H.S.M.... The Ice Tour

It was hell in Bridgeport, Ct. Even more so than usual.
The moment will be etched in my memory.
An email comes through the work network: Freebies. High School Musical: The Ice Tour. On the bulletin board.
Tickets can go fast. Thirsty Thursdays at the New Haven County Cutters, our then-unaffiliated and now defunct independent league baseball team, rarely made it to the cork board. Dollar beers will do that.
So I jumped. I grabbed eight, four for us and four for the out neighbors up the street, who somehow managed to figured out a graceful way to dodge the HSM bullet to the head.
Now for anyone unfamiliar with High School Musical, the only thing worse that Troy and Gabriella on TV is them on skates. Ethan was pumped. Tears streamed down Lillie's cheeks the whole time, the poor overwhelmed

girl who can't stand crowds. And then,

Hellejuaja........

The world-class skaters with the fake mikes started.............

Calhoun who?

If you didn't go to Penn State, you wouldn't understand. The guy's 81, is finishing his 58th year at PSU as head coach or assistant, turned down pro coaching offers, lives here with his wife Sue and around State College he is nothing short of God. No offense to God or Jim Calhoun.
And JoePa is still listed in the phone book.
OK, so some refs don't like him but that's another story.

Why did it take so long to elect him to the College Hall of Fame?

Darwin Awards

Survival of the fittest and demise of the dumbest. This one seems to go against the grain.

Just when you thought you saw everything...

... a West Haven groom disappears a day after his wedding with the wedding money and turns up three days later, still in his tux, soaked, bloody and claiming he was kidnapped, held for days, beaten, robbed and stuffed in the trunk of his own car.
Cops theorize he went on a drug binge, spent all the money and then staged the whole thing after, I suppose, he had a moment of lucidity and realized he had some explaining to do.
I would have loved to interview the wife. She already filed a criminal complaint with West Haven and I suspect might have had a lot to say. Or maybe she would have slammed the door in my face.
Cops wouldn't identify her or give his address because, presumably, it would lead to her.
NHPD cops are bad that way. They release next to no information, ostensibly, to protect the integrity of the investigation (which is bull. Some facts you keep close to the vest, sure, but New Haven takes it to an extreme. How many shell casings were recovered? Several. How did the burglar gain entry? We're not getting into that. Do we have a motive? Not that we're releasing.
What's the harm in saying, six, cut the screen and went through a kitchen window and that the shooting appears to have been drug related but it's still early in the investigation and sometimes things change as the probe progresses.)
Get an address of a homicide victim? Forget it. I've been told that's to protect the family from intrusion, which I can respect as noble but is a decision that the family should be able to make. There was a homicide victim this year, a teen who was killed in Edgewood Park, whose family was actually upset that the media wasn't paying due attention to their son's slaying, like his life was less meaningful than other victims who got more coverage.
Really, when it comes down to it, shouldn't it be the family's choice. If I knock on the door and tell me to go away, I will.

Shown The Door?

Did Cisco Ortiz, the outgoing police chief, leave of his own accord as the City Hall fell all over themselves saying or , like former Fire Chief Dennis Daniels, did the mayor show him the door. My gut tells me it was the latter, but no one from City Hall would ever admit it. The mayor doesn't like controversy and, according to script, city powerbrokers made the company line clear. As Rob Smuts, the city's CAO, put it, who could begrudge a good opportunity for a good guy.
Anyone who follows the p.d. knows the relationship between the mayor and Ortiz was, at times, strained and some people would argue the "at times" is too generous. So, did Ortiz land the security at Yale on his own and make his decision on his own terms or did the mayor, looking for a way to jettison the chief without it being blatantly obvious that he jettisoned the chief, make some calls to Yale to make sure Ortiz had a soft landing and a nice press conference.
Dunno. And City Hall will never tell.

My Wife is a Hooker

They actually have a bumper sticker that says that, and Marissa, the wife, is on the prowl one. Actually, it says Hooker mom but I like my version better.

The son started kindergarten Friday. He was chomping at the bit ("How many sleeps until I start?" he hept asking. He doesn't quite get the concept of days, I guess)

He had a good first day. He has the hots for some girl named Victoria. Can't wait to meet my future daughter-in-law. I'm assuming she's a blonde. His last girlfriend, by his account, had 'hair like the sun.'

The folks at Hooker (Worthington Hooker School is the full name) are cagey. We started with orientation and, mid-way through, the principal casually had all the kids line up with their teachers and headed up to the classroom. It was 10 minutes before any parents realized that that was the final goodbye.

Check out the girl behind Ethan with the "who the hell are you? look." The girl behind her smiles every time someone pulls out a camera.

Origin of Kaempffer's Korner

We journalists love our alliteration.
But if anyone out there is about 60 years or older and lived in Freehold, NJ, you might now that that Kaempffer's Korner is a rip off. My dad and Uncle Charlie ran an old produce stand on Route 9 back in the 1950s. (You know the lyrics, "Sprung from cages on Highway 9." The Springsteen song)
I think that's right, about Route 9, but I might be making that up. I'll have to ask my dad.