...to a 40-year-old love letter last night. Sweet potato Kept it too long. Shriveled scabby skin. So I peel it, down deep. Pale flesh inside, not orange. Is it OK to eat?
Search engine Yields ag-school info. Found a yam variety named "Vardaman". Whoa.
English major Went to my shelf, retrieved Faulkner. Yep. Vardaman character in As I Lay Dying. The letter Tucked inside the front cover. From a lover, posted 40 years ago this week. He's in New Haven, then; I'm in Austin.
Six months earlier I'd met my future husband, for better, for worse, in Austin.
Jim's letter spoke passionately of life and death, meaning and purpose--concerns felt keenly by brilliant youth. He sensed I'd said goodbye.
He wrote, "Your letter read like a tickertape from a news service as I just read it again for the tenth time--not so warm & human and loving as it was the first several times. It seemed very distant & cold this time--maybe that's me..."
Oh no, dear boy. It wasn't you.
It was I, delivering what you sensed. Distancing myself. Hedging my bet. Hoping the new boy would be the man in my life. He was, and now he's passed away.
Wonder what I wrote you then. Wonder where you are now.
Yesterday's top story in my local rag (Fort Worth Star-Telegram)--Texas ranks last in health care and education. Ya think? Uhhm, yup. See today's story:
Burleson’s Taylor Elementary School was briefly evacuated Wednesday morning when a toilet paper roll was set on fire in a restroom at about 8:30 a.m.
Emergency personnel responded and put out the fire, which melted the plastic housing around the toilet paper holder and created a large amount of smoke.
The school is at 400 NE Alsbury Blvd.
Campus administrators decided to relocate 13 classrooms to temporary buildings so maintenance staff could clean and air out the affected area.
WAR. We broke the 4-minute million. As in dollars. I clocked it twice. About every 3:56 minutes we waste $1,000,000 on war. At 4pm CDT today we'd squandered $908,653,700,000 in 8 years of war Stop the killing, start the healing!
'''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' HEALTH. $484,000,000,000 in estimated benefit payments for 2009 Medicare . (from the July-Aug 2009 issue, AARP bulletin,pg 9)
Can't afford both now. Shall we keep on killing people 8 time zones away? Or shall we take care of the elders who took care of us, right here?
In naming its new center for international students after former Vice President Dick Cheney, the University of Wyoming made a mockery of itself.
Yesterday the Cheneys went to Laramie to dedicate the Cheney International Center at UW, an educational monument whose namesake embodies rapacious wanton evil.
Ex-Veep Dick and cohorts Bush and Rumsfeld are war criminals whose legacy includes heinous acts of torture, gross violations of international law and the widespread suppression of civil rights that defined the Bush era. Will UW be naming its new business school Bernie Madoff Hall? '''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''''' At least there were protests.
LARAMIE -- The Cheney International Center became part of the University of Wyoming campus Thursday over the objections of protesters who carried signs in opposition. . . .
(Really I feel their pain, the folks who protested this travesty at the U of Wyoming. I live 30 miles away from W's new home town.)
Milton Whitley displays his Twisted Yam on a Stick — a fried, spiral-cut sweet potato on a 13-inch skewer. S-T/Max Faulkner
The Texas state fair is on, and the winners of the wretched-excess-in-fried-food contest hit the paper yesterday. Yeah, it's gross. Deep Fried Butter proved a strong contender, winning 'Most Creative' but losing to top winner Fernie's Deep Fried Peaches and Cream. Read the whole story and look at the pix.
S-T/Max Faulkner
Gary Duddleston samples Fernie’s Deep Fried Peaches and Cream during judging for the Big Tex Choice Awards. S-T/Max Faulkner
I could not figure out what one of the finalist's dishes was about, only hearing the name on TV. Twisted Yam on a Stick. Then I saw Max Faulkner's photo in the Star-Telegram yesterday. Oh, Milton, you are my hero.
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
A local story from the Saturday Sept 5, 2009 Fort Worth Star-Telegram. The paper had a picture not shown in the link. From the cutline: Hundreds of statues of Pak, the monk who brought Buddhism to southeast Asia from India, melted in the fire...
Little statues of the monk sitting in the lotus position, hands folded, all charred and melted. Very sad. I hope they restore the temple quickly.
FORT WORTH — Wat Lao Thepnimith looks like a postcard from Southeast Asia planted in a suburban patch of houses nestled in northwest Fort Worth.
