"I mean, you know..."

Live television  news.

I mean, you know, like live TV news. You know?

Goodness, you know, I mean, how many times in a live phone report can a reporter say "you know", a report that lasted less than 90 seconds. You know?

Well, in case you don't know, the young reporter said it NINE times. I mean, you know, that's a lot of "you knows". And, it was mixed it with a lot of "I means", you know? I mean, really, that's the truth. You know?

It's not totally her fault, you know. Consultants, some years back, started telling television journalists to be conversational. "Deliver your stories as, you know, you would if you were talking to your friends". I mean, you know, it's all a matter of communicating on, you know, your friends' level. You know?

Live TV news, take it from me, is not as easy as you might believe. It does require concentration, and it requires a comfortable knowledge of the details of the topic of the report. A basic working knowledge of the English language, mixed with an ability to actually tell a story, is important. You know?

I will not point out which reporter on which station did this story. It, however, is on the station's web site. At least, you know, I mean, it was when I started writing. A hint: it's about, you know, a fire in an eastern North Carolina communtiy.

(Bet I know one news director who will pass this around his newsroom...know what I mean, Verne, err, Scott? )

Our Libyan Intervention: Campaign Strategy?

Ok, we send men, women and machines to help the rebels in Libya, rebels who don't want Moo-amar Kha-daffy to run their country any longer. Hey, most of the free world is behind those rebels, and agree that the scumbag should go. But, at what cost?

So far, we've lost a 40-MILLION dollar airplane. Thank goodness the crew is ok. I have no idea, and neither do you, how much it has cost U.S. taxpayers to fund this presidential re-election campaign. Tomahawk missiles, alone, run about $750,000 EACH. No telling how much fuel we've burned in the airplanes, helicopters, trucks, and ships during the last month, or so. No doubt, Congress is going to be asked to add additional money to the Libyan Campaign Fund. Personally, I think the president's campaign fund should pick up the tab.

To add insult to injury, the bucks you and I are spending to get rid of the Kha-daffy operation is only part of what it's gonna cost us. Once the dirtbag is toast, as good neighbors, we're going to repair and replace everything we've blown up. What a crock!

For the life of me, I don't understand. What's in it for you and me? Cheaper prices for gasoline? Hasn't worked that way since we rescued Kuwait from another nut case.

I can understand why we're bent on getting rid of any government that supports bin Laden and his band of terrorists. They have proven what they can and will do. Time and again. Just too bad that Al Gore and others blew off Oliver North in the 1980's when Colonel North told them that bin Laden was the most dangerous man in the world and should be eliminated. At that time, bin Laden was an easy target. He kept popping his head up, here, there, everywhere. As I've stated so many times: one man, one rifle, one bullet, one mile. The problem would have been solved five seconds before the folks standing around the bearded baboon even heard the shot.

Last I checked, a .308 bullet...a good one...could be had for about a buck. Maybe more if the Pentagon is ordering them. But, still a lot cheaper than a dozen Tomahawk missiles. My offer still stands...I'll pay for the bullet. And, throw in some extra ones for other problems. 

The National Anthem's Unknown Verse.

Now, this is good. Turn up your speakers, take a listen. While you're listening, pay attention to the crowd's reaction. A marine, at a tea party of all places, took his turn at the microphone. And, he mesmerized the other folks there.

http://nation.foxnews.com/culture/2010/06/07/watch-marine-stuns-crowd-tea-party

Might be some politics in this. But, I don't care. I like it, anyway. And, besides, we need some good politicians.

Do you think that putting our trust in God, in our NATIONAL anthem is what irritates the president? Poor guy. He just can't get away from it, can he?
All together now.....awwwwwwwwww.

Recipe: Shrimp Creole, the easy way

It's Gullah time, once again. This company puts together some pretty cool packages. Meals Ready to Eat that taste NOTHING like Uncle Sam's version of MRE's. A week ago, on a Sunday morning, I tried out the Shrimp and Grits. I suggested some slight modifications, personal preferences, if you will.

