."

I can not say how much their behavior disgusts me.

Man Shot In Head During Uptown Robbery

Man Shot In Head During Uptown Robbery

A 25-year-old man is in critical condition after a Saturday night shooting in Uptown.The man was walking with his mother, sister and her friend after they finished dinner in a restaurant at Hennepin Avenue and Lake Street.
According to police, two men approached the group about 10 p.m. at 31st Street and Girard Avenue South. The suspects allegedly stole the mother's purse. Then, even though the victims didn't put up a fight, the suspects allegedly fired two shots, hitting the man in the head.
Ronald Barry, who lives in the apartment building next to where the shooting occurred said, "I heard the shots ... a lady screaming. I called 911 and ran to their aid. There was obviously nothing I could do for the guy. I mean, it was a horrible sight."
The victim's mother was visiting from Virginia. The group was attacked only blocks away from the restaurant where they ate.
Kris Arenson, an inspector from the Minneapolis Police Department said, "Usually when the purse is given up, or even if the purse isn't given up, we haven't had any (people) that have been shot."
Police said the suspects immediately fled the scene, jumped into a white car and headed south on Girard Avenue.
While the area is not known for violence, resident Justin Ellis wasn't surprised there would be a robbery outside his building. "Last summer, I was walking to my car early in the morning before work, I had an early meeting, and I got mugged," Ellis said. That day, Ellis got away, but a woman on Hennepin Avenue didn't.
Police gave vague descriptions of the suspects, only saying they are men between 17 years old and 22 years old and were both wearing dark clothing. Anyone with information about the shooting is asked to call the Minneapolis Police Department at 612-692-8477.


Victim of Uptown shooting dies

Minneapolis police said today that a man who was critically wounded in a shooting in Uptown on Saturday night died Sunday.
Robberies in Minneapolis' Uptown area, where Michael Zebuhr of Buckhannon, W. Va., was shot, have spiked several times in the past year. That brought an increased police presence, arrests and a temporary lull in Uptown robberies, police leaders say.
Police have been focusing patrols on the nearby Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods along Franklin Avenue, which have traditionally had more of the Fifth Precinct's street crime, said Inspector Kris Arneson. That may have pushed crime toward Uptown, she said.
Residents and business owners share police concern about the violent, but unusual, robbery.
Zebuhr was shot about 10 p.m. while returning to a car with his mother and two others from an Uptown restaurant.
He was a 2005 graduate of Davis & Elkins College in Elkins, W. Va., and is a graduate student in bioengineering at Clemson University in Clemson, S.C. He was in Minneapolis to visit his sister with their mother, Suzanne Strong. Police said Zebuhr was shot after two men grabbed his mother's purse. Police had made no arrests Monday, and they said there may also have been more suspects in a getaway vehicle.
Arneson noted that robbery has increased in the precinct this year, but not significantly in Uptown, where crime often occurs just outside the commercial hub on side streets.
Police say street crimes like robbery seem to be moving south and west from the Whittier and Stevens Square neighborhoods toward Hennepin and Lake.
Robberies in the Fifth Precinct have increased 43 percent to about 100 so far this year over last, Arneson said. Citywide, robberies grew 39 percent in the same period, according to police data through March 13.
Authorities said that despite the violence of Saturday's robbery, few victims are shot if they oblige a robber's request.
It is unclear whether Saturday's incident is linked to other cases. Lubinski said there were no "strong constant" patterns in robberies this year, which are up in each precinct.
Anyone with information about the robbery is asked to call 612-692-TIPS.

This was just 4 blocks from my apartment. And they did everything you're supposed to if you get mugged. Everything. And this guy still got shot. I'm about ready to move to the country.

One More Poem

Glazed eyes staring out into the cold
grey skies, grey heart
all the color has bleed away
no blacks, no whites, it's all shades of grey

a silence descends on my soul
left here with out a voice
waiting for the purity of snow
to lay a blanket over me

night and day cycle endlessly
each as grey as the last
while all my regrets
cycle endlessly in my brain

I look to the sky in vain
searching of any sign of change
any pale hint of color
any sign of life over the horizon

(03-03-06)

Two new poems (mostly finished)

You shine on me gently
a distant star
in the cold, unforgiving night

I fear your disintigration
as the frozen space
tries to close you in

I want to bring you close
to keep you from the darkness
to keep you warm

a swirling supernova
you hold such power
in a single word, a sigh

you have woven a net
star-fire, to cover over me
I can not fight this

enraptured by your light
I wait silently
longing for your embrace
(03-03-06)


A shining supernova
in the expanse of darkness
I am enraptured by you

a net of star-fire
a shining silken ribbon
your likely snare

I can not fathom it
the power you hold
for you I'd burn oceans

you hold heaven in your eyes
fire on your lips
in your heartbeat is my breath
(03-03-06)




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Comments:
(Originally posted on myspace on April 25th)

Patience

04/27/06 8:28am

She is certainly a lucky girl to have caught your attention like that!

Patience

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Aeryn

04/27/06 10:58am

*S* A Ralph Waldo Emmerson quote comes to mind-
"Thou art a delicious torment to me."