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Monday January 31, 2005

I've never has any secrets until I got old. Now there are things about myself and my  relationship that I won't ever tell anyone. Sad.

Where can I get that iguana bait? It's time we rid this island of exotic pests. (I'm not talking about tourists, so calm down.)

Name the lizard:  The lizard pictured is a Madagascar Day Gecko.  They are beautiful with bright green skin and the brilliant orange spots.  If you are lucky enough to have a family of them and you can protect them from cats they should thrive and help provide good bug control in your yard.  If they are always in one place you can feed them with meal worms available at a pet store.

Monday January 31, 2005

Sunday January 30, 2005

If I have a choice, I'll stand in line behind a man at the market because he'll probably pay with cash or a credit card (that he'll have ready) and he'll probably do his own bagging to speed things up. On the other hand, If I'm behind a woman she's probably going to write a check and then use coupons. An, of course, she won't start writing that check until after all her coupons have been verified. And bagging is just an option to most of them.

I’ve seen references in this column dissing paperboys and fireman standing in the middle of the highway soliciting. I agree with the writer. I just saw a car almost hit the paperboy at the entrance to Key West. They shouldn’t allow them in the roadway.

What do you call male ballerinas?

Whatever happened to Christo. the "artist" who dresses nature. Remember he draped the mangrove islands off Biscayne Bay? I think he did something to a big canyon too. Has he run out of cloth?

Sunday January 30, 2005

Saturday January 29, 2005

I see very little legitimate things about the election in Iraq. One whole segment of the population, the Sunni, aren't even voting. A lot of areas are too dangerous to have the elections, so they're not. No candidates were seen because of the danger and 28,000 Turban-Americans, who've never even been there, are allowed to vote by absentee ballot.

I don't like car chases in movies or any chases for that matter. Sci-Fi movies are the worst. They usually have a little plot line and the rest of the movie is running and chasing. It's the same in books. Those international "Thrillers" from Ludlum and his ilk are usually the same; a plot line and then running and chasing for the rest of the book. While I'm here ranting, I'd like to see a police car just drive up to a crime scene instead of that power-slide thing that they do. One more second longer isn't going to catch the killer!

In The 1939 movie Ninotchka, Melvyn Douglas said to Greta Garbo, "Radio. It's a box you buy in the installment plan and before you finish paying for it they tell you, you need a new one." The very same thing could be said today, 66 years later, about computers.

If people think the residents of the Big Pine area treat the tourists badly try being a tourist in Key West.  My cousins are in town and were staying at the Sheraton across the street from the beach.  The room was sold to them as non-smoking and reeked of smoke.  The toilet was peed in and un-flushed. They went down to the reception desk to ask to be moved.  The person told them they can't move them due to being full.  I guess a full hotel is reason to piss in your toilette upon check in.  They asked to see a manager. Some useless woman came out who said she was the manager's assistant and the manager was in a meeting.  This woman actually asked them if they were sure one of them didn't use the bathroom and forget to flush it.  Then she asked if they were positive it was smoke the room smelled of.  She gave them a can of air freshener and suggested they spray it in the air conditioner.  Finally, the general manager came out of hiding.  She stunk of booze and was glassy-eyed.  She offered to have house keeping go clean the toilet and said there was nothing she could do about the smoke smell in the non-smoking room.

Someone must have smoked in the non-smoking room.  My cousins told her they understood that she can't control all the customers, but would think they would spray the room after the smoker checked out before renting the room as a non-smoking room.  She offered to give them a free breakfast for the trouble.  I guess free breakfast justifies a smelly room with piss in the toilet.  To bad someone didn't crap in it, they might have gotten free dinner. 

At this point they were disgusted by the whole hotel and the smell of her booze breath, so they accepted the room, but checked out the next morning.  They were planning on staying 5 days.  They checked into The
Radisson.  Hopefully, they will be treated better.  What an impression they have of their first visit to the Florida Keys.

Saturday January 29, 2005

Friday January 26, 2005

There's a good recipe for traditional Key Lime Pie in the Recipe Page. Pies made from this recipe have gone to Jimmy Carter's Inauguration and to the table of King Juan Carlos of Spain. It's pretty good. Meringue instead of the newer whipped cream.
http://www.bigpinekey.com/Recipes/recipes.htm

Local school alumni, alumnae, teachers, and all who have immigrated from localities beyond, please notice the prevalent number of us who are barely able to functionally read. Forget about writing. Most disturbing, the inability to articulate a thought, if there was one. I am not being a smart ass, but communication, it seems to me, is profoundly essential. The fundamental currency. It could be argued that it's never taught because the epidemic has lived through the generations >thereby< gaining acceptance. Interested teachers will throw up their hands. (Boring, isn't it)?

People are virtually paralyzed when they're afforded the opportunity to resolve a grievance, or a dispute, or communicate a need. Since many are incapable of presenting their own case, they have little regard for another's. (What is the opposite of talking? The answer of course,  is waiting). When the subject makes the attempt, they're lost if they can't do it with the few clichés, or two or three platitudes they've devoted to memory. So frustration precedes the customary barrage of school yard insults. It seems to me, usually this has to do with being afraid of looking stupid, or trying to maintain an image of superiority. People who are able to express themselves effectively, end up having to do the communicating for their counterparts as well... y'know, fill in the blanks and stuff.

I've been renovating houses for most of my life and the area that I pay most attention and give the most detailed work is directly across from the toilet. That's the only place in the whole house where people just sit and stare. That area is the most scrutinized place in the house.

Re: Cute Guy Alert. Yes, I have all my teeth and a full head of hair. I don't do drugs or even drink alcohol. I am a good, honest, hard working man who contributes regularly to our community. I can buy my own cheeseburgers and suggest that you spend your money on someone who needs it. A real beach boy knows it's always summer within.

