Police on Capitol Hill are baffled by an attempted robbery that began with a handgun put to the head of a 14-year-old girl and ended in a group hug.
It started around midnight on June 16 when a group of friends was finishing dinner on the patio of a District of Columbia home, authorities and witnesses said. That's when a hooded man slid through an open gate and pointed a handgun at the girl's head.
"Give me your money, or I'll start shooting," he said, the witnesses told The Washington Post.
Everyone froze, they said, but then one guest spoke up.
"We were just finishing dinner," Cristina Rowan, 43, told the man. "Why don't you have a glass of wine with us?"
The intruder had a sip of their Chateau Malescot St-Exupery and said, "Damn, that's good wine."
The girl's father, Michael Rabdau, 51, told him to take the whole glass, and Rowan offered him the bottle. The would-be robber, with his hood down, took another sip and a bite of Camembert cheese and put the gun in his sweatpants.
Then the story got even more bizarre.
The man with the gun apologized, the witnesses told the Post.
"I think I may have come to the wrong house," he said. "Can I get a hug?"
Rowan stood up and wrapped her arms around the man and the four other guests followed.
The man walked away a few moments later with the crystal wine glass in hand. No one was hurt, but once he was gone, the group went inside, locked the door and called 911.
Police said Friday that the case was strange but true. Investigators have not located a suspect.
"We've had robbers that apologize and stuff, but nothing where they sit down and drink wine," Cmdr. Diane Groomes said. "The only good thing is they would be able to identify him because they hugged them."
Sounds like another "Great Moment in the History of White Trash"...
Two people were arrested early Saturday after a bachelorette party got out of control over a male stripper act, according to police.
Washington County sheriffs said a Portland man called police to the home on NW Kearney Street just after midnight to report a robbery.
The caller said he was acting as a security guard for his two friends hired to perform a striptease routine -- but told police the men stopped their act after the women became too drunk and unruly.
He told 19-year-old maid of honor Tessa Weller that the three were going to leave, according to deputies. But thatÂ’s when Weller called her boyfriend to come get the money back from the strippers.
While driving away from the home, the victims said that they had to stop because one of their tires had been slashed. Right then, police said 21-year-old Joshua Fultz came up and threatened them with a bat, demanding the $200 back. The victims gave back the money and Fultz went back to the house, police said.
Officers arrived and arrested Fultz for weapons charges, menacing and robbery. Marisella Lee Vidalez, 19, was also arrested for slashing the victim's tire. Weller was cited for minor in possession.
#1
It'll be intersting to see what happens in the trial. The male strippers can say almost anything happened since they were leaving early when this happened.
"Yes judge, we are erotic dancers not man-whores. This all started when we refused to have sex with the maid of honor so she called her boyfriend to beat us and take the money back."
Posted by: BA ||
07/13/2007 12:30 Comments ||
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#4
This reminds me of the time when my sister turned 40. Our brother and his wife hired a male stripper for the party. The joke was on my sister in law. She was a junior high school teacher, and the stripper had been a student of hers five or six years earlier. She was so embarassed she had to leave the room. (My sister enjoyed the show.)
Chopped cardboard, softened with an industrial chemical and flavored with fatty pork and powdered seasoning, is a main ingredient in batches of steamed buns sold in one Beijing neighborhood, state television said. The report, aired late Wednesday on China Central Television, highlights the country's problems with food safety despite government efforts to improve the situation. Countless small, often illegally run operations exist across China and make money cutting corners by using inexpensive ingredients or unsavory substitutes. They are almost impossible to regulate.
State TV's undercover investigation features the shirtless, shorts-clad maker of the buns, called baozi, explaining the contents of the product sold in Beijing's sprawling Chaoyang district. Baozi are a common snack in China, with an outer skin made from wheat or rice flour and a filling of sliced pork. Cooked by steaming in immense bamboo baskets, they are similar to but usually much bigger than the dumplings found on dim sum menus familiar to many Americans.
The hidden camera follows the man, whose face is not shown, into a ramshackle building where steamers are filled with the fluffy white buns, traditionally stuffed with minced pork. The surroundings are filthy, with water puddles and piles of old furniture and cardboard on the ground. "What's in the recipe?" the reporter asks.
"Six to four," the man says.
"You mean 60 percent cardboard? What is the other 40 percent?" asks the reporter.
"Fatty meat," the man replies.
