One of the great things about living in Rock Hill is the exciting local news in our daily paper the "Rock Hill Herald." A year or two ago, the story of the stolen wiener sign
was the talk of the town. Today, everyone is talking about the stolen life sized, anatomically correct, goat statue. The story is on-line at the Herald. Christy Mullins reports that, "Bob last was seen late on Jan. 6 wearing a red knit hat and scarf — which he had begun wearing Dec. 1 to keep warm."He had been the the victim of pranks in the past, but the usual suspects are claiming innocence.
Neighbors and Bob's owner, 53-year-old Madeline McDonald, had a running joke about moving the goat statue late in the night. He could be acrobatically dangling from the crape myrtle tree or tastefully straddling the wrought-iron bench, depending on who visited last.
But McDonald woke one day last week to find that her goat statue wasn't nuzzling the bushes, tail out, as he had been the night before, near a planter box in her front yard.
He wasn't tossed on a tree branch or masquerading near the sidewalk.
McDonald even looked on the roof, where neighbors had rumored they'd move Bob next. And just in case the wind had blown hard, McDonald looked in her back yard and neighbors' yards, too.
In case the wind had blown hard????
There is a reward for the return of the goat. Check out the article for more details.
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The death of print journalism is overstated, at least when it comes to local papers. There will always be a market for local interest stories, features and sports which the big guys think are beneath them. Of course, the big guys are now bemoaning the 24/7 news/commentary cycle which make the morning papers "yesterday's news" literally. As far as the local papers go, as long as there are goats and wiener signs, the future is secure.
ReplyDeleteCheers.
A lot of folks I know scoff at the local rag and subscribe to the Charlotte Observer instead. When I subscribed to the Charlotte paper, the thing that struck me was that they included a section called the York Observer which sometimes had a photo of some new event in our county but the article beneath the photo was totally unrelated and North Carolina oriented. They may have changed since I last subscribed, but there is no substitute for a local newshound on the beat. It will be a loss if the local folds.
ReplyDeleteI was curious what the replacement value was, what a goat statue would cost, so I tried bing-ing "goat statue". Up near the top was a story about a Swedish goat statue. Apparently in Sweden, before Santa Claus became the tradition, men used to dress up as goats to bring presents to children. And even now, many Swedes have a straw goat decoration in their home at Christmas time. But in this story, their is a giant straw goat statue that is donated to the city and gets burned every Christmas by vandals. Seems a little pagan, like the movie Wicker Man.
ReplyDeletehttp://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091223/od_nm/us_goat