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2015 September

Saturday, September 5, 2015

The-Coconut-Telegraph-w-Coconuts

Since 2002. Now Published Wednesdays and Saturdays

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wetstock11--9.6.15[Wetstock 11] Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, children of all ages, WETSTOCK 11 is tomorrow, Sunday! The on the water community concert is Sunday Sept 6th 1 pm (Keys time) at Picnic Island (coming into Pine Channel across from Little Palm Island).

It will be a great day of peace & music for all. I am pleased to announce the musical addition and locals’ favorite recording artist “Adrienne” with John Bartus & Jade Storm. Adrienne’s new CD is fantastic and getting  a lot of airplay.

So, come on out and enjoy the day! See you there, Your Friend, Flip Flop Bob

[Animal Shelter] “Well, George, this is another fine mess you’ve gotten us into.” — The Director of Safe Harbor Animal Rescue to the Keys (SHARK) has told Monroe County that they may not be able to fulfill its contract.  You remember SHARK, Commissioner George Neugent’s handpicked successor to Stand Up For Animals (SUFA) as the provider of animal control services for the Middle and Lower Keys.

After asking for an increase in funding, SUFA was run off as a result of alleged “financial irregularities”.  When challenged in court to prove the allegations, the County chose to settle rather than go to trial.

SHARK Director, Tara Vickery, is quoted in the Barometer as saying “financial irregularities” including such things as failing to have an audit for several years (SUFA never missed an annual audit), lapses in insurance coverages (SUFA never experienced any insurance lapses), regular fines for late filings from both state and federal agencies (SUFA never was assessed such fines), failing to make payroll (SUFA never failed to meet its payroll obligations), announcements by the IRS and the Florida Department of Revenue that they will soon be visiting the facility (SUFA never had such a visit by either agency), disconnection of the on-call phone number making it impossible for the public to contact them (SUFA’s phone was never disconnected), and possible revocation of its status as a non-profit organization (SUFA was never threatened with such action by any government agency) may lead to their demise.

In his comments on the situation, County Administrator Roman “get me an iPod” Gestasi amazingly suggested, among other things, that one solution might be to “give the organization a longer contract” because “bigger donors are unwilling to write a check for a larger amount if the contract only has a few years to run.”

What?  Seriously? We should extend the contract of an organization that admits being guilty of substantially more misdeeds than the one it replaced?  And for ideas like this we pay this guy a 6-figure annual salary? Not only that, but this man goes on to say, “Is the bookkeeping messed up a little bit?  I think we can safely say yes.  But operationally it appears they’re doing fine.  I’d rather have bad paperwork than bad operations from this kind of facility.”  This from a person who, in sworn deposition, freely admitted that there were absolutely no problems with the animal control services provided by SUFA, but insisting that in spite of that they were unqualified to continue as a county contractor.

If you look up the definition of “hypocrisy” in the dictionary I figure our illustrious County Administrator’s picture is bound to appear.

gears in a row

[Government Machine] This was on display at the “Cotton Ginning Days” in Dallas, NC on October 11, 2014. It doesn’t do anything except make noise, belch noxious gas into the atmosphere, consists of lots of lost motions and is costly to run. The builder has titled it “Scale Model of the US Government.” It’s powered by a 1920’s vintage “hit & miss” engine. Video

[Crook] A Key Largo man accused of forging someone else’s name on the title of a boat trailer and selling it without the owner’s permission was arrested Tuesday, according to the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office. Michael Abraham Vaught, 34, faces two counts of grand theft, dealing in stolen property, forgery and uttering a false or forged document.
smoke weed[Mary Jane] Key West has joined other Florida cities in adding a civil penalty for small-time marijuana possession, while the county is still hammering out a new way to ease the penalty for 20 grams or less of the drug. City police officers now have the option of handing out a $100 violation to someone found holding that amount, rather than making an arrest. there is more to a criminal case than the arrest. “The time and money city employees spend processing it, the amount of paperwork involved, it’s the same whether it’s 20 grams or 0.2 grams,” Zeman said. “Our time could be better spent on bigger projects.”
[The Dark Net Is Going Mainstream] There’s a parallel Internet you may not have run across yet — accessed by a special browser and home to a freewheeling collection of sites for everything from anonymous activism to illicit activities. Jamie Bartlett reports from the dark net. Video
bacon-hope
I am looking to replace my hurricane shutters. Can anyone suggest a good company?
Guitar-Seat

 

I want that!

