August 16, 2019

Pressure cooker.


"Authorities are looking to question a tall, thin white man seen pushing a shopping cart near the Fulton Street subway station, where two rice cookers were found Friday morning. A third rice cooker was found next to a trash can in Chelsea.... All three devices were stainless steel, silver commerical [sic] grade rice cookers with black handles; all three were empty."

IN THE COMMENTS: rehajm:
That John Mackey...
mccullough:
Wants to be able to make steel cut oats
Ha ha. I thought about that too. (For context, see this post from 7:08 AM about Whole Foods CEO John Mackey, who "typically packs a rice cooker with him (to make his morning steel-cut oats)."

MikeR said:
Performance art. Old tradition at subway stations.
Yes, I remember this story from 2002:
Clinton Boisvert, a newly enrolled student at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan, was arrested this week and charged with reckless endangerment after dreaming up one of the more provocative art projects of the post-September 11 era: placing 38 black boxes, bearing the word "fear" in white lettering, around the Union Square station, a crucial hub where six lines intersect. The bomb squad was called in and the station was shut for five hours last Thursday, causing a ripple effect of chaos on the network, as panicked commuters and transit workers feared a terrorist attack.

But in a city still especially alert to people behaving suspiciously in potential target zones, witnesses soon came forward to report seeing two "artsy types" distributing the boxes, a police source was quoted as saying. Police canvassed art schools, and Mr Boisvert turned himself in.... The NYPD said nobody had immediately reported the boxes when Mr Boisvert was seen distributing them, and that the art student had planned to bring friends to witness the installation the following day. If convicted, Mr Boisvert could receive up to a year in jail - and a useful boost to his profile as an up-and-coming conceptual artist.
I can't find anything on the later career of Clinton Boisvert.

41 comments:

rehajm said...

That John Mackey...

Bob Boyd said...

Relax. It's not even plugged in.

mccullough said...

Wants to be able to make steel cut oats

MikeR said...

Performance art. Old tradition at subway stations.

Paul said...

Sad thing about banning guns... the killers just migrate to lessor guns or other methods. See a 12 gauge pump 5 shot shotgun and a hacksaw makes a very short cannon. Make two or three and you have at least 15 shots that, well, one shot and you are hamburger.

Even using Joe Biden's favorite, the double barrel, hacksaw and a few of those guns makes you 6 shots (you an always reload them ya know.) Still capable of mass murder.

Oh, and folks those pressure cookers show someone is planning to REALLY MASS MURDER.

Fernandinande said...

I support pressure cooker control.

Silly-villians have no legitimate use for cookers with shoulder things that go up, nor those without shoulder things that go up.

Christopher said...

Test response.

Ann Althouse said...

"That John Mackey..."

LOL. That's what I thought too!

DarkHelmet said...

I stood in line at SFO security for about 45 minutes yesterday. Should have been 15 minutes at most, but inefficiency reigns supreme in such matters. I scanned the crowd around me. Looked at their faces. Thought to myself, "There is not one single terrorist standing in this line. I know it. Everybody around me knows it. Even the TSA knows it. The whole thing is an utterly pointless charade. Even so, each of us was giving up 45 minutes of our lives to play our part in the farce.

As always, these ruminations led me to consider how much I resent Islam, the Middle East and our own idiot government for foisting this nightmare upon us.

Dude1394 said...

Keep calling people racist, sexist, fascist, nazi, deplorable, xenophobic for political reasons will not end well. Refuse to control the borders will not end well.

MadisonMan said...

What happens to the Rice Cookers when the police are done with them?

reader said...

Is it a rice cooker or a pressure cooker?

gilbar said...

do cooks Really NEED these high pressure cookers?
Seems like something the military would use (to cook oatmeal?) We need to BAN these !!

Francisco D said...

Relax. It's not even plugged in.

LOL!

Sadly, not too many people will figure that out.

reader said...

You get my Instant Pot when you pry it from my cold dead hands. I made some fantastic Ranchero Beef in it yesterday. Husband ate it on homemade tortillas last night.

Ken B said...

So, I thought the new new thing was to not give people free publicity. Instead we get press conferences about a hoax. Do we WANT more hoaxes?

