Posts by Alex Miller

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Attack of the Killer Tornadoes

On Friday evening, 10 December 2010, some 30 tornadoes smashed through six mid-West states, creating havoc and spreading devastation, claiming upwards of 100 lives.  The outbreak, apart from being one of the worst recorded, is all the more historic given the unseasonable timing, with most tornadoes occurring in the spring.  Normally, cooler temperatures preclude the formation of tornadoes, and this December rampage is yet another sign of increasing weather instability stemming from unchecked climate change globally.

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“Rust” Never Sleeps: The Strange Case of Alec Baldwin

On October 21, 2021, police were called to the set of “Rust”, a western being filmed in Bonanza City, New Mexico.  An accidental shooting with a prop gun, discharged by star Alec Baldwin, had killed the film’s cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, and wounded director Joel Souza.  The cause of the incident is still under investigation, but somehow, live ammunition was loaded into a real revolver, not blanks in a prop gun.  While setting up the next shot, with the gun pointed at the camera and the cinematographer, the weapon discharged; Baldwin’s statement is that he had cocked the gun, based on Hutchins’ instructions, but did not pull the trigger.

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Harry Potter Turns 20

By which, I mean the movie franchise, which celebrated the twentieth anniversary of the release of its first film, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone”, on 16 November.  Harry Potter the book series began publication four years earlier, and Harry Potter the character has been given a birthdate of 28 July 1980 by his creator, J.K. Rowling.  Rowling herself was born on that date, fifteen years before, giving her a strong identification with the character that made her famous, beloved, and incredibly rich.

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The Waukesha Christmas Parade Massacre

On Sunday, 21 November 2021, a man broke through barriers and drove his red SUV wildly through a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, killing six and injuring more than sixty others.  The suspect, Darrell Brooks, 39, was well-known to local police, a repeat offender who had just been released from jail two days prior on a thousand-dollar bail after arrest on a domestic abuse charge.  Brooks had been accused of trying to run down his girlfriend with the same SUV.  Witnesses said that Brooks swerved through the parade route in a zig-zag pattern, apparently attempting to hit as many people as possible.  Police recovered Brooks and the damaged SUV several hours later; he was arraigned on multiple counts and bail set at a more reasonable $5 million.

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Garden Glimpses: November Color

Better late than never, as they say.  Autumn came in dribs and drabs this year, with the accent on the drab – tan, brown, and sepia tones dominated early fall, with bright, brilliant colors a rarity, but now that the ghosties and ghoulies have been (mostly) packed away, a few shots of bitter cold have turned what’s left of summer’s foliage into a stunning panoply of red, yellow and orange.

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Joe Biden’s 2021 Solar Return

Joe Biden’s solar year began at 11:31 AM EST on 19 November 2021, in Washington DC, just hours after a Lunar Eclipse with the longest duration in 580 years, which fell exactly opposed his natal Sun.  This is not a positive augur for the coming twelvemonth, and delving deeper into the details, we’re not seeing much to alleviate that.

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