Spring is DEFINATELY here!

And I'm DEFIANTELY loving it! I haven't created or written anything in three days! The weather has just been beautiful, and I've been "porch lounging", trying to chase this little Robin down with my cam, telling DD to "shoosh" so her excited playfulness wouldn't scare her (the Robin) away! It just wasn't Spring until I got a pic of this delightful little creature! The sun has been so warm and bright, it finally did rain a bit lastnight, not that we are in any major shortage of water, we had quite a bit of snow and other precipitation to keep things moist, however Spring Rain is just a whole different type of moisture for all those posies and buds coming out! So glad it rained overnight, and it's looking like a nice day arriving as I type! I tend to venture outside so much more (as I'm sure everyone else does too), I can sit on the porch for hours watching DD play with the neighbor kids, and I have a higher desire to listen to music, so I get those speakers cranking. Technology is awesome, I can stream to Hot 102.1 in Virginia Beach (my old stomping ground!) or I can listen to WPGC 95.5 out of DC or I can hear what's going on out in Lincoln, NE on KIBZ (shout outs to Renie!)

As for creating...I really gotta get my ass in gear! I signed up for Illustration Friday, and yesterday was my first topic sent to me, the topic is SPRING! Amazing, I'm in another swap for Spring too. But as for this Illustration Friday stuff...I believe when signing up for the group, they were suppose to send me a password, which I didn't receive, now I don't know how to login and publish my illustration? I have SO many passwords and User IDs, I try real hard to use the same ones or else I'd be in this confused situation that I now find myself in... Any suggestions for how to fix this? I sent a request email to the link that was sent to me, but it was returned "undeliverable"...short of signing up under another name, don't know what to do!

On a more somber note, we've had a second shooting just this week (story from WNEP News) It's just not normal, our little town is going crazy! We've been dealing with the drug influx for over 22 years now, and that's all become rather "acceptable", we've learned to be a very multi-cultured town, with lots of folks from more urban areas coming to our town to rehabilitate from their drug addictions, and just to have a better, safer living environment for themselves and their children. And for many (influxers), it has worked out well, but it's their family and friends that come to visit the influxers in our town and find that it's also a real good place to sell their drugs at a much higher price, and with all the recovering addicts, they all make real good customers when they relapse. Along with the dealers, have come the gangs, turf wars, and retaliation! I don't know if it's going to be possible to get this under control, there's too much money involved for the gangs. I was real upset with the article in the Williamsport Sun-Gazette, a town meeting was held after the first shooting this week, and it understandably became a "vent session"

As the session neared its end, James looked tired and said he was disappointed. There had been too much”bitching and moaning,” he said, and many of the people didn’t understand the purpose of the meeting.

Well, yeah...DUH! Our city tells us NOTHING about the victims or the suspects, and I can understand that they are protecting their investigation, but no names means we know NOTHING of who is doing this, who we should be watching for so EVERYONE becomes a suspect...thinking "have they caught them, or are they in the next vehicle coming down the street and are we going to get shot in some crossfire?!" Another quote I was very unhappy with:

People come out and get involved for 30 days or so, he said, then when they think everything is all right they drop out. The crime commission volunteers were happy about one thing: A lot of people signed up, maybe as many as 200. But they were concerned about how many would stick with it.

You know, you arrogant bastards! Give the citizens some credit! Why should the citizens do YOUR jobs? What do you want US to do? Go walking and stalking around in the middle of the night, standing our ground on these corners to keep the gun toting dealers off them? Should we go hang out at the bars and report any suspected drug activity? Go sticking our noses all up in this, chasing these people with guns down? We don't have what it takes to protect our neighborhoods except for dead bolt locks on our doors! All we can do is post signs and pray that we aren't next for trying to run them off! One thing I can tell you that I WILL be doing, is calling Children Services the next time I see anymore young children out running their neighborhood after dark with no supervision!