10 for 10 (8th Entry): The First Line of the Novel 'Choke'

Greetings to our blog readers in Macedonia, Belgium, and Jordan.......in order to substantially increase our global audience we will name drop Serbian soccer player Branislav Ivanovic of Chelsea and German striker Mesut Ozil , who is of Turkish heritage, for Arsenal.

Tonight actually marks the 10th anniversary of our first blog entry here on this blog, to our knowledge only four or five people read that one. Hopefully, at least 98 will read this entry (nudge, nudge, wink, wink....)

On a personal note, we want to send our kudos to Chris Hurst, the 11:00 news anchor for WDBJ-7 in Roanoke, Va. If you watched CNN a few weeks ago, you saw him speak with Anderson Cooper, he has been through a lot. Tonight marks his second week of returning to the broadcast booth. Since Roanoke is our hometown, we wish Hurst the best.

We were hoping a joke about Scott Walker, the Wisconsin governor who dropped out of the Republican presidential candidate race, but we are running late, and you can see the tweets of his former employee Liz Mair, which are indeed quite amusing.

Tonight, we are going retro with the first line of Chuck Palahniuk's great 2001 cult classic novel "Choke." A few years ago, we had lots of fun with posts about the first lines of novels, such as Leo Tolstoy's "War and Peace," which we must profess to have never read!

Here is the first line from "Choke:"

"If you're going to read this, don't bother. After a couple pages, you won't want to be here. So forget it. Go away. Get out while you're still in one piece. Save yourself."

http://chuckpalahniuk.net/

Breaking News Tweets: Riots in Baltimore

Here are some of the latest tweets regarding the riots in Baltimore stemming from the police custody death of Freddie Grey, 25. The pictured images of Anderson Cooper from CNN, the Baltimore Oriole, and Gov. Larry Hogan (R-Md). Here they are:

1) The Hill: Maryland Governor Hogan: Things are going to be different today in Baltimore.

2) Talking Points Memo: The right piles on Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake over her quote about letting protestors 'destroy.'

3) National Review (a right-wing publication): If you allow lawlessness to go unchallenged: You get more of it."

4) Mother Jones (a left-wing publication): Rand Paul blames the Baltimore riots on absentee fathers.

5) The Baltimore Sun: Tomorrow's Orioles game will be played at 2:05 p.m., and be closed to the public.

6) Slate: CNN's Baltimore coverage is dreadful and shameful.

7) David Swanson (liberal activist): Send the whole police force and National Guard to Camden Yards. Watch peace break out.

8) Newsweek: Update numbers from Baltimore riots: 202 people arrested, 20 cops injured, 144 cars set on fire.

9) Chicago Tribune: Obama on rioting: 'They aren't protesting, they aren't making a statement, they're stealing.'

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.baltimoresun.com