Goodbye, Barney, You Will Be Missed

Don Knotts, aka Barney Fife, passed away this past Friday at the age of 81. And with him goes a little piece of my childhood. I, like many others of you I'm sure, grew up watching the Andy Griffith Show and Barney was always the real star of the show. This photo was taken in 2001 in Knoxville at the Mayberry Reunion held at the Gaylord Opryland Hotel. I was fortunate enough to meet many of the stars of the show over the three days we covered the event, even spending a couple of hours in a pub with Betty Lynn who played Thelma Lou and Maggie Peterson, better known as Charlene Darling. But Barney was, as always, the show stopper. Barney, you will be missed. Check out all things Mayberry at http://www.mayberry.com.

Basketball Time

It's regional tournament time in basketball, and I've spent the last couple of days at Jacksonville State, site for the Northeast Regionals. My favorite part of the games is the fans, students who are allowed to skip school and roadtrip. And boy, oh boy, do they get fired up for the games. Painted faces and chests, weird clothes and hats, they go all out to cheer on their schools. And sometimes things get out of hand. At Troy State yesterday, 4 female fans were arrested after getting into a fight after the game. "Be True To Your School", sang the Beach Boys. Just don't get locked up in the pokey for it.

100th Post!!

Well, what a milestone. This is the Sand Mtn. Photog's 100th post, who would have thought it? To all you out there who said it would never last, I guess I've shown you!!
Going through some old tape today and found this clip of my son Forrest back in Kindergarten. He is the cute curly-headed one on the right. We were shooting a story about Crossville's lunch room crowding problems when we were paged out to the shooting death of Grant's police chief Verlon LeMaster. Which only goes to show how a day in the news business can go; one minute you're doing a cutesy story about school lunchrooms and the next minute you have to head out to a story about the death of a man you know and like. Ups and downs. That's what this business is all about.

Church Arson Close to Home

Well, Sand Mtn. dodged another bullet with the ice and snow this weekend. But today, Sunday, I got called into work to cover a church arson in Etowah County. The church is the Chapman's Chapman Holiness Church in Glencoe, and as you can see from the photos it was only an attempted arson. Someone lit a fire on the side of the church, but it appears to have burned itself out before doing any serious damage to the church. Right now, investigators do not think this case has any thing to do with the others arsons down South. As always, we will keep you updated.

Ice For The Weekend??

Well, the meteorologists are calling for ice and snow again this weekend. That means your faithful Sand Mtn. Bureau Photographer will be working Saturday morning. Gotta be here to tell everyone about conditions here on the mountain. That makes 2 Saturdays in a row working the ice and snow shift. The only problem is that this Saturday is Jemma's birthday party at the skating rink. Will the weather affect party plans? Let's hope not, birthdays only come once a year you know. Anyway, tune in Saturday morning for the latest in weather and traffic from here on Sand Mtn. And we'll see about the ice and snow.

Our State Parks??

This is a photo of the new gatehouse being built at Lake Guntersville State Park. It's all part of the new multi-million dollar renovations being done at the park to upgrade the lodge and overall look of the park. Now don't get me wrong, I'm all for the renovations, Good Lord knows they needed it. But our story today is about how visitors to the park will soon be charged a $3 fee to enter the park. That's not a camping fee or fee to play golf, that's just to enter the park. I thought the state parks belonged to all of us, land set aside for Alabama residents to enjoy the great outdoors and get back to nature. Now, they are telling us that we will have to pay to get onto our own land and enjoy our nature. That's just wrong. I happen to love Lake Guntersville State Park and truly like all the people who work there and who run the place. But I still think it's wrong to charge people to get onto state land. Am I wrong about this? I would like to hear what you think.

Let It Snow, Let It Snow!!

Looking at New York City, this can't be called much of a snowfall, but for North Alabama it was a pretty good snow. And for my kids, it was one of the first snowfalls they had seen. Jemma was born in February of 2001, and it was January of that year since we have had a snowfall of any significance. So when we saw the first snowflakes starting to fall, we all grabbed our coats and mittens and headed outside. I do have to admit that Wende and I were pretty excited about the snow ourselves. So a couple of snowball fights later, but sadly no snowman, we headed inside to warm up. When I was a kid, seems like we had a least a couple of snows a year that were big enough to keep us out of school. But the last few years we haven't had any. Today the kids were out of school, but the snow was all but gone by mid-morning. Let's keep our fingers crossed for some more snow, what do you say??

