Thoughts from Crow Cottage

(soon to be retired)




Previous Entry :: Next Entry

Read/Post Comments (13)
Share on Facebook



Man on the run, and turkey in the straw

Into every drab, boring, lah-dee-dah life a little newsworthy excitement must fall.

Who said that?

I wouldn't normally call this "excitement" as that word seems to imply enjoyment, but the news did excite to the point where I felt like I needed to be in lockdown here in my own home.

It all began, for us here anyway, at around noon yesterday. The men in the street were finishing up their sewer hook-up work and were at the point of hot-topping all the dug-up areas of the hill out front. I just knew that the smell of hot hot-top in the air was a really good thing because that signals the end of this 3 week odyssey of noise and dust and big diggers and etc. out front.

Then I heard helicopter sounds above the house. I went to look out the front door and saw the culprit, hovering high in the sky over a section of the neighborhood. Another helicopter came along and both would come and go alternately, and both would stay and hover over the same area - just above the University campus that is down the street from here. This went on for quite a long while, so I imagined they were hunting for something or someone.

Just as I came back into the living room, on the local TV news station came the report - there had been a stabbing on a University shuttle bus by a young man who had stabbed a young woman and, when he intervened, the bus operator, as well. Neither was life-threatening. The woman's injuries, to the hand or arm, would not require her to go to the hospital, but the bus driver did spend his day at the hospital being treated for chest and shoulder slashes.

The suspect got away! Since it was all done in broad daylight, and there were a half-dozen or so passengers on the bus, a good description of the suspect was given to police and thus to the viewers like me tuned in to the local news. He was a man of about 20 years of age, had long (?) red/blonde hair, a gray cap, white shirt, khaki trousers, red sneakers and was driving a brown 1999 Toyota Camry - and the license plate was also given out.

This all happened a stone's throw from our neighborhood, just down the street really. That made me quite nervous, a slasher was on the loose. But I could take comfort in the fact that we had "the men" working on the street out front and surely they wouldn't let the suspect sneak in here and get us! And then there are the scary guard dogs we employ here in this house who would scare off any type of intruder!

I shut the front door, closed any open windows and locked them all. We tuned in the local news station and waited for updates.

He had jumped into his brown Toyota and driven down Jefferson Avenue toward the city center - which is in the opposite direction of our house. Whew... I breathed a small sigh of relief there. They will get him downtown somewhere no doubt.

The helicopters continued to fly overhead for the better part of the afternoon. That didn't bode well, must've meant they hadn't found him yet.

At around 2:30, the phone rang and it was the robo-call from the City - telling all about the incident and to stay indoors and be on alert. The University was on lockdown for a while, too, but finally they were all let go after a few hours. However, the guy was still at large... were any of us safe?

I just wished and prayed that Paul would come home early. But the men were out front until about 5 o'clock, so there was that... my security detail!

They did, indeed, wind up their job and hot-topped the street, several layers, and swept up all the dust and mess they'd made and off they went just minutes before Paul strolled in from his work. He missed all the fun! He always does.

So for the whole night I was on edge. Worrying over every little outside noise, thinking it was the suspect trying to find a safe haven in our cottage. The dogs would bark at noises outside but that wasn't really anything new. It's what they do!

We watched our regular British shows and part of the baseball game (Sox v. Colorado Rockies - which we won 15-5 BTW - Go Sox!), then went to bed. I checked the internet first for any news on the possible apprehension of the stabber but nothing was found. I listened to most of the game on the radio and drifted off to sleep for a short while. When I woke up, I found that we'd won the game 15-5 and was quite happy about that, but I also heard a brief news story that they'd got the guy - in upstate New York!

suspect in attack at salem state univ.

I waited for the regular news to come on and heard the story - he had driven all the way across Massachusetts and was in upstate New York when he had car trouble. A police officer came along and stopped and ran his car tags thru the computer and Hello! He was a wanted man! They took him in without a fight and he is still in New York as I write, waiting to be extradited back here to face charges of attacking with intent to murder and also weapons charges of a knife. They got their man!

kip keeps up-to-date on all the news

That's him above. Apparently, he'd been arrested just a week or so earlier on possession of a knife and had been let go. Isn't that always the way?

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~


Crisis ended. The street guys are gone. Today was the first weekday that I wasn't awakened at 7 a.m. to the noise of big trucks and diggers. Just birds happily singing the praises of the cool late September weather and sunshine all around.

The only other thing of note I have to report on today is in the form of a puzzle - a kind of "Where's Waldo?" puzzle. Here it is:

can you find the turkeys?

Find the turkeys - there are three.

Here's a better shot:

can you find the turkeys?

Here they are:

can you find the turkeys?

They moseyed around in the front garden for a bit until they heard from the canine contingent of the household - woof-woofing at them - and then they sauntered off down the street to inspect the new hot-topped surface... making sure it's all done to their satisfaction.

Three cheers today for our law enforcement officers, doing their best to get their man - good work!

Bex & Co.


It's in every one of us to be wise;
Find your heart, open up both your eyes.
We can all know every thing without ever knowing why.
It's in every one of us, by and bye.



~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~



2003 - Present Archives at Diaryland
2007 - 2009 Archives at WordPress
2009 Archives at JournalScape
2010 Archives at JournalScape
2011 Archives at JournalScape
2012 Archives at JournalScape
2013 Archives at JournalScape



Read/Post Comments (13)

Previous Entry :: Next Entry

Back to Top

Powered by JournalScape © 2001-2010 JournalScape.com. All rights reserved.
All content rights reserved by the author.
custsupport@journalscape.com