The Buddhist campus is the heart of a Lao-American Buddhist community that began resettling in North Texas in the mid-1970s. Many of the estimated 11,000 members are refugees of Communism who fled after the Vietnam War — a conflict in which many Lao were allies of the United States.
On Aug. 24, a fire destroyed the campus temple, the Sim Building. Rebuilding is the only option for a structure described as a labor of love. "We are really so, so sad," monk Kommana Vongphakdy said. [more...]
They started out like so many faith communities as a house church, in a trailer. I feel a kinship for this, as it mirrors the origins of Quakerism. Small groups worshiping anywhere they could. Today Buddhists and Quakers both turn inward to listen to the "still small voice" speaking to us, in our worship, in their meditation.
Outwardly quite different, as we have no temples or rituals (in my form of Quakerism), and temple and symbols are quite important to these Buddhists--gold tiles and mirrors of Lao architecture. And the little statues, thank-you gifts "given to people who donate to or volunteer with their Buddhist community."
Ten years ago there was a rash of church fires nationally, and here in Texas. Quaker workcamps were organized to help some of them rebuild. Perhaps they can help again.
1. El estúpido. This belongs in the dictionary to illustrate "racial profiling", starring los pendejos del Servicio Forestal.
Ya know how the Forest Service wants us to be their eyes and ears and nose out in the forest? It's the Smokey Bear* thing, "Only you can prevent forest fires." Good deal. My family has a house in a national forest, and I always appreciate watchfulness. But not this kind.
DENVER (AP) — A federal warning to beware of campers in national forests who eat tortillas, drink Tecate beer and play Spanish music because they could be armed marijuana growers is racial profiling, an advocate for Hispanic rights said Friday. . . .
. . . The U.S. Forest Service quickly retracted the warning. . .
. . . Michael Skinner, a law enforcement officer with the U.S. Forest Service in Colorado, said warning signs of possible drug trafficking include "tortilla packaging, beer cans, Spam, Tuna, Tecate beer cans," and campers who play Spanish music. He said the warning includes people speaking Spanish. . . . [and] this may or may not represent criminal activity, but are indicators, and he urged any campers who encounter long-term campers meeting the profile to "hike out quickly" and call police.
OK. So now Smokey says, "Only you can become a brownshirt." And indulge yourself in racist paranoia and rat out your brown brothers (can I get an 'amen' for the brown-brown irony there?), the ones that you find in the forest.
You know, the ones saying, "Guey, más espam, por favor." Gimme a break! Sure, the megazillion-dollar-deadly-serious-way-too-successful drug cartels are going to stash a couple campesinos on a Colorado mountain. With a case of Spam, some cervezas and a copy of Jerry Garcia's wife's book.
Oh yeah, and a boom box to play their reggaeton music. Real loud.
(note: click on the book, then click 'Quick American Archives', see a big list of books of related topics. Far out, man.)
Excuse me, but I think you can probably grow pot anywhere from Vail to Veracruz, most of which is mountains in Mexico, and the Forest Service wants us to stake out Colorado mountains for them? Huh?
Nope, those drug cartels are way way too organized and industrial for that stuff. They are fatally serious agribusiness with a real lucrative crop.
To catch the people hiding in the forest growing dope, they should be profiling guys named Mountainsong Peace Herb, 50-something, long long grey beard, silly grin, white skin, red eyes. Listening to "Strawberry Fields" on the boombox. Hey, you could follow him back from Burning Man! Whoa. It's happening tonight!!! Y'all should follow everyone home from Burning Man.
2. El horrible. This one from yesterday, on the border where I grew up. This is how the drug cartels work, on a massive scale. Right out in the open, in your face, gun you down. Import weed by the ton. Et cetera.
The brutality of a massacre at Juárez drug rehabilitation center in which 18 people were killed shocked a city already plagued with record-breaking violence.
A motive for the attack was under investigation, but it appeared to be linked to feuding drug trafficking groups.
The sad part:
Chihuahua state public safety secretary Victor Valencia said such drug centers are sometimes fronts for criminal gangs and one narcotics expert said the slayings are unlikely [to] make much of a difference in the overall balance of power in the drug war. [emphasis added]
They lined up 19 "men ranging in age from 17 to 51" against a wall and shot them with AK-47s. It's cartel-on-cartel violence. La Linea vs La Familia. Juarez vs Sinaloa. Some victims may have been Aztecas gang members. They coincidentally run drug-treatment centers. (Did you know we have gang members in the Army? Oh, that's another story.)
