Y’all didn’t save my kids no damn ice cream and cake.
Now I’m definitely not going to state my opinion on the gun laws in the US! I’ve already been beat up online enough for that in the past… ‘right to bear arms’ and all that – from the US Constitution – which is interpreted in many different ways.
What I do want to highlight though, is an incident that occurred at a childrens’ birthday party in a southern part of the United States on Saturday night… Clementine, in South Memphis to be precise.
When a father found out this his kids didn’t receive any birthday cake and ice-cream at the party, what the good ol’ boy did would have made his righteous shooting buddies proud.
According to police, Joseph Hayes was angry that his children didn’t get any treats, so he went home, retrieved his firearm and returned to threaten the host.
Mr Hayes became extremely upset and, with the gun in his possession, began yelling at the victim, “Y’all didn’t save my kids no damn ice cream and cake.”
He faced court in Memphis, Tennessee today, after being arrested and charged with aggravated assault, and was held on a $30,000 bond.
Somehow I don’t think that his kids will get all that many birthday party invitations in the future!
On 8th May, 2011 (day after the general election), Sengkang West celebrated its 5th anniversary with our Community Day. Nearly 3,000 residents braved the hottest weekend of the year, to attend the celebrations.
As usual, with any community event, and especially one of this magnitude, so many volunteers came out early to prepare for the day. Given the late evening before (it was around 4am before any of us got any sleep after the excitement of the general election vote counting), it was a mighty effort from all concerned, and given the timing, was not without logistical challenges in the days leading up to the event…
From Mickey (who is pictured here below with his kick-start of a double-shot of coffee, and who also happens to be my co-chairperson for what could just well be the hugest community event for 2011, which will be happening this October – big secret right now, but keep your eye out for the announcement as the date gets closer), the PCF, RC and CCMC members and groups, to our guest-of-honour, Dr Lam Pin Min, who (after about 9 days of campaigning), I suspect had very little sleep at all after being re-elected as the Sengkang West MP for the next 5-years. It was fantastic to see so many people cheering and congratulating him on the result – in my humble opinion, I think the citizens made a very good decision at the polling stations… if the reaction of the residents at the community day is anything to go on, Dr Lam is very popular indeed.
Before the event… preparations underway – it was a bit of a Mr Bean beginning for me – sweating and somewhat muscle-sore after spending a lot of time arranging around 400 chairs into position, while taking some pictures of the PCF teachers, the strong wind blew a large whiteboard into the air, only to land corner-first on the top of my head. The loud ‘bang’ was enough to draw the sympathy of everybody around, and many people came to my aid. Of course, wanting to always appear to be the tough man, although I was very embarrassed, I pretended it didn’t hurt at all… when no one was watching, I slinked off to the toilet to clean the gash on the top of my head and wash the blood from my hair – I still have a lump on my head today
As usual, I cannot post pictures of any of our community events without the mandatory ones of my kids looking cute:
I had to include an image of the ‘Mountain’ of goodie bags that were prepared for the residents… the artwork for the bag design was created by ‘yours truly’… after much discussion and voting on a variety of designs, images and fonts that I offered up, we (the organizing committee) finally agreed on this one:
A beautiful sunny day in Sengkang West – looking back at our estate from Fernvale Point… not a cloud in the sky!!
Below are some more pictures from the day. I snapped around 600+, and it’s always difficult to pick the right few for my blog, so be sure to view the galleries by clicking the following links:
I’m not prudish enough to think that the latest adult game for Nintendo Wii and Playstation that is due for release next month should be banned. In fact, I’m all for partners engaging in whatever games they feel fit to improve their lives and add a bit of spice to their relationships.
However, the Independent body in Europe that has given the ok for a 12+ certificate rating must have rocks in their head! It is no wonder that some concerned parents are outraged just by watching the promotional trailer by software giant, Ubisoft. The British parents allege that it “promotes orgies and lesbian sex to kids as young as 12″.
The trailer available on YouTube that promotes the game, “We Dare” features two couples following on-screen instructions from their game console… The girls in the ad are seen with the Wii remote sitting suggestively between their lips. The couples then hide the “Wiimote” inside their clothes while the others spank their bums which in turn controls one of the characters on the screen.
There is a couple of versions of the trailer, but there is no doubting that they are suggesting couples play the game together during a ’swinging’ kind of party and partner swapping.
According to a spokeswoman for French makers Ubisoft: “We Dare is intended for an adult audience… the age rating was set by an independent European panel.”
Of course, everybody knows that we are now in the Year of the Rabbit… but if you take note of what I’ve been eating over the last week in Shanghai, you would be forgiven for thinking that I should be back in 2007… the Year of the Pig (because I’ve been gorging myself like an absolute swine)!!
I’m putting any weight gain down to the slower metabolism due to the cold weather up here north of the equator… the day we arrived it was -3C with a little snow. Although I do know that the activities we partake in during the festive season are probably large contributors to the shift in belly circumference… here in China during Lunar New Year, it’s nothing but Eat… Play… Sleep… Eat… Play… Sleep (*repeat*)
Anyway, just for a quick update on the activities so far, here are a few of the highlights:
In collaboration with omy.sg, the Hong Kong Tourism Board sent ten
bloggers from the Singapore Blog Awards 2010 to Hong Kong to experience the Hong
Kong Dragonboat Carnival, part of the Hong Kong Summer Spectacular Program.
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