Blast from the Past: Remember the DC Sniper?

A Very True Reminisce of Grandmother's Life Told in Snippets and Smiles

Blast from the Past: Remember the DC Sniper?

It’s imperative upon me to explain a few things before yon reader continues on.

First, the essay below was written by me truly right during the height of the DC Sniper mania.

At the time, hand to God, I was manager of a shopping center in Prince Georges County Merryland. At the time I actually LIVED in Merryland!

During the read here’s hoping that the point of view presented brings perhaps a smile or a jarring memory of the event.

Which brings me to a final point. This is why I create this Blog for my Granddaughter. Because as you read below yon reader will experience that same feeling of deja-vu at this first person account of the event as it was actually occurring as a future Kaitlyn Mae will experience while reading of events of this era.

For instance, yon reader is going to love my preliminary conclusions about the identity of the sniper, not yet known at the time of the writing. I was as wrong about it as the DC cops! I was on the mark about Merryland’s Gubernatorial candidates, however. Read it and smile.

At the time of the writing, I was author of a daily email newsgroup called “The Daily Musings”. It’s a Yahoo group used now mostly to promote my Blog postings. Before that I had my own email list that I maintained by hand and also sent out daily musings.

I’ve got a whole slew of these retrospectives is what I’m saying here. Including my writings after 9/11, the 2000 elections, some pop culture missives, a bunch of good stuff. This is the first I present.

I’ve been Blogging all my life. Before Dan Rather, the activity didn’t have a name. I did call myself an “Internet Writer” for want of a better term. Well now weird ones like me have an official job title.

Forthwith:
===============

10/15/2002

Sniper Mania

Greetings from Sniper Alley, Merryland.

My much needed vacation from writing, work and all things domestic did not serve as well as I would have preferred to rejuvenate my mind, body and psyche. This is not because such as ignoring deadlines for the editors, meals for the husband and times to report to the job, hasn’t happened these past two weeks. It’s just that when Pat decides to mentally remove herself from it all in preparation for the coming elections and holidays, some crazed sniper decides to attack the region as I fill my gas tank while crouching behind the car.

It’s tense here, folks. Very tense. For while the odds of taking a bullet from this nut are decidedly slim, the notion of possibly taking a bullet in the head, no matter the odds, takes some of the joy out of life, if you get my drift.

Law Enforcement tells us to live our lives per normal so thus I begin this column anew. Let’s get this silly sniper news out of the way then continue on to such as politics, gardens, life musings and poking fun in general at all things liberal.

The sniper has been hitting in an area of Merryland that yon editress generally does not frequent. He's been hitting in Merryland’s Prince Georges and Montgomery county, counties some 35 to 40 miles to the north of Critter Cove. Yon editress does help to manage a shopping center solidly in sniper territory and on occasion does have to go on-site. Since the sniper attacks I’ve not had to be on-site but when time comes that job duties require, I think I’ll avoid that casual smoke on a bench or that café latte on the terrace of Starbucks. My movements shall assume a zig-zag motion to avoid being target in nearby rifle scopes.

As for just who the sniper is, I think there’s a 75% chance he’s a lone white male nut type, former military or police officer, and a 25% chance he’s a lone terrorist of the mid-eastern type with a greater plan to terrorize the area to complete economic shut down. While all that I’ve read indicates that his targeting ability is not necessarily extraordinary, all the pundits and psycobabblists generally agree he is methodical and quite adept at escaping from the crowded areas he likes to target. Whoever he is, I believe he sets up at an ideal spot, ie a place where he can set up his rifle and wait for a handy target then calmly drive off during that hectic time when victims are ascertained, help obtained and cops finally notified. He’s got almost a 30 minute window of time to get out of there and in most cases 30 minutes is plenty of time to hop onto a nearby expressway and head off to non-detection.

Merryland is one of only two states in this country with required “bullet fingerprinting” yet don’t I see the anti-gun nuts shouting all over the air waves that more gun control is needed, as if this guy ever stood in a line and calmly filled in the reams of paperwork this state requires for any citizen to avail themselves of our second amendment rights to own a gun.

And I’ll tell you all something else. Merryland citizens right now aren’t all that interested in the blow-dried politicians telling us we must give up OUR guns while the sniper gets to keep HIS.

Yet doesn’t the lovely Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Merryland’s current Lieutenant Governor and would-be full-fledged Governor up and craft a campaign ad lambasting her opponent Earlich for voting against some ridiculous gun control law or other? The woman is taking advantage of our deaths for her own political purpose is what I’m saying here and moi predicts….NOT GONNA WORK. But hey, I can’t stand the woman at any rate and it’s rather fun to watch her dig her own grave.

Go on, walk up to any Merryland citizen, anybody, and suggest that it’s now time for more gun control laws in this state where one must already give up their firstborn for the honor. They’ll be no gentle nod of agreement, trust me. Merryland citizens are liberal fools but with bullets being aimed at them daily they’re not taking kindly that the politicians think their best protection is to further restrict THEIR access to a gun. Not many of us think the sniper followed Merryland’s restrictive gun control laws at any rate and see no reason to implement more laws that aren’t being followed anyway.

And here’s another factoid currently floating under the radar. Merryland has a death penalty but there’s been a moratorium put upon it by the very honest Governor Paris Glendenning for a study awarded to the University of Merryland that he may be a chancellor in his post-governorship years at that institution. In other words, if Merryland gets this guy, he will NOT be put to death. Let’s hope Virginia gets the guy.

Said Governor Paris Spendenning gets upon our TV screens, imploring the sniper to turn himself in and calling him a coward. Last week the diminutive lesbian Barbara Mikulski and the coifed Paul Sarbanes, Merryland’s senators who both voted AGAINST the Iraq resolution last week, showed up on our screens for face time and no other purpose.

They all make me sick. Even the rest of Merryland’s citizens have been decidedly underwhelmed by the politicians they suddenly realize they’ve elected and what losers they are.

Actually this is a possibly good thing. The citizens of this liberal hell suddenly realize the awful people representing them. They’re also seeing the next awful one coming down the pike, Mrs. Kennedy, Kennedy, Kennedy (why say her other names when THIS is the one she wants us to hear). Who could not resist, as I stated earlier, a campaign commercial to exhort for even more meaningless gun control laws.

They do nothing but primp even as Merryland citizens regard them warily. Makes one almost optimistic that the voting booths will speak. The voting booths, should the dead not vote in Baltimore as they do every year, will speak and the voting booths will say loud and clear….Merryland deserves better than this.
=======