Here’s the latest update on the This is crap entry:

From Will, last night~

Ugh!

I hate days like today. I’ve spoken with Mike Krewson (assistant GM of the DCC), and if you believe what he has to say…and I don’t know why I wouldn’t considering he’s got nothing to lose by telling it like it is, we’ve been duped here folks by our own MYHL leadership.

On some points in the email…it seems that the ability to cancel ice time exists by either party for just about any reason and at any time…we’re a bottom feeder in the DCC budget and they’re almost giving us the ice time (including lights, personnel, clean up, zamboni’s, etc.) at cost…just above it per Krewson.

The cheer event is supposedly bringing in more $$$ than the ice time would have in DCC revenue and potentially hotels, food, gas, etc. The DCC wants to get this event annually and really capitalize on the total package of money coming into the county from it.

Mike did recognize the fact that one, likely two, more sheets of ice are an need for Desoto county and with that ice we would turn into a hockey and figure skating destination complete with bigger tournaments and all that jazz. So…who’s going to pony up the $8 million or so to make that happen.

Bottom line…the tone and the information in the original email was misleading in some ways that probably caused some of us to go off half cocked.

Now I’m still very upset because my kid is losing MORE ice time this season, but I’m not sure anymore who I’m more upset with.

One very key thing I did take out of the discussion is this: As the DCC becomes more and more popular a venue, we can expect the ice time available for youth hockey, beer leagues, figure skating, etc. to decline dramatically. Evidently the DCC has been telling these groups that for a few years already. Also, if there were no RiverKings at the DCC, there would be NO ICE PERIOD.

So…with that discussion having been had…we’re back to square one and I have this nagging feeling that MYHL owes a lot of parents refunds on league fees since they pay the DCC as they go for ice time.

Because Chris is Complicated Enough.

Compliments of The Advertising Slogan Generator

Because Eileen tagged me!

Four jobs I’ve had:
Surgical Tech, for several different oral surgeons and one plastic surgeon
Computer geek, including as a Mac Genius, and even owning my own company, once upon a time
And my two favorite jobs
mother and wife (to an even bigger computer geek)

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over :
“Jaws”
“The American President” (love mixing politics and romance, don’t know why)
Any of the four watchable Star Wars movies (episodes 3-6)
“Airplane” (wish real life was that funny)

Four Places I Have Lived:
McKinney, TX (lived there first, and I will forever be a Texan)
Washington, DC
Newport News, VA
Ramstein, Germany

Four TV Shows I Watch:
“FireFly”(yeah, it’s off the air, but occasionally I stumble across a rerun)
“CSI”
“Law & Order: Criminal Intent”
“Survivor” (great, now I’m embarrassed)

Four places I’ve vacationed:
Chincoteague, VA
Nice, France
Orlando, FL
Port Aransas, TX

Four Favorite Dishes:
Lasagne
Fried Rice
Chicken Enchiladas
Big, greasy, artery-hardening Swiss/mushroom burgers

Four Sites I Visit Daily:
RiverKingsFans.com
Glassrattler
Tech-Unity
NetVibes (my homepage)

Four Places I Would Rather Be:
St. Tropez
Skiing in Taos
Dallas, TX
At home, under the covers with my honey

I tag Will, Daphne and Stephanie!

A little background: I’m trying to spread the word about something going on here at home in North Mississippi. Our children have a local youth hockey league that plays in our local Civic Center. We get to play there when they have ice for the Memphis RiverKings, and when there’s nothing else going on. We accept this and we’re grateful for the time. We do pay the Civic Center for the time, and we take as much as they’ll give us, which is very little. But we have had dates scheduled in March and now they have bumped our last Sunday’s games for a cheerleading competition. It’s disgraceful, and we’d like an explanation, and hopefully, some recourse.

For anyone who doesn’t have a youngun’ in the Memphis Youth Hockey League, we found out yesterday that the games we had scheduled for March 5th have been cancelled. Cancellations happen, but not with this kind of short notice, and to do it the Sunday before our last game, is pretty incredible, as they can’t be rescheduled. I’ll attach the body of the email I’ve gotten about this, and you decide. The rest of the email lists the contact info for the supervisors and directors of the DCC, as well as contact info for several local reporters.

