So — what do we have here? A “Dark Satanic Lord” practicing dark “magik,” a vampyr and pagan, a man with a history of having sex with underage girls and now apparently “marrying” one and taking her into hiding from the authorities, and a man who ran for Minnesota governor.

It had better of been a good burger.

Code Adam is a missing child safety program created by Walmart, named in memory of Adam Walsh, who was abducted from a Sears in 1981.

It is a 6 step process as follows:

1. If a visitor reports a child is missing, a detailed description of the child and what he or she is wearing is obtained. Additionally, all exterior access to the building is locked and monitored; anyone approaching a door is turned away.
2. The employee goes to the nearest in-house telephone and pages Code Adam, describing the child’s physical features and clothing. As designated employees monitor front entrances, other employees begin looking for the child.
3. If the child is not found within 10 minutes, law enforcement is called.
4. If the child is found and appears to have been lost and unharmed, the child is reunited with the searching family member.
5. If the child is found accompanied by someone other than a parent or legal guardian, reasonable efforts to delay their departure will be used without putting the child, staff, or visitors at risk. Law enforcement will be notified and given details about the person accompanying the child.
6. The Code Adam page will be canceled after the child is found or law enforcement arrives.

No word on what the process is if a child is found, but the parents are missing.  But my guess is that they aren’t supposed to page the kids name and physical description over the PA, let the kid wander around for 15 more minutes and then let the kid go off with some stranger, like they did at the Vadnais Heights, MN, store a few weeks ago.

As stated above, Adam Walsh was abducted from a Sears store in FL.  The story goes, he was watching some older kids play some videogames and his mom (Revé) went off to do some shopping, and came back about 7 minutes later to find everyone gone.  There are rumors that the older kids were asked to leave the store, and Adam may have been ushered out of the store with them.  From there, Adam was abducted, and his severed head was found 2 weeks later.

“Convicted serial killer Ottis Toole confessed to the boy’s murder but was never tried for the crime. Although no new evidence has come forth, on December 16, 2008, police announced that the Walsh case was now closed as they were satisfied that Toole was the murderer of Adam Walsh. Ottis Toole died of liver failure on September 15, 1996.”

AMBER alerts, officially named “America’s Missing: Broadcasting Emergency Response” were originally named for Amber Hagerman, a 9-year-old child who was abducted and murdered in Arlington, Texas in 1996.

U.S. Department of Justice has the following criteria in order to issue an AMBER alert.

1. Law enforcement must confirm that an abduction has taken place
2. The child must be at risk of serious injury or death
3. There must be sufficient descriptive information of child, captor, or captor’s vehicle to issue an alert
4. The child must be 17 years old or younger

These rules are not always followed:

A Scripps Howard study of the 233 AMBER Alerts issued in the United States in 2004 found that most issued alerts did not meet the Department of Justice’s criteria. Fully 50% (117 alerts) were categorized by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children as being “family abductions,” very often a parent involved in a custody dispute. There were 48 alerts for children who had not been abducted at all, but were lost, ran away, involved in family misunderstandings (for example, two instances where the child was with grandparents), or as the result of hoaxes. Another 23 alerts were issued in cases where police didn’t know the name of the allegedly abducted child, often as the result of misunderstandings by witnesses who reported an abduction.

70 of the 233 AMBER Alerts issued in 2004 (30%) were actually children taken by strangers or who were unlawfully traveling with adults other than their legal guardians.

The only other thing I have to say about AMBER alerts is you can sign up to get them texted to your cell phone.  I will do this once they start following the US DOJ rules to eliminate false alarms.

There are some things in here I meant to block quote, but couldn’t get it formatted right, but my source information was wiki, wiki, and wiki.

A few years ago a state-wide smoking ban went into effect in Minnesota. This precipitated a huge revenue slide for bars.

Enterprising bar owners built outdoor patios in an effort to try to win back some business. So how does the government respond? By taxing, of course:

One of the biggest whacks upside the head of the local blogging/trivia community this past year was the Met Council’s ruling that bars that’d established “smoking patios” outside their premises had to pay fees on that extra square footage as if it was indoor, year-round revenue-generating space. This has forced Twin Cities’ bars to shut down the practice of having special patios for smokers, especially cigar buffs.

The Met Council, for the uninitiated, is the most dangerous government entity in Minnesota, based on the fact that they have a lot of power and are generally misunderstood by the public. (Actually, the County Commissioners may give the Council a run for their money for that title…)

Mitch Berg makes a plea for public action to try to reverse this decision:

Bureaucrats take phone calls seriously. They – the smart ones, anyway – know that every phone call represents 100 people who didn’t call them. One call represents 100 like-minded people; it’s public relations truism.

And so it’d be great if you could take a moment to contact the members of the Met Council. Here they are. Please take a moment and leave them polite, reasoned messages asking them to reconsider their policy; it’s killing bars, putting people out of work, and playing into the hands of chain restaurants and establishments. Phone is better than email, but either is vastly better than letting the other guys have the stage to themselves.