I gave the Shrimp Creole a try this week. The little Gullah sacks are pretty cool. The recipe is on, not in, the bags. Debbie at The Ship's Wheel, a gift shop inside Tideline Marine (Jacksonville NC), knows my passion for seafood and cooking. Most stuff, of course, I do from scratch. But! I always look for really E-Zeee things to try out, for those mornings or nights when I just want something fast. Usually, that results in a take-out pizza (there's a great place in Jacksonville, another in Morehead, if you're ever interested).

Back to the shrimp creole. Not a difficult  dish to  prepare from scratch, but if you don;t want to stop by the supermarket and pick up the ingredients, the Gullah sack is pretty cool. It has two packets. One with rice. One with the powdered sauce mix. The recipe tells you to cook the rice, covered, for about 25 minutes. That's about right. At least, they didn't use that 5-minute rice stuff. Boil the water, per the instructions, add the rice, reduce heat, cover, simmer for 25 minutes.

As soon as you start the rice, put on another pot of water, per the instructions, and add the sauce ingredients. Boil, per the bag's directions. It takes about 20 minutes, and will be good to go about the time the rice is ready. Kinda neat how that works out. If you're like me, at about 10 minutes of sauce-cooking, you might want to add a can of either tomatoe wedges or diced tomatoes. I drained mine...I didn't need the packing juice. The maters gives a little more stuff  in the sauce. Another hint: canned tomatoes, to me, are not as sweet as vine ripened ones. Doesn't matter which variety, I've tried them all. So, with canned tomatoes, I add a pinch or two of brown sugar.

Now, for the scrimps, aka shrimp. You can use fresh ones, if you have them. You might just want to keep some frozen shrimp on hand, along with the Gullah sacks, for that unexpected sudden arrival of company, or for times when you just want something GOOD, fast and easy. I prefer the uncooked, easy peel kinds. They thaw, in water, in about 15 minutes, or so. When you decide on shrimp creole for dinner, open a bag of shrimp first, drop them in water, then swap out the water in about five minutes. This should be cold tap water. During that time, you can start  the rice and sauce process.

Once the shrimp thaws, just peel them. Remove the tails, of course. They really are easy to peel, because the backs of the shells have been split, and the big vein removed.

Drop  a pad of butter in your skillet (olive oil is good, too). I prefer stainless, feel free to  use whatever you like. I do suggest medium heat. There's no need to burn the butter, or the shrimp. Sautee the shrimp, stirring regularly to ensure even cooking. DO NOT OVERCOOK! I hate rubbery shrimp. Once they're a medium-deep pink, drop them in the sauce. This should be at the 20 minute cooking time for the sauce. KILL THE HEAT. The shrimp have already cooked, and just need to soak up flavor. Serve up the rice, add the sauce/shrimp, as much as you like. Garnish with pasley, if you desire. Enjoy.

A 30-minute, or so, meal that's about as close to cooking from scratch as you can get.

I have one more Gullah sack to try out. She Crab Soup. I'll let you knew as soon as I take a swing at it. I haven't read the packet, yet, but I will bet that I need crab. And, like frozen shrimp,  have several containers waiting to be thawed.

Always prepared. For the unexpected.

A Day Late, but a Day Never Forgotten: Case Never Solved

Billy Nunalee  1954-1978

4 April. That was yesterday. I didn't forget what day it was. I just didn't feel like writing anything. But, it's a date I remember every year.

4 April 1978. 33 years ago. I was a reporter for a Wilmington television station, been there about two years. A day before newsrooms were staffed 'round the clock. Good reporters had sources, those folks who tipped us when something went down. If you were good, some of those sources were from the law enforcement community. But, you had to earn their trust and, just as importantly, their respect. Without either, you were just another reporter, oftentimes an enemy of law enforcement. I had been lucky, after moving to Wilmington. A number of the local cops found out I had already been one of them for a while. Made my job covering hard news much easier.

4 April. The phone rings, as it often did, about 2 am, as I recall. One of my sources (good reporters will never rat them out, either) told me that a Wilmington (NC) police officer had been shot. He didn't know the condition, but said everything was "bad".