____________________________
Hello folks,

The Desoto Civic Center advised me by email on February 17th that we would lose our ice time on March 5th. For those counting, that is 15 days. We are losing that day due to a cheerleading event that needed to be moved because of the impeding weather that forced the cancellation of the cheerleading event in Tunica.

We had 14 hours of ice time scheduled for that day. Additionally, figures skaters had a couple of hours and the men’s league had time also. In all, almost 17 hours of ice time was to be used. What did we have scheduled that day? Our rec. league has been trying to finish for the last month. They had seven games that day including games with Little Rock. Right now, I doubt that we can reschedule them. We had the high school skills challenge and all star game. These will be hard to reschedule.

We can’t understand why a customer that will spend over $130,000 can’t get any assurance of ice even within 15 days. We were not bumped by a concert that would make the DCC several thousand dollars; we were bumped by a cheerleading competition. I have nothing against cheerleading but will it is not be an event with only parents and families and a few fans attend? By the way, according to the website of the cheerleading company, attendance is free to the event.

http://www.wsacheer.com/custom/webpage.cfm?content=content&id=103

We have endured all kinds of cancellations of ice all year, but never with this short notice to something that is similar to our youth sport mission. We need your help. If you are a Desoto county tax payer, please ask your representatives, where we rate in importance to Desoto County. Ask your mayor, your city or county councilman and your friends in the media, why the customer that spends the most at the DCC is is treated like we don’t exist if anyone else wants the building. Other events like this cheerleading competition have many venues to choose a perfect date and we have only one venue that we hold events and we are only wanted when NO ONE else wants the building.

_____________________________
I’m doing my best to spread the word. My children already get so little ice time. I know we don’t live in an “ice” rich environment, but this is truly a shame. We already have to fight for the little bit of time using the ice in the Civic Center, and now to be bumped for something when we were there first is shameful. I don’t know how we’re going to explain this to the kids.

Some people can be so incredibly dumb, greedy, self-absorbed, cruel, and immoral, all at the same time.

This poor soul lost her camera, and the story that follows it, is well, just amazing.

From lostcamera

I hadn’t posted here in a while, because just after the last post, I got a call from an excited park ranger in Hawaii that “a nice Canadian couple reported that they found your camera!” She gave me their name and number, and I eagerly called to reclaim my camera.

“Hello,” I said, when I reached the woman who had reported the camera found, “I got your number from the park ranger, it seems you have my camera?”

We discussed the specifics of the camera, the brown pouch it was in, the spare battery and memory card, the yellow rubberband around the camera. It was clear it was my camera, and I was thrilled.

“Well,” she said, “we have a bit of a situation. You see, my nine year old son found your camera, and we wanted to show him to do the right thing, so we called, but now he’s been using it for a week and he really loves it and we can’t bear to take it from him.”

I listened, not sure where she was going with this.

“And he was recently diagnosed with diabetes, and he’s now convinced he has bad luck, and finding the camera was good luck, and so we can’t tell him that he has to give it up. Also we had to spend a lot of money to get a charger and a memory card.”

It started to dawn on me that she had no intention of returning the camera.

“We’d be happy to return your photographs…”

I was incredulous. “This is an expensive camera, you know.”

“Oh, we know, we looked it up.”

Read the rest here

I sure hope you get your camera back, and if there’s anything I can do to help, please let me know.

Credit: Got this story link from BoingBoing

From washingtonpost.com
Policing Porn Is Not Part of Job Description
Montgomery Homeland Security Officers Reassigned After Library Incident

By Cameron W. Barr
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 17, 2006; Page B08

Two uniformed men strolled into the main room of the Little Falls library in Bethesda one day last week and demanded the attention of all patrons using the computers. Then they made their announcement: The viewing of Internet pornography was forbidden.

The men looked stern and wore baseball caps emblazoned with the words “Homeland Security.” The bizarre scene unfolded Feb. 9, leaving some residents confused and forcing county officials to explain how employees assigned to protect county buildings against terrorists came to see it as their job to police the viewing of pornography.

After the two men made their announcement, one of them challenged an Internet user’s choice of viewing material and asked him to step outside, according to a witness. A librarian intervened, and the two men went into the library’s work area to discuss the matter. A police officer arrived. In the end, no one had to step outside except the uniformed men.

They were officers of the security division of Montgomery County’s Homeland Security Department, an unarmed force that patrols about 300 county buildings — but is not responsible for enforcing obscenity laws.

Read the rest here

Cheney’s Got a Gun