And make sure you put helium in it when you finish.

[pomtzu]

Something is really hinky about this story.

Looks and smells pretty fishy now.

Speculation is that it was a publicity stunt of some kind, and the parents were in on it. On Larry King last night, the boy said he "did it for the show". They were on GMA this morning too, and the father just isn't acting like someone who went thru such a traumatic experience, and said he's appalled that people think it was a hoax. He just acted strange, to say the least.

The family qualifies as "attention seekers" - been on Wife Swap twice. They are facing a whole lot of questions by the authorities.

I hope they have to pay the cost of yesterday's fiasco if it proves that it was indeed a hoax. Just putting that Black Hawk in the air is a costly venture, not to mention all the rest of what transpired.

[aTailOf2Kitties]

This song popped into my head yesterday and just won't leave. Thanks, Balloon Boy. (yeah I know he ended up being at home but this song invaded my mind when everyone was still looking for him)


LEARNING TO FLY by Tom Petty:

Well I started out down a dirty road
Started out all alone
And the sun went down as I crossed the hill
The town lit up the world got still

Im learning to fly but I aint got wings
Comin down is the hardest thing

Well the good old days may not return
And the rocks might melt, and the sea may burn

Im learning to fly but I aint got wings
Comin down is the hardest thing

Well some say life will beat you down
Break your heart, steal your crown
So I started out for God knows where
But I guess Ill know when I get there

Im learning to fly around the clouds
But what goes up must come down

Im learning to fly but I aint got wings
Comin down is the hardest thing
Im learning to fly around the clouds
But what goes up must come down

Im learning to fly
Im learning to fly

[Catherinedana]

I can't come back! I don't know how it works! Good-bye folks!

[Pembroke_Corgi]

This was all over the news yesterday as it was local- I'm glad the little boy is ok, but it does seem a bit weird that a boy that young could hide for so long undetected, or even get into the attic himself (do new homes even have walk-up attics?). I feel a bit sorry for the boy either way- if he's really that scared of his dad, I don't think that's normal.

I only watched one clip this morning, but the father was just talking about his experiments, and saying the whole family chased dust storms, etc. Maybe he just doesn't know how to respond to all the attention, but it almost seems like he was fishing around for some funding for his dumb experiments.

[lvpets2002]

Oh I so aggree on this.. The adventure was flakey all along.. I just cant see people putting people thru stuff like this just for attention.. Oh yes they still have a lot of explaining to do for sure..

Looks and smells pretty fishy now.

Speculation is that it was a publicity stunt of some kind, and the parents were in on it. On Larry King last night, the boy said he "did it for the show". They were on GMA this morning too, and the father just isn't acting like someone who went thru such a traumatic experience, and said he's appalled that people think it was a hoax. He just acted strange, to say the least.

The family qualifies as "attention seekers" - been on Wife Swap twice. They are facing a whole lot of questions by the authorities.

I hope they have to pay the cost of yesterday's fiasco if it proves that it was indeed a hoax. Just putting that Black Hawk in the air is a costly venture, not to mention all the rest of what transpired.

[Taz_Zoee]

I completely agree that this was a huge publicity stunt. And I hope they have to pay for all that happened.

I saw one thing where Falcon was talking and he said something about Shaggy. Bruce asked me...Shaggy?? I said, it's probably his brothers name. Not sure if I was right. Yeah, definitely attention seekers when you name your children Shaggy and Falcon.

[RICHARD]

Oh,
I do know how it is here in Cah lee fuh nee ah!

----------------

"Learning To Fly"
Pink Floyd

Into the distance, a ribbon of black
Stretched to the point of no turning back
A flight of fancy on a windswept field
Standing alone my senses reeled
A fatal attraction holding me fast, how
Can I escape this irresistible grasp?
Can't keep my mind from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted Just an earth-bound misfit, I

Ice is forming on the tips of my wings
Unheeded warnings, I thought I thought of everything
No navigator to find my way home
Unladened, empty and turned to stone
A soul in tension that's learning to fly
Condition grounded but determined to try

Can't keep my mind from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earth-bound misfit, I
Above the planet on a wing and a prayer,
My grubby halo, a vapour trail in the empty air,
Across the clouds I see my shadow fly
Out of the corner of my watering eye
A dream unthreatened by the morning light
Could blow this soul right through the roof of the night

There's no sensation to compare with this
Suspended animation, A state of bliss
Can't keep my eyes from the circling skies
Tongue-tied and twisted just an earth-bound misfit, I

---------------------------

Shaggy, Falcon and Scooby Doo?

------------------------

I really want to know how this was slanted by the media overseas!!!

--------------------

Of course he had to jump in the balloon.

Imagine what child protective services would say if you put the kid in Ruby Red Slippers.........

----------------

I do have to say one thing.

If anything, the peeps who chased the balloon down are thankful for a little excitement and a change to their usual chasing down of cats in trees, calls to Grandma's house because she stood up too quickly and little Thelma (Yes we are doing a Scooby Doo thread--Shaggy?) getting her head stuck in the child gate between the kitchen and wash room......

It probably took a few hours off their lives, but we do have a pretty good system of first responders here in the States.


LOLOLOLOL,

I could see someplace like Soviets scrambling MIGs to shoot the little Bees turd down.

