Graduate Class #22

Rape and sexually related deaths.  One of the more depressing lectures.

Kinds of rape, Groth’s  typology of rapists, how to do a rape kit.

Meeting

Far from home, in a strange city, with four sports channels, two golf channels, and the NFL channel on TV, but no food network or PBS.  Then, of course, there’s the All Law and Order All the Time Channel.

Happy 234th Navy

Happy Birthday Robubba!

Bank Bleg

I’ve been a loyal National City Bank customer for nearly thirty years. I’ve liked their service, I’ve been happy with their rates, heck, I went to school with the former CEO’s kid. Many friends have worked for them.

But they were taken over by PNC. For the past couple of months, their standards have changed. Oh, the young guy in the Lakewood branch where I buy my cashier’s cheques is still on the ball and friendly. The branch manager in my home branch, though, is treating me with thinly-veiled contempt. Errors are made. Funnily enough, they are always errors in the bank’s favour, and I cannot get a satisfactory resolution.

Frankly, National City now sucks. Can anyone recommend one? The best one I’ve ever had to deal with was the First National Bank of Damariscotta, where I have an account, but the closest branch is in Wiscasset. And Wiscasset traffic is a bear on Rte 1. I’d be interested in hearing suggestions. I want a checking account, a savings account, I want to transfer the house note, and pleasant, friendly service.

In The Running For Strangest Title Ever.

Autoerotic fatalities with power hydraulics. 
O’Halloran and Deitz.  J Forensic Sci. 1993 Mar;38(2):359-64.

The subject was pretty strange, too. Anyone who would write poetry to his backhoe is…unusual.

New England Seminar in Forensic Sciences Day 2

Started off with unknowns.  We then discussed the CSI effect and how that show is making the practice of forensics difficult.  Some teachers are using the show as a teaching tool, having their students critique the problems that each episode highlights.  It is interesting that each episode has a higher budget than the Las Vegas Crime lab has in a YEAR.  We also reviewed excited delrium.  After lunch, we examined fire invesigation and got the answers to the unknowns.

Found a very good deli in the evening.

In the evening, we had drugs that can cause homicidal ideation, two cases of excited delerium, a case of granulomatous myocarditis, a thorough work up of an accidental death due to a long arm (one of the very few cases ever, and an exemplar of how such cases should be worked up) and a fatality due to a splitting wedge.

I was also glad to get a chance to talk to the author, Archer Mayor, who is attending this conference for a second time.

New England Seminar in Forensic Sciences Day 1

With a thorough review of what can go wrong medically with pilots, we were off and running and thoroughly disgusting our little student helper from Colby.  Next, we covered hot and controversial topics in forensic medicine, and had some interesting cases from Delaware.

The evening session had a variety of cases, with rat attacks and the Kingsbury Run Torso murders.

Big Brown Truck of Happiness

It came.  With Sumatran, Holiday Blend, Big Ben, and  Highlander Blend from Prestogeorges, and more Corner Gas.  W00T!

45 Years

Where the earth shows its bones of wind-broken stone
And the sea and the sky are one
I’m caught out of time, my blood sings with wine
And I’m running naked in the sun
There’s God in the trees, I’m weak in the knees
And the sky is a painful blue
I’d like to look around, but Honey, all I see is you.

The summer city lights will soften the night
Til you’d think that the air is clear
And I’m sitting with friends, where forty-five cents
Will buy another glass of beer
He’s got something to say, but I’m so far away
That I don’t know who I’m talking to
Cause you just walked in the door, and Honey, all I see is you

(CHORUS)
And I just want to hold you closer than I’ve ever held anyone before
You say you’ve been twice a wife and you’re through with life
Ah, but Honey, what the hell’s it for?
After twenty-three years you’d think I could find
A way to let you know somehow
That I want to see your smiling face forty-five years from now.

So alone in the lights on stage every night
I’ve been reaching out to find a friend
Who knows all the words, sings so she’s heard
And knows how all the stories end
Maybe after the show she’ll ask me to go
Home with her for a drink or two
Now her smile lights her eyes, but Honey, all I see is you

Stan Rogers