| Daring heist at SBI branch
In spite of a high alert sounded in the state after the Ludhiana blast, it just took less then 25 minutes for three men in their late 20s to rob the main branch of the State bank of India of Rs 46.15 lakh in broad daylight here today. The three armed with firearms tied four employees and two customers inside the bank and made good with the cash after getting hold of the vault keys. The three men arrived at the bank at 9.20 am and entered the premises by telling the peon that they had come from the SDMs office. After gaining assess into the bank, the robbers trained a revolver on the template of peon Baldev Singh and held him hostage. As security guard Prem Singh reached the bank, he was also detained by the robbers. One of the robbers then started cleaning the veranda of the bank to avoid unwanted attention of passersby.
Update: Library Has 10 Copies of "Water for Elephants"
Librarian Bette Ammon e-mailed a few minutes ago to say that "Water the Elephants," the first selection for the new Huckleberries Online Book Club, arrived at the library Friday. They'll be available this evening. Three are reserved, including one by me. Seven others will be available. The library's open now, if you want to reserve a copy. Bette's also preparing some guidelines to help us get started on this adventure. P.S., I just finished reading Slavomir Raciwz "The Long Walk" and recommend it highly. It's a true story about 7 desperate prisoners who break out of a Communist prison in Siberia at the outbreak of World War II, in the dead of winter, and succeed in walking all the way to India, through the Gobi Desert and over the Himalayas. Easy read. Incredible story about man's desire to be free.
The best, the worst, and the downright strange of 2007
Just wait until Britney Spears really starts to get desperate for attention." 2007 saw Britney get her head shaved, fail numerous drug tests, lose her husband, lose her children, and have her vagina rise to a level of superstardom the rest of her body can now only dream of. Please, Britney, stop. And that goes for your sister, too. Vive la difference! After Paris Hilton was caught driving with a suspended licence, she spoke to Barbara Walters in a telephone interview from a Los Angeles County jail, claiming that she had found God: "I feel as if I'm a different person," she said. "I used to act dumb." Sex and violence Rap star Akon was caught on camera this year abusing both male and female fans. During a concert in Trinidad, Akon invited a girl on-stage and used her to simulate a sexual act, only to later discover she was a minor and a minister's daughter.
Old grievances fuel ethnic strife
Circumcision is an important rite of passage for Kikuyus but is not widely practiced among Luos. The Luos and the Kalenjins, who have been aligned throughout the post-election period, then counterattacked, and the result was a citywide melee with hundreds wounded and as many as 50 people killed. By Friday night, the Kenyan military was deployed for the first time to intervene. Local authorities also slapped a dusk-to-dawn curfew on Nakuru, another first. Many people in Free Area, which is now almost totally Kikuyu, say it will be difficult to make peace. "We're angry and they're angry," said John Maina, a stocky butcher, whose weapon of choice Saturday was a 3-foot-long table leg with exposed screws. This is the reality across much of Kenya, and it seems to be nothing short of ethnic cleansing.
Editorial: DNR's short-term funding fix.
Budget shortfalls loomed and threatened the state's precious outdoor bounty. They'd have to lay off conservation officers and cut game management programs, they clucked. Reduce research, slash fish-stocking programs. Whack the walleye, trim the trout. Nothing, they said, could pull the state from the financial abyss. Nothing, of course, but a big tax hike on state hunters and anglers. The DNR could fend off its funding woes by demanding outdoors-inclined folk swallow double-digit price increases on the licenses required to shoot or hook fish and game here. The plan could generate millions of dollars and float the DNR's boat for the next couple of years. Otherwise, so long, steelhead. Buh-bye bears. No way around it.
Reviving the Taurus is bull
I don't know what I find more silly. The fact that Ford has brought back the Taurus name or the fact that my colleague David Kiley—who does consider him a tastemaster of all things marketing—thinks it's a great idea and that he deserves a whiff of credit for the decision. In any case, it's one of the dumber ideas I've seen in a while. Ford is taking a name that they killed with a decade of bad design and terrible sales and marketing strategies and putting it on a car that has gone unloved since its launch. Sounds like Ford will flush millions in marketing and ad dollars down the tube with this one. True, the Taurus was once the best-selling car in America in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. Then Honda beat it with the Accord and Toyota eclipsed both with the Camry.
Bulletin board
EAST HUNTINGTON BASEBALL: Signups at Wilson Field, March 8, 11 a.m. to 1p.m. Tryouts begin at 1 p.m. Signups at Enslow Field, March 15, 10 a.m. to noon. Minor league tryouts, March 15, 1 p.m. ASA SOFTBALL: March 22 clinic at Barboursville Community Park. Coaches at 10 a.m. Umpires at noon. Contact West Virginia ASA commissioner Robert Jobe, 416-1205. LEAGUE 3: Minor League boys and girls tryouts, along with Major League boys and girls who did not attend the earlier tryout, is March 8 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Huntington High YMCA facility. Contact David Clay, 634-9244. STING BASEBALL TRYOUTS: Age 12-U Tri-State USSSA team. All Tri-State players welcome. Team plays locally and travels. Contact Todd Raines (304) 633-6258 of Larry Goodwin (740) 533-3772.
Louisville lands sharpshooter
University of Louisville mens basketball coach Rick Pitino said earlier in the week that the recruiting efforts of his staff were focused on the Class of 2009.
And it didnt take him long to land one of his main targets.
Northfield (Mass.) Mount Hermon School junior Mike Marra committed to the Cardinals today, one day after Pitino watched him in a game.
Louisville was everything I wanted, Marra told The Courier-Journal today. I dont see any other coach getting more out of me than Rick Pitino.
The coaching staff meant everything to me. I had a great vibe from them.
The 6-foot-5 Marra, a native of Smithfield, R.I., picked the Cardinals over Providence, Massachusetts, Gonzaga, Wake Forest and Michigan.
Mount Hermon coach John Carroll said it took a while for Marra to get adjusted in his first year at the school.
Lacy to retire as president at Kronos Inc.
The Ain brothers at Kronos Inc. are losing one of their right-hand men. Paul Lacy, president of the Chelmsford maker of labor-management software since 2005, announced plans to step down. "It's been a great ride," said Lacy, 60. "I'm looking forward to learning to relax and then actually doing it." Lacy is a 20-year veteran at Kronos. Before being named president, he was executive vice president and chief financial and administrative officer. He was the key player in terms of getting the company to go public in 1992, and the point man behind many of Kronos' many strategic acquisitions. During his tenure, Kronos grew from a company that made time clocks with $26 million in annual revenues to an enterprise software company that posted $662 million in revenues in its most recent fiscal year.
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