Published Tuesdays and Fridays. Letters to the editor with pictures. Since 0202.
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| [Irma Clean Up] My husband and I must have a different work ethic then some people. We are both approaching 80 and have managed to clean up nearly an acre with 4 ft of storm debris. We had many trees come down and had water damage to our home. We even took hazardous materials to the dump. This is not the only major storm we have experienced. We experienced the ’62 storm and Sandy. Besides working, we managed to clean up the mess we faced. We also cleaned up after George and Wilma. It annoys me that you don’t think you have to rush to clean up the mess you are faced with. No one likes looking at a third world country and that is what the Keys look like now. I know of many friends young and old who are depressed looking at this mess. Make the time to clean up your mess. Let’s get the lower Keys back to what it was. |
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| The feeling on Big Pine Key, best I can tell is, the anger is subsiding, replaced by disbelieve. The Night of The Living Dead, Shell Shock, A Bad Dream, crossed with, Twilight Zone & Outer Limits have become the norm. We are “too pooped to pop” to quote Chuck Berry. A big part of the ugly will be gone by the new year, that’s the best we can hope for. We understand now, more than ever the impotence combined with a large amount of incompetence that our County Commissioners are afflicted with. Understand that Piners are not just waiting, doing nothing. We are all working hard, working at our jobs, paying our bills, feeding our families, cleaning up our island and repairing our homes–every day. That routine is all that keeps many of us sane. This too will pass. Spring will come, the island will bloom, life will go on. It will be forever different. We will have much time to assess wrong doings. Then we will speak in the voting booth. Hold on to your Joy my friends, that’s an inside job. Blessings and a Merry Christmas. ~Coconuts Bar & Liquor Store, down town Pine Key |
[Rudolph] And they never laughed and called him names again. |
| [Affordable Housing] It angers me that downstairs apartments aren’t legal. They would instantly solve the affordable housing problem. To alleviate FEMA’s objection, they could be mandatorily evacuated during a hurricane at the same time tourists are told to leave. Why must they insist on every bit of vacant land built on? I’m sure many homeowners would love the extra income from renting their downstairs enclosure to working folks. If we had a decent group of County commissions they could persuade the government to permit these efficiency apartments. |
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| [Rip-off] Deer KW Citizen, You have a lot of nerve charging $208 for the online subscription for such a second rate newspaper as the Citizen. I get the NY Times online for $119.88 a year and there’s no comparison in quality. Why is the online price the same as the home delivery price? It costs you the same to ‘deliver’ one online edition as it does to deliver one million. |
 [Quacking Up] We lived on BPK for several years a mythical story was about The Three Ducks on Key Deer Blvd. I saw the 3 ducks at the same place near the ball field for many months but have been challenged, calling them a myth. By the time I took the picture only one was left. Can anyone corroborate that my BPK myth? |
| North Pole Radio. Holiday sounds. Link |
[Hanged] Fred Ewert met his end in Key West 1904 for killing Frank Whitaker. The gallows was erected behind the jail at the corner of Whitehead and Fleming streets. |
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| Woody Guthrie wrote hundreds of songs charting life in America including ‘This Land is Our land’. Tom Morton hears about the man and his music from his eldest son Arlo Guthrie, an acclaimed singer songwriter in his own right who wrote ‘Alice’s Restaurant’ and has recently performed at Celtic Connection. Audio |
[Truth Serum] Alcohol, because sometimes the truth needs a laxative. |
| Michael MacDonald is coming to Key West? Yeah, I’m a be there. James Ingram and Michael McDonald – Yah Mo Be There |
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| [Debris] One of the reasons that we on Big Pine are still up to our ass in debris is that we have a county commissioner, George Neugent, who could care less about what happens to us. He lives in Marathon and has always thought more of other folk’s concerns than he has of ours. That is exactly the reason he has never (let me say that again — never) carried his own district in any election. He caters to, and is voted for, by Key West, Marathon, and Ocean Reef not his home district. ~jdykhuisen@aol.com |
[Fast Eddie’s Fabulous Forecast] Irreverent commentary, analysis, and predictions on college football. Link |
| Forward your scam email to me@rescam.org. Link |
 [Conquistadores 1518 Mexico] Our legs, thighs, and arms were to be eaten at their feast, and our entrails, with the remaining part of our bodies, were to be thrown to the serpents and tigers, which they kept confined in wooden cages. I must add a word or two about the wooden cages we saw in this town. These were constructed of heavy timber, and filled with grown-up men and little boys, who were fattening there for the sacrifices and feasts. Most of these animals had been bred here, and were fed with wild deers’ flesh, turkeys, dogs, and sometimes, as I have been assured, with the offal of human beings. These diabolical cages Cortes ordered to be pulled down, and sent the prisoners each to their several homes. He likewise made the chiefs and papas promise him, under severe threats, never again to fasten up human beings in that way, and totally to abstain from eating human flesh. But what was the use of promises which they never intended to keep?
