Saturday Mourning

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At about 3:30 Saturday morning, as the rave at Capitol Hill Arts Center (CHAC) was winding down, the young people who lived at 2112 East Republican Street scanned the dance floor for people they could invite to their afterparty. They made a habit of welcoming strangers—it’s how they had all met one another in the first place. They had almost finished with the invitations when Jeremy Martin, 26, spotted a hulking, solitary figure.

“Go ask him,” Jeremy said to his best friend, Anthony Moulton.

Another person who lived at the home, 24-year-old Jesiah Martin (no relation to Jeremy), remembers having seen the man that night—conspicuous not just for his 6’5″ 280-pound frame but for the fact that he wasn’t dressed up or dancing. “He was by himself mostly, fly on the wall style,” said Jesiah.

Anthony, who is disarmingly goofy in the way of most in their group, approached the man and said, “Do you know the difference between Scotch and beer?” Most at the party were drinking beer, but Anthony handed the man a flask full of Macallan. The man took a swig and grimaced. But he liked it. He even smiled, leading Anthony to say, “Hey, what are you doing after this? We have half a keg at our place…”

And that is how Kyle Huff came to visit the house on East Republican Street.

I’ve mentioned before that The Stranger has been consistently doing the best reporting on the Capitol Hill shooting. They continue with this feature story on the events of the night.

Weapons of Mass Destruction

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Aaron Kyle Huff's weaponry (photo (c)2006 Greg Gilbert/The Seattle Times)

  • A semi-automatic assault rifle.
  • A pistol-grip shotgun.
  • An aluminum baseball bat.
  • A machete.
  • Over 300 rounds of ammunition.

All but the shotgun were recovered from Aaron Kyle Huff’s truck after the massacre on Capitol Hill; the shotgun is one similar to the one Huff used during the shooting. Not pictured is Huff’s semi-automatic handgun, also used in the attack.

All legal to own.

For God’s sake, why?!?

NRA members and “right to bear arms” wingnuts, feel free to brand me as a gun-control nut. I’m fine with that.

There is NO good reason why this sort of weaponry (specifically, the assault rifle and pistol-grip pump action shotgun…obviously, it’s a bit hard to get worked up over a baseball bat, and while I personally find a two foot machete pretty damn creepy, it’s nowhere near the same league as the guns) needs to be openly available to the general public. You want to hunt? Fine, hunt. Buy a hunting rifle and go slaughter as many deer as you want. But this kind of stuff?

Seattle Chief of Police Gil Kerlikowske has it right:

As many as 30 people were in the house when the man approached, draped in bandoliers of ammunition and armed with a handgun and a pistol-grip, 12-gauge shotgun — a weapon Kerlikowske pointedly said was “not for hunting purposes, but for hunting people.”

What actually happened was bad enough. It makes me ill to consider what could have happened if a police officer hadn’t been in the area and on the scene after only five minutes of shooting.

Close to Home

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When Prairie came home last night, there were a couple police cars in our parking lot, along with a couple of large black SUVs. She wasn’t sure why they were there, but after an hour of them sitting in our parking lot, she got a little nervous and decided to come up and wander the mall until I got off of work.

Today, as more news about Saturday’s shooting in Capitol Hill was released, we found out why they were here.

A Seattle Police SWAT team and bomb squad raided a North Seattle apartment Saturday night looking for evidence that neighbors say is tied to the shooting on Capitol Hill that morning which left seven dead.

KOMO 4 News has learned that inside the apartment, police found guns, ammunition, and a hand grenade.

[…] Police came to search an apartment where twin brothers have lived for the past four or five years. When one of them came home, police put him in handcuffs and took him away.

“Well, they said it was in connection with the shootings down on Capitol Hill that happened,” said apartment manager Regina Gray.

The folks who run the apartments tell us police told them little else. But, we do know, officers evacuated the entire third floor of the complex where the brothers lived.

We’ve also been told, police collected weapons, numerous rounds of ammunition and a grenade out of the apartment.

Later in the day, more confirmation came out.

Seattle police believe the man responsible for Saturday’s Capitol Hill massacre is Kyle Aaron Huff, 28, who had lived in North Seattle since moving from Montana with his twin brother about four years ago.

The assistant manager at the Town and Country Apartments where the brothers lived said police told him that Huff was the suspected shooter.

Jeff Green, a dispatcher for the Whitefish, Mont., police also said that Seattle police contacted the department Saturday and told them Huff was the perpetrator of Seattle’s worst mass murder in 23 years. Huff previously lived in Whitefish.

[…] Police raided the apartment Huff shared with his twin Saturday evening. They arrived at the Town & Country Apartments in the 12300 block of Roosevelt Way Northeast with a battering ram and a shield, but they were apparently let in to the apartment by the suspected killer’s brother, said Jim Pickett, assistant manager of the apartment.

Police brought out three rifles and what appeared to be a grenade, Pickett said.