Talk about "bad"! It was bad all over. I was at the scene within 15 minutes. Outside a 7-11 store (that's when we actually had 7-11 stores). Uniform cops milling around. No one with a lot of information escept that one of their own had been shot. Word came from the hospital within a half hour. Officer James William (Billy) Nunalee was dead. Officially. No doubt, he was dead at the scene, but he was rushed to the hospital, only a couple miles away.

Billy Nunalee. The days when reporters covering the police beats, as I did, knew every cop in town. I knew Billy. A nice guy. I actually had to give a statement when I witnessed a wreck he was in. I also remember him, with two rowdy people in headlocks, at a big free-for-all. I was only a few blocks away when I heard his call for help...a 10-33 call. Pulling up, I saw him smiling. He said something like, "so how's your day going?" His shirt was ripped, I remember that his badge was missing. His hat was gone, too. Can't remember if he ever got everything back.

Dead at the scene, no doubt. He had been shot, numerous times as it turned out, with what was likely an M-16 fully automatic rifle, or the civilian equivalent, the semi-automatic AR-15. Perhaps a civilian gun illegally modified to be fully automatic.

Officer Nunalee, on routine patrol, stopped at the 7-11 store, part of his routine patrol procedure. Though 7-11 stores were originally opened from 7 am to 11 pm, many became 24 hour stores over the years.

Exiting the store, Billy was confronted by at least two people wearing masks. Impossible, the store clerk said, to tell whether they were male or female, young or old, black or white. Several robberies had been committed by such a pair over the previous couple months. Some speculate that Nunalee was in the wrong place at the wrong time, that the would-be robbers were getting ready to hit the store and were either spotted by Officer Nunalee as he walked from the store, or they just decided to take out a cop.

Just because he was there.

He could have posed a threat, sure, just by his presence. They could have remained in hiding, of course, and waited until he left. They obviously knew he was there. A marked police car in front of the store with no other customers is pretty hard to miss.There's no indication  that Nunalee ever saw his killers. They just gunned him down.

Detectives, off duty officers, officers with the City-County Drug Squad, State Bureau of Investigation agents...a lot of cops...started showing up. Frustrated and upset. Shocked. Big city butchery had come to their small town. One of those officers was working the perimeter, making sure to keep everyone out. She was on patrol, a couple blocks away, checking buildings as cops on the late shift often do, always looking for signs of burglaries. She told me she heard either gunfire or firecrackers, a lot of them. She tried, unsuccessfully, to reach Nunalee on the police radio. A few minutes later, she found him, lying beside his patrol cruiser, in front of the 7-11. Just minutes after the killers left. Had they waited, even for a couple minutes, she could have been victim number two.

Small world it is. I had gone to high school with this cop's older sister. Years before. She left the force, not too long afterwards. Haven't heard from her in years.

The clerk was nowhere to be found. At least one bullet hole was in the store's front plate glass window (could have been the glass door). The clerk later returned to the store, and told investigtors what he saw. When the masked gunmen shot Billy, they walked over to his prone body, then fired numerous times into it, more than a dozen times, in all. They took his revolver, a Smith and Wesson .357 magnum from his holster, and shot at the shell-shocked clerk. He ran out the back door, and hid in the woods until he felt it was safe to come out.

Billy's revolver has never turned up.

Over the days and weeks that followed, a lot of people were questioned. Drug dealers were rousted. Understand that drug dealers usually know what's going on in the crime world they live in. They hear things, and often use that information as bargaining chips when they get popped on a dope charge. If they can give up a bigger fish, in exchange for some help from the cops, they'll rat out their own brothers. No one said this is a perfect world. In the days and weeks following 4 April 1978, drug agents put a lot of pressure on known drug dealers.

A lot of tips came in, but nothing good enough to take to the bank. No charges were ever filed. And, a cop's killers remained at large.

