When in Doubt (or in Boston), Blow It Up

If you accept the premise that colorful light boards displaying cartoon characters should be blown up because they might be bombs, this one seems like a no-brainer: Today police in Boston—the only city that was thrown into a panic by a marketing tactic that was taken in stride, if not completely ignored, in nine others—blew up a "suspicious package" chained to a parking sign. The local Fox affiliate reports that it might have been a device used by the transportation department to count passing vehicles. But you can't be too careful.

Police in Santa Fe seem to agree. Last week, apparently confusing the F-bomb with a literal one, they blew up two of three CD players that had been set to play "foul language" and "pornographic messages" during Ash Wednesday services at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi. They kept the third possible bomb intact, A.P. reports, "to test for fingerprints or DNA and trace its components."

[Thanks to Thomas Paine's Goiter for the links.]