[“Key Deer Blvd Ducks”] I saw all three of them on Tuesday morning.
sausage22

 

[Immigration] Sausage Biscuits are coming over here and taking our jobs. And they are willing to work for nothing, Build the wall!

Deer Ed,  Your Sept 2nd CT video of the interview with Oliver Sacks was truly interesting.  I only clicked on it because of the photo, which looked like someone other than Oliver Sacks.  Thanks! Video
longitude8

 

[Latitude and Longitude] Type in your address.  Quick as can be, a map appears with your location, your GPS coordinates, and Latitude and Longitude.  It’s a nice bit of trivia to add to your house numbers or bar signs. The only thing wrong is when I entered Big Pine Key’s zip code, 33043, it took me to No Name Key! Link

KW City Commissioner Harry Bethel is against decriminalizing small amounts of marijuana and is calling it the wrong message to send to children. Instead he would like to continue sending the message to children that it is okay to use the more powerful drug alcohol. Don’t these old guys see their hypocrisy?
thatcher3

[Neanderthal Man] We are being taken down, step by step and the only way out is a two step process: 1-Reinstate the draft. Males only. 6 million males turn 18 every year. No need for females sharing ranks. The military is not an equal opportunity employer. It is a fight to win proposition. 2-Restore mans’ rightful position as the head of the household to restore society as a whole. Women cannot follow, much less lead!

[Mexico’s Entire History] Enrique Krause — Mexico: Biography Of Power. Link
ear-swords

 

[Ear Swords] Ok me Bucco, so Ye wants to join the Brotherhood of the Sea, but all Yer lacking is that Gold Pirates Sword thru Yer ear–or nose if Ye chooz. Well, Old Doc Geno just raided his Black Jack Rathmans’ treasure trove and dug out some Booty. Came upon some real nice hand made 14K ear(or nose??) swords– sware to Davy Jones. So if it’s the Pirates Life for Ye contact old Doc Geno. 304-2065.

Did you know that Microsoft gives free help by telephone? It’s true, but only for Windows Update or security issues, and only in the US and Canada. It’s 866-727-2338.
fly fishing smiley face[Bone Fishing off Cuba] Few spots in the world offer better flats fishing than the waters off of Cuba. Just don’t expect any amenities. Link
What did the Pirate say when he turned 80? “Aye Matey.” Damn that was clever!
Badazz-Buick-Convertible

 

[A Real Plum] Badazz Buick Convertible.

[Good Cop] Here’s a shout-out to all our law enforcement personnel, particularly the Florida Hwy Patrolman who came to my aid when my tire blew on the very scary 7 Mile Bridge!  With the unfortunate circumstances our officers are experiencing right now it’s important to remember that they’re here to serve in the best way they know how.  Every time they put on their uniforms they become a potential target. Let’s show them a little respect, a wave, a thumbs-up.
tor

For the Dark Net use the Tor browser without giving away your IP address. Link

[Cats] Lee County program inadvertently floods neighborhood with cats. Video
funny bone laugh[How TO Tell A Joke] People should not be able to telegraph where a joke’s going:’ The only way to guarantee surprise is to create original material. Street jokes – the kind you read in a book or hear at summer camp and tell with the preface “Want to hear a joke?” – are almost never funny. They also often involve animals, inexplicably. (If you must go that route, ducks make for the funniest animal jokes, according to a global survey done by scientists at the University of Hertfordshire.)