Does anyone remember the people that made a balloon to get over the Berlin Wall?

[momoffuzzyfaces]

They were showing clips today of the balloon getting loose. It looked like the Dad was the one who let it go. He was trying to act all mad and stuff. I think I was put on myself.

In one of the tv interviews the reporter asked the kid why he didn't come out when he heard them calling him. He said he was told not too. Then his dad hushed him up real fast. Now he changed his story.

[Grace]

They were showing clips today of the balloon getting loose. It looked like the Dad was the one who let it go. He was trying to act all mad and stuff. I think I was put on myself.

In one of the tv interviews the reporter asked the kid why he didn't come out when he heard them calling him. He said he was told not too. Then his dad hushed him up real fast. Now he changed his story.

And did you notice, there was no basket attached to the balloon when it took off? So much for that theory. I wonder what that deputy had been drinking when he supposedly saw the basket fall off?

That kid has been puking his guts out on national TV - maybe sick of lying?

[cassiesmom]

Looks and smells pretty fishy now.

Speculation is that it was a publicity stunt of some kind, and the parents were in on it.

The family qualifies as "attention seekers" - been on Wife Swap twice. They are facing a whole lot of questions by the authorities.

I heard a commentary on news radio today that said the father was developing the balloon as an alternative to heavy commuter traffic -- not sure if that is the truth or if the commentator was being facetious, though.

I didn't know you could be on Wife Swap more than once!

[Edwina's Secretary]

The family did live in California (doesn't it figure???) while the husband was trying to "break into" acting and/or standup comic. Their landlady when living here has been interviewed and doesn't say anything very nice about the father....

The first question that popped into my mind when I heard the story...why weren't these boys in school? At six and seven - shouldn't they be?

[blue]

The family is going to be charged!

[Catty1]

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/0...s_usa_aircraft

Colorado sheriff: "balloon boy" case was a hoax

1 hour, 43 minutes ago

DENVER (Reuters) - The flight of a home-made helium balloon that sparked a frantic rescue attempt for the young boy thought to be aboard was a publicity-seeking hoax, a Colorado sheriff said on Sunday.

Larimer County Sheriff Jim Alderden said the parents of 6-year-old Falcon Heene would likely face charges in the bizarre incident, which riveted television viewers across the United States for more than two hours on Thursday.

The airship took to the skies on Thursday morning and Richard and Mayumi Heene claimed that their son had climbed aboard, touching off a massive search and rescue operation as the odd silver craft drifted for 50 miles, trailed by U.S. National Guard helicopters. The boy was found not in the flying saucer-shaped craft but safe at home.

"It has been determined that this is a hoax, that it was a publicity stunt," Alderden told a press conference.

"We believe we have evidence at this point to indicate that it was a publicity stunt done with the hopes of better marketing themselves for a reality television show at some point in the future," he said.

Alderden said the parents would likely be charged with conspiracy, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, making a false police report and attempting to influence a public servant.

He said investigators believed that Falcon Heene and his brothers, who are 8 and 10, were "100 percent involved" in the caper but were not expected to face criminal charges because of their age.

"On the bizarre meter, this rates a 10," Alderden said.

Authorities had considered desperate measures to somehow bring the balloon down safely before it slowly began to deflate on its own and landed softly in a wheat field near Denver.

'PLAN WAS TO LAUNCH A SPACECRAFT'

Rescuers who raced to the balloon and found it empty then began to scour the countryside for Falcon, fearing that he had fallen out -- until the family announced that he was safe and had been hiding in a garage attic.

Questions were raised after a CNN interviewer told Richard Heene to ask his son why he had stayed in hiding so long when searchers were desperately calling his name.

The boy responded: "You guys (his parents) said that, um, we did this for the show."

The Heene family has appeared on the ABC television reality show "Wife Swap" in which families swap mothers to deal with family problems.

They gave interviews on a series of U.S. morning shows on Friday to emphatically deny the incident was staged. Falcon vomited repeatedly on camera.

Alderden said his investigators determined that the incident was a hoax after interviewing all five members of the Heene family and searching the home.

"This has been a planned event for some two weeks," he said. "The plan was to launch the spacecraft for a reality TV. The plan was to create a situation where it appeared that Falcon was in the craft to gain publicity. To obtain notoriety to obtain publicity for a television show."

The sheriff, who on Friday had largely dismissed suggestions from reporters that the balloon flight might be a hoax, said that he had, to some extent, manipulated the media in order to gain the trust of the Heenes.

"I bumped against the line of misleading the media," he said. "I hope I didn't cross that line. I bumped up against it by perhaps overstating our assurance or belief that there was nothing behind this."

(Reporting by Dan Whitcomb, editing by Jackie Frank)

[pomtzu]

IMO, the children should be taken from the parents and the unstable environment in which they live, and the parents made to pay back every penny that this sick trick cost the taxpayer!

[momoffuzzyfaces]

IMO, the children should be taken from the parents and the unstable environment in which they live, and the parents made to pay back every penny that this sick trick cost the taxpayer!

They should thump the dad on the head hard too for worrying half the country to death!!! Or at the very least, swat him hard with a rolled up newspaper!!!

They don't need to worry about me watching any show they are ever on. I can hardly stand to see them on the news any more.