What dows FEMA stand for

Find Every Mexican Available.

I really have a yen to go back to my home town

Women Sought In Daring TV Theft From Mo. Wal-Mart

Daring TV Heist: Woman Poses As Wal-Mart Worker While Another Plays Role Of Customer In Theft

(AP) Police are looking for two women who pulled off the daring theft of a high-end television set from a Wal-Mart store. Police on Monday said one of the women posed as a Wal-Mart employee and the second played the role of customer Sunday night. The duo made off with a 52-inch, flat-screen Samsung TV worth $1,300.

Police Cpl. Chuck Niess said that by the time any real Wal-Mart employees became suspicious, both women were gone. He said the phony employee was dressed as a Wal-Mart worker in tan slacks and a blue shirt and wore a communication device on her belt.

She recruited some true employees to help her load the TV on a cart.

Niess said Pittsburg, Kan., police reported suspects matching the same descriptions staged a similar theft at a Wal-Mart in that city.

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Information from: The Joplin Globe, http://www.joplinglobe.com

Copyright 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Derecho

Several weeks ago we got hit was some storms that caused a lot of damage to my friends in SW Missouri and so forth. The Weather Service has completed damage surveys and concluded that what happened was a progressive derecho event or a book-end Vortex. In any event, the system had several characteristics which were hurricane-like including an eye!

I have heard several TV meteorologists classify this as a "Land Hurricane" and indeed, this type of formation is unprecedented. However, the Weather service has chosen to classify this as a derecho. What is a derecho you ask?

According to the NWS a derecho is:

A derecho (pronounced similar to "deh-REY-cho" in English or pronounced phonetically as "") is a widespread and long lived windstorm that is associated with a band of rapidly moving showers or thunderstorms.

Click here to hear how the word "derecho" is pronounced.

Because derecho is a Spanish word (see paragraph below), the plural term is "derechos". In this case there is no letter "e" after the letter "o".

See the website "Facts about Derechos" for further information.

Derechos are typically gust fronts, characterized by "bow echos" on the radar. However, this formation differs from classical derechos in that it it displayed several characteristics indicative of tropical cyclonic type systems.

One of the indicators of so-called "Global Warming" (which is a misnomer by the way -.it should be termed Global Climate Change, but I digress) is that extreme weather events will become the norm. Formations like this may be in our future.

Images and Words - Bad Day

The New Star Trek

Well, I just got through watching the new Star Trek movie. This is such an iconic franchise that most purists like myself have reservations whenever anyone tampers with the universe. I really stopped watching Star Trek after the "Berminization"of the whole thing after the death of Roddenberry. There are things that you just don't tamper with. Rick Berman ruined the whole thing with his "take" on Star Trek. The ideals that Roddenberry had were compromised in the pursuit of ratings.

However, it can be argued that the franchise needed something fresh, a new approach. I can't say I am a fan of J.J. Abrams. I have gotten lost with "Lost" which is so convoluted that I could not follow it anymore. So I approached with some trepedation this "re-imagination" of the franchise. My disapointment is tainted with my experience with the "re-imagination" of the Battlestar Galactica franchise which was totally messed up. While that take on BSG was more "realistic," I eventually was turned by the constant violence and lack of humanity, heroism and nobility in the characters. I want to watch something that uplifts me, not brings me down and BSG depressed me. Therefore, I was prepared not to like Star Trek.

There are still some aspects in this one I don't like. For one thing, Dr. McCoy should be much older than Kirk and not go through the academy with him. The characters are united much too early, but I suppose one must get all the principals together in order to jump start the franchise. Also, there is a romantic relationship implied that really turned me off and was definately not a part of the original franshise.

However, the new re-imagination is a fresh approach to the Star Trek universe that is filled iwth action. The movie is like a roller coaster ride. Star Trek was never really a roller-coaster. It was a more an allegory that told us stories about how we delat with each other using the Science Fiction as a backdrop. It told stories about how we deal with rascism, war, genocide, love, hate, etc. It was a drama that, at times, delved into the action adventure genre, but did not remain there. It was limited by its budget and technology and yet still managed to entertain. Given the new franchise's nearly unlimited budget, we are going to be treated by more action-adventure stories in the future. Given its box office take so far and fan reaction, we are likely to see more of these in the new franchise. Time will tell if these new stories will be any different than the old ones.

The Storm of Flu

I had my vengeance upon the swine of the world yesterday by eating pork chops at the local IHOP in the strip center near me and going to see the new movie "Earth" which was very beautiful and impressive. I have been following News reports of the so-called Swine Flu and with all the recent talk about the flu lately I decided to research about the 1918 flu pandemic to find out why it was so bad.

Apparently in the 1918 flu, people with healthy immune systems were affected the most because of the very fact that they HAD healthy immune systems. What the flu does is trigger a "cytokine storm." I'd never heard of this, but essentially it is an overreaction of the body's immune system to "a new and highly pathogenic invader" to quote Wikipedia's entry on the subject. The immune enters a positive feedback loop, constantly manufacturing more and more immune cells and the body essentially feeds upon itself. The result is that the body drowns in its own fluids in the resultant pneumonia.

While this new H1N1 influenza A, (as now officially termed by the WHO), shares the same characteristics as the 1918 flu, it hasn't triggered such storms in many of its victims here and elsewhere since many probably don't have the more healthy immune systems which would trigger the storm that destroys the body.

So what I gather from it is this. Even if you have a healthy immune system and have fought off the flu in the past, a trip to the doc might not be inappropriate if you get this bug. Trying to fight it alone might just result in your body feeding on itself and your eventual death because of your healthy immune system.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm

More Mall News

Well, Mark Shale will close on the 26th. They are selling the store fixtures so get there if you want a good deal on mannequins. Jimmyz will be closing soon. They are offering 40% off all the items in the store. Jimmyz was a more hip-hop version of Aeropostale and has not proven successful so Aeropostale decided to close that division down. This will be another gap on the notorious north end dead zone at the Galleria.

At another General Growth Property in Austin, Texas, Dillards has elected to sue General Growth for neglecting the mall and wants out of its lease. According to the AP,

The suit claims that the Highland Mall was allowed to "deteriorate in character and quality such that it is now approximately half vacant, has a poor tenant mix comprised of tenants that are not consistent with (a) first-class shopping center operation." The suit also says that a JC Penney anchor store has left the center.

Dillard's wants a federal judge to void the company's lease with the mall.

A Dillard's spokeswoman said the company does not comment on litigation, as did a spokesman for Simon Property Group.

I should say here that Highland Mall is a joint venture between GGP and Simon.

Apparently Highland is now on a short list probalby like Crestwood here locally that will probably be closed soon. Crestwood Plaza is a mall here that traffic patterns and demographics has left behind.

The fact that Simon is a joint venture partner in this facility and it is still deteroriating does not bode well for other mall operators in the industry. While this may be an isolated case, it does bear watching. A lot of guys at the mall are hoping that Simon is the one that buys the Galleria out, since they are the ones that won't clean house when they buy. (I believe I had said that they are the ones that like to clean house (i.e. fire everyone and start with a clean slate of staff) but I got them inverted with Westfield who does do that sort of thing). But is Simon is in similar financial straits, then any hope of salvaging the industry is in shambles. It will be up to indivdual local developers in cities to either buy indivdual properties, or let them fall.