Being a professional funny man is hard, so treat every joke as a work in progress. Tell the same wisecrack over and over for weeks, tweaking it slightly as you go in order to figure out the right timing and phrasing. Even though a new joke might be a result of reams of notes on potentially funny things and months of reciting punch lines alone in front of the mirror, the delivery should feel spontaneous. You want to make it sound like this is stuff you just made up on the spot. Slow down. Don’t get nervous and start talking faster just because people haven’t laughed for a minute or two. Silence is the hardest part – try not to be afraid of it.

Some jokes are not salvageable and die along the way, while others emerge, finally, to laughter. When your punch line lands, your audience should simultaneously be laughing and asking themselves, “How did he do that?”

The only real metric that matters to a joke-teller ought to be laughter in his or her presence. If people aren’t laughing, then it’s slam poetry, and that’s not what you’re trying to do.

Officially this marks the end of the summer season. But up here in the Northeast, it’s the best time of year. The humidity goes down and the beach crowds go home.
conspiracy6

 

This is how myths and conspiracy theories spread.

[Hypocrite Refuses Same Sex Marriage] The woman who refuses to sign a marriage application for two gay people on religious grounds is above all a hypocrite and not acting according to her faith. She happens to be an Apostolic Christian who has been married three times. The Church forbids divorce, especially serial divorces, like her. Hypocrites like here think they can pick and choose what Church laws they like and don’t like. What really happened is she just doesn’t like gay people. If she refuses to do the government job she was hired for she should be fired.
Edd-Byrnes-Kookie-T

 

Edd Burns.

Edd Byrnes & Connie Stevens — Kookie, Kookie, Lend Me Your Comb

[Spies Like Us] I have a rant. I don’t rant often, for what that’s worth. The government has just declared that capturing everything everyone said on their cell phones is illegal without a warrant. In the meantime, FBI Surveillance 6, a wi-fi connection in my neighborhood, interrupts my service regularly. I KNOW when they come on because everything on my computer goes haywire. I can be in the middle of a lengthy letter to anyone, and am not able to finish it. I have learned to check who is on the list of wi-fi connections open, and sure enough, every time this has happened (several times a week) it is when they activate theirs. I have no problems otherwise. I would think that they would be better at it.
barbecue flare up

 

I checked at the meat dept. BPK Winn D is going to be barbecuing ribs outside Sat & Sun. My informant wasn’t certain about Monday, Labor Day.  Darn! Because that’s the day I’ll be in BPK. They generally do that on the 3-day holiday weekends. I’ve bought them before & they are delish!

[Hypocrite Refuses Same Sex Marriage] It’s interesting to watch events unfold.  So a 3 time divorced Christian clerk is selectively enforcing ‘god’s law’ and thinks that’s above the law of the country. Geez, what a dangerous precedent.  Can you imagine if everyone elected to a government post decided to work from their own set of ‘laws’?  I’d hate to be Jewish, Protestant, Muslim, etc in Kentucky. Who knows what she’ll decide to interpret next!  It’s pretty sad, but it makes you appreciate what we have in the Keys. It’s not perfect here, but it’s pretty darned good.
jenner9

 

[Breakfast of Champions] Look what can happen if you eat Wheaties for 38 years!

[Spies Like Us] I sailed around the world, and met many people in many countries. I still keep in contact with quite a few of them. This does not make me anything but well-traveled. For what it’s worth, I cannot read the occasional Arabic that comes through from some of their friends, although I can and do read several other languages. Why this makes me a target I have no clue. If you’re out there, come on over and let me know what the heck’s going on. You know where I am. I’ll even make coffee. But please leave my computer alone!
Just-Coincidence

 

Just a coincidence?

You don’t hear much about the $9 billion dollar CERN super collider- the 17 mile long particle accelerator on the Swiss/French border buried up to 575 feet underground. According to the CERN website, if the wire filaments of its super-magnets were unraveled, they would “stretch to the Sun and back five times with enough left over for a few trips to the Moon.” It will develop temperatures 100,000 times hotter than the center of the sun later this month in the latest experiment.

