Portland Citywide Snowball Fight!

SNOWBALL FIGHT!!! Whoever has the day off or gets sent home early because of the snow, meet at the bridge in Deering Oaks Park at 3:00PM. If you have goggles, wear them. INVITE YOUR FRIENDS! Dress Warm!!!! If you can make it, or if you can't make it, please repost this, let's see how many people we can get!

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=170836926293080

And while you're at it, someone should bring a big kettle of hot chocolate!!!

Rogue rose thievery

Well, you've read about weird crime here on the blog before, but this one is new to me. Portland's Deering Oaks park, just down the block from me, is a great place in the summer months, and many come simply to smell the roses in the gorgeous circle garden between High Street and State Street. Apparently, someone has been loving them too much, though. The city is looking for help in nabbing the crooks. The Portland Daily Sun reports:

Rose poachers steal color from city garden
By David Carkhuff, Staff writer

Rose poachers have become a thorn in the side of the city, stealing fresh blooms from a nationally recognized rose garden at Deering Oaks.

Gardeners at the Deering Oaks Rose Circle, located on the east end of the park next to State Street, noticed Monday that somebody had illegally cut roughly 100 roses from the display garden, according to John Shannon, horticultural supervisor with Portland Public Services.

"Somebody is starting to harvest," he said Tuesday. "We came in Sunday, and as of yesterday, it looked like somebody had cut 100 roses."

This was a repeat of a problem first noticed last year, he said.

The Rose Circle features 600 rose bushes and is one of only 134 rose gardens in the United States where the American Rose Society previews its "All American Rose Selections," offering a sneak peak of award-winning roses a year before they go on the market.

"It's a jewel to the city of Portland," Shannon said.

Last year was the first that city crews noticed large-scale thefts of roses, Shannon said, marking a new, disturbing trend.

"We've come in and found scissors on the ground. A lot of times it seems to be happening on a later Sunday," Shannon said.

On weekends and evenings, if someone in the public sees pruning happening in the rose circle, they should call the police, because it's not a city gardener but a vandal, he said.
[...]
But the bulk of the theft appears to be organized. Shannon said he's saddened to see the poaching, something that had not happened on this scale in the rose circle's 71-year history.
[...]
Anyone with information about the rose circle vandalism is asked to call Portland Police at 874-8479.

Read the full article here: [Source]

Deering Oaks smash-up!

Those of you who were wondering what the upside-down car in Deering Oaks on that foggy night the other week was all about, here's the scoop!

Driver Flips Car into Deering Oaks Park After Reckless Ride
Tuesday, March 31, 3009

Portland police arrested Ahmed Ibrahim, 24, a Parkside resident, at around midnight on March 27th, after they say he hit four parked cars and a house - on different streets - while driving around his home turf. Police say Ibrahim also ran a red light, and he has no driver’s license.

After hitting each car, police say, Ibrahim kept going and didn’t stop until taking a turn that was too wide at the intersection of State Street and Park Avenue, which caused his car to flip and then catch on fire on the grass at the front of Deering Oaks Park. Ibrahim was transported to Maine Medical Center, but had no serious injuries.

Parkside residents reported hearing a very loud acceleration of a car motor, followed by the sound of impact, almost immediately followed by sirens, which led them to speculate that it was a high-speed car pursuit that ended quickly.

Charges are pending, since the case is still under investigation.

-Marge Niblock and Michelle Souliere contributed to this report.

[Source]

I found mention of it on the WCSH-TV6 site as well (click here to read), once we had a name for the fellow.

Also on the WCSH site, Kellyanne2 posted about her run-in with the perpetrator: "I almost got hit by this guy! I was seconds away from parking right where he ran into, taking a street sign along with him. I had to push on my gas pedal and burn out, with him coming up behind me, until I, myself had to run a red light to get away from him as I went straight into the ice arena parking lot when he turned right and seconds later he found himself upside down on Park Ave! It was the craziest thing I've ever seen!! I was shaking for a long time afterwards."

Whistler plagues Parkside

Last night, starting as early as about 8:00pm, a woman wandered up and down State Street around the Sherman Street and Grant Street block, and further, whistling a piercing note, much to the annoyance of the neighborhood. Every now and then residents wouldn't hear her for a while, and all hoped that she had finally quit her racket. However, each time, this was not the case.

In a method not unlike Chinese Water Torture, this shrill and un-ignorable presence reared its noisy head hour by hour, sometimes more often, and found locals calling the police for assistance repeatedly, to no avail. As late (or rather early) as 3:00 in the morning, if you can believe it, this was continuing, at which point Portland Police Dispatch replied to this caller that, "Things seem to be quieting down in the rest of downtown -- they have been extremely busy tonight. They should be able to finally get someone over there shortly. We'll see what we can do."

After 3:00am the woman seemed to give up (either that or the police finally caught up with her, or I finally passed out from sheer exhaustion), a full 7 hours after she started her spree. We'll see if she shows up again tonight.

IF SHE DOES come back, and you would rather get some sleep: Please call in a noise complaint to the Portland Police Department. Their non-emergency number is (207)874-8479. I'm pretty sure she's violating the local noise decibel limit ordinance, not to mention the basic right to an environment where one should at least get some sleep in the middle of the night, i.e., she is most definitely disturbing the peace.

The woman's description from last night is as follows, with some allowance for difference due to the dark nighttime conditions:

Height: around 5 foot 6 inches, possibly on the shorter side of that measurement

Hair: appears to be dark blonde, long, and pulled back

Wearing: jeans, flared at the bottom, brown tank top

Overall: Caucasian (white), mid-twenties to mid-thirties in age

Various theories of what she was trying to accomplish that have been heard are:

That she is stark raving mad

That she is a hooker that has come up with the most annoying way of attracting customers ever developed in the history of mankind

That she is looking for a lost pet that she desperately wants to find

All I know is, folks around these parts want to get some sleep tonight, and if they don't, things may get pretty nasty in the ol' Parkside neighborhood.