2 infant skeletons from 1930s found in Los Angeles trunk

Gloria Gomez stepped eagerly into the basement of the once-grand Glen-Donald apartment building near Los Angeles’ MacArthur Park on Tuesday afternoon, hoping to find some treasures in three large trunks that someone had left there in storage decades ago.

The first two trunks were empty. Using a screwdriver, she broke the lock on the third. Gomez, the building’s manager and an amateur antique collector, was giddy over what she found in the former ballroom: a gleaming crystal bowl, stacks of beautiful books, including a copy of “Peter Pan,” and two leather doctor’s satchels.

Inside the bag was a small bundle wrapped in copies of the Los Angeles Times from the 1930s. Xing unpeeled the newspapers and shrank back in horror. Inside the satchels were the mummified remains of two babies. The women immediately called police, who are now trying to unravel a mystery worthy of Raymond Chandler.

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Gator Hunting Season, But No Guns Allowed

Every summer since 1988, the state of Florida has opened many of its lakes, rivers and swamps to a limited-time public alligator hunt. This year’s hunt began Aug. 15 and continues through Sept. 12.

Once listed as an endangered species and protected from harvest, the American alligator has bounced back to sustainable levels that can withstand hunting, according to Steve Stiegler, a biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s alligator management program.

Though gators as small as 18 inches can be legally bagged, few hunters would consider it worth the effort. Most aim for something closer to the Florida record of 14 feet, 5/8 inches, taken in 1997 at Lake Monroe in Seminole County.

Bagging a gator isn’t as easy as it might seem. Hunters are not allowed to use guns to kill gators. Instead, they may use pole spears, bow-and-arrow, or rod-and-reel to catch the animal, then use a bang-stick — a pole with an explosive charge on the end — to dispatch it at point-blank range before bringing it into a boat.

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Bag of Randomness

  • WifeGeeding and I are finally caught up with all Mad Men episodes, now I can look up things on the web and not worry about accidentally reading a spoiler.
  • I’m still having trouble getting use to the fourth season and I think that’s because of all the change in the series.  Don isn’t married and is depressed, the office is new and not as nice and classy, and not seeing some of the old characters is a big adjustment.
  • I think Don Draper is the immoral Superman.  Superman has Clark Kent, Don Draper has Dick Whitman.  Superman has the Fortress of Solitude, Don Draper has his trips to Los Angeles.   Superman’s weakness is Kryptonite, Draper’s is women.   Both were adopted and have a past few knew about.  Dude, I could go on and on.
  • I’ve been on antibiotics for ten days and I’m still not better, it’s time to see the doc again.
  • Dick Armey was on The Daily Show and I found the interview to be quite interesting.  It’s always fun to watch the full unedited videos on their website.  There was one point during the interview that Armey just sat cross-armed which I thought was strange.
  • I can still remember sitting in an economics class when my professor made a graph comparing guns verses butter and thinking . . . what the heck?
  • My friend Barry has an interesting commentary about the last of the U.S. combat troops leaving Iraq that just really made me think, actually I think I wholeheartedly agree with him:
  • We, for all practical purposes, left Iraq tonight. That idiotic escapade cost 4,415 American soldier’s lives and left another 32,000 wounded. And the number of men and women suffering psychological damage cannot be known.Unforgivable.And it you want to tell me it was to bring democracy to those who were oppressed by Saddam Hussein, hold your breath. Freedom for them? They are all Muslims. You don’t even want them to have the freedom to build a church in this country. Right?And in a few years, Iraq will be in more chaos than ever.
  • A comment left on this blog that caught my attention – I also read a tweet the other day that reminded us that we’ve been building ground zero’s near mosques since 2003…
  • Nightline had an interesting segment on the area around ground zero, also known by many as hallowed ground.  I wasn’t aware of the strip clubs immediately next to the area.
  • How the “ground zero mosque” fear mongering began
  • Where Are They Now: Nickelodeon Game Show Hosts
  • Fly Eating a Wasp
  • Total Star Wars cuteness – Toddler Droid Dresses
  • Baptist church closes, instead of selling the building, they gave it to a Hispanic congregation
  • Christwire.com – Is My Husband Gay?
  • Another great find by my friend Andy…….. The Christian paradox:
    How a faithful nation gets Jesus wrong
  • Somewhat related from the WSJ – The Perils of ‘Wannabe Cool’ Christianity
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