OK, turns out Mark doesn’t like it that I’ve put the smack down on him littering all over my Web page.

Let’s appreciate the irony of this for a second, shall we?

Mark objects to not being able to post on my Web site, unfettered, on his own free will, whenever he chooses. However, you can’t respond to anything on his news Web site without submitting a Letter to the Guy Who Runs the Geocities Upload Feature Publisher with your phone number (a risky venture in itself) and a scan of your driver’s license to prove your identity.

Now, if you’re new, or if you need a refresher course, please seen JoAnn in Real Life’s post No. 549 in the blog post entitled, “Verify THIS” where she has, through information from sources at West Virginina’s Division of Motor Vehicles, proven (beyond reasonable doubt) at least two of those people he named in his letters have no valid West Virginia driver’s license, period, and the other three have addresses that are far different than from where their letters originated.

JoAnn says, “The only criteria required are that each person listed on Halburn’s Web site has a current West Virginia drivers’ license.”

Two do not. That’s never been addressed. I just want that on the table. Faithful readers know the closest you get to an admission of guilt from Mark Halburn is silence.

So, Mark, in defense (and shaky defense, at best) of some issues with some of the comments posted about a couple of recent articles on his news Web site took it upon himself, again, to write me an e-mail to correct me.

I told him I’d run his letter if he sent me a scan of his driver’s license, since I made everybody else do it, too. ‘Cause, you know, that’s what he does. He said so. He said every person who sent him a letter had to scan his or her license to prove his or her identity. Nevermind none of them exist in the Putnam County Tax Department database as owning any property whatsoever. And we’ll let the fact that some of them just plain don’t exist, period, slide. Mark is now demanding I prove I have driver’s license scans of each and every one of you. Get on that, would you?

But, without further delay, I present Mark’s submission. Because, I shit you not, he actually sent me a scan of his driver’s license. I am not going to post it because he asked me not to post it. Why am I agreeing? Because I’m a hell of a girl. That’s why. I also just want it out there that there are some things you can’t unsee.

GOW:
Since you will not let me post anymore to defend the attacks, here’s some info that YOU can post:
1) Chris submitted the article (that I asked him to write) before he posted it on WVRecord.com. Once he posted the UPDATED version, I replaced the “Courtesy of” article with a direct link. I asked him to write the article because I was so close to the issue.
2) I dropped out of the lawsuit at Harvey Peyton’s recommendation because of the property ownership issue and so that I could cover the lawsuit without being a part of the suit itself.
3) Ben Newhouse and Scott Edwards have not returned calls about the bidding process for the guard rail story. WEEKS AGO I sent an email to Newhouse asking that the work be done without disrupting us and offered easy scheduling solutions. All were ignored. This is typical of City of Hurricane crap. You TRY to do the nice thing, the right thing, and they ignore you and shove construction noise down your throat!
4) The guard rail existed for more than a year. My old blog talked about the noise that was made during its installation and had a photo of the installation. It was moved this week because ONE neighbor, John Clay, whined about it being tough to move his little boat.

Many thanks!

Mark Hallburn
Publisher
www.PutnamLIVE.com
Putnam County’s News Leader
304-415-6397

So, there you have it, folks.

I’d also just like to tell you, Mark, while I’m thinking of it … You have a Web site. It’s not my job to allow you to defend yourself on my Web site. That’s why you have your own Web site. You don’t allow people to defend themselves on your Web site without jumping through a set of hoops no publication in the country makes people jump through. I wasn’t allowed to, on my own free will, tell the alleged John T. Reed about all of my reporting experience. I had to do it here. You, however, have been able to detail here everything you’ve ever done, including what sandwich you had on July 17, 1984 while hanging out with Karl Malden asking him what he thought about Michael Jackson, with no limits.

I put the limits on your posting, Mark, for your own protection. Every time you open your mouth, bad things happen. You get beaten down like a red-headed stepchild every single time you try to defend your constantly indefensible actions. But screw it. You want to keep getting exposed by people from your own county, you got it. It’s not my job to save you from yourself. So, feel free. The limit’s gone. But so is any ability you have to threaten me with lawsuits because you just asked to be a participant.

In an interview posted on ContactMusic.com, Jerry Springer admits he can’t figure out how his show has been on the air for 19 years.

I had no idea it’s been that long, either. My first exposure to the Jerry Springer show came when I was in college, and I was utterly fascinated.

I’d finished up my shift in Clarksburg (about an hour and a half from my Mom and Dad’s) and decided rather than go back to Morgantown to drive to New Martinsville to spend the weekend there. By the time the trusty Prizm rolled into the Big Town, it was nearing 2 a.m. I came in, went to the TV room, and lay on the couch. When I started flipping channels, I came across something on KDKA that actually caused me to sit up.