Thursday January 26, 2005

Big news for families: they're building a miniature golf course next to Boondocks in downtown Ramrod Key. Finally, something for the family to do together without having to travel. all we need now is a small bowling alley and movie house.

For over a year, roomer has it that Manley-DeBoer Lumber Co. in Key West has bought Pinewood Materials and will be opening a lumber yard on Industrial Road. Do you think this will ever happen? It sure would be nice to have a full service lumber yard here.

I'm sick of people complaining about the Key Deer's customers. Every type of watering hole is needed. Clientele have a way of going to the place that their most comfortable in. Some go to Little Palm and some go to the Key Deer Grill. Nature has a way of getting people to settle-in. If the Key Deer wasn't there someone else would build a bar just like it. It fills a need. No one has to go there.

Good book. Inside the Kingdom: My Life in Saudi Arabia
by Carmen Bin Ladin She married one of Osama's brothers, a fabulously wealthy Saudi. And she tells what life is like inside the Magic Kingdom (Magic for men--not for women.)

With Homeleand Security in effect does that mean that there are no longer any illegals coming from Mexico? Or do we still turn a blind eye to them. If they're still coming over the border like they used too, what's to stop a terrorist from doing the same?

Paradise Insurance Co. If it was paradise we wouldn't need insurance.

Don't you think Pfizer Pharmaceuticals should get rid of the P in in front of Pfizer; or shouldn't they put an F after the P in Pharmaceuticals?

Thank you all for the awesome ideas for the birthday parties! Keep 'em coming. It's a good feeling to read a complete stranger wishing my son a happy birthday!

This guy gets scarier and scarier.
Secret Unit Expands Rumsfeld's Domain. New Espionage Branch Delving Into CIA Territory  --By Barton Gellman W Post (1/23)
The Pentagon, expanding into the CIA's historic bailiwick, has created a new espionage arm and is reinterpreting U.S. law to give Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld broad authority over clandestine operations abroad, according to interviews with participants and documents obtained by The Washington Post.

Barely 24 hours after the last marching band paraded past the White House, the president's lieutenants were out there spinning that all those lovely words didn't mean quite as much as they seemed to have meant.

And now we learn that we should not read too much into the president's enchanting freedom talk. He just wants to look "bold."

For his own sake and ours, Bush and his advisers should not be making it easier for adversaries and skeptical allies to dismiss freedom as an advertising slogan used to justify whatever foreign policy the administration decides to pursue. All presidents need a dose of realism, but surely this president doesn't want it said that his willingness to stand up for freedom depends on what the definition of "freedom" is. You can spin a lot of things. Freedom shouldn't be one of them.   
--By E. J. Dionne Jr.  (Washington Post Jan 25, 2005)

Wednesday January 26, 2005

Please stop insulting people who disagree with you by calling them a tourist or such other negatives. It's so base. Try to rise above animal instincts. It feels better.

Clinton hater. Yesterday someone wrote that Clinton bombed the Serb-Croatian country to take peoples' mind off his b**w job. I'm always amazed at the level of hate people have for the former president for such a minor infraction of societies' mores.

To the person who wrote in and said that they would not eat at the Square Grouper because he would not eat “in a place named after drugs” I can only say that he is missing out on a great restaurant experience because of his microscopically narrow view and utter lack of a sense of humor.  The word “pomposity” comes to mind.

So, Slick Willie (oops…I mean former President William Jefferson “I didn’t have sex with that woman” Clinton) and his wife, Senator Hillary Rodham “Now, where did I misplace all of those records” Clinton,  were in Key West, walked along Duval St., greeted strangers, had their picture taken and begged for money (oops….I mean soliciting contributions for Hillary’s NEW YORK BASED political machine).  Wow, was I impressed.  But then, as I thought about it, I was in Key West the other day and as I walked along Duval St. I saw a local bum (oops….I mean a poor, unfortunate homeless individual) greeting strangers, occasionally getting his picture taken and begging for money (oops… I mean soliciting contributions for his Key West based lifestyle). The only difference seemed to be was that the bum didn’t get his picture on the front page of The Key West Citizen and stayed in town after he got his money.

Tuesday January 25, 2005

Fat Tuesday is Mardi Gras, the festival New Orleans, Louisiana, is famous for. "Gras" is French for fat and "Mardi" is French for Tuesday.

The annual festivities start on January 6, the Twelfth Night Feast of the Epiphany, when the three kings are supposed to have visited the Christ Child, and build to a climax on Mardi Gras, or Fat Tuesday, which always occurs on the day before Ash Wednesday. The parties and parades will continue until Lent begins at the stroke of midnight on Tuesday.

What Democracy Means to Me by Johnny Carson (1991) delivered as a tribute to the Soviet republics created after the fall of communism. As Doc and the band played "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" in the background, Johnny summed up the totality of life in the land of the free:

Democracy is buying a big house you can't afford with money you don't have to impress people you wish were dead. And, unlike communism, democracy does not mean having just one ineffective political party; it means having two ineffective political parties. Democracy is welcoming people from other lands, and giving them something to hold onto -- usually a mop or a leaf blower. It means that with proper timing and scrupulous bookkeeping, anyone can die owing the government a huge amount of money. Democracy means free television, not good television, but free. And finally, democracy is the eagle on the back of a dollar bill, with 13 arrows in one claw, 13 leaves on a branch, 13 tail feathers, and 13 stars over its head -- this signifies that when the white man came to this country, it was bad luck for the Indians, bad luck for the trees, bad luck for the wildlife, and lights out for the American eagle. I thank you.
--R.I.P. Mr. Carson.

Bill Clinton was in KW. Wow. He's the only famous person that I'd really like to spend some time with.