The bun maker and his assistants then give a demonstration on how the product is made. Squares of cardboard picked from the ground are first soaked to a pulp in a plastic basin of caustic soda — a chemical base commonly used in manufacturing paper and soap — then chopped into tiny morsels with a cleaver. Fatty pork and powdered seasoning are stirred in. Soon, steaming servings of the buns appear on the screen. The reporter takes a bite. "This baozi filling is kind of tough. Not much taste," he says. "Can other people taste the difference?"
"Most people can't. It fools the average person," the maker says. "I don't eat them myself."
The police eventually showed up and shut down the operation.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
Report: Cardboard Main Ingredient in Chinese Neighborhood's Steamed Buns
#3
Ha ha ha. Try telling that to a Chinese. They are astounded when they find that rice is grown elsewhere. And there's no way that it could be as good as Chinese rice. For a rice country (the southern part, anyway), Chinese rice is really blah. No flavor.
And I'm not surprised one bit about cardboard in the baozi. the shirtless, shorts-clad maker of the buns
This is what you're up against in China. Some guy who just doesn't care one bit that he's poisoning people. If questioned, he'll say that "I'm just trying to work" and he'll get defensive that you're trying to threaten his livelihood.
#5
A friend of mine grew up in China. Her hated mother is a pretty well positioned member of the scientific/technical elite - and a party member too.
Sunny got out and managed to get here with no job or school position waiting. Took citizenship here as soon as she could and has stories about China that would set peoples' hair on end about life there.
#8
g: This is what you're up against in China. Some guy who just doesn't care one bit that he's poisoning people. If questioned, he'll say that "I'm just trying to work" and he'll get defensive that you're trying to threaten his livelihood.
Actually, it goes beyond this. It's more along the lines of "everybody does it - and the difference between me and everyone else is that I got exposed".
I wonder if I can eat one again without thinking "cardboard? sodium hydroxide?"
Posted by: John Frum ||
07/13/2007 15:03 Comments ||
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#15
And how is this any different than Quaker "rice cakes"?
This reminds me very little of a classic Guindon cartoon depicting various fruits and vegetables looking on during a tearful airport reunion. The caption reads:
"A rice cake is reunited with its birth mother, a styrofoam cup."
#16
Hmmm... I wonder if Dr.Mengele ever considered cardboard instead of the sawdust he fed to concentration camp prisoners? OTH could sawdust be used in making baozi?
I'm thinking that the cardboard baozi does NOT have a Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture certification.
#17
China is where the US was in the 1880s. The US cleaned up our act through laws and civilization. We can't force the Chinese to do so but if they start to lose access to our market they may start to reform themselves. Time to stop coddling them because we're desperate to sell to the emerging market.
#18
In India, Basmati is sold as "perfumed rice."
I think it smells like dirty socks, and I don't detect any taste difference from the regular stuff. I have seen huge rice paddies in Texas. I don't know what percentage of of the US market comes from that state's producers. I like Thai sauce mixed with rice.
Has anyone tried long-grain black rice? It grows in shallow lakes in Minnesota and surroundings. Natives would place their canoes under rice bushes and then shake rice grains into them. That practice is still done in some places.
#19
Arkansas is the biggest rice producer in the US.
Production ranking in millions of pounds:
1. Ark 8611 medium and long grain
2. CA 4352 mainly medium grain
3. LA 2440 medium and long grain
4. MS 1286 long grain only
5. TX 1434 medium and long grain
6. MO 963 medium and long grain US agriculure report June 2002.
I doubt if the rankings have changed in the past five years altough the production figures may have changed.
I believe you may be referring to wild rice. It is actually not a variety of rice but one of a totally different New World genus, Zizania aquatica, and is related to real rice only in the same way that wheat is related to oats.
Wild rice (Zizania palustris L.), Poaceae is native to North America and grows predominantly in the Great Lakes region in shallow lakes and rivers (Martin and Uhler 1939). This large-seeded species, one of four species of wild rice has been gathered, dried (Fig. 1), and eaten by people since prehistoric times (Johnson 1969). Early North American inhabitants, especially the Ojibway, Menomini, and Cree tribes in the North Central region of the continent, used the grain as a staple food and introduced European fur traders to wild rice (Jenks 1901). Manomin, the name they gave wild rice, means good berry. Early English explorers called this aquatic plant wild rice or Indian rice, while the French saw a resemblance to oats and called it folle avoine (Steeves 1952). Other names given to wild rice include Canadian rice, squaw rice, water oats, blackbird oats, and marsh oats. However, the name "wild rice" persisted and today it is the common name for the genus Zizania, even though the wild type of rice (Oryza) is also called wild rice.