This show, that I’d never seen or heard of before, had a guy in his Navy uniform about to propose to his girlfriend. He’s on one knee, and she says she’s been keeping something from him. Yep. She’s … a dude. So then they start scrapping, there’s screaming, bleeped out words, chair throwing and utter chaos and an audience chanting “Jerry!! Jerry!! Jerry!! Jerry!!”

I didn’t believe it was real. I really thought it was some kind of sketch comedy show and I’d just not been able to piece together who was doing it. Whatever it was, I was hooked. But it was only on at 2 a.m. on Saturday on one channel. One day. One channel.

Sometime after that night in 1999, it caught on like wildfire in North Central West Virginia and I had it on four or five channels at four or five different times a day. I found it to be a reliable go-to when I had nothing to do or nothing to watch, and if for nothing else, to laugh at its unbelievability and be glad that my family was The Cleavers compared to these people on my television.

But almost 20 years? Wow. I never did get to see a taping (yet). Several of my friends and I have made plans to get the free tickets and head to Chicago, but life gets in the way. There’s hope though. And there’s some Antarctic cross-dressing lesbian one-armed midget sleeping with his grandmother somewhere I need to insult in the final segment.

Really, people should look up to this guy as the ultimate model for how to act like an entitled dumbass:

(komonews.com)

Now, at this point, this isn’t a new story, really. We’ve seen this kind of behavior a thousand times. Someone gets hosed at a drive-thru and you feel the need to rant and scream like a lunatic and, oh, call 911, because it’s an emergency.

Haven’t we learned about the drive-thru? Really?

In case you haven’t, here’s Leo Getz explaining in “Lethal Weapon 2″ the problems with using a drive-thru.

He’s really sage, that Leo Getz. I’ve had my share of getting hosed by those front-line workers at McDonald’s. The most notable one to this day was likely my own fault, but witnessed by my mother. We were going to the WVU-Virginia Tech football game in 2005 and got up early to stop at my hometown McDonald’s before making the trip across the country roads to Morgantown. We pull up, and it went a little bit like this …

Speaker: Welcome to McDonald’s, can I take your order, please?
Me: Sure, I’ll have an Egg McMuffin, two hash browns and a Sausage McMuffin with cheese only.
Speaker: An Egg McMuffin, two hash browns and a Sausage McMuffin with cheese only?
Me: Yes.
Mom: They’re going to give you a muffin with a slice of cheese in between it. You should have told them no egg.
Me: Mom, nobody in the world’s that stupid. A Sausage McMuffin with no sausage would be a cheese McMuffin.
Mom: I’m telling you, you’re going to be pissed.
Me: It’s not possible, Mom. Nobody would misunderstand that.
(Food handed out window, we’re about a half-mile down W.Va. Route 2 when my Mom starts laughing as she stares at my unwrapped breakfast of one slice of cheese between a half-toasted English muffin.)
Mom: I told you.
Me: SONOFABITCH!!!

So, logically, one could argue that I totally got effed at the drive-thru. I may have been partially to blame, but I still got effed. Mostly for thinking I was making myself clear. You can guarantee I’ve never ordered it that way since. It’s best to be 100 percent clear with people at a drive-thru for their benefit and yours.

But did I throw a fit? Nah. Just a small outburst, then some healthy laughter. Did I consider calling 911? No way. Would I have threatened to sue? Jesus. Only idiots threaten lawsuits over something like a botched drive-thru order.

This guy, however, really upped the ante. He went for the trifecta with a healthy dose of “making shit up.”

Ore. man upset by McDonald’s order calls 911 repeatedly

I love that not only does he feel justified in calling 911 about an effing hamburger, he also feels justified in telling the 911 operator that he’s been robbed and, oh, that the McDonald’s employee was holding a gun to his head.

This guy went to the pokey over two items off the dollar menu.

Bravo, sir. In terms of being a complete and total dumbass, you’ve set the bar high. It’ll take work to top you.

From Putnam County’s News Leader’s “Letters to the Publisher” page:

I Miss Your Enduring Walmart Blog

Hey Where’s Your Enduring Walmart Blog?? I Really Miss The Belly Aching. I’m Sorry Let Me Say I Miss Your Blog Of Real Life With Wal-Mart!Keep Up The Good Work!!!

Tony Sutherland
Hurricane

Publisher’s note: The “Enduring the Hurricane Walmart” blog was pulled after contributors to an out-of-state blog continued to harass my family in print and by honking horns as they drove by our home.

It is most unfortunate that standing up for your personal right to peace and quiet in Putnam County is not respected by out-of-state bloggers.

It is more unfortunate that Putnam County politicians, including Raymond Peak, Scott Edwards, the Hurricane City Council, Patti Schoen, Mike Hall, Karen Facemyer, Steve and Troy Andes, and Raymond “Joe” Haynes fail to protect longtime Putnam County residents against excessive noise from out-of-state businesses and construction companies.

