Weathering the Broken Links

Apparently, they’ve “exhausted all the possibilities” (according the the Mayor in this video) and now their only recourse is a complete curfew on select neighborhoods. One council member, Eugene “Red” Johnson said:

“As far as I’m concerned, at 3 o’clock in the morning, nobody has any business being on the street, except the law, … Anyone out at 3 o’clock shouldn’t be out on the street, unless you’re going to the hospital.”

Ummm. The CNN article states that it’s a 24-hour curfew. While it can be debated that there are reasons to be out at 3am, you can’t justify a 24-hour curfew by pretending you’re only inconveniencing late night owls.

Further, watch the video where one resident says you can’t even go outside without being approached by police. Apparently, they’re telling people on their own property to go inside.

I know some residents are supportive of the effort as it really is a rough neighborhood with lots of problems. But I don’t care what your intentions are. I If you think your only option is to hassle everyone because you can’t think of a better way to crack down on the real criminals, you’ve gone too far.

Certainly the local police can do some real police work (i.e. without violating people’s rights) which makes it undesirable for the criminals to ply their trade there.

I was at urgent care this weekend for a broken digit.  While waiting for my x-rays to be checked, I spotted a pile of some vaguely familiar instruments heaped haphazardly on a wheeled cart.  Lo and behold a pile of vaginal specula (speculums for those who never studied Latin)!

Not being a woman I found it a little exciting.  But then I noticed what else was on this cart, and got sort of turned back off: cleaning supplies. Latex/nitrile gloves and antiseptic hand cleaner, OK.  Windex and floor cleaner, not OK.

Further, were those specula waiting to be used?  Or were they recently used, cleaned, and waiting to be autoclaved somewhere?  Either way, another turnoff.

Okay. They must not have a good place to store everything.  But it seemed that putting this stuff on a cart and leaving on display it in an area where patients hang out is not the brightest thing to do.

We all know that there’s stuff that goes on behind the scenes that we just don’t really want to know about…you know, the stuff the minimum wage burger flippers are doing way in the back.  My advice is to keep this stuff out of the customer’s view.  Roll that cart of oddly mixed stuff back into a closet somewhere please.