Go ahead, read this story of violence in Juarez. Learn that Sinaloa Familia bring religion into their drug gang cult. Click here. Look at the raw video footage from the carnage. No audio, only the street sounds of Juarez at night as gurneys load slowly into ambulances.
Death, big and bloody. It's what's happening on the supply side of our demand for drugs. Think about it, particularly if you use the kind we can't grow domestically. The high-dollar kind that people in Mexico are fighting a war to supply you with. Check into the Betty Ford Center. You probably won't get gunned down there. ------------------------------------------------- *footnote re Smokey: He was a real bear cub found after a fire in the national forest where my family has a home. Marketing made him a legend and made babyboomers aware of fire safety in the wilderness. Smokey is buried at his museum 165 miles north of Juarez in Capitan NM.
Ex-guvvie, bless her, she keeps harping on that death thingy. Lord, the stuff they keep making up about health-care reform!
Here's our death panel in Huntsville. Lie down on it, and we will make you dead. I don't think we should do this. Everybody we put down on this panel is a child of god. Seems wrong for humans to get in the way of god working in a person to redeem her, to redeem him. No matter what he did or she did. When we kill people here, we interrupt god's work in them.
Death is real. It will happen to you. Me. All of us. Be prepared for it, make plans for your death. Seems like a good idea to discuss it with your family, your god, your faith community, your doctor, friends, neighbors, anybody who will listen to you. As you make your choices. Some of us don't get a choice. I watched my 55-year-old husband die of sudden cardiac arrest six days short of getting health-care coverage at his new job. I want EVERYBODY to have HEALTH CARE. No exceptions. Just do it.
From left, head robber-baron henchman Barry T. Smitherman, Chairman Public Utility Commission of Texas (PUC), with commissioners Donna L. Nelson and Kenneth W. Anderson, Jr. Lawyer, lawyer, lawyer. Governor crony? Token woman? Mars inhabitant?
Go ahead, click the links, read their bios.
At left, the more likeable Stooges, although Donna up there seems like a nice woman, from her bio.
Our three Texas stooges are turning our electricity provider Oncor into thugs by rewarding bad behavior. Nutshell situation:
Electric meters mandated for updating. Good idea.
Oncor rushes out and buys some meters. Wrong move.
PUC sets standards for new "smart" meters. Big ooops.
Oncor whines about bad business decision. Suck it up, y'all.
PUC says poor baby wasted money on meters, you need a rate boost. Huh?
When every every thing is trending down, like oh... natural gas prices, consumption of goods, consumption of services, employment, natural gas prices, did I mention those? I meant the natural gas they use to generate electricity. That natural gas. It's cheaper now.
Me, too. When you are a giga-mega-million-dollar utility company you do not get to have buyer's remorse. You do get to fire the buyer, maybe even the whole procurement department. And you do get to suck it up and go on. Take your lumps. Forgo obscene outrageous profits for a few quarters. A few years.
PS. Dear Oncor, If I have a new, wrong meter that needs replacement, let me have it when you remove it. I bet I can sell it somewhere like China or Arkansas and get some of my money back. Do ya think y'all could do the same?
That year, 1969, was my last summer in college, a couple months after I met my future husband. He joined a rock-and-roll band, and they had a house-band gig that summer in Fort Worth. I remember seeing a guy in the parking lot at my apartment complex in Austin shouting up at me, "Hey I'm going to Woodstock!" I wasn't; I was headed to Fort Worth.
We were 20, the perfect age for that Woodstock moment. Fairly innocent, still children, technically. Yes, boys and girls, the voting age was 21 then.
Both of us loved the 1930s era. The fashions, the cars, travel by ship, movies from then. He read Fitzgerald. I enjoyed Hemingway outside of class. That bygone era was so romantic.
Who could imagine feeling that way about our era? Not us at the time. And now it's happened.
So here's a link to a cheesy icon of the era. Tie-dye. A cheesy how-to video that's not really tie-dying. I never wore tie-dye t-shirts back then. Too cheesy. I wear one now for nostalgia, because my son made it at Yearly Meeting 15 years ago.
Lord have mercy! Amazon has a 3-tape set of VHS videos, "Learn How to Tie Dye". At least it's not done by Martha.
Here's a how-to video a girl put up online, 17 minutes. Hope it's good. I'll see it next week when it finishes downloading on dial-up. Waiting for a part for my DSL. Being patient, like Job.
