Harrowing Hudson River Is The Video You Need Now. Seriously

A superhero in Hoboken rescues Teddy. Film at 11. 

You probably need a feel good story right now. I do.

Don't worry about the beginning of this story, because, spoiler alert, you'll like the way it turns out.

Inside Edition reported on what they call is a harrowing rescue along the Hudson River in Hoboken, New Jersey recently.

A toddler named Thomas, who is almost 3 years old,  lost his best friend, "Teddy" who fell into the river while he and his mom were taking a stroll.

A heroic rescuer appeared on the scene, found Teddy floating in the river, retrieved him and performed some dramatic CPR.

The rescue was successful!  Teddy has fully recovered and has been reunited with Thomas.

Like many heroes, the rescuer disappeared into the crowd when things settled down. Thomas' dad, Ron Levi, is on the hunt for the hero.  The Levi family, at the very least, wants to take the hero out for ice cream.

You'll fully understand when you watch the video:

Youth Basketball Team Rebels Gloriously Against Dumb Adult Rules

A fifth grade basketball team in New Jersey votes to keep
girls on the team even though the CYO organization said they couldn't.

Hats off today to the St. John's New Jersey 5th grade basketball team, who chose unity and fairness over the silly "rules" of adults. 

There were nine boys and two girls on the St. John's CYO team.

Mucketymucks with the church found out about the girls playing on the team and laid the law down.

The team was not allowed to have girls. Ditch the girls or give up the rest of the season, the team was told, as NJ.com reports.

The boys on the team would have none of it.  They said no girl team mates no playing.

An opposing team, St. Bartholomew the Apostle, had just showed up for a game against St. John's but the refs announced the a CYO director instructed the refs not to allow the team to play if the girls remained on it.

There was a bit of a discussion over whether it could be an "unofficial" game, but nobody seemed all that keen on the idea. And coaches were reluctant to force a decision on the fifth graders.

Finally, a parent named Matthew Dohn spoke up and asked the St. John's fifth grade team directly: "Is your decision to play the game without the two young ladies on the team, or do you want to stay as a team as you have all year?   Show of hands for play as a team?

All 11 members of the team raised their hands. When parents asked the question a diffeent way: Should the girls stay out of the game? No hands went up.

Parents reminded the team that if they let the girls play, the rest of the season would be forfeited. "If the girls play, this will be the end of your season. You won't play in the playoffs," said assistant coach Keisha Martel.

Martel is the mom of one of the girls in question.

"It doesn't matter," one boy replied. Soon the rest of the team joined in chanting, "Unity!"

NJ.com reported that many spectators cheered along and several parents began to cry.

Here's how one parent reacted, says NJ.com:

"Pride. Just pure pride......These kids are doing the right thing. We don't have to tell them what to do. They just know. It's amazing."

The fifth graders also appear to be more brave than the adults who made the decision to bar the girls. The kids on the team were outspoken on their position to say the least.

An anonymous complaint about the girls playing led to the decision to bar them. That came when St. John's played another school called St. Theresa's, where the family of one girl was suing the school to allow her to play on the boy's team.

The school responded by expelling the girl and her sister, though an appeals court ruled that the girls must be reinstated.

In the case of the St. John's game, the CYO organization said rules are rules and girls must play with girls, and boys must play with boys.

At least the kids understand there is sometime a need for flexibility.

Said parent Rob Martel: "They're kids and all they wanted to do was play.....This is adults that couldn't figure out how to let the kids play two more games. This isn't the WNBA or NBA. They're just trying to get better, and I think they got better today."

Well, maybe not at basketball, since the kids weren't allowed to play. But they certainly showed their growing skills at the game of life.

Oddballs With Airhorns The Latest Weird Crime Spree

Here's the entertaining mug shot of John Nuggent
accussed of blaring an air horn for many weeks on end
in the early morning hours in a California neighborhood
in apparent revenge against somebody who lives there.  

There have been a couple of weird incidents involving air horns recently, and I'm hoping this is not part of a trend.  

A guy in El Segundo, California was recently arrested after keeping residents of one neighborhood up at night for weeks with the air horn he blew as he drove through the neighborhood.

The guy's, um, interesting mugshot is at the top of this post.

According to the Los Angeles Times, John W. Nuggent was stopped by police in his air horn equipped car earlier this month:

"On  Sunday, patrol officers heard the blare of a actuated air horn - a device similar to a train horn - as it shattered the pre-dawn silence of El Segundo's west side at about 4 a.m., police said on Facebook.