[…] During a news conference this afternoon at Seattle police headquarters, Whitcomb said police recovered a semi-automatic rifle, a machete and hundreds of rounds of ammunition from a Dodge Laramie pickup belonging to the suspect which was found near the Capitol Hill house where the shooting occurred.

[…] Pickett said the Huff brothers had never been a problem for him.

“They were very friendly, very friendly, very polite. They said ‘yes sir, no sir’ and they were always glad to help.”

So…yeah. It appears that the Capitol Hill shooter was a neighbor of mine. The next building over, and I don’t recognize him from the picture in the Times article, but still one of my neighbors.

Freaky.

Capitol Hill Tragedy

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So sad and terrifying.

Kleptones: 24hours

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For those interested in mashups: The Kleptones (producers of two of my favorite mashup albums of the past few years, A Night at the Hip-Hopera and From Detroit to J.A., though Yoshimi Battles the Hip-Hop Robots just didn’t do it for me) have just released their fourth full-length album, the two-disc set 24hours. Torrents for split-track and full-mix versions are available, and there’s even a 6 to entertain you while you download.

iTunes “Stand and Deliver” by Society Burning from the album Shut Up Kitty (1993, 5:03).

No Sakuracon for Me

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I’d mentioned before that I was planning on heading downtown today to wander around Sakuracon and get some shots of the various cosplay kids. As it turns out, I’d actually forgotten to ask for today off from work…so that won’t be happening. Oops.

On the other hand, photos from Sakuracon are starting to show up on Flickr…and maybe I’m not missing all that much?

Read more

Mac OS X turns Five

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Isn’t that about time to start kindergarten?

John Siracusa has a nice look at five years of OS X on Ars Technica today.

A side-by-side test-drive of Mac OS X 10.0 and 10.4 is shocking. The eternal debate is whether this gap exists because 10.4 is so good, or because 10.0 was so, so bad. That said, Apple’s ability to plan and execute its OS strategy is not open for debate. In five short years, Apple has essentially created an entirely new platform. Oh, I know, it’s really just the foundation of NeXT combined with the wreckage of classic Mac OS, but I think that makes it even more impressive. Two failing, marginalized platforms have combined to become the platform for the alpha geeks in the new century.

Today’s Mac users span a much wider range than those of the past. Mac OS X’s Unix-like core reached out to the beard-and-suspenders crowd (and the newer source-code-and-a-dream crowd) while the luscious Aqua user interface pulled all the touchy-feely aesthetes from the other direction. In the middle were the refugees from the Mac-That-Was, but they aren’t the story here. Mac OS X is about new blood and new ideas—some good, some bad, but all vibrant. The Mac is alive again!

After spending half my life watching smart, talented people ignore the Mac for reasons of circumstance or prejudice, it’s incredibly gratifying to live in a post-Mac OS X world. When I encounter a tech-world luminary or up-and-coming geek today, I just assume that he or she uses a Mac. Most of the time, I’m right. Even those with a conflicting affiliation (e.g., Linux enthusiasts) often use Apple laptops, if not the OS.

iTunes “Related Vortex” by X-Dream from the album Spirit Zone Vol. 2 (1996, 8:48).

Monty Python’s Lord of the Rings

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One of my favorite old pre-web ‘net institutions was the Internet Oracle. You’d send a message off to the Oracle, and the Oracle would answer your question. In return, you’d have to answer a later question someone else had sent to the Oracle, thus becoming the Oracle yourself. Not very surprisingly, in-jokes, puns, and general absurdity are highly prized when crafting Oracle answers.

I’d more or less forgotten about the Oracle until Phil dropped a link to the Internet Oracle website into my del.icio.us inbox today.

Immediately, I went to the most recent “best of the Oracle” digest (I used to have a whole collection of their “best of” digests), and found this gem:

The Internet Oracle has pondered your question deeply. Your question was:

Oh Oracle most amazing wonderful, I grovel before your sheer brilliance
and wit, whose puns not even Noel Coward on his best day could have
matched,

What is a good question to ask you?

And in response, thus spake the Oracle:

You know, last time someone asked me this, I suggested asking about
Monty Python’s Lord of the Rings. And I fobbed them off because they
hadn’t asked that. So to make up for it, and because you groveled so
nicely, here it is.

Aragorn: I am the rightful King of Gondor!
Woman: Well, I didn’t vote for you.
A: You don’t vote for kings.
W: How’d you get to be king then?
A: I am the descendant through sixty generations, father to son, of
Elendil of Numenor. Here is Anduril, the Sword that was Broken, and
is now reforged!
Dennis: Inheriting a three-thousand-year-old bit of tin from your
great-grandad is no basis for a system of government.
A: Be quiet!
D: I mean, if I went round saying I was Lord of Moria because I owned a
rusty hatchet, they’d lock me up!
A: Shut up!
D: Ah! See the violence inherent in the system! Help! I’m being
repressed!
A: Bloody peasant!