...leads to Baconhenge. You'll see in a minute. I was all ready for some serious blogging today about universal healthcare (we need it, just do it), maybe short congrats to Justice Sotomayor (yay!! she's #111 of the Supremes). But no, instead I'm compelled to share this bit of fluff. Heavy fluff.
Today, first time we got to Ikea early enough for breakfast! Good, cheap, 2 bucks. Scoop of scrambled eggs, fried potato cubes, bacon, French toast sticks. When I got home I went straight to a search engine. Looked up: "french toast sticks" calories
Bad? Sure. Over 100 cal per stick; three sticks on the plate. Ate 'em all. Fat calories? Mostly. Go for amazing nutritional details here and here. If you dare.
Then I looked for "french toast sticks" images. Here's the prize pic.
Baconhenge.
It came from a user on sports blog compendium SB*NATION who goes by mcboomofdoom and has a passion for bacon, Click his link above, scroll down for pic and caption. Plus more bacon stuff. I guessed right. That glop the bacon-wrapped toast-stick pillars arise from is a fritatta. Whatta guy, whatta thing, whatta guy-thing.
"contempt of cop" That's the explanation I heard from a commentator on NPR. The offense is offending a cop. Hurting his or her feelings by not being nice. But since that one's not on the books as a real crime, the cops have to arrest the perp for something else, like disorderly conduct.
On 7/16/09 at 12:44 PM, 58-year-old Henry Gates of 17 Ware St. Cambridge, MA was arrested for Disorderly conduct after exhibiting loud and tumultuous behavior.
I guess it's good to know that the police these days are so sensitive that things like talking back to them in Massachusetts and oooops, maybe even making gestures, scary scary gestures like at the Rainbow Lounge incident, yes, that things like that are so hurtful to the big tough cops, they just have to arrest somebody.
OK, I blame the moms of today. They must not have taught their children well. They must have left out "sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me."
Hmmm. Maybe that could be in the remedial sensitivity training curricula for cops.
My absence from the blogosphere is caused by my struggle with a local issue with wide repercussions in civil rights. The cops and the TABC and the gays and the bar raid here.
It happened a month ago at the Rainbow Lounge in Fort Worth. It was gay bashing. Literally. At almost the same hour as the original riot-provoking raids at the Stonewall Inn 40 years before. Go figure.
I want to rant and rave and blog about it--and the healing that's started in the aftermath. But now the cops in Cambridge are the ones being hit with an ugly stick. They are looking bad ugly, after arresting Henry Louis Gates. Again, both sides probably involved men behaving badly. Both sides. Bad bad behavior.
Let's check the Cambridge cops' website. Nice pix. Nice-looking folks also. Nice badges. Click the photos to go to their webpage. And see the top item on their page--the press release about their peccadillo. At least nobody went to the hospital. This time.
Serving the public as a cop is a horrible difficult dangerous job. I wish we could fully staff the force without attracting the folks who want to be cops for all the worst reasons.
photo: Mark Stehle / AP Kelbin Carolina demonstrates Thursday in front of the Valley Club in Huntingdon Valley, Pa., in response to allegations that the swim club blocked a group of minority children from joining weekly swims at the pool.
Kelbin's sign says it perfectly. Something happened last week--either mispoken/misunderstood comments or outright racism--in Huntingdon PA, at a swimming pool, at a private club, to little children, where people with Jim-Crow attitudes swim.
(I first heard about it Friday at one of my favorite blogs, Hasta Los Gatos Quieren Zapatos. Those hermanas come up with an amazing variety of compelling news, and their own views can make you stop and think.)
A stock photo (?) from their blog illustrates the situation. What's wrong with this picture? NOTHING. Well, nothing to my eye. It looks like the kids on my block playing.
When the hurtful words they heard were how their presence would "change the complexion" of the club, would you want to take your complexion of color back to that same sinkhole of bigots?
Follow the links and read a really good recounting (oh no I didn't say that) of the day's events when Al finally won and ex-Senator Norm Coleman came to accept the agony of defeat.
Jay Weiner chronicles the day's events, to the minute. That's the funny part.
"At 1 p.m., " Minn Supremes give verdict... "By 1:47, " Coleman lackey announces press conference at the now-ex-senator's home for 3pm... "Just past 3 p.m., " Coleman concedes, tells the Gov to sign Franken's election certificate... "As if on cue, at 3:17", the Gov sez he'll do just that... "By 4:20", Franken emerges from his house (above) and accepts graciously.