Most famous as a stuffing for game birds, only in recent times has cultivation begun on a large scale level. Previously, its production was the strict domain of native American Indians in the Minnesota and Great Lakes regions. True wild rice, called by its Indian name, "manoomin", has a more pronounced flavor than the more hardy agricultural zizania cultivars.
#21
I eat Wild Rice when I can get it. It is usually mixed with long grain rice. When fully cooked it has sort of a crunch to it, and when used in stuffing it holds flavor better than other rice. I stuffed and baked green peppers with it and frijoles, but didn't think that worked well.
#2
The whole thing would have been fine, if the boys had not been able to defend themselves. They'd be in prison, Nifong would be in higher office, and everyone would have patted themselves on the back for condemning racism by white men.
#4
My primary hope is that the lacrosse players don't sue the state of North Carolina, since I live there. I would hate to have to pay for Nifong's errors. Let the people of Durham county, and the city of Durham pay. They elected this idiot.
#5
Nifong is very lucky this little misunderstanding didn't take place in the 1920's or 30's. The outcome, as well as his personal situation, might have been somewhat more dire.
#6
more and faster please. I'm starting to come to the realization that we may need a Constitutional Amendment stating that the only requirement to hold Congressional office is that you're NOT an attorney. He is lucky this didn't take place in another time, Besoeker, you're right on that one!
Posted by: BA ||
07/13/2007 10:19 Comments ||
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#7
lawyers would make a good substitute for the "fatty Meat" in the chinese cardboard buns mentioned above.
Going out to eat with a pal is one thing, but actually eating your friend for lunch could cause serious health problems.
Health guru Randall Fitzgerald, is the author of The Hundred-Year Lie (Plume), a book that reveals how to protect yourself from chemicals that could ruin your health, and says the human body is so contaminated with chemicals from modern life that we canÂ’t eat ourselves.
Fitzgerald says, “If cannibalism were legal in this country and our flesh was up for review by the FDA, we would all fail the inspection.” He says our bodies house hundreds of synthetic chemicals from beauty products, tap water, and medicines that are all toxic.
So what it boils down to is that being the next Hannibal Lecter is still not a good idea. Says Fitzgerald: “We’re simply not fit for human consumption.” This "article" is probably a scanned-in press release from the aforementioned "health guru" or the PR type flacking his new book. Apparently someone thought it would be "cute" to talk about environmental chemicals from a cannibalism angle.
What were they thinking? Were they thinking?
Memo to the health guru: cannibalism is creepy.
Memo to the PR flack who thought this was cute: associating your client with cannibalism and other creepiness does not make people want to buy your client's stuff (certain niche markets excepted, of course--but you don't want to go there).
Posted by: Mike ||
07/13/2007 14:02 ||
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Thanks, Randall. I'll keep this in mind the next time I'm tempted to try cannibalism...
#4
Seems that by the time you choose cannibalism the health factor of the meat is sort of irrelevant.
Reminds me of hte old Dennis Miller joke when he heard that Jeffrey Dahlmer wore a condom while having gay sex. "How is it the wear a condom message got through but the don't eat people one didn't quite sink in?"
#5
Consumption of human brain matter has also been identified as the likely source of CJD (Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease):
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD) is a rare, degenerative, invariably fatal brain disorder. It affects about one person in every one million people per year worldwide; in the United States there are about 200 cases per year. CJD usually appears in later life and runs a rapid course. Typically, onset of symptoms occurs about age 60, and about 90 percent of patients die within 1 year. In the early stages of disease, patients may have failing memory, behavioral changes, lack of coordination and visual disturbances. As the illness progresses, mental deterioration becomes pronounced and involuntary movements, blindness, weakness of extremities, and coma may occur.
There are three major categories of CJD:
In sporadic CJD, the disease appears even though the person has no known risk factors for the disease. This is by far the most common type of CJD and accounts for at least 85 percent of cases.
In hereditary CJD, the person has a family history of the disease and/or tests positive for a genetic mutation associated with CJD. About 5 to 10 percent of cases of CJD in the United States are hereditary.
In acquired CJD, the disease is transmitted by exposure to brain or nervous system tissue, usually through certain medical procedures. There is no evidence that CJD is contagious through casual contact with a CJD patient. Since CJD was first described in 1920, fewer than 1 percent of cases have been acquired CJD.