Hail to The Assistant Chief

Monday, Carson and I went to Priceville to cover the Vice President coming to town. Randy Owen of Alabama sang the national anthem before everything kicked off. And of course there was a lot of security. The top picture is of the Secret Service agent whose job it was to keep an eye on the media. She stayed right around us the whole time, about 4 hours. The V.P. swept in, made his speech, and was gone in about 30 minutes. Overall, it was nice to be part of a big event, not everyday the V.P. comes to town.

Eagle Pictures

Here are some video stills from the bald eagle release Saturday at Lake Guntersville State Park.

Bald Eagles and Kids

Saturday, the kids and I headed out early to Lake Guntersville State Park to see a pair of bald eagles released back into the wild. The eagles had been found injured near Lake Guntersville and taken to the Raptor Center at Auburn where they were nursed back to health. Saturday, they were brought back here and released. They truly are magnificent birds, really huge.
We got to the park early and while riding around the top of the mountain came upon three deer grazing on the side of the road. They let us get close enough to get a couple of good pictures. The picture of the kids is at a waterfall just outside the park.
Since I was shooting the eagles on video for the TV station, I didn't get any good still pictures of them. If you would like to see pictures of the eagles, go to the website of my friend Brandon Pierce, http://www.piercephoto.net. He and John Chumley got some good close-ups.

I Hear A Train A'coming

Hi, I'm your faithful Sand Mountain Photog blogger, and here is the news from the mountain. For the second time in just about three weeks a train and a tractor trailer collide on highway 75 in Albertville. Luckily, no one was hurt in the wreck. The odd thing about this happening yesterday is that the city council had just met earlier in the week and discussed this crossing. According to the State of Alabama, this is only the 227th most dangerous crossing in the state so nothing will be done about it. Right now, there are no flashing lights, no cross arms that come down to block traffic on this busy highway. Will this latest accident change any minds? Or, as usual, will someone have to die before any changes are made? Let us hope that city leaders will act quickly before something really bad happens here.

Poop-Go-Round

Today was a day everyone should be glad there is no such thing as "smell-o-vision"! We took a tour of Albertville's sewage treatment plant as part of our coverage of the smell problem in Albertville. So we got to walk over and on top of the different buildings at the plant. The first picture is what they call the "clarifier". It's the big round tub where you see the bridge going around in circles. Well, we got to climb on and ride that thing around and around the huge tub of, well, waste. Yes, human waste. So that was a first for me, to ride around in circles over hundreds of thousands of gallons of poop. I'm just glad that Carson didn't decide to push me in. I'm not sure anyone would have volunteered to jump in and save me.

Reading Buddies

You know, sometimes it is hard to find time to do this blogging thing, or else there just isn't anything going on that is that interesting. So, this isn't that interesting, but here is a picture of your faithful photog blogger with a future photographer at Guntersville Elementary school. Maybe one day he can have my job and I'll be able to retire to the Old Bureau Photographer's Home.

Busy Weekend!!

Wow, what a busy weekend on Sand Mountain. It all started Saturday night when I got called out to an attempted robbery and stabbing in Collinsville at the Dollar General Store. The store clerk was stabbed in the stomach several times, but luckily she is doing well. Police caught the suspect in about 30 minutes. So after going to the bureau and feeding the video back to Huntsville, I go home. I'm there about half an hour when the pager goes off again. There has been a shooting in Geraldine. That's the top picture of the trailer where a 17 year old boy was shot at least twice with a shotgun. They airlifted him to Huntsville Hospital, and he is still alive the last time I checked. Neighbors heard the shots and saw someone run from the trailer and get into a green car and leave, but DeKalb County deputies have no idea who did the shooting at this time.
Then on Sunday, I get called because an Albertville police car is on fire. Get to the scene and find out it was a K9 unit. Officer was chasing a runner when he heard his car explode. Went running back to find his car totally engulfed in flames. He then ran up to the car and was able to get his dog, Kilo, out before he was seriously hurt. The car was a total wreck.
So this is what we call the "waves rolling in". It has been pretty quite around here for awhile, but the last month has seen at least 3 murders, 2 or 3 accidental shootings, lots of robberies, and the stabbing. So grab your surfboard and hold on tight. We are going for a ride!

