Aaron Landry

Monthly Archives May 2007

Lost Cat

Lost Cat, originally uploaded by s4xton.

"A family with a broken heart till she comes home."

Dave and I noticed this sign last weekend across the street from my house. Since, he’s had a couple similar cats show up to meow at him. He’s called the number and they’re not a match. I also saw a gray cat yesterday run across the street in front of my car, sit down and meow at me but I don’t think it was it either.

I haven’t usually taken these kinds of signs with that much thought but it is posted right across the street and I keep thinking of what I would do if I lost Nadia.

¶ Posted 23 May 2007 § Cats § Minneapolis ‡ Comments (7) ° Tagged: cat, longfellow, lost cat, sign

Links

Links, originally uploaded by s4xton.

I normally don’t shell out links in my posts but there’s some cool new stuff from some friends in the last couple months that I think should be shared:

David Loomer started Twin Cities Live, a video podcast where he goes to a ton of shows (which isn’t anything new), tapes them with a cheap camera and posts the best bits. If you missed Andrew Bird last weekend, check out “Why?” Such a great night that was. The site is very happy with your RSS reader or iTunes too. He hits good shows.

Taylor Carik has been, under the radar, running a new site with no name, no about page, no navigation, no comments and really nothing except for the generous sharing of what he sees and reads while he has his finger on the pulse of Minneapolis and Saint Paul. If you don’t read many local blogs and don’t plan to read a ton of them, this is the one local blog you need. If you’re still reading MNspeak, you might as well switch to Taylor Carik’s new site.

If you need your staple of the Bartel Cartel after you stopped reading MNspeak, Cristina Córdova (of Chasing Windmills fame) has been the editor of The Rake’s Secrets of the Day for a couple months now and has become a regular morning read for me and serves as one of my primary “what’s going on today?” feeds.

Tricia Foo-Ying, who runs the humorously long Minnesota List started a new ambitious project where she interviews Rhode Scholars. I can’t wait to see how this pans out.

Although the next two aren’t friends, they’re worth mentioning…

reviewsby.us is starting to come of age and is apparently getting a redesign from the folks at timeforcake. There’s a ton of restaurant review sites around for users to publish their own reviews, but reviewsby.us is run by locals here in Minneapolis and you can even review specifics of the menu. Their back-end is there; it’ll be cool when they get their design and UI cleaned up.

Merlins Rest is my new neighbor a couple blocks away on 36th and East Lake. They opened a couple weeks ago. As far as I’m concerned, it’s pretty much the same crowd that came from Molly Quinn’s Irish Pub and then hung out at the Lake Street Garage for a bit. They serve some good pints. A major upgrade from the dive that was there before.

¶ Posted 15 May 2007 § Minneapolis ‡ Comments (6) ° Tagged: lake street

Letter from the USDA - APHIS

Letter from the USDA - APHIS, originally uploaded by s4xton.

About a year ago, I found a link to a SuperWeed 1.0. I contacted them once to see what they’d reply with and I never heard anything back. I soon forgot about it.

On November 27, 2006, an envelope from the UK showed up. There was no return address. All it contained was a package containing some seeds and a piece of paper indicating that it was “SuperWeed 1.0″ and a blurb about it. It took me awhile to remember what this was about. I figured it was a joke and that I wasn’t actually possessing a “genetic weapon” and posted it on my website. I never did anything with the seeds.

On December 22, 2006, I got a call from a special agent with the USDA after he showed up at my house and talked with roommate Allen. I agreed to meet with him in my front porch. He arrived with an FBI agent specializing in bioterrorism and another guy from the USDA. I didn’t know what it was about until they showed me a printout of the SuperWeed 1.0 post from my site. I guess it wasn’t a joke. I fully complied with them, answered a ton of questions and volunteered the SuperWeed 1.0 package which they took and photographed.

On February 28, 2007, a new investigator with the USDA called me at work and asked to meet with me. In a half hour, her and that other guy from the USDA I met previously showed up at my office. I was told that the FBI investigation was over and at this point the USDA was investigating my situation.

Today I picked up a letter sent certified mail stating that I am asked to pay a civil penalty of $250 to settle the matter. The settlement agreement points to 7 CFR §319.37(a) and 7 CFR §351.3.

If I pay the penalty I neither admit nor deny the violations and I waive my right to a hearing. If I do not pay the penalty, a complaint will be issued charging me with the violations and seeking higher penalties.

It’s like, “we could to try to screw you over for this, but if you pay 250 bucks we’ll call it a deal.”

Moral of the story: It’s not always smart to contact people on the internet that are suspicious and if you get a strange package in the mail, report it. (Especially if you blog about it!)

If you’re curious, they tested the seeds and they were identified as: Brassica napus, Capsella bursa-pastoris, Raphanus rahanistrum, Galium sp., and Chenopodium sp.