This is what the view looked like outside my window yesterday.
And this morning,
Here’s another one of the car. Good thing I’m not going anywhere this morning.
I spoke to someone who lives about 20 minutes away and they didn’t get any snow. The big difference is that we live on a mountain, in fact, from the end of my road, I can look down on the top of a sky slope across the valley.
A recent article in the New York Times discusses the allure of weekend homes in our two counties for city dwellers who love to garden. The article’s author, Stephen Orr, spoke to residents from both Columbia and Dutchess Counties for the piece.
You can read the article now by clicking here.
It appears as if a classic e-mail scam has received a local twist. Residents of Dutchess County have been subjected to an email scam in which residents have been receiving an email that states they are going to be murdered unless they send money to the scammer’s account.
If you receive an email like this, call your local police department.
I try to keep things light around here but I think it’s important that the following story from Reuters is shared.
U.S. toll in Iraq hits 4,000 as four soldiers killed
By Ross Colvin
BAGHDAD (Reuters) – The death toll of U.S. soldiers in Iraq reached 4,000 on Monday, days after the fifth anniversary of a war that President George W. Bush says the United States is on track to win.
The U.S. military said four soldiers were killed on Sunday when a roadside bomb, the biggest killer of American soldiers in Iraq, exploded near their vehicle in southern Baghdad.
One soldier was wounded in the attack, which brought the number of U.S. military deaths to 4,000 since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
The deaths came on a day when the U.S.-protected “Green Zone”, the government and diplomatic compound in central Baghdad, was hit by repeated rocket and mortar fire, part of an upsurge in violence in the capital and elsewhere.
Sunday’s violence, in which dozens were killed, underscored the fragility of Iraq’s security. There has been an increase in attacks since January, although U.S. military commanders say overall levels of violence are down 60 percent since last June.
What impact the 4,000 milestone will have on a war-weary American public and the U.S. presidential campaign will be hard to assess in the short term, but war critics are likely to seize on it to boost their case for U.S. troops to be withdrawn.
“You regret every casualty, every loss,” U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney said during a visit to Jerusalem. “It may have a psychological effect on the public, but it’s a tragedy that we live in a kind of world where that happens.”
The U.S. military dismisses such tolls as arbitrary markers.
I don’t like to talk politics here but, as a New Yorker, I just can’t let Spitzer’s bombshell announcement yesterday go without mention. In case you haven’t heard what that announcement was, NY governor, Eliot Spitzer, admitted to being involved in a high-price prostitution ring. Personally, I’m not bothered by the fact that he was visiting a lady of the evening. I always thought he looked a bit sleazy and figured he was probably up to far worse than hookers. What shocks me is how stupid he must be to think that the governor of New York would be able to get away with flying a prostitute from NY to Washington DC for a $4000 “date”. I’m not implying that Spitzer or any other political figure should be expected to live their lives with greater morality than any other citizen – but, don’t choose a career of public service and public scrutiny if your private life is filled with secrets.
Columbia County Current 