Welcome to Thursday, which, during the holiday season, is basically just the laid-back Happy Hour that precedes the weekend's All You Can Drink specials. Pace yourself, and make sure you order some apps so you'll have something in your stomach — the deviled crab potstickers and kale-and-pancetta stuffed mushrooms are 2-for-1 until 7.
Yesterday's school disruption news comes from Highlands County, where a 29-year-old man was arrested and charged with faxing bomb threats to not one, but two area high schools. Still no word on why in the world a 29-year-old man would fax bomb threats to two area high schools. Maybe he was just hoping someone would write the most confusing and incongruous sentence about a high school bomb threat ever; in that case, achievement unlocked.
Two Pinellas County deputies were suspended for violations of department policy in the wake of an investigation into an arrest caught on dash cam video that the suspect's attorney claims clearly shows use of excessive force. The deputies were not suspended for use of excessive force; one is being punished for the unsafe way he approached and engaged the suspect from behind, the other for intentionally turning off his dash cam's audio — which the officer testified he has a habit of doing and which is not at all troubling or something he should maybe immediately be fired for after admitting he does it all the time. Also, a mute button on a cop car's dash cam probably shouldn't be a thing.
And finally, a Hernando County commissioner donated an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle as the top prize for a local Toys for Tots raffle, and doesn't understand why some people might think that was inappropriate, or at the very least staggeringly tone deaf. Hey, did you donate anything? At least this guy took a shot…
This article appears in Dec 14-21, 2017.