Woman Dies in Emergency Room...Nobody Notices

For more than an hour, a woman lay on the floor in a hospital emergency room dying. She had been in the waiting area for more than 24 hours after she had been forcibly admitted to the psychiatric ward. Patients (psych unit patients mind you) sat just a few feet away, but seemed to not notice. Six staff members have been fired. Of course the New York City Health and Hospitals Corporation promises a thorough investigation. (Read full story on CNN.com)

We live in such a sad time. No regard for human life, but if that had been a dog, every person in the waiting room and every staff member on that floor would have been fired and arrested for cruelty to animals.

The end is near.

Teen Tries to Flush Newborn Down Toilet at School

At first glance, I thought this was an update to the story that hit the news a few days ago about the 14 year old who gave birth to a stillborn baby on a Continental flight and put the fetus in the wastebasket. To my horror, I realized that this is ANOTHER 14 year old in Texas who has had a baby, except this time she delivered the baby alive in the Jr. High school restroom, heard him cry and then tried to flush him down the toilet, which killed him.

The girl was taken to a hospital. People who knew her at school said she wore baggy clothing, and nobody suspected she was pregnant, The Houston Chronicle reported Thursday.

School officials learned of her pregnancy when another student who was in the restroom while the eighth-grader was in labor went to ask the school nurse for help, said Kathy Clausen, spokeswoman for Baytown's Goose Creek school district.

Authorities have not announced what charges the girl will face, if any. She is too young to be considered for the death penalty.


Feel free to comment. I am absolutely speechless right now.

UPDATE: Experts Have Doubts About 3rd Graders Plot to Attack Teacher

The AP reports that experts are skeptical about the 3rd graders determination to really follow through with the plot to harm their teacher. Although it was clear that they brought a glass paperweight in order to knock the teacher out, in addition to a steak knife, handcuffs, and duct tape, experts said children that age are certainly imaginative and capable of creating elaborate games. But Dr. Louis Kraus, a child psychiatry expert at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, said he doubts they would have actually attacked.

"The reality is it is highly unlikely they would have been successful at this," Kraus said. "Even if it had begun, it's unclear whether they actually would have followed through with it."

Okay. If a 12 year old is capable of dancing at a strip club and making good tips, then I believe these 3rd graders fully planned to go through with this - Ocean's Eleven style.

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3rd Graders Plot to Attack Teacher

THE PLOT: A group of 3rd graders (8 and 9 year olds) at Center Elementary School in Waycross, Georgia brought a broken steak knife, handcuffs, duct tape and other items for the job and assigned children tasks including covering the windows and cleaning up afterward, police said Tuesday.

THE MOTIVE: They were mad at the teacher because she scolded one of them for standing on a chair.

THE TARGET: A veteran teacher who teaches students with learning disabilities (ADD, ADHD, etc).

THE PUNISHMENT: The students have been suspended, but the school system is trying to see how far they can go with the discipline since they are all under 13.

THE SAD PART: The principal seems to be in denial. "This is an isolated incident, an aberration. ... We have good kids," Center Principal Angie Coleman told the newspaper.

Yep, good kids who compiled duct tape, a steak knife, and handcuffs in a duffel bag and brought it to school. Unless they were bringing props for the school play "Extreme Home Makeover featuring Cops and Chefs", something is horribly wrong Principal Coleman. I hope this is an April Fools joke.

14 Year Old Delivers Fetus in Airplane Restroom

*sighs*

I've reluctantly been watching this story develop all day. At first the airplane cleaning crew reported finding a fetus in the wastebasket about 15 minutes after the plane landed in Houston. Of course it wouldn't be difficult to find out who the mother was, considering they have a passenger log and in all likelihood the lady would still be at the airport (I know I've never been able to depart a plane and leave the airport within 15 minutes). Anyway, surely they could quickly locate the woman and find out what happened, right?

Well, sort of.

Finally we find out that the woman they were looking for turned out to be a 14 year old middle school student who was returning from a school trip in New York and reportedly didn't even know she was pregnant. Preliminary reports say that the baby was stillborn.

Everybody's concerned about having the race conversation and I agree that it's needed, but is anyone except me noticing that somebody needs to start having the teenager conversation? I've done a few posts in the last 2 weeks dealing with some heavy stuff concerning tweens and teens. It's reported in a recent study that 25% of teens have an STD, a 17 year old recently left her kids at home to eat cocaine while she went out to sell drugs on the corner, a 12 year old was just found working in a strip club...and more horrible reports concerning teens are popping up every day.

We're letting them grow up too fast. They have too many privileges, too much freedom, too much technology and no innocence. Will parents please start being parents again? Your children may hate you for it now, but they will thank you for it later.

Teen Mom Arrested After Kids Eat Cocaine

Tyrone Biggums is a fictional character created for a sketch comedy show by comedian Dave Chappelle. Tyrone is a crackhead who sells real estate, wears a FedEx hoodie, drinks Red Balls (cocaine in a can) like water, and loves peanut butter and crack sandwiches. Chappelle made Tyrone a lovable character and pop culture's favorite crackhead with his cocaine white lips, semi-articulate speech, and propensity to sprinkle crack rocks on his meals like seasoned salt.

We were in stitches watching as Tyrone was the guest speaker at a drug awareness day at an elementary school and as he sold a friend's house while the friend was out of town and had a crack party with the proceeds. We laughed while Tyrone went through an intervention, busted a car window to save a baby locked in the car (actually his goal was to steal the radio), and once picked up a city bus just to get to a dime under one of the wheels. He is the closest many of us have ever had to having a live crackhead in our living room. We could laugh at Tyrone, because he's not real. His whole life is a literally joke. A script in the mind of a brilliant comedian. ...I just wish that this news story was a joke too.

This is one of the worst examples of art imitating life. When I spotted this story over at C&D, I was in utter disbelief. This is a mess on so many levels. First of all, this child is 17 with her own two-year old. Secondly, she is babysitting somebody else's 2 toddlers. Thirdly, she leaves them in the house (apparently alone) where cocaine is out in the open, to go out and sell crack. Fourth(ly?) after it became apparent that the kids ate the cocaine, she didn't take them to the hospital until one had a seizure.

Stuff like this just shouldn't happen in real life.

*exhale*