The funeral procession for Officer Drew Henley yesterday was the biggest I’ve ever seen. People were standing with umbrellas in the median of Godwin Boulevard in the downpour to pay their respects as the blue-light flashing motorcade passed. It was a stirring sight.

Such a tragedy.

Please remember Henley and his family in your prayers.

There seems to be lots of activity going on around downtown. The old Bookman store is being readied for the market. I don’t know the owner, but I’ve been told he’s from Norfolk. I saw him out on the street one night recently around 8 p.m. with lights on the sidewalk and a hose in hand cleaning things off. I walked around downtown Tuesday afternoon taking a visitor on a tour and the building looked great.

Also, there’s much activity over at the old Gurley Press building. We saw several workers inside there. We stopped one on the sidewalk and he said they were doing a remodeling job and he thought a bar of some sort was going in there.

While I mentioned here a couple blogs ago my feelings on the Terry Schiavo matter, a few other items have popped up as the story has unfolded.

The case is certainly tragic for Mrs. Schiavo and her family,

and it’s a shame that it has created such loathsome behavior on the part of both sides.

Terry’s husband, of course, is somewhat less than a sympathetic figure, who reportedly wants her dead to come into some money and to be able to marry his mistress. He’s beneath contempt.

But so is Tom DeLay (big surprise there) the sleazy Texas congressman who led the effort for congress to stick its nose in this wretched woman’s case.

Radio talk show buffoon Neal Boortz, on his program yesterday, mentioned tapes of the dastardly DeLay telling his congressional allies that the Schiavo case was a &uot;Godsend&uot; to their cause because it shifted media attention away from all their troubles, particularly DeLay’s own ethics case. I didn’t hear the tapes, but Boortz said he played them.

I heard Terry Schiavo’s parents took the case to the Supreme Court overnight so hopefully it will be resolved one way or another today.

If West Virginia beat Texas Tech tonight in the Sweet 16, you might want to skip this tomorrow because I will be particularly obnoxious. Go Mountaineers.