"Shrapnel"...

Aside from the misuse of the word "shrapnel" (this is, for most laypeople, one of those "clip/magazine" distinctions without difference) the reporting of this thing is getting up my nose.

The chief of emergency medicine at Brigham & Women's keeps telling NBC reporters that the only "fragments" they're pulling out of people are bits of debris from objects you'd expect to find on the street. They keep asking him about "shrapnel". To save wear on his vocal cords, perhaps he could hold up a card on which he's doctor-scratched "We haven't pulled any ball bearings out of anybody yet that I'm aware of, but we'll keep looking for you."

NBC has theme music already.

On the spacing of the two explosions, Brian Williams (who humped a mic all over the Green Zone, you know) kept reiterating that "Those of us who've been to the wars overseas will find the second detonation* a common tactic..." or words to that effect. Anyhow, he wanted all the listeners to know he'd been in the $#!+. The Marine vet he used this schtick on didn't crawl through the line and choke him, more's the pity.

Meanwhile, the Boston police chief, who just had a herd of zebra charge down Main Street, can probably be forgiven for not expecting horses when he heard more hoofbeats that day. (And that's not to say that it wasn't deliberate, but it's looking like that's not the way to bet.) Like always, all the speculation being vomited onto the airwaves to sell commercials in the immediate aftermath is just future fodder for the the conspiracy 'n' coverup buffs.


*Like spacing a second charge to catch responders is some sort of Islamist innovation. *CoughEricRudolph'BortionClinicCough*