“This result tracks with Republicans taking control of the House by the end of the evening,” says Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.
(Source: theweek.com)
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On Saturday night around 11 p.m., residents of the Richmond Hill subdivision on Indianapolis’ southeast side were shocked by a massive explosion on Fieldfare Way that set several homes ablaze, killing two people, leaving five homes completely destroyed and 26 others severely damaged. Residents described the explosion as a nightmare in which debris rained down on the area like snow, and windows and garage doors a block away from the epicenter were blown out.
Indiana has a long history of such accidents, including the 1963 gas blast that ripped through the Indianapolis State Fairgrounds Coliseum killing 74 people and injuring 400 others.
(Source: theweek.com)
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A flurry of tornadoes in the South and Midwest killed 40 people last week, leaving a path of destruction across five states. But it wasn’t all bad. Here, some inspiring stories of survival and miraculous luck:
- The mom who saved her children
An Indiana woman, Stephanie Decker, rushed her children into the basement of her new house as the storm hit. She bound her 5-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son together in a blanket, and shielded them with her own body. The dream home that had taken seven months to build was reduced to rubble in seconds, and beams and other debris crashed into the basement, pinning Decker. She lost one leg below the knee, and her other foot. Her children survived without a scratch. Decker’s husband, Joe, says he told her “‘They’re here because of you.’ I let her know that nothing else matters. I said, ‘You’re going to be here for your kids, and you get to see them grow up.’”
- The kids who survived being blown from their home
Latonya Stevens blacked out when a tornado ripped apart her North Carolina home. When she came to, only one of her four kids was at her side, and Stevens, fearing the worst, ran outside shouting, “Where’s my babies!” The missing children — ages 3, 4, and 7 — had been in their rooms upstairs, and were swept away along with most of the home’s second floor. Once the tornado passed, two of the kids were found nearby, but one, 7-year-old Jamal, had been thrown 100 feet. All three kids were fine, other than a few cuts and bruises. “It’s a miracle they survived,” said their grandfather, Clarence Gray Jr. “God was looking out for them.”
- The Alabama man reunited with his imperiled dog
Greg Cook was at work when a tornado slammed into his Limestone County, Ala., house. When the winds subsided, he rushed home and found his neighborhood destroyed and most of his house gone. He assumed he would never again see his dog, a chocolate Labrador named Coco, who’d been left at home when Cook went to work. But Cook crawled through a window into what was left of a hallway, and found Coco, wet and shivering. “It was just such a relief, I was happy to see him,” said Cook through tears. “I love my dog. He’s my best friend.”
- The mom who saved her children
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Beginning Of The End Of An Era of the Day: Indiana’s public school will no longer teach students the art the “fair hand,” permanently replacing cursive writing with keyboard proficiency.
“The Common Core State Standards do not include cursive writing at all,” says the Department of Education in a memo to state Superintendents. “Instead, students are expected to become proficient with keyboarding skills.”
41 states have adopted the new common core standards for English which does not require schools to teach cursive writing, but have yet to ditch the time-honored tradition.
I’m from Indiana, and despite how much time I spend at a computer, I still write in cursive on a pretty regular basis. Sigh. Oh well.
(Source: thedailywhat)
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Indiana congressman Baron Hill loses to Republican Todd Young