Officers looked around and saw only one car on the street - a little blue four door 2006 Chevrolet Aveo - and pulled it over, said Sgt. Vincent Martinez.

In the back of the car, officers found an air tank with hoses connected to a device near the car's gas pedal, Martinez said. When an officer tried the car's horn, the sound of 'a big truck or train' blasted from the diminutive hatchback, he said."

Authorities said Nuggent was setting off the airhorn in the predawn hours for weeks in the neighborhood because he was getting revenge on somebody who lives there with whom he had some sort of dispute.

Nuggent is unsurprisingly charged with disturbing the peace.

Meanwhile, Hopatcong, New Jersey had its own air horn crisis this week.

For reasons unknown, other than this guy thought it would be funny, Kevin Hemmerich of Hopatcong arrived at the town's police station wearing a bunny costume and repeatedly blowing an air horn while his brother Jason filmed the episode, says NJ.com.

Kevin Hemmerich was there to turn himself in on an outstanding warrant for not serving community service after he'd been caught driving without insurance.  

Kevin Hemmerich of Hopatcong, NJ inexplicably turned
himself into police on an outstanding warrant wearing
a bunny costume and blowing an air horn.
Police were not amused.  

People at the police station repeatedly asked Kevin Hemmerich to stop blowing the air horn but he kept at it.

That was until two police officer came into the room, punched Kevin and slapped the phone Jason was using to video the incident out of his hands.

That left Jason feeling pretty whiny: "This is my hometown and he punched my brother in the face for no reason,' Jason said.

Well, actually I think there was a reason why your brother got punched, Jason.

Still, the officers involved are under investigation, because it really is improper for police to punch somebody who is not a threat, even if the person in question is incredibly annoying.

Extreme Vulgar Temper Tantrums On Facebook Won't Get You Elected To Office

Weirdo former GOP candidate Michael Krawitz
and his hate messages to a reporter.  

Breaking news out of New Jersey: Republican Michael Krawitz is no longer a candidate for the West Deptford Township Committee.

OK, this isn't earthshattering news.  With all due respect to the fine citizens of West Deptford, we normally wouldn't care about this bit of election news.

Except for the reason why Krawitz has withdrawn his candidacy. He's a big Donald Trump fan, and wasn't happy at all that Daily Beast reporter Olivia Nuzzi posted on her Facebook page a critical article about Trump written by a colleague.

So Krawitz took to Facebook to criticize Nuzzi. So far, we're OK. You can criticize a reporter's work. Journalists tend to have thick skin.

But the problem is Krawitz's, um, way with words.   

He wrote to Nuzzi: "Fuck.You. Olivia. I. Hope. Somebody.Rapes.You.Today. :)

Nuzzi responded by writing: "This man who wants me to be raped today was a Republican candidate for office in NJ."

To which Krawitz responded. "Hope.You. Get. Raped. By. A. Syrian. Refugee. :)

You can see the obvious problem here.   Not a nice guy.  Not somebody who would get a lot of votes for the West Deptford Township Committee. Or any other office.

I'm also curious about his style. Every word is followed by a period. And he ends his hate sentences with a smile emoticon. Like the little smile makes the nastiness go away or something?

Definitely some issues here.

Krawitz apparently said his Facebook account got hacked the day his messages appeared so it wasn't him. With that, Nuzzi produced another Facebook love note she received from Krawitz back on August 10:

"Hows. The. Gun. Crime. In. Democrat. Chicago. Olivia. You. Ugly. Stupid. Cunt. :)

Again with the periods after every word and the smiley emoticon!

Nuzzi said she's been harassed by Krawitz since 2014. And as a female reporter, she always gets totally misogynistic comments from guys - mostly on the far right of the political spectrum, who don't like her work.

I guess they can't criticize the quality and accuracy of Nuzzi's reporting because it's solid, so their onl recourse is to call her every horrible name in the book. That accomplishes a lot!

In a statement before Krawitz withdrew his candidacy, Nuzzi said she trusted the voters of West Deptford Township to make the right election decision.

And Nuzzi said this:

"As a reporter, bullying of this kind from would-be politicians makes you fear for your First Amendment rights. As an American and a woman, it makes you fear for the state of our country and the safety of half the population that inhabits it."

She's got a great point: We can laugh at the stupidity and awfulness of Krawitz. But the legions of Internet trolls and such out there like Krawitz really do degrade this nation.

Krawitz is no longer running for office and has crawled back under his rock.  So that's good. I just wish the rest of the trolls out there would crawl under rocks and go away, too. But there's so many trolls, I don't think there's enough rocks out there for them.

