Before shifting from Weekday Mode (also known as Auto Pilot) into Weekend Mode (also known as The Ides of Tequila), please take a moment to settle into Hindsight Mode (also known as Killing Some Time At Work Online). Think of it as a Transition Mode (also known as Anytime After Lunch).
In wow-that-was-quick news, regionally famous law firm Morgan and Morgan has filed a class action suit against Mosaic over its radioactive swimmin' hole. Blinky, the three-eyed fish from The Simpsons, tries not to look at his phone every five minutes.
So why did Bay area traffic suck yesterday? Let's see. Ah, yes — a U.S. Border Patrol stop on I-75 in which multiple passengers fled the stopped minivan, and a driver on I-275 who was Baker Acted after exhibiting paranoid behavior and claiming there was a bomb in the car. You know what? At least both of those incidents are more valid than "slowing down while passing a fender-bender hoping to see a dead body."
A Tampa man was arrested and charged in Polk County with lying under oath and fabricating his credentials as an expert witness in cases of child porn and sex abuse. He may have lied in more trials in neighboring counties, but authorities have to figure out if he was actually a witness in those trials. or just lying about that, too. Cue the Law & Order: SVU episode in 4, 3, 2…
And finally, Sarasota law enforcement officers and emergency medical responders made a public plea for people to stop using heroin and fentanyl amid an "epidemic" of overdoses. "I just don't know how we got here," said somebody, studiously ignoring the very, very obvious path — from ignoring the social roots of drug use and criminalizing addiction to the War on Drugs and overprescription of opioids — that got us here.
This article appears in Sep 22-29, 2016.