A few years back, Wilmington police reported that the brutal slaying of one of their own was solved. With the death of a man who had come to their attention years earlier. A man, serving a life sentence for a murder that he committed after Nunalee's killing, kicked the bucket in prison. He looked good for it, no doubt. He was certainly capable of shooting a cop. But, nothing concrete, no real physical evidence that could absolutely link him to the murder, was ever found. At least none that was ever made public. Where's the likely murder weapon, a .223 Colt assault rifle? A lot of bullets and spent shell casings, all containing ballistics evidence, were recovered. A stolen .357 magnum revolver, it's serial number listed in the National Crime Information Center, still missing. Relatively good details about the clothing worn. A woman claiming that the killer was her husband, and that he had buried the rifle at a location she gave police. No weapon was found. Crooks like to keep their guns. Or sell them. A prize weapon, like the M-16, and the .357, are tough to part with. But, nothing has turned up. Nothing to match the ballistics. Nunalee's gun is still at large.
No concrete evidence. No deathbed confession. No jailhouse confession. As far as we know, anyway. You would think that a cellmate might have learned something, something he could use for his own benefit. Cop killers in prison rank pretty high. Why wouldn't a convicted killer take advantage of this. Why wouldn't he tell someone something that would have elevated his status among prisoners, something that could have been useful to detectives. He didn't have a lot to lose.

One now-retired cop, a friend of mine, isn't so sure that they got their man. True, he and Billy were friends, and he...like a lot of other cops from that time...want to see that concrete evidence I mentioned. Unless it shows up, the 4 April 1978 murder of Officer Billy Nunalee will remain unsolved. In a lot of minds.

From the  Officer Down Memorial Page http://www.odmp.org/officer/10035-officer-james-william-nunalee-sr.

Officer James William Nunalee Sr.Wilmington Police Department
North Carolina
End of Watch: Tuesday, April 4, 1978
Biographical Info
Age: 24Incident DetailsCause of Death: Gunfire
Date of Incident: Tuesday, April 4, 1978
Weapon Used: Rifle; M-16
Suspect Info: Case never solved

We Are Up The Creek. Miss you.

Yep. My bride and I are  up the creek. Luckily, we had a paddle. Unlike some folks.
A great April day, it was. A day for a little trip up Southwest Creek, near Jacksonville (NC), outside the New River Marine Air Station.

The sky was clear enough to see all the way to outer space. Jet trails everywhere.

We tried fishing. Not really too hard. I didn't even take a cooler, save for the one with a couple soft drinks in it. If I don't take a cooler filled with ice, I'm not seriously looking for fish. Yep, I will have a fishing pole or two. Just in case.

We thought it might be chilly. And, it was. When we were speeding along. Robie was prepared.

We found this pretty ragged osprey, just sitting on a stump alongside the creek. He made no effort to fly away, as do most of these birds when people, armed with cameras, approach. We came to the conclusion that he had a hurt wing, as we were able to get within a dozen feet. No doubt, he was giving it time to heal, safely atop the stump, surrounded by water.



It was a great opportunity to see a bit of wildlife. Like this turtle, catching some early spring rays on top of a log.

Didn't take him long to sprout a couple up-front legs, though, and head for the safety of the creek water.

I'm not completely sure how safe those waters are. This is not a log. It's a gator. About six feet, maybe more, of alligator. I hope turtle soup is not on his menu. If you're quiet, you can get within moderate telephoto lens range for some decent pictures of these guys. You might not want to carry your small dog along, especially if he likes to jump overboard to chase logs.

          Back upriver,  some nice mallards made for a good snapshot. Love those green heads.



                            Need boat stuff? Up river, at Jacksonville? Stop by and say "howdy".

                             Be sure to tell Max "hi". He'll welcome you with a lot of barking.

I'm friendly. Real friendly. Trust me.



April Fool's Day. Freedom. It ain't free, ya'll.

It's Friday, the first of April.
April Fool's Day, they call it.
I call it a new month.
A fresh beginning.
The arrival of more flowers.
Green grass.
Singing birds.
And, I am looking forward to warm water, calm seas, and peace on the high seas.
And, while I'm looking forward to enjoying all of this, I think of young men and women, making sure I...and others like me...can enjoy.
Below is one of those circulating e-mail stories. Regardless of how many times I ge it, or how many times I'll see or hear of a Snopes claim that it's false, I stil enjoy it. Doesn't matter. The situation may or may not have happened. Who cares? The message is Lima Charlie.

