![](http://blog.countrytimecreations.com/wp-content/uploads/pony_parade.jpg)
![](http://images-partners-tbn.google.com/images?q=tbn:kziwD30kPKBjoM:image58.webshots.com/58/6/67/82/456466782rDTnfR_fs.jpg)
Family friendly and striving to be a worthy choice for your Internet browsing. Comments and material submissions welcome: tkforppe@yahoo.com . Pocomoke City-- an All American City And The Friendliest Town On The Eastern Shore.
The animals come in two-by-two. Hotel staff and visitors have gotten used to the elephants' impromptu strolls through the lobby. Now the family group, headed by matriarch Wonky Tusk, return every November and stay for four to six weeks to gorge on mangos - up to four times a day. Andy Hogg, 44, the lodge director, has lived in South Luangwa National Park since 1982. But in all his years of dealing with wild animals he has never seen such intimate interaction between humans and wild animals. "This is the only place in the world where elephants freely get so close to humans," says Andy. "The elephants start coming through base camp in late November each year to eat the ripe mangos from our trees."
Living in the 5,000 square mile national park, the ten-strong elephant herd is led to the lodge each day by Wonky Tusk. The hotel was built directly in the path of the elephants' route to one of their favorite foods ....Mangos
"The most interesting thing about these wild animals," explains Andy, "is that this is the only herd that comes through, and they come and go as they please."
Mfuwe Lodge consists of seven camps and the base camp where the elephants walk through. Employing 150 staff, the management of the lodge report that there have been no incidents involving the wild elephants to date. "The elephants get reasonably close to the staff, as you can see in the pictures of the elephants near the reception area," Andy explains.. "But we do not allow the guests to get that close."
"Guests can stand in the lounge but only as long as there is a barrier between the elephants and the guests," he added.
"The elephants are not aggressive but you wouldn't want to tempt them. It is the elephant's choice to be here and they have been coming here for the last ten years. There are other wild mango trees around, but they prefer ours. The lodge was unwittingly built upon their path," Andy says, "so we had no idea they would do this. It wasn't a design error, we just didn't know. The lodge was built and the elephants started walking through afterward."
"We keep people at a safe distance, but allow them close enough to see what is going on. These are still wild and dangerous animals, so there must be enough time for people to get away."
The hotel is set in an idyllic national parkland. Naturally, the lodge becomes busier for both elephants and guests during November. "We find that we get more people visiting us during the elephant migration because of the unique experience of being so close to wild animals in an unusual environment," says Andy. "But as I said this is a totally natural phenomenon, as the elephants come here of their own accord. It is certainly a rare but magnificent sight."
O.J. Simpson wants items that were seized in Vegas
O.J. Simpson filed a declaration in court Friday claiming that several items seized by authorities following the bungled hotel heist that sent him to prison are rightfully his and should be returned.
The declaration in Superior Court lists numerous signed footballs Simpson says he was awarded during his glory days as a college and pro athlete in the 1960s and 1970s. Others include ties Simpson says he wore during his murder trial and a picture he says the late FBI director J. Edgar Hoover gave him.
Simpson says most of the items disappeared when he moved from Los Angeles to Miami after being acquitted of the 1994 murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman.
"These items were utilized in my daily life," he says in the declaration filed by his lawyer. A hearing is scheduled for Aug. 18.
The items include a ball he was awarded in 1975 for scoring four touchdowns in a single game, others commemorating seasons in which he gained more than 1,000 yards and a ball commemorating his selection as a college All American in 1968.
Since his Sept. 13, 2007, arrest in Las Vegas, Simpson has insisted he was only trying to retrieve property stolen from him when he and several others burst into a hotel room and confronted a pair of memorabilia dealers who were led to believe they were offering the items for sale to a private collector.
Simpson, who was convicted of armed robbery, kidnapping and other charges, was sentenced to nine to 33 years in prison. Most of the others pleaded guilty to lesser charges.
Almost since the day of the arrest, the items have been the subject of a legal tug-of-war between Simpson and others.
One of the memorabilia dealers has laid claim to them and Ronald Goldman's father, Fred Goldman, wants them to help satisfy his share of a $33.5 million wrongful death judgment he and Brown's survivors obtained against Simpson.
"Tragically, we support Mr. Simpson's claim of ownership," said Goldman's lawyer, David Cook. He added he believes if Simpson prevails in court the items will eventually be turned over to Goldman.