CJD belongs to a family of human and animal diseases known as the transmissible spongiform encephalopathies (TSEs). Spongiform refers to the characteristic appearance of infected brains, which become filled with holes until they resemble sponges under a microscope. CJD is the most common of the known human TSEs. Other human TSEs include kuru, fatal familial insomnia (FFI), and Gerstmann-Straussler-Scheinker disease (GSS). Kuru was identified in people of an isolated [cannibal] tribe in Papua New Guinea and has now almost disappeared. FFI and GSS are extremely rare hereditary diseases, found in just a few families around the world. Other TSEs are found in specific kinds of animals. These include bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), which is found in cows and is often referred to as “mad cow” disease; scrapie, which affects sheep and goats; mink encephalopathy; and feline encephalopathy. Similar diseases have occurred in elk, deer, and exotic zoo animals.
[emphasis added]
No matter how adventurous of a culinary explorer I am, nothing on earth could get me to eat any animal's brains. Besides, one look at the nutritional information is enough to make you scream.
#7
Zen, that picture is great! Did you just whip that up?
Posted by: Mike N. ||
07/13/2007 18:03 Comments ||
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#8
I knew a ex-cannibal chief. (New Guinea) (ex-because he ate everybody he knew before getting religion and becoming the Lutheran Bishop of New Guinea).
He told me civilized man didn't taste good. All, that coffee, tea, stress, drugs and stuff. He preferred to eat organically raised folks. Explained that when they raided another tribe they would raise the kids with them but never feed them meat. Then when the day arrived, it was bang bang Maxwell's silver hammer (no he didn't know about that but it fits into the story so well) and presto chango LONG PIG is SERVED!
At about 11:30 a.m., the Barnstable Fire Department received a report of a motor vehicle accident. But it turned out the owner of a landscaping company was working beneath a three-quarter ton pickup truck trying to fix it when the vehicle suddenly rolled. A wheel went over his head and shoulder, Barnstable Fire Lt. Ed Guilford said. "But he's in great shape," Guilford said.
When the rescue squad arrived to the Millway address, they found the man smoking a cigarette Luckies Brand with his crew. He had a tire track across his head, significant "road rash" and a missing patch of hair to prove he had been under the wheel.
Posted by: Helmuth, Speaking for Chusoling1715 ||
07/13/2007 13:26 ||
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#2
*shrug* It's not reasonable to expect scientists and engineers to spell illogically. That's why technical people spell it gage and English teachers gauge. Back during my brief stint in the lab it used to drive me mad. ;-) Thank goodness for spell check programs -- but they will default to either British or American standard. Which is probably what happened here.
A MAN has been arrested after an armoured personnel carrier (APC) was taken on a rampage in Sydney's western suburbs.
Mt Druitt police on patrol discovered the armoured vehicle destroying an electricity substation in Sterling Road, Minchinbury, at about 2am (AEST) today.
They followed the APC through several suburbs, including Mt Druitt, Dharruk, Emerton, Glendenning and Plumpton.
The APC left a path of destruction, bringing down a number of mobile phone towers and relay sheds, police said.
The pursuit ended in Dean Park after about 90 minutes, when the vehicle stalled as it was being driven towards another mobile phone tower.
Police arrested a 45-year-old Dharruk man and took him to Mt Druitt Police Station for questioning.
#1
Reminds me of the good old days in San Diego when the stolen National Guard tank was running amuck down the 15.
Too bad the Sydney stooge wasn't also shot dead.
#3
Police say the tank was used to destroy six mobile phone towers in a number of suburbs, including Mt Druitt, Emerton and Plumpton.
-An electricity sub-station at Minchinbury was also destroyed.
A six-year-old girl from the Arab village of Isawiya was evacuated to Hadassah-University Hospital in Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, after she was accidentally shot in the head during wedding celebrations on Thursday night. Police have opened an investigation into the incident.
Posted by: Fred ||
07/13/2007 00:00 ||
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#1
She wasn't marriageable by a few hours yet so no harm no foul.
#7
A Jew sniper was hiding in the clouds above. When we shot the guns upwards in celebration he returned fire and killed the girl. It's the only way to explain the entrance wound ontop of her head.
/Jihadist
On a serious note, I feel sorry for the girl and hope she survives. You would think bullets were free the way they shoot them off at celebrations. What ever happened to party favors and horns?
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