We were told that the flesh of young children, as a very dainty bit, was also set before Montezuma sometimes by way of a Relish. After Cortes had reproached him for the human sacrifices and the eating of human flesh, he issued orders that no dishes of that nature should again be brought to his table. |
| Governments are necessary because the population hasn’t shown the ability to behave their collective selves. However, it’s the people who we elect to represent our wishes that’s the problem and that’s where things go south. It has been continually demonstrated that our elected representatives are not particularly interested in the wants of the electorate, but that they have their own agenda and on the top of their list is to run down and make the opposing side look bad and get themselves re-elected. Making America a better place to live is way down on their priorities. Getting re-elected is number one |
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| [Debris] The other day I was driving down Key Deer Blvd and I saw a Monroe County Public Works guy using a string trimmer to tidy up the grass along the fence at Watson Field. Hey guys, we are up to our asses in debris and you’re spending time manicuring the landscaping at a ball field that will not be usable in months? Every employee with a county pick up truck should, before he or she does anything else, be picking up the trash at the roadside on our islands. |
This free key deer sticker is on a phone belonging to a twice wounded Afghanistan war veteran who just completed 6 trips across the country by hopping trains (talk about PST!). He said he and his partner would lay under truck trailers strapped down to flatbed rail cars because the boxcars were all locked. I met him at Coconuts where he said he had just completed his odyssey and was going to live on Big Pine Key. Full Menu > Free Key Deer Bumper Sticker |
| My wife woke up feeling my hand on her leg, then on her knee and then on her thigh. She said, “Honey, I’m awake now. I said, “Well you can go back to sleep, I found the remote.” That’s when the fight started. |
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| [Adventure Story] An anonymous, wealthy Englishman goes on a shooting trip to the continent. In his sights is ‘the biggest game of all’: the head of a brutal European dictatorship. Geoffrey Household’s classic British thriller was first published shortly before the outbreak of war in 1939. The first of a 15-part reading read by Michael Jayston. Audio |
 [Truth] Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunters. When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it–always. ~Coconuts Bar & Liquor Store |
| Life has never given me lemons. It’s given me anger issues, anxiety, a serious love of alcohol and a dislike of stupid people. |
[Roman Catholic Superstition] Vestiges remained in the arcane rituals of Christianity, in its god-eating rites of Holy Communion, its hierarchies of saints, angels, and demons, its chanting and incantation, its holy calendar’s astrological underpinnings, its consecrated robes, and in its promise of everlasting life. Even now, its priests dispelled evil spirits by swinging smoke-filed censers, ringing sacred bells, and sprinkling holy water. |
| [Net Neutrality] They’re not coming for your guns. They’re coming for your internet! |
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| Winn Dixie promotion. Link |
| [Sal is Back] It appears the 5 people running your county government have finally found out that stealing peoples building lots and giving them to the birds and the bees has finally caught up with them. Over the years these people have taken perfectly good lots and added them to the Tier System or made them almost impossible to build on so the owner would sell them to the county for nothing, just to avoid the aggravation of dealing with the other people at the building department. Those practices have now causes a shortage of places to build workforce housing after the destruction caused by Hurricane Irma. Irma destroyed over 15000 homes and most were trailers in low-lying areas of the county occupied by the work force.
The trailers destroyed now must be elevated and conform to all modern codes. In short, they’re done for. If you want a few chuckles you can go the county web site and watch these people squirm at a meeting they had on November 2. Good luck. ~Salvador Gutierrez Jr. Candidate for County Commission in 2004/2008 Hudson, Florida |
| As another algae bloom continues to settle in across Florida Bay this year, new research findings linking cyanobacteria — commonly known as blue-green algae — and chronic neurological diseases like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, and Alzheimer’s disease are gaining widespread attention. Link |
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