Dogs Not Allowed At New Jersey Dog Park

Up until a few days ago, dogs were not allowed
at a new dog park in Pompton Lakes, New Jersey.  

The community of Pompton Lakes, New Jersey finally has a new dog park where pups and their owners could run and play and fetch balls and such.

Or maybe not.

The dog park is built and ready to be used, but dogs are not allowed in, thanks to quirks in the town's ordinances.

The dog park is within the larger Hershfield Park, and nobody realized until after the dog park was built that dogs aren't allowed in Hershfield Park, according to NorthJersey.com

The only way to get to the dog park is to go through Hershfield Park, so unless you drop dogs from helicopters into the dog park, Fido can't go to said park.

Pompton Lakes is going to have to change its town bylaws, so that you can take a dog on a leash through Hershfield Park, then led the pups run free once their inside the dog park

But for now, technically, at least, no dogs are allowed in the dog park.  But the town has gotten rid of the "No Dogs  Allowed" signs and Pompton Lakes cops are now looking the other way when dogs enter the park on a leash.

Apparently, Turkeys REALLY Hate Letter Carriers

Apparently, wild turkeys DO NOT like letter carriers,
as an incident this past week in New Jersey proved. 

In New Jersey this week, a letter carrier was held hostage in his U.S. Postal Service vehicle but was eventually rescued.

Police quickly responded and resolved the hostage drama, with no injuries to the letter carrier.

The suspects in the crime were not thugs out to steal mail, checks or the letter carrier's wallet. They were wild turkeys, CBS 2 New York reported. The letter carrier's dspatcher called the cops.

The police responded the the letter carrier's position: They blasted the police sirens, which scattered the turkeys. The letter carrier was still nervous afterward.

"He was concerned that once we left they were going to go back after him," police told CBS 2. "I don't know if he's had a run-in with these turkeys before."

I wouldn't be surprised if he did. YouTube is rife with videos of turkeys attacking letter carriers. I get turkeys don't like the mail geting through.

The New York Times reports that wild turkeys were re-introduced in New Jersey in the `1970s and now there's someting like 25,000 of them. Sometimes they do end up attacking people, which is a bit scary.  New Jersey passed a law banning people from feeding them, as they don't want the turkeys in residential neighborhoods.

All this makes me nervous. Sometimes, flocks of wild turkeys visit my yard in northwestern Vermont. So far, they've been quite peaceful, and take off if I approach them. They're certainly more scare of me than I am of them.

I guess I just better not wear clothes that look like those of a letter carrier and dammit, I sure won't hold envelopes in my hands outside if I see turkeys in my yard.

Bears Make The Most Of A Hot Suburban Afternoon

A family of bears enjoys a refreshing dip in a New Jersey
pool on a recent hot afternoon. Video of
this scene has gone viral  

If you live in the suburbs, what better way to spend a hot afternoon to play out in the pool. You know, mom, the kids all splashing around having a good time.

So it was in Rockaway Township, New Jersey recently, when a a family did just that. Of course, it was a family of bears, not humans that were splashing around the backyard pool.

The Basso family, who normally plays in the pool, huddled inside and filmed the spectacle.

The fun part about the bears on video is how much they are just like a regular human family playing around the pool, the toys and the swingset.

One of the young Basso kids is distraught at one point and starts to cry as they watch from their window. ""They took my floaty!" the crying girl says. Those selfish bears! They should share the toys.

Mrs. Basso assures the kid that she will buy her daughter another floaty.

The bears obviously causes some damage to the pool and toys, as the yard was designed for humans, not bears, but the Basso family said the harm was not great and that the bears were pretty good houseguests.

The video below is 11 minutes long but worth the entire time. The Bassos said the bears were in the back yard for almost an hour.

The video has naturally gone viral and has been featured on many MSM news programs. But I can't resist sharing it here, too:

Extremely Scary House Gas Explosion Caught On Police Dash Cam

Aftermath of the dramatic explosion in New Jersey.  

Today in New Jersey, a house exploded into smithereens due to a gas explosion.

Crews were on the scene in Stafford Township, New Jersey this morning, looking for the source of a gas leak when the explosion occurred, reports NJ.com. 

Nobody was in the house, which was under renovation, but gas company employees, police and fire officials were at the scene when the blast happened, says NJ. com.

Fifteen people were hurt, and two are in critical condition.

Obviously, the house was destroyed. Two houses on either side of the explosion are so badly damaged that they are at least temporarily uninhabitable. Other houses suffered lesser damage.