Steven Hawkings, the extremely brilliant physicist that you see in photos crumpled up in a wheel chair with communication aids but home to a phenomenal mind, is worried about the CERN experiments. They are accelerating particles right now (it takes months to get them to near light speed) for an experiment with “the God particle” this month, recreating conditions of the “:Big Bang” that supposedly started this universe. Says Hawkings: “The God particle found by CERN could destroy the universe,” The Higgs Boson could become unstable at very high energy levels and have the potential to trigger a “catastrophic vacuum decay which would cause space and time to collapse and… we would not have any warning to the dangers,” he continued. (Wow! That’s a helluva gamble, eh?)

Astrophysicist Neil de Grasse Tyson said that the experiment could literally cause the planet to “explode.” by putting more energy into it than what holds it together. (How’s that for a Darwin Award?)

Sergio Bertolucci, former Director for Research and Scientific Computing of the facility, said the super collider could open otherworldly doors to another dimension for “a very tiny lapse of time,” (Reminds me of an old Twilight Zone episode. Too spooky.)

So in other words, scientists are experimenting with the biggest machine on earth to see what happens when they play God with subatomic particles at the speed of light. September could be a very eventful month, as in “end of the world”?. Don’t be like those passengers on the Titanic that passed on dessert. Get some. Then get some more. Whether the whole world ends or just yours, you don’t know when. Live now, don’t miss out. I’m going to Springer’s for a beer and Myles’ music right now! Link

Sunset-Mallory-Pier-1975

 

Sunset at Mallory Square 1975.

[Faith] People say it is impolite to argue about politics or religion in public. The real reason is because there is never pure logic, mathematical understandings, simple common sense and down to earth realities mentioned to prove religion of any type or politics are viable and not just a hypnotic mind bending con invented to control the gullible in profiteering scams. Prove this wrong! If there is something out there that made this universe so be it, but show me!
ice9

 

[Yum!] I’m finally sitting down to my vegan, gluten free, raw, non gmo, organic, fat free, low carb meal.

Computers are supposed to speed things up except if you have a question for the company that you spent a small fortune buying their hardware and software, then it takes weeks if at all to get a reply back. Too many people or not enough answering email?
hippy
I think it’s low-down for guitar player Mike Mancuso to back out of playing at Wetstock at the last minute for no good reason. Boo.
time-travel2The definition of the word conundrum is: something that is puzzling or confusing. Here are six Conundrums of socialism in the United States of America.
1. America is capitalist and greedy – yet half of the population is subsidized.
2. Half of the population is subsidized – yet they think they are victims.
3. They think they are victims – yet their representatives run the government.
4. Their representatives run the government – yet the poor keep getting poorer.
5. The poor keep getting poorer – yet they have things that people in other countries only dream about.
6. They have things that people in other countries only dream about – yet they want America to be more like those other countries..
John was the last of the gospels to be written. Sixty years after the crucifixion — twice as long as Mark’s had been. Only John mentions the spear in Jesus’s side and many other anomalies not mentioned in any other gospel. When I tell my stories of what I remember sixty years ago, they have little resemblance to what actually happened.
snake_man_07

 

[“Snake lands on head. There are no words to express the revulsion that lingers”] I agree, that poor snake must still feel disgusted by that encounter.

