Running of the Bulls in Jamaica, Queens

A bull escaped from a slaughterhouse on Tuesday running through the streets of Jamaica, Queens with reckless abandon, terrorizing pedestrians in its path. The NYPD was in hot pursuit as the bull paraded down city sidewalks and hopped fences looking for its way out of the urban maze. The beast was struck with tranquilized darts resembling carefully placed swords from Spanish matadors while crowds gathered to watch the event. Its captors from the nearby Aziz Slaughter House chased the bull until it turned its horns toward them and charged. They escaped being gored without the customary cheer of Olé!

The bull traveled two miles and was seemingly cornered before escaping to run a half mile more. It finally sat down in a yard on 158th Street and 116th Avenue and was captured and transported to a nearby animal shelter where it was later pronounced dead from the corrida. The gallant run by the beast to escape the butcher's knife prompted a candlelight vigil in its honor outside the slaughterhouse the next day. 

Bull escapes slaughterhouse in Queens. Theodore Parisienne

While the annual Running of the Bulls Festival takes place in Pamplona, Spain in July, New Yorkers received an unexpected preview this winter. To some, it came as no surprise as the bulls have been running wild on Wall Street for the past month.

The Enduring Beauty of Liz Cho

Have you ever stared at a portrait of a lady for an eternity? What if eternity was measured in 10 minutes or 10 hours or 10 days? What if you saw the same picture each day for 10 years? Would it feel like eternity? Could any portrait hold you captive for that long? Perhaps if it changed ever so slightly each day, a new hairstyle, a different dress, a dash of pepper here, a pinch of salt there, would it continue to entice the palette? Imagine if the lady could speak and you could watch her expression change from mock disbelief to spontaneous laughter in an instant? Would eternity be long enough?

Liz Cho, Eyewitness News, Feb. 4, 2016.

I first wrote about Liz Cho in December of 2006 when she was the co-anchor of Eyewitness News at 11pm. Her bright portrait illuminated my tranquil living room each night. Those times when she was absent, there was a noticeable void like a blank space on a museum wall. I took note of one such absence in 2007 when she was on maternity leave and triumphantly announced her return a few months later. I chronicled the disappearance of her wedding ring in 2008 and speculated there was a budding romance between Liz and her co-anchor Bill Ritter. It was an unfounded rumor; however, it forshadowed her public divorce in 2012 and her equally public romance with Good Morning America's Josh Elliott with whom she would marry in 2014.  

The consummate professional, Liz Cho's personal life rarely interfered with her professional one. The only disruption in a decade was when she left the 11pm broadcast to fill the 4pm void in programming when Oprah Winfrey retired. The change in shift was thought to be temporary at first, but it soon became permanent. The portrait of the lady that had become a fixture in my home seemed lost forever, snatched away by an earlier broadcast that mercilessly conflicted with my own schedule. Luckily, it wasn't for long. As my living room grew less tranquil with a growing family, my schedule skewed earlier and earlier until her 6pm broadcast filled the time slot before dinner. 

Liz Cho, Eyewitness News, Feb, 14, 2017

To me, it does not seem like an eternity since I first gazed upon the portrait of this particular lady. Her elegance and beauty has not only endured a decade, it has radiated in high-definition from an increasingly larger frame, leaving me as captivated today as I was back then.      

Related posts:

• Liz Cho Gave Birth to a Baby Girl Today
• It Appears Liz Cho Is Still Married
• Liz Cho Dating Josh Elliott

Thank You Lord

Thank you Lord for the ability to make a wrong a right

and coffee and aspirin after a late night,

Thank you Lord for another chance to run and laugh

and for declining the penalty after an ill-advised gaffe,

Thank you Lord for treating us all the same

and for being impartial to our endless blame,

And thank you Lord for listening to my prayer

and letting me know you're always there.

Ireland Baldwin drinks coffee (Pinterest).