Bob Smith said...

If some itinerant “performance artist” frightened me I’d figure out a way to frighten them back.

Ken B said...

BBQ ribs. 40 minutes in the instant pot with a rub and a little liquid — beer and soy sauce is good — then 30 minutes on the grill with sauce.

Bay Area Guy said...

Gotta be a little less cavalier here - could be a dry run

Wince said...

Obviously a wrongful act to leave those hoax devices.

But on the positive side, as an "unplanned drill" it may help instill a more calm situational awareness among the population.

StoughtonSconnie said...

With the family in East Rutherford right now, wrapping up a week in New York. Took the A and C routes through the Fulton stop several times. Saw this on the local news this AM. First thought was trial run. Didn’t think of performance art. If that’s what it is, I’d suggest that a more jarring performance to the subway-riding public would be to go down and clean the station. Bar bathrooms on football Saturdays are cleaner.

Fernandinande said...

If you see something, pressure cook something.

Fernandinande said...

If you see something, say "Trump made me do it!"

Ficta said...

Yes. It's kind of funny. Particularly the tie in to steel cut oats. But the Boston Marathon bombs were made from pressure cookers.

Anne-I-Am said...

It is not a pressure cooker. There is no pressure release valve. Sheesh.

AllenS said...

Checking out the picture of the culprit, he will be easily identified. Very clear picture of him and his tattoo.

Xmas said...

A little less scary than The Mooninite Scare in Boston.

FullMoon said...

Speaking of performance art, is that girl still carrying the mattress around?

Maillard Reactionary said...

What is wrong with a city where subway riders have to risk being splattered with glutinous rice?

eLocke said...

I just took the 1 train in this morning. They announced that the 2 and 3 weren't going to Brooklyn because of an active investigation at Fulton St.

For some reason the 1 was just fine to ride on through though.

Narr said...

HLM: A reputation for arrogance can be a great advantage to an ambitious young man.

Strikes me that these artists are proving that's still true.

It's an interesting coincidence that the devices are about the size of the power unit for the first truly person-portable EMVs, developed by Marconi in 1908, which spurred in turn some efforts by Putilov in Russia to adapt the instruments to cold-weather conditions.

The First World War led to rapid development of EMV-related technology, though civilian use of the devices fell as they were first taxed (bringing in less revenue than anticipated except in Austria) and then put aside entirely as the materials needed were diverted to the war effort except in Austria.

In the US, Kettering and eventually Tesla turned their minds to the issue of mobility also, but without producing commercially viable products; some scholars believe that among Tesla's missing papers are notes on remotely-powered and even solar EMVs.

Narr
All true, except in Austria



Aggie said...

"Speaking of performance art, is that girl still carrying the mattress around? "

Odd you mention it, she was spotted this morning. Yes, she's still carrying it and working for the bomb squad.

Red Feather said...

 Ken B said...
So, I thought the new new thing was to not give people free publicity. Instead we get press conferences about a hoax. Do we WANT more hoaxes

You must have missed the pertinent piece of information: they were left by a white male. It's part of the new White Supremacist Terrorism narrative. Were the culprit non-white, it wouldn't have merited more than a passing mention.

Laurel said...

Pretty sure this is our Clinton Boisvert.
Note that bksoaps.com is defunct.

https://patch.com/new-york/ditmaspark/the-brooklyn-soap-company

Big Mike said...

If it was a dry run for a terrorist attack he failed. If it was a prank, he still failed because no one is laughing.

Big Mike said...

Where are summary executions when you need them the most?

Ken B said...

Red Feather
Ahhh. Indeed.

DavidUW said...

Patrons can do performance art too. And beat the crap out of him. Artistically.

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Nichevo said...

Anne said...
It is not a pressure cooker. There is no pressure release valve. Sheesh.

8/16/19, 10:05 AM


So what? Why is everyone stupid about this? It doesn't matter that they were pressure cookers at the Boston Marathon bombing. They were just large metal vessels that you could fill with explosives and shrapnel. Rice cookers are quite adequate to that task. You could use a stock pot just as easily.

Anonymous said...

Why are they looking for him? Do they want to give him his rice cookers back????