By 4:20. Oh yeah, "by" heh heh 4:20. Heh heh heh, I'm laughing like Bevis. And Butthead. At 4:20. OK, it's 4:22 where I am.
The pricey convenience-store chain, 7-Eleven, gave a big waaaaaaah today. They whined about the cost of doing business, namely the fee they pay Visa & MasterCard when they make a charge-card sale.
And they want you to sign their petition about those "unfair" fees so they can take it to Congress and show how we want them to fix it for poor lil ol' 7-Eleven. Who do they think they are? MoveOn.org?
Yeah, I'm gonna sign their petition right after I drop in at MoveOn, gas up the car and give 'em 5 bucks for a gallon of milk. Hello, 7-Eleven? You are a CONVENIENCE STORE. You sell overpriced crap and make your price point because you are SELLING CONVENIENCE.
. . . Of the more than 5,700 stores the company operates and franchises in the United States, some 4,200 are franchised. . . .*
A World-Class Organization
At 7-Eleven Our Mission is: To consistently serve the changing needs of customers for their convenience.
Our Vision is: To be the best retailer of convenience.
Those fees aren't "fair" or "unfair", they simply are what they are. Somewhere between say 2% and 5% depending on whom you negotiate with to handle your merchant account.
Those people have to pay their people, come on, dontcha get it 7-Eleven? Convenience ain't cheap. Credit cards are convenient. Uh, what was your vision again?
Go talk to your bean counters, let them 'splain it to you Lucy that it's called a selling expense. That's how I booked it when I owned an import wholesale company.
Oh you gotta read the last one in which they ask themselves if this means they'd lower prices and they can't even say "yes" or "no".
Well, we know the answer is "no". Pity they didn't have the strength or the honesty to say so.
Notes: *that's 1500 stores outta 5700, or 26% owned by corporate D&B estimates 7-Eleven sales at $15,471,100,000 (oh my, that's about the cost of an Iraq-month) Hoover's says the average convenience store grosses $2,000,000 in sales annually 7-Eleven is whining about an average of $28,000 in fees annually Hmm. That's 1.25% of sales. Do you feel their pain yet?
OK, the Independence day holiday came and went. Hope you enjoyed your cookouts and 4th of July fireworks.
The just-say-no-to-Chinese boycott is technically over, but you don't have to stop. Every time you put that Chinese product back on the shelf, you proclaim your independence. Keep it up, please.
Sidebar here: Born or made, nature vs nurture, whatever. Lawyers are not like other mortals. They relish contemplating, then arguing, what are called points of law. They can go on and on forever, even when not on the job. The email thread below proves that.
Back to what's abandoned, and when does something found become something stolen.
The court in Corpus Christi calls this image stolen, and may exclude it as evidence in the trial of state school officials who were running a fight club with mentally disabled youth.
The nutshell story: phone belonged to a former school employee, found at a store by a guy who thought it had music on it, no music but damning videos instead. Almost 20 videos since 2007.
So instead of boosting tunes, he gets videos that two tv stations pass on. (I bet he was trying to sell them.) Phone moves on to a woman who gives it to a cop buddy. And now, since the phone was not abandoned intentionally, its contents are protected. Read the story. It's sad all around. [posted via Google Chrome browser]
Turns out the city thinks recycling materials are of value and therefore stealing from the recycling bins is illegal. After all, they do sell it for money.
The attorneys in the two 'hoods (ours = Mistletoe, south of us = Berkeley) weighed in, plus the councilman's office, for a stunning 6-entry string of emails on this subject.
Reprinted with names redacted, below: (On second thought, since he's an elected public official, I left the councilman's name in.)
-----Original Message----- From: RPM [mailto: ] Sent:Wednesday, July 01, 20096:27 PM To:MistletoeHeights Neighborhood Association Subject: Re: [berkeleybuzz] Re: Garbage Theft
Thanks to T---- D---- for the input she provided.
As noted in the original messages, the issue is not with abandoned "garbage", but with recycling, which are items of value that are not abandoned but presented for transfer to a specific party. The fact that the original message also referred to a grocery sack removed from the trash may have caused this confusion.
The reference to "lazy", while perhaps inartful, was not directed toward the officer's action, but to the advice that was a casual misapplication of reasoning appropriate for one category (trash) to other items (recycling) solely because they might look similar or happen to sit on the curb. This casual assumption that one rationale automatically has wider application is a mistake made occasionally, particularly when legal advice gets relayed from one officer to another. In my experience this usually occurred when a lawyer provided an opinion in one case and then the story spread by word of mouth, sometimes without context or detail.
