June 13, 2017
Sex trafficking sting nets 12 arrests, Albany County legislature votes down anti-nepotism proposal, Kirsten Gillibrand and the F word
Underage sex trafficking sting
Police say an underage sex trafficking sting operation based in Warren County netted the arrests of 12 men from around the region. The sting involved posting online ads with an undercover police officer posing as the contact person -- they men were arrested when they showed up and agreed to a price. The sting included the Warren County Sheriff's Department, State Police, and FBI. [TU] [Daily Gazette] [Post-Star] [News10]
Trial in the death of Medina Knowles
A prosecution witnessed testified Monday that when he and Raekwon Stover were inmates at the Schenectady County jail, Stover admitted that he had fatally shot Medina Knowles (the witness is set to get a reduced jail term for his testimony). [Daily Gazette]
Albany County anti-nepotism proposal
The Albany County Legislature voted against a proposed resolution that would have imposed stricter rules for the hiring of former officials and the family of county officials to county jobs. [TU]
Ghost tours at The Mount
The Mount -- Edith Wharton's home in Lenox -- has a series of ghost tours on Wednesdays this summer. Blurbage:
Creaking floors, slamming doors, and ghostly footsteps...The Mount's haunted history includes it all! For over a century, The Mount has been home to writers, actors, wealthy families, hardworking servants, and teenage girls. Take a special guided tour of the most haunted parts of the estate to find out who may still call The Mount home. You never know who-or what-might happen to show up!
If anything, it sounds like it could be a fun way to get a tour of the estate. The tours start at 7:30 pm on Wednesdays.
Advance tickets are required -- they're $24 / $20 for kids (not recommended for under 12). And they sell out -- both remaining dates in June are already full.
Lenox is in western Massachusetts, just about an hour's drive from Albany.
photo via The Mount's Facebook page
Lamb sloppy joe at Chez Mike
Sloppy joes were a mainstay in my culinary repertoire growing up -- mainly because you can't burn them.
See, my mother (bless her) went through a period of time when she confused the smoke alarm with the kitchen timer. About the same time, my dad was the volunteer fire chief of our small town, and as a way to live-up to the job, installed 16 smoke alarms in our modestly-sized home that were all connected. When one went off, they all went off. And unless you completely forget that there's meat on the stove (like, go to the grocery store 30 minutes away while dinner is cooking), it's pretty hard to set off that many smoke alarms with sloppy joes.
So when I hear of someone "upgrading" the humble sloppy joe with lamb-sted-beef, I'm all in.
Capped
From the "What other cities are doing about their waterfront highways" file: Here's more about that plan Philadelphia has to cover a section of I-95, creating park space that will connect the city to Delaware River waterfront downtown. That article has a bunch of renderings for the project. [Curbed Philadelphia]
West Fulton Puppet Festival 2017
From the description for The Legend of the Banana Kid: "The Legend of the Banana Kid features 20 of our hand-crafted glove, mouth and rod puppets, and a slew of flying and twirling styrofoam bananas." What other sort of bananas would you ever want?
The West Fulton Puppet Festival returns to its eponymous hamlet in Schoharie County July 7-8. Now in its third year, the festival includes performances of all sorts of puppetry. Some condensed blurbage:
The 2017 West Fulton Puppet Festival will feature work suitable for the whole family by puppetry artists, and one circus performer, from New York, Maine and Florida, playing in rotation throughout the two-day Festival. The lineup includes Double Image Theater Lab's I Laid an Egg, join Margot and her imaginary friend, Egg, as they take us on a surprising journey into the wonderful world of make-believe ... Morgan Kelly's Island Turtle, explore the coastal ecosystems through the eyes of a child and includes a post-show workshop ... Seano Presents: Shakespeare's Clowns! performed by former Ringling Bros. Barnum & Bailey circus clown Sean Fagan, it's part poetry, puppetry, parade, and play ... and the award-winning Frogtown Mountain Puppeteers, who ride into town with their wild west cowboy adventure The Legend of the Banana Kid ... Andy Gaukel's Schweinehund--a live puppetry and animation piece inspired by the life of Nazi concentration camp survivor, Pierre Seel--will round-out the Festival with a special presentation for adult audiences only ...
The Festival takes place in and around West Fulton Park, and utilizes The Hall at Panther Creek Arts, plus non-traditional performance spaces, including nearby barns, the Historic Schoolhouse, and a circus tent.
Here's the schedule of events. Admission for the puppet performances is free, but tickets are required. They're available on site the day of, starting with the beginning of each day.
West Fulton is a hamlet in the town of Fulton -- it's pretty much right in the center of Schoharie County, just about an hour from Albany.
Following the many paths in Saratoga County
A clip from the map we rolled use the new data.
Check it out: Saratoga PLAN has released a new set of info about the many recreational trails and paths in Saratoga County. Blurbage:
Saratoga County boasts over 280 miles of recreation trails - with new trails added or improved each season. Saratoga PLAN is the keeper of a countywide trails dataset, which was originally compiled in 2011 and was updated during 2016-2017. The updates were made possible due to a network of tireless volunteers, important partners, and two skilled interns, Amy Marshall and Abigail Larkin. ...
Knowing the location, condition, and allowable uses on a given trail is imperative for recreation planning by everyone from the casual or serious user to local and countywide planners. Saratoga county is known for its trail diversity, including the urban Saratoga Greenbelt Trail, the historic Champlain Canalway trail, the nature trails of Moreau Lake State Park, and the more local loops offering enjoyable outdoor experiences in Saratoga PLAN's Coldbrook and Ballston Creek Preserves. Eventually, as new trails are developed, such as at Corinth Reservoir Recreation area, Anchor Diamond Park, or around Lake Bonita in Moreau Lake State Park, they will be mapped and added to the countywide trails dataset.
Saratoga PLAN has made the files available that geographic information systems can use as a sort of recipe to make maps of the trails. You can use an application like Google Earth to view them.
We downloaded info and rolled a map for easy viewing. Let's have a look...
Today's moment of summer
After being cast aside for margarine cups for so many years, the buttercups felt vindicated when the tide of popular opinion turned back against the imitators.
By the way: Though pretty look at, buttercups and their related flowers are toxic to both humans and animals if eaten.
... said KGB about Drawing: What's something that brought you joy this year?