Drug dealers understand the metric system. Why don’t the rest of us?
dead parakeet[An open letter to Walton’s Pet Store owner, Big Pine Key location] I’m sure you have forgotten about me and the African Grey you sold me 4 years ago, his name was Boo. Please allow me to refresh your memory. I purchased Boo back in March of 2011. He was too young to take home; your staff in the Big Pine store was still hand feeding him. I waited about 6 weeks for Boo to be weaned before I took him home. During those 6 weeks you took him to the vet twice because he was sick and he was placed on antibiotics. I visited Boo several times a week at the store and I was never told he was sick. Does any of this ring a bell Mr. Walton pet store owner? It should.
2 days after I took him home, he could not breathe normally. I took him to the vet right away, that’s when I found out you had taken him to the same vet! When I talked to you on the phone you apologized and said, “Yes, in retrospect, I should have told you be was sick.”
Boo died on August 28, 2015. He was 4 years old. I hope you enjoyed the $1200 I paid you for Boo, after all, why else would you knowingly sell a sick bird if not just for the money. Did you ever wonder what Boo’s life was like? Did you ever think about me, your customer, and what it feels like to lose a very much-loved pet?
As it turns out, Boo was born with a birth defect within his sinuses that did not allow him to breathe easily. He constantly had a runny nose. I had to suction his nose twice a day. He hated it, hated the towel I used to cover him with, and hated my hand for doing that to him.
Every morning over the past 4 years I expected to find Boo dead, lying on the bottom of his cage. Boo never breathed a normal breath of air, he always struggled with breathing but did learn how to compensate for it. Many days he was able to clear his own nose.
I spent 4 years knowing Boo would not live a long life. 4 years of feeling so, so sad for him.
Even though Boo had his problem, he was a very special, smart and funny bird and I loved him very much. On the morning that I found him, I thought my heart would break. I was so sad for him and angry with you Mr. Walton pet store owner.
In my own retrospect, I’m glad that I did not fight you in the beginning and demand my money back because, as we know now, Boo would not have a normal life, ever. You wanted me to return him to the store until he was better. He never would have gotten better. Would you have euthanized him? Instead, Boo was happy, well taken care of and much loved. He enjoyed riding in the truck and camping. He loved mangos and broccoli. We shared many bowls of warm oatmeal together in the morning and he would kill for a piece of corn.
You will be greatly missed Boo. I love you. ~ amiraweston@comcast.net
I saw all three of the black ducks with white spotted heads today on Key Deer Blvd. They all are doing just fine.
boxer jab

Do you know who the heavyweight boxing champion it? No one does. Boxing has declined since our youths. When we were kids we all knew the champ!

[Duh Department] Earlier this year Jamaica legalized possession of small amounts of marijuana. What will change? They rarely arrest anyone for possession anyway. It’s still very difficult to get it off the island.
ecocapsule2The Ecocapsule is a decent concept, but maybe let them get the bugs out first. In a rainstorm, opening the door will direct the downpour onto the interior floor. How is the door supported when open? My guess is gas charged springs. Will it stay up or collapse with a wind gust? How long does it take to open in that heavy rain? It has a toilet, but how much holding capacity for the wastewater? How is it emptied, and where? Or is it a compost toilet? Weight may be an issue at 3300 pounds. Add a trailer, and this is not a light tow. Video
[Division] Two thousand years ago a pair of brothers set out from the Holy Land to spread the Christian gospel. Saint Peter traveled to Rome, becoming the symbolic founder of Western Christianity. His brother, Saint Andrew, traveled to Greece, becoming a symbolic founder of Eastern Christianity. For centuries, the church they helped create remained a single institution. But one thousand years ago, west and east divided.

Western Christians became Catholics, led by the successor of Saint Peter, the pope. Eastern Christians became Orthodox, led by the successors of Saint Andrew and other apostles, known as patriarchs. Today these are the largest Christian denominations on earth. Between them exists a small group known as Eastern Catholics, who confound all distinctions by following Eastern traditions while obeying the pope.

bill-bunn

 

Happy Birthday Monday the 7th to my man. Still Bill Bunn!

[Florida Lawyers And Judges And Cops And The Fed] How do we stop this injustice and crime? With bats and balls and big guys with mean faces and lots of get even revenge! Like in the old days!
Give-Me-Your-Wallet!

 

And the robber said, “Give me your wallet.” And I did…Bang!

Submit anything of a positive nature, unless it’s breakthrough stuff to island@bigpinekey.com

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