BigPineKey.com

[“The oldest businesses on Big Pine”] Underseas dive shop was first opened next to Gabby’s Texaco station which is now the Shell station. Mr. Jim’s was a breakfast only place where Springer’s is now located. Bistro 31 was Judd’s, the only “grocery” store. Sea Center was here but the original building is now gone. Big Pine Fishing Lodge and the Old Wooden Bridge Fishing Camp were here. The Big Pine Inn was in full swing. Soon came the Sharecropper, that is now the Bucktooth Rooster. New businesses on Big Pine are Coconuts, the health food store and True Value.
Oh, and Bareger(sic) & Gibson Real Estate is now First State Bank. The Post Office was in the little sign shop building across from the former Keys Federal Credit Union. That, folks, is the original Big Pine Key!

57 percent of people facing foreclosure on their homes identified medical debt and other medical costs as a primary cause. Here’s the clincher: only 10 percent of those people didn’t have insurance! The others were all insured, but their policy was so complicated that they didn’t know they weren’t covered until they needed the insurance. Health insurance is a criminal enterprise designed to avoid paying claims and misleading the insured. Life is too complicated as it is, let’s make it better. We need national healthcare to make America great again.

[“Wedding venues in the Keys”] My son and daughter-in-law were married at Parmer’s Resort on Little Torch. It was beautiful and most of the guests stayed at the resort. Everyone had a great time.

In March 1898, the Spanish Naval Court of Inquiry submitted to U.S. Secretary of the Navy John Long it’s results that found the Battleship Maine was destroyed by an internal explosion. The conspiracy theorists are still having a field day speculating on the cause of the sinking

[Savages] Congo — A Congolese militia group has decapitated 42 policemen after ambushing them in an increasingly violent region where the U.N. is searching for missing American and Swedish investigators.

[Remember the Main] On March 27, 1898 eight bodies from the Battleship Maine were buried in the Battleship Maine Plot in Key West City Cemetery.

[Pet Peeve] When the stapler is out of staples. [ [ [ [ [ [

[Redneck Blinds] No need to clean or dust them. Just tear off and toss away.

Bacon is better than that girl or guy who said they would die for you. Bacon, actually, did die for you. Bacon’s love is real.

The Cudjoe Regional windfall of sewage charges for uncollected, untreated sewage is what allowed FKAA to reduce the sewer bill by 15% for FKAA executives in Key Haven who never even “contributed” their $4500 special assessment for our sewer infrastructure. Instead, our rates will pay to replace their super leaky piping that FKAA bought for $2 million with your money, and pump it to Big Coppitt (built with your tax money) where it will be inadequately treated and dumped into shallow wells for distribution into nearshore waters. Central sewers have always been about the money and facilitating development, not the water quality.

[Movie Review] “A Dog’s Purpose” at Tropic Cinema, in Key West. Terrific film. Alas, the entire gig hinges on dogs, but not humans, can’t piss off the religious elements, are born, live, die, then are born again, live, die, and keep doing that, I suppose, until they get it right, or whatever. I bawled plenty at the end of the film. Maybe, I hoped, it was a sign that somehow, some way, my own life would be a happy ending. Probably not going to hold my breath and hasten the ending.

Who plans these projects? Why wasn’t the money set aside so you don’t have a new empty building sitting there — for Lord knows how long — looking stupid?

An internet search shows that the Refuge Manager in May 2016 said the project would cost $500K. Another article just in January 2017 quotes the Public Relations Representative saying the project will cost $300K. Here we are now with a shell of a building and a need for $500K more!

Did anyone at the US Fish and Wildlife Service think this through? This is not how you plan and fund a project.

[Screwworms dead] A public meeting was held Saturday to wrap up the New World Screwworm eradication efforts and explain the monitoring that will continue regarding the endangered Key deer. Representatives were at the meeting to discuss what was done and what will happen in the future.

Now let’s discuss the bike path. Before we had the path, bikers rode on the road. A little dangerous, so someone decides to build them their own path that half the bikers refuse to use. I can understand the path. I don’t understand all the railings. They bikers no longer have to be on the highway. Does the guardrail mysteriously make them dizzy causing them to fall off the straight and level bike path? Luckily, they held off closing the bridges until the rails were completed?

Along with the new bike path comes aggressive signage. There is so much signage that they have to put 2 or 3 signs on each pole. On the Key Deer stretch if they put in another 10 signs they will be able to tear the fence down because the deer won’t be able to get around the signs to get to the road.

Normally rum will let me ignore all the waste and stupidity, but they have brought all this to a level where I need a new drug to be able to absorb this insanity. They need to legalize really, really, good pot if the government expects us to believe they have any clue about anything at all.

Munson Island, just off shore of South of Big Pine Key. Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm, but to add color to my sunset sky. Blessings my friends. There is beauty if all forms, shapes, color & texture. It surrounds you.  ~Coconut Bar & Liquor Store

If Mote Marine is so wonderful then why, dear County Commissioners and City Officials, aren’t they addressing these issues and why, Sanctuary Advisory Council, aren’t they addressed at the SAC meetings?

I applaud the efforts of this group and now that I know of them I will support them in their efforts. Its nice to have the shade of these trees for a break from the heat and sun. I don’t feel the need to cut them down just to be environmentally politically correct. Link

The next door neighbor showed photos that indicate that already, on “king tides”, the road in front of this house goes partially underwater. So in a storm surge of significance there is no question that the pump station will submerge and be flooded. The collection system was not designed to accommodate significant Inflow & Infiltration in grinder pump areas, so if this is a typical installation, the wastewater may not all reach the plant in even heavy rain conditions.

The Contract called for sealed pits and “flood-proof” Wager brand vents. This flood protection feature that was supposed to prevent total destruction of thousands of E/one grinder stations such as occurred in Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and in the northeast in Super Storm Sandy was proclaimed in multiple public meetings as why the same fate would be avoided in the CRWS.

Questions for FKAA and BOCC and maybe the State Attorney: Was there a change order and contract credit for this further cheapening and endangerment of the system by installing unsealed rim-vented pits and eliminating the flood-proof vent? If not, who authorized the change to this SRF-funded contract, and by what means? Did the BOCC, as system owner, approve the change, with full knowledge of the possible repercussions?

The Wager vent is shown on the permit application drawings approved by the DEP on a sheet titled “Simplex Grinder Package Typical Site Installation.” Did the DEP approve this significant change to the Drawings and Contract that renders the grinder pits prone to flooding? Approximately how many pump stations are not flood protected and on which islands?