OPERATION BAIT AND HOOK
REELS IN MORE THAN 30 ARRESTS
Task Force Still Searching For 13 Suspects
CHESAPEAKE – A lengthy and meticulous investigation resulted in the arrest of 33 individuals by the Eastern Drug Task Force following a successful round-up on Thursday, July 16, 2009. The round-up, dubbed Operation Bait and Hook, was the result of a fourteen-month long investigation involving the distribution of illegal narcotics on the Eastern Shore of Virginia. The probe resulted in more than 50 Circuit Court indictments from Accomack and Northampton Counties.
Approximately $79,000.00 worth of marijuana, ten firearms and $2,800.00 in U S Currency was seized during the operation.
The arrests took place throughout Accomack County and Northampton County in the early morning hours. More than 75 law-enforcement personnel were part of the special, joint operation.
The Eastern Drug Task Force was formed in 1989 and is compromised of members from the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office, Northampton County Sheriff’s Office, and the Virginia State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation.
For this operation, a combination of collective resources was involved in the capture of the wanted suspects:
Participating Agencies:
· The Virginia State Police
· Accomack County Sheriffs Office
· Northampton County Sheriffs Office
· Drug Enforcement Administration
· Exmore Police Department
· Virginia Marine Police
· New Jersey State Police
· Trenton, New Jersey Police Department
· Onancock Police Department
The following subjects have been arrested on charges:
Fredrick Bull, Raven Copes,
Anthony Duffy, Otha Godwin,
Patricia Johnson, Phillip Justice,
Craig Lipscomb, Carolyn Mears,
Oleisha Mears, Justin Scarborough,
Dennis Taylor, Anthony Turner,
Larry Turner, Carlos Pitts,
Jaron Watts, Corey Baines,
Marcus Carter, Patricia Chandler,
Martez Doughty, Germaine Collins,
Steve Giddens, Omar Giddens,
Charles Johnson, Larry Jones,
Tina Moses, Randy Myrick,
Kenneth Upshur, Mike Walker,
Lonnie Wiggins, Scott Wivel,
Herbert Young, Rodney Spady
The following subjects are still WANTED: Leonard Brooks of Cape Charles, Virginia
James Hall of Machipongo, Virginia
William Reid of Nasswadox, Virginia
Upshur Ayres of Onancock, Virginia
Wendy Beauchamp of Virginia Beach, Virginia
Justin Walker, address unknown
Charles Collins Jr. aka “Stank” of Painter, Virginia
Raul Dorleans aka “Wahoo”, address unknown
Valice Ray Harmon of Horntown, Virginia
Anthony Johnson of Wattsville, Virginia
Fairdale Johnson of Withams, Virginia
Kenny Simpkins aka “Chunks” of Greenbush, Virginia
Lykeford Stanley of Salisbury, Maryland
[Click Here for Photos of the Wanted]
Any information in relation to the location of the above individuals, please contact Accomack County Sheriff’s Office at 757-787-1131 or the Northampton Sheriff’s Office at 757-678-0458.
Anyone wishing to provide information related to drug activity on the Eastern Shore of Virginia may contact the Eastern Shore Drug Task Force at 757-414-0746.
Any further questions please contact Sgt. Michelle Cotten at 757-746-2557
Major Garrett: In your speech this morning you said the Cold War reached its conclusion because of the actions of many nations that were made by many nations over many years. Mr. President are the Russian sensitivities so fragile that you can’t say that the Cold War was won, the West won it and it was led by a combination of democratic and Republican presidents?
Barack Obama: There were a whole bunch of people around Eastern Europe who showed enormous courage (like the Iranians today?) and… uh, I think that it is very important in this part of the world to acknowledge the degree to which people struggled for their own freedom. We don’t have to diminish other people in order to recognize our role in that history.
Though both Barack and Michelle went to Harvard Law, they didn’t overlap — she got her degree in ‘88 and he graduated in ‘91. They actually met in Chicago when he was a summer associate at a law firm in Chicago.
More than eight months after Barack Obama was elected president, the mystery surrounding his precise birthplace is deepening as the myth-busting website Snopes.com – along with several news agencies and an Obama community blog – directly contradict the president's own claim regarding the hospital in which he was born.
In an official letter signed by Obama on White House stationery, the president celebrates his birth at the Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women and Children in Honolulu, Hawaii. The facility has posted that letter on its website, along with video of the letter being read in public.
But according to Snopes, the popular online hoax-buster that many rely on as the final word on both important and frivolous stories, Obama was born at a different hospital in the Hawaiian capital.
Want to turn up the pressure to learn the facts? Get your signs and postcards asking for the president's birth certificate documentation here.In Snopes' entry concerning allegations that Obama is a "radical Muslim," the site addresses the birth history of the commander in chief, stating, "Barack Hussein Obama was born on 4 August 1961 at the Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu, Hawaii." WND took a screen shot of the entry and highlighted the name of the hospital.