How to Recognize Different Ents From Quite A Long Way Away

Number One: The Larch.

Gimli: Is Ori here?
Orc: No.
G: Is Fror?
O: No.
G: Nali?
O: Dead.
G: Loni?
O: Gone.
G: Floi?
O: No.
G: Are there in fact any dwarves left in Moria at all?
O: No. I was deliberately wasting your time.
G: I see. In that case I’m afraid I’m going to have to cut your head
off.
O: Fair enough.

Number One: The Larch.

Aragorn: Now stand aside!
Lurtz: That’s just a scratch.
A: I cut your arm off!
L: No you didn’t!
A: What’s that, then?
L: Just a flesh wound.
A: Fine. [chops Lurtz’s other arm off] Victory is mine!
L: Come on! Have at you!
A: You’ve got no arms, you stupid orc!
L: Yes, I have!
A: Look!
L: I’ve had worse.
A: I don’t have time for this. [cuts Lurtz’s head off]
L: Oh? Call it a draw.

Number One: The Larch.

Gandalf: How long is it since Saruman bought you?
Wormtongue: Gee, I didn’t expect a kind of Orcish Inquisition.
[The doors of the hall burst open, and three Uruk-Hai enter.]
Ugluk: NOBODY expects the Orcish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is
surprise. Surprise and fear, our two main weapons. Our two main
weapons, surprise, fear, and an almost fanatical devotion to Saruman.
THREE main weapons, surprise, fear, nice black uniforms… I’ll come
in again.

Number Four: The Bristlecone Pine.

Bridge keeper: Who would cross the Bridge of Death must answer me
these questions three, ere the other side he see.
Frodo: Ask me the questions. I am not afraid.
BK: What… is your name?
FB: Frodo Baggins.
BK: What… is your quest?
FB: To destroy the One Ring!
BK: What… is your favourite colour?
FB: Blue!
BK: Right. Off you go.
Sam: That’s easy!
BK: What… is your name?
SG: Samwise Gamgee.
BK: What… is your quest?
SG: To destroy the One Ring.
BK: What… is the capital of Assyria?
SG: [pause] A!
BK: Smart-arse. Go along, then.
Gollum: Ask us!
BK: What… is your name?
G: We’s Smeagol!
BK: What… is your quest?
G: To get the Precious!
BK: What… have I got in my pocket?
G: [pause] We don’t know that! Aiieeee!

You owe the Oracle a picture of Rohan’s army banging coconut halves
together.

Dear Sir,
I wish to complain in the strongest terms about the preceding answer.
It was nothing but a series of rehashed sketches with a few choice
words added. Yours, Arthur Philip Dent (Mrs), deep fine leg, Norfolk.

Dear Sir,
I never wanted to write this oracularity anyway. I wanted to be a
LUMBERJACK!

Colonel: Stop that! It’s silly!

iTunes “Dream Baby (Nocturnal)” by My Life With the Thrill Kill Kult from the album Sexplosion! (1992, 7:05).

Wimoweh Lawsuit Won

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In the jungle,
The mighty jungle,
The lawyers sleep tonight…

Heh.

Back in July of ’03 I pointed to an incredible in-depth look at the story of ‘Wimoweh’, the South African tune most popularly known as the melody for “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”.

A year later, in July of ’04, came word that Disney was being sued by the heirs of ‘Wimoweh’ author Solomon Linda.

Finally, the case has been won by Linda’s family.

No one is saying how many millions will go to the daughters of the late composer Solomon Linda, who died in poverty from a curable kidney disease in 1962 at age 53.

But the family’s settlement with New York-based Abilene Music, which gives Linda’s heirs 25 percent of past and future royalties, has broad implications.

[…] In the 1950s, at a time when apartheid laws robbed blacks of negotiating rights, Linda sold worldwide copyright to Gallo Records of South Africa for 10 shillings — less than $1.70.

Gallo also tried to sell the work in the United States, but American folk singer Pete Seeger had adapted a version that he called “Wimoweh.”

[…] It remains to be seen how the settlement with Abilene, which holds the copyright to the popular songs that grew from Linda’s composition, will affect his family. Abilene music could not immediately be reached for comment.

Of his three surviving daughters, only the youngest has a job, as a nurse, and she still lives in the family home in Soweto, a satellite suburb set up for black workers under apartheid.

Her sisters never reached high school. One runs a home-based grocers. The other recently lost her job cleaning a doctor’s office and supports a daughter who gets occasional work cleaning homes.

Linda’s fourth daughter died of AIDS in her 30s in 2002 as the lawsuit dragged on, without money to buy drugs that could have saved her life.

Neat to see the story finally reach resolution. I highly recommend reading the 3rd Ear article that details the origins of the song and what happened to Linda and his family.

iTunes “Lion Sleeps Tonight, The (Wimoweh)” by Nylons from the album Best of the Nylons (1993, 3:12).