As one of those lawyers in the past, I share blame for some of those instances. That was the target of the lazy reasoning comment. I'm confidant every FW officer would respond, as this one certainly did, and do his best within the law as he understood it. They don't enjoy ignoring neighborhood intruders any more than residents do. The point here is that he was limited by the advice he was given, and that advice was "lazy reasoning".
More importantly, as noted below, the City of FW has a specific ordinance prohibiting removal from recycling bins. Of course this is not a major offense, but arrest and deterrence are authorized. Similar "recycling" theft ordinances exist in many cities nationwide, based on a brief Google search. These ordinances are obviously necessary to prevent other parties from roaming the streets and emptying recycling carts of the highest value material.
I do not have current access to determine if these ordinances have ever been challenged or altered by any court, but the continued existence of the FW ordinance suggests it remains valid. If T---- or anyone else has other information, that would be welcome.
All of this discussion serves to remind everyone to use shredders or other precautions when disposing of personal papers. However, the need to discourage increased vagrant traffic in the neighborhoods, along with preserving the financial viability of the recycling system, remains the primary issue related to recycling cart "diving".
The following information was provided by Joel Burns' office after their notice of the Berkeley discussion.
Berkeley,
The information below was provided by Joel Burns office after reading the Berkeley email and quizzing city waste folk about whether the officer's info was accurate. There is a specific city ordinance preventing the action observed in Mistletoe. It relates specifically to recycling, because that is material of value.
Garbage is generally fair game because once it hits the curb it will likely be considered abandoned, regardless of the city cart. Loose trash and loose trash bags are clearly fair game for search or removal.
R---- M----
K---- W------
Council Aide to Joel Burns
1000 Throckmorton Street
Fort Worth, Texas
76102
From: M---, K--- A Sent:Wednesday, July 01, 200912:28 PM To: W----, K---- Subject: RE: Garbage Theft
It is not accurate. Our ordinance says –
Sec. 12.5-824. Preparation of recyclables for collection.
(k) A person commits an offense if that person removes or causes the removal of recyclables from a recycling cart that does not belong to that person when that cart is placed for collection.
This was specifically written to prevent “pearl divers” from taking materials out of the recycling carts. There is not anything specific for the garbage.
K---- M----
Assistant Director, Environmental Management Department
I can certainly understand the concern that led to this question, but in 1988 the United States Supreme Court said that a citizen does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in trash, garbage bags, and other refuse placed in a curbside location intended for pick up by the trash collector. California v. Greenwood, 468 US 35 (1988). Therefore, the items are considered abandoned, and there is no standing for a resident to complain of theft of trash items. This “abandoned property” theory is supported by long-standing, well-settled Fourth Amendment case law, both before and after the 1988 case. BTW -- those of us in law enforcement rely on this theory when officers find evidence of a crime in trash. And I am definitely not a defense attorney: I’ve been a prosecutor for more than twenty years. The officer was not being lazy, but was citing correct constitutional law. I hope everyone has a safe holiday weekend.
Hi R---- and all, I do recall an appellate court opinion denying a motion to exclude evidence that the police had taken from the defendant's trash can, sitting out waiting to be picked up. The court reasoned that the owner did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in his trash because he had "abandoned" it (the same word the police used here). I can see a difference between a reasonable expectation of privacy in what's in the can, for 4th amendment purposes, and an ownership interest in the trash, awaiting pick up by the intended transferee, for a theft analysis.
This is a special case because the guy admitted a criminal intent. I think that worthy of a police investigation apart from the question of title to the trash (which could get weird). Personally I'm not too interested in stopping someone from looking in my trash for something they can use, so long as they don't make a mess. I guess I'll have to make sure we shred all our receipts--I've been kind of hit-and-miss about that (though most receipts don't have credit card numbers or bank account numbers on them any more). I do value my privacy and don't want the police searching through my things, even on the curb, nor do I want ID thief's going through it.
A Quaker, politically active. Semiretired now that I got old enough to get survivor's benefits. So now I don't "do", I'm semiretired.
Recently I said this to a friend, "That's so American, to identify our self--our very selves--as the answer to 'what do you do?' Me? I dream, I create, I love, I survive. And I don't worry. blah blah"
tolen. 