Another Day, Another Meth Story

Another story about crystal meth today. Seems like we have done quite a few of them lately. Unfortunately, meth is a very serious problem here on Sand Mountain. We were talking to a sheriff's office investigator yesterday, and he said that probably 90% or more of the crimes they work are related to meth in some way or the other. Either robberies or burglaries where the people are trying to get money to buy meth, or fights or shootings where meth is to blame. And there is no easy answer to the meth problem. Laws limiting the amount of pseudofed have cut down on the number of labs, but the use of the drug is still up. What can we do??

Happy New Year!!!

Here is wishing each and every one of you a Happy New Year! Hope you all have big plans for a great celebration. Here in the Hood household, we have two kids with a stomach virus so looks like our plans involve staying home and doctoring the young-uns. Oh, well, Dick Clark is supposed to be back this year so it won't be a total loss.
See ya again in 2006!!!

White Christmas

Yes, this picture was taken in Alabama. North Alabama. While the rest of us had our normal brown Christmas, the folks at Cloudmont Ski Resort in Mentone had their usual white Christmas. Thanks to the modern marvel of snow making machines, they are able to produce enough snow to have skiing every year at the resort. Folks come from all over the South to glide down the slopes and risk life and limb for a little fun. The great thing here is that even though the temperatures may be in the 50's the snow stays. So, while the rest of us endure another plain Jane Christmas, some folks high atop Lookout Mountain enjoy their fluffy white stuff, and hope to keep all their bones intact.

Fun At The Falls

Well, it's the week before Christmas, and it finds your faithful Sand Mtn. Photog on vacation. Just me and the kids, and with the cold weather we find ourselves going stir-crazy. So today, with a little nicer weather, we took off for Noccalulla Falls in Gadsden for a little picnic and some playground time. Here are the kids with the falls behind them. If you have never been to the Falls, or not in a while, you'll find some changes. Like a fence around the place keeping you out unless you pay. And guess what? The park is closed. So this is the best, free, view of the falls you can now get. So we did the park and then went to the mall.
So, please forgive me for staying away for awhile. But let me take this chance to wish you all a very Merry Christmas!! Yes, I said Merry Christmas. Hate me if you will, but that is the reason for the season.

Hot Rodders Rejoice!!

Just look at this thing!! The second picture reminds me of a Hot Wheel toy car, but man is it bad!! OK, I'm sorry, but I am a car nut. I get excited when I see something like this and know that a car company, Dodge, just might actually put it into production. I love hot rods, especially late 60's and early 70's muscle cars like the Chevy Camaro, and the Dodge Chargers and Challengers. Dodge put the new Charger into production already, and now this new Challenger will be a concept car and, hopefully, a real production car in the next couple of years. Although I have never been a Ford fan, I also really like the new Mustang with its retro look. To me, those muscle cars of my youth are still the best looking things on the road. Although if this Challenger makes it, I may have to change my mind.

I like change. Change is good. Well, not really, but I decided to give the blog a new look. You know, to keep things fresh. Anyway, not much going on today. Carson had a doctor's visit so I'm just kinda chilling, been cleaning up here at the bureau. Oh yeah, there was a wreck in front of my house last night. Wende and I heard this loud noise outside, and she thought it was raccoons on our back porch. I looked outside and saw a car had run off the road and into the trees across the road from us. Called 9-1-1 and got an ambulance on the way and then went out to check on them. Young girl driving a new Mustang had ran off the side of the road, overcorrected, and went across the road and through the ditch and into the woods. Took out my neighbors mailbox for about the fifth time. Driver broke her nose and passenger said her knee was hurting, so off to the hospital for them. I think the total count was 1 Crossville policeman, 3 county deputies, 1 firetruck, 1 ambulance, 1 state trooper, 6 or 7 volunteer firemen, and 1 wrecker. My brother Dusty called wanting to know if we were alright because his girlfriend went by the house and told him there were a bunch of policemen at the house. Finally got wrapped up about 10:15 pm. Lots of excitement in the country last night.