Flannel Shirt

High tide

It seems like this is happening down in the Southland quite a bit lately.

Authorities were trying to determine Monday how 160 bales of marijuana got into the Pacific Ocean off Orange County.

The marijuana was discovered Sunday, and a flotilla of official boats eventually hauled in more than 8,000 pounds of the drug and unloaded it at Dana Point Harbor, according to Lt. Joe Balicki of the Orange County Sheriff's Department.

The first call reporting the bales came about noon, Balicki said, and the Sheriff's Department sent out three boats, including two of the agency's fire boats.

The U.S. Coast Guard and the Border Patrol were also involved, he said.

The bales were found bobbing in the water about 13 miles from shore, Balicki said, with no vessel nearby.

Mayor of Newark a hero

Cory Booker, the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, ran into a building and saved a woman's life.

Pretty cool. Booker, before he became a politician, played tight end for Stanford. Apparently, he does this all the time.

Pepe Escobar

If you are interested in what is actually happening in Syria, and what it means, I suggest you visit Asia Times and read Pepe Escobar.

 

Ghost ship sunk

The ghost ship launched from Japan during the tsunami last year has been sunk by the U.S. Coast Guard in the Gulf of Alaska.

“It’s between 150 and 200 feet long, it’s unmanned and unlit and adrift. In the dark, it presents a significant danger to other vessels transiting that area,” Sara Francis, a spokeswoman for the Alaska Coast Guard, told AFP.

The Japanese owners of the ship had said they did not want it back. Early Thursday, a Canadian crew had tried to save it, but after a closer inspection they abandoned the idea and the operation to sink the ship began.

The Coast Guard fired an initial salvo of 25 mm explosive rounds, causing the ship to catch fire and list slightly, according to Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Kip Wadlow, in the Alaskan capital of Juneau.

A second salvo was fired later in the afternoon, he said, and the Coast Guard confirmed the vessel sank at 6:15 pm Thursday (0215 GMT Friday).

Pee guitar

In my neverending search to find important developments in mankind's growth I give you Pee Guitar.

Reminds me of a joke by George Carlin that involved a group of men, a keg of beer and a Kent micronite filter.

 

A history of coups in Syria

There is a fascinating cartoon in SLATE which goes through all the post-WWII coups in Syria. How much you wanna bet that the CIA doesn't have its fingers in the current events there?

Ghost ship

In a world where everything's accounted for, it's, I don't know, reassuring that something the size of a ship can get lost.

The rusty, 150-foot "ghost ship" from Japan now floating off the coast of Canada remains out at sea, and it has not been determined who might remove it.

CNN identified it as a squid fishing ship from the Japanese port city of Hachinohe in Aomori prefecture. It was swept out to sea following the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11, 2011.

The owners of the ship have not been publicly identified. However, the hull numbers were used to contact the Japanese owners of the ship, who confirmed no one was on board when the tsunami hit.

The ship has been floating across the Pacific Ocean for a year and was finally discovered last week about 120 nautical miles from Haida Gwaii (formerly known as the Queen Charlotte Islands).

I'm guessing that over the next weeks and months more flotsam and jetsom from that horrific tsunami will begin washing up along the Pacific shore.

Gee, you think?

President Obama says that Iran would act like victims if they were attacked.

US President Barack Obama warned a premature attack on Iran would allow it to play the “victim” in the nuclear crisis, in remarks published Friday days before he meets Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu.

In some of his toughest comments yet on Tehran’s nuclear drive, Obama also said Israel and Iran should take seriously possible US action against Iranian nuclear facilities if sanctions fail to stop the country’s atomic ambitions.

“I think that the Israeli government recognizes that, as president of the United States, I don’t bluff,” Obama told the Atlantic Monthly magazine.

Am I missing something? If you attack someone aren't they victims of your attack?

Joan called me

The baby hasn't arrived yet.

Doula duty

I won't be seeing Joanie today. She's on doula duty, she got the phone call at a quarter to eight this morning.

That's fine. It's wonderful to imagine the joy that comes when that baby is born.