    As I came out of the supermarket that sunny day, pushing my cart of groceries towards my car, I saw an old man with the hood of his car up and a lady sitting inside the car, with the door open.

                               The old man was looking at the engine. I put my groceries away in my car, and continued to watch the old gentleman from about twenty five feet away.

                               I saw a young man in his early twenties with a grocery bag in his arm walking towards the old man. The old gentleman saw him coming too, and took a few steps towards him.

                               I saw the old gentleman point to his open hood and say something. The young man put his grocery bag into what looked like a brand new Cadillac Escalade. He then turned back to the old man. I heard him yell at the old gentleman saying:

                               "You shouldn't even be allowed to drive a car at your age."
                               And then with a wave of his hand, he got in his car and peeled rubber out of the parking lot.

                               I saw the old gentleman pull out his handkerchief, and mop his brow as he went back to his car and again looked at the engine.

                               He then went to his wife and spoke with her; he appeared to tell her it would be okay. I had seen enough, and I approached the old man. He saw me coming and stood straight, and as I got near him I said, 'Looks like you're having a problem.'

                               He smiled sheepishly, and quietly nodded his head. I looked under the hood myself, and knew that whatever the problem was, it was beyond me. Looking around, I saw a gas station up the road, and I told the old man that I would be right back. I drove to the station and went I inside. I saw three attendants working on cars. I approached one of them, and related the problem the old man had with his car. I offered to pay them if they could follow me back down and help him.

                               The old man had pushed the heavy car under the shade of a tree and appeared to be comforting his wife When he saw us he straightened up and thanked me for my help. As the mechanics diagnosed the problem (overheated engine), I spoke with the old gentleman.

                               When I shook hands with him earlier, he had noticed my Marine Corps ring and had commented about it, telling me that he had been a Marine too. I nodded and asked the usual question, 'What outfit did you serve with?'

                               He had mentioned that he served with the first Marine Division at Tarawa, Saipan, Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal ....

                               He had hit all the big ones and retired from the Corps after the war was over. As we talked we heard the car engine come on and saw the mechanics lower the hood. They came over to us as the old man reached for his wallet, but was stopped by me. I told him I would just put the bill on my AAA card.

                               He still reached for the wallet and handed me a card that I assumed had his name and address on it and I stuck it in my pocket. We all shook hands all around again, and I said my goodbye's to his wife.

                               I then told the two mechanics that I would follow them back up to the station. Once at the station, I told them that they had interrupted their own jobs to come along with me and help the old man. I said I wanted to pay for the help, but they refused to charge me

                               One of them pulled out a card from his pocket, looking exactly like the card the old man had given to me. Both of the men told me then that they were Marine Corps Reserves. Once again we shook hands all around and as I was leaving, one of them told me I should look at the card the old man had given to me. I said I would and drove off.

                               For some reason I had gone about two blocks, when I pulled over and took the card out of my pocket and looked at it for a long, long time. The name of the old gentleman was on the card in golden leaf and under his name was written: 'Congressional Medal of Honor Society.'

                               I sat there motionless, looking at the card and reading it over and over. I looked up from the card and smiled to no one but myself and marveled that on this day, four Marines had all come together because one of us needed help. He was an old man all right, but it felt good to have stood next to greatness and courage, and an honor to have been in his presence. Remember, OLD men like him gave you FREEDOM for America.  Thanks to those who served and still serve, and to all of those who supported them, and who continue to support them.

                               America is not at war.  The U.S. Military is at war.  America is at the Mall. If you don't stand behind our troops, PLEASE feel free to stand in front of them!

                               Remember, Freedom IS NOT free.  Thousands have paid the price, so you can enjoy what you have today.

                              Today's Prayer.

                               GOD OUR FATHER, WALK THROUGH MY HOUSE AND TAKE AWAY ALL MY WORRIES; AND PLEASE WATCH OVER AND HEAL MY FAMILY; AND PLEASE PROTECT OUR FREEDOMS, AND WATCH OVER OUR TROOPS, WHO ARE DEFENDING THOSE FREEDOMS.  AMEN.