A police cruiser dash cam captured the explosion. My, gawd, how violent. This is really, really scary:

Stupid Ingenuity Department: Guys Try To Use Severe Cold Snap To Cover Up DWI

Police in New Jersey said this guy figured if he
froze water on frigid pavement where he had
a car crash, he could blame the problem
on icy roads and not that he had been drinking.
Nice try, but nope. 

Police in Sparta, New Jersey have accused a guy named Brian Byers, 20 of drunken driving.

What makes this case interesting is how Byers and his buddy, Alexander Zambenedetti, 20, tried to get out of trouble, according to the Daily Record newspaper of Parsippany, New Jersey.  

Police in the town said they found Byers and Zambenedetti near an intersection very early Sunday morning while the temperature was 1 degree above zero and the wind chill made it feel like it was 15 below.  

Zambenedetti was shirtless, which is a bit odd considering the weather. He explained to police he had fallen in the snow and gotten his shirt wet.

I know, that still doesn't make sense, but oh well.

It turned out Byers had earier crossed through the intersection and hit a guard rail on the other side of the road, the Daily Record said. He then fled, driving his damaged car to his home less than a mile away.

Later, police told the Daily Record, Zambenedetti drove his own car back with Byers to scene of the crash with two five gallon buckets full of water in the car.

Why? So they could pour water over the intersection, which would freeze and make the road dangerous. That way, Byers could tell police the crash was caused by very icy road conditions, not that he maybe had a few drinks.

Well, that's one way of trying to turn unpleasant winter weather to your advantage. "It's not my fault, officer. Old Man Winter is screwing around with us. Look at how dangerous this icy road is."

Police said the pair might have made several trips to dump water on the road. The town had to send a Department of Public Works truck to the intersection to dump half a ton of salt on the ice the two guys left behind. So they must have used quite a bit of water.

The Daily Record said police saw through the guys' icy ruse. Both were charged with driving while intoxicated. And being stupid.

Persistence: Guy Robs Store, Imprisoned 15 Years, Gets Out, Robs Same Store

When I was a kid, teachers kept telling me, "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again."

Christopher Miller, unsuccessful
twice now at robbing the
same N.J. shoe store.  

What they didn't tell me was if the very idea of trying something the first time is really dumb, then don't try, try again.

But I figured that out on my own.

But apparently Christopher Miller, now 40, didn't.

According to the New York Post, Miller robbed the Toms River Stride Rite shoe store in New Jersey in 1999. He was caught and went to prison for 15 years.

He got out recently, and there he was almost immediately, robbing the Toms River Stride Rite shoe store.

Says the Post:

"The manager of the Toms River Stride Rite, who happened to be on duty in 1999, thought she had deja vu when she saw Miller walk through the door again on Saturday.

"I knew who he was right away," said the 43-year-old worker. "I just think (he came back) because he didn't get anything the last time."

This time, Miller DID manage to snag  $389 in the robbery, but was caught with the loot a short time later.

As for a motive, the best we can come up with is this theory by anonymous New Jersey Corrections officials in the Post article:

"This guy is either really stupid or he just really likes it in jail." 

Would You Buy Cheese Along the New Jersey Turnpike?

There's been a fair amount of media attention in the past week about the guy who allegedly stole 21 tons of Muenster cheese from Wisconsin and tried to sell it at a rest stop along the New Jersey Turnpike.

Veniamin Balika, 34, is accused of trying to fence
21 tons of stolen cheese along the
New Jersey Turnpike.

Yeah, he's in trouble, and New Jersey police have impounded the remaining cheese, but a question remains: How much of the stolen cheese is left? Or more crucially, how many people were stupid enough to buy the cheese?

Most people would think that a guy selling cheese at a rest stop is a bit sketchy, and perhaps the food shouldn't be trusted.

Everybody loves a bargain and I'm sure the accused, Veniamin Balika, 34, was offerintg the cheese at a nice discount. But still.

Even if you knew the cheese was not dangerous, wouldn't the fact that it's being sold at a rest area raise a couple red flags? Most people don't go to rest areas to shop. If I must stop at one, I make sure I do my business, as it were, as quickly as possible, then get out of Dodge.

Apparently, New Jersey health officials will inspect the cheese. If it passes muenster, er, muster, a charity might receive the windfall. Which is fine, because at least someone will have checked the cheese to make sure it won't kill you.

There is hope for the cheese. NorthJersey.com reports the cheese was found in a refrigerated truck at the rest stop, so at least it wasn't left to rot in the spring sunshine.

Hmm. Now I could go for some cheese. There is one rest area on the highway near my home, but, call me crazy.  I think I just might go to a reputable food market instead.