*****

Hey, y’all … that’s as close to a mention as I’m going to get!

But, Mark … let me help you out. What you meant to say was, “I have no courage to stand behind my beliefs, even when called out, so once someone actually called me out and didn’t back down in the face of threat of lawsuit (twice) or repeated spamming of her own site, I decided to take my toys and go home.”

You’re really pathetic. You expect anybody to actually feel sorry for you after what you’ve done? Like, suddenly, a light bulb is going to switch on and someone’s going to say, “Ah, jeez, if only we’d have built that double-thick, giant, soundproof dome around that Wal-Mart and its roads like Mark wanted, because Mark’s always right.”

This was never about the noise. Ever. This had nothing to do with noise and everything about your behavior. Stop crying me a river about nobody respecting your need for silence. Everybody here has said they agree with that basic right. They just don’t agree with you acting like a maniacal, insufferable douche to reach the solution you seek.

Sigh. But hey, thanks for the quasi-mention. And if Tony exists (and there is a Tony Sutherland in the tax database), then I hope you got his drivers’ license just like the other ones. ‘Cause that’s policy, right? Kisses!!

OK, God. It’s not funny anymore.

Report: ‘Informercial King’ Billy Mays dies

Siiiiiiiiiiigh. If anybody needs me, I’ll be crying into my OxiClean.

Nashville blogger Jason Reese has put up an amazing post about the death of Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett in the same day. He talks about how a writer for The Associated Press wants to lay at our feet the notion we’re a crushed generation because our heroes (so to speak) are dying and we’re getting old. He also has some thoughts about how life was different when we were kids … there was a good rack of National Enquirers and Globes and Weekly World News in the grocery store checkout, but there was no TMZ. No E! No 24-hour news cycle.

Check it out. It’s a great read.

(zoomentertainment.com.au)

Conversation via BlackBerry Messenger

Ashlea: I’m in Walmart. Shopping with Grandma.

Me: Oh snap.

Ashlea: Grandma just grabbed herself to portray Michael Jackson.

Ashlea: In the middle of Walmart. FML.

Me: That’s a blog.

Ashlea: That’s FML.

That evil, evil rodent you see in the picture above is the mole from the Word Mole game on my new BlackBerry Storm. I discovered this game this morning when I went to go play BrickBreaker on my Metro ride in. When I realized that trying to manipulate the little bounce pad by touch screen was frustrating, I went to this game.

(I do apologize for the geeky overtones of this post … it’s a quiet day because the news is dominated by Michael Jackson, nobody’s done anything really stupid yet and I welcomely accept any opportunity to make fun of myself.

With the Red Line still at less than 100 percent, I’ve been stuck taking the Green all the way into L’Enfant Plaza and switching to the Blue/Orange. It adds about 10 minutes or more to the trip, depending on how you catch the second leg. It sucks because it’s all underground, too. No Twitter. No Facebook. No e-mail. I did crossword puzzles for the first couple of days, but I got bored with that pretty fast, so other than listening to music, I had the games.

Word Mole is my kind of game … You have a grid with letters and you keep making words. Longer words get more points. You keep making words, going up a level, beating the clock, collecting vegetables, all of it.

Today, though, my game was tight. I kept making seven and eight letter words. I was coming up with words like “perplexed” and “establishment” and felt incredibly proud of myself for “quixotic” until …

I hear the chime and see the doors close at McPherson Square and the train move toward Farragut West. I’d become so involved in defeating the rodent, I forgot what the hell I was doing and missed my Metro stop. At 9:30 a.m.

FML.

I got to Farragut West just as a train bound BACK toward McPherson Square came along. In three short minutes, I’d be back a block from my office. But not before I felt a whole lot more stupid because of it.

Hey, Putnam readers. I just got an e-mail from someone who’d like me to get the word out that the Hurricane Fire Department carnival (which started Tuesday) runs through this Saturday. I would imagine it’s a great, and inexpensive way, to treat your family on a Friday night.

For more details, you can call the fire department at 562-5663 or just leave me a comment and I’ll track it down for you.

I’m going to take a break from mourning Michael Jackson to continue to point out that Mark Halburn is a hopeless pathological liar.

In my spam queue, I have this:

Now, in case you can’t read that because it’s small, I’ll help you out with this one:

Hrm … You know, I checked, and there’s no domain registered that’s “LeeIsaFraud.com.”

But you can clearly see from the screen grab above … they’re coming from the exact same IP.

The comment, if you couldn’t read it from the grab:

The more you guys trash talk, the more intelligent Mark sounds. The property is right beside a Walmart. Of course it is valuable. The house is irrelevant. So is the owner. What matters is what can be developed.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen. That’s Mark Halburn, pretending to not be Mark Halburn, talking about himself in the third person.

This almost makes me feel better … but I’m still pretty sad about Michael Jackson.