Visit this link for detailed action information.

Man With Workout-Ball-Slashing Fetish ChargedDULUTH, Minn. (WCCO) ―

Court documents say Bjerkness told police he slashed the rubber balls
to satisfy a sexual urge.

The St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office says a man with a self-professed
sexual fetish for slashing rubber balls was arrested and has appeared in court.
Police started looking for 31-year-old Christopher Bjerkness after surveillance
tape allegedly showed him breaking into a fitness clinic in May and slashing
exercise balls.

Authorities are familiar with the Bjerkness. A criminal complaint released
last week says he was convicted in 2005 of breaking into a sports facility at
the University of Minnesota in Duluth and slashing about 70 balls. Each ball
cost between $30 and $60.

The complaint says when he pleaded guilty in that case, he admitted to
slashing more than 40 other balls at two clinics.

Court documents say Bjerkness told police he slashed the rubber balls
to satisfy a sexual urge. Experts said he has an unusual attraction to
inflatable exercise devices.

Bjerkness appeared in court Monday morning and his bail was set at $10,000,
according to the Sheriff’s Office. He’s scheduled to return to court in a
month.

I’m just speechless!

Source: Ed, who sent me to this article.

The Western Wisconsin Derecho was a severe storm (or more accurately, a Derecho) that occurred through several counties of Western Wisconsin on July 15, 1980. It caused nearly $160M in damage (1980 dollars)(including severe damage to Menards headquarters) and is still referred to as “The July 15th (1980) Storm,” “July 15th, 1980,” or simply “The Storm.”

The best part is, the storm was all Minnesota’s fault!

That’s a half truth. The storm formed in MN, picked up speed, and did most of it’s damage in Wisconsin.

The storm developed during the heat wave of 1980. Eight days prior to the storm, MN had experienced highs above 90°F, which primed the fuse for a storm.

As the storm raced through St Croix, Pierce, Dunn, Eau Claire, Chippewa, and Clark counties, it caused a band of damage more than 20 miles (30 km) wide. A maximum wind speed of 110 mph (177 km/h) was recorded at the Chippewa Valley Regional Airport, while 100 mph wind was recorded in the city of Eau Claire. At 9:39 p.m., WEAU-TV broadcast an alert from the National Weather Service about one of several tornado warnings that evening for Eau Claire County; moments later, the station lost power and went off-the-air.

Although much of the storm’s damage was caused by straight-line winds a total of 10 tornadoes (ranging from power of F0 to F3) were reported.

Also, there was controversy because although the Feckless Jimmy Carter declared it a disaster area, due to the massive influx of Cubans into the country, the Mount St Helens eruption of 18 May, the severe tornadoes in Grand Island, Nebraska in June, and flooding in western Pennsylvania during August, the FEMA rules changed, covering only 75% of the damages, leaving WI with $800,000 of disaster to cover.

Source: My hero

Phoenix, AZ has 6.3 times greater crime risk than wholesome Waconia, MN.

Not a surprise, but scary to see the breakdown, especially motor vehicle theft. Yikes. The Club © Steering Wheel Lock is available for only $42.99, here.

Source Here

Is an INCREDIBLY short read. I read it at lunch yesterday, dinner, and lunch today, and I’m done. It is even a shorter book if you don’t read the Albus Dumbledore commentary, and even SHORTER if you don’t read the footnotes!

For those of you who don’t know, “The Tales of Beedle the Bard” is a J. K. Rolwing book that is basically a collection of 5 classic wizard fairytales from the Harry Potter universe. The book also contains commentary on each story “written” by Dumbledore.

The short stories were pretty good, and the commentary was a little dry, but still interesting.

Overall, maybe a little overpriced, but otherwise, not bad.

The Minnesota Music Hall of Fame is located in New Ulm, Minnesota, next to the Library.

The Museum exists “to honor musicians, both past and present, who have contributed significantly to the Minnesota music scene” and contains memorabilia related to these musicians.

Prince, of course, is an inductee, as are The Rockin’ Hollywoods, who headlined more than one Maple Grove Days.

Another inductee is Jeanne Arland Peterson. Ms. Peterson is one of only two women in the museum, the other being Judy Garland.

I had never heard of Ms. Peterson until today, when I read about her here. She is an amazing piano player, and had quite the voice in her heyday.

James Lileks has a great story about meeting Peterson at her son’s house this weekend. (Her son was in Morris Day and the Time!) He’s also got a few examples of her work.

Like all octogenarian piano players, Ms. Peterson also has a web page.

BTW, don’t confuse the Minnesota Music Hall of Fame with the Minnesota Rock Country Hall of Fame, which is now called the Mid-America Music Hall of Fame. Peterson and The Rockin’ Hollywoods are inductees in both halls of fame.

So my parents, and Jeff and The Wife (r), have these canasata cards. If you don’t know what Canasta is, you’re not old enough. Once you turn 70, you automatically know these things. Now, back to the cards. So Kalena and I are jealous of them because they are really nice. They look like this: