Breaking the waves
There’s no finer way to mark an unexpectedly balmy January afternoon than with a trip to the beach. Last Saturday, I didn’t even have to catch a ride out of town to do it, as the semiannual Surf Expo brought veteran clamdiggers of all ages to the man-made grotto that is the Orange County Convention…
Time to judge
Rev. Henry Lyons’ state fraud/racketeering trial opens in Pinellas this week. Judge Susan Schaeffer refused to relocate it, despite megapress coverage, explicitly acknowledging that many F Staters don’t read all that much. Other developments: Co-defendant Bernice Edwards was charged with shoplifting designer sunglasses in Milwaukee in December, and a 1997 audio tape surfaced (perhaps inadmissible…
Less-traveled legal labyrinth
Movie: A Civil Action
Buddha pests
Movie: Free Tibet
Irish charm
Movie: Waking Ned Devine
Less-traveled legal labyrinth
Movie: A Civil Action
Buddha pests
Movie: Free Tibet
Irish charm
Movie: Waking Ned Devine
They fought the laws
Lee County is not teaching miracles as history. Jacksonville students may no longer be forced to hear prayers at graduation ceremonies. Police offer the Miami homeless a shelter rather than a jail cell. And a Dade County ordinance making it a crime for the poor to seek day jobs has been invalidated — at least…
â??80s revival
Outgoing Florida Republican Party chairman Tom Slade is trying to unseat Republican National Committee chairman Jim Nicholson of Colorado. His chances are slim, but Slade says he’ll fight it out until midmonth, at least, before seeing if he has the necessary 83 votes. With the Clinton impeachment backfiring, what’s Slade’s prescription for GOP revival? “The…
UCF gunning for No. 1
No. 1 in student athletic fees, that is. A committee has proposed raising the annual fee by $102, to $297. If the Board of Regents approves the increase, UCF’s full-time students will have the largest fee among the state’s 10 public universities. School officials knew that their quest to create a dominant football team would…
Brew ha-ha
Saying that if there is good coffee in Tallahassee, “I haven’t found it,” last week Gov. Jeb “Java Jibe” Bush called in the St. Petersburg Times for the establishment of “a good Starbucks franchise,” effectively dissing Barnie’s — Orlando’s own coffee and tea chain. Orange County Democratic Party chairman Doug Head wasted no time in…
Grade A jumbo eggs
Orlando Weekly111 W. Jefferson St., Suite 200Orlando, Florida 32801Voice: (407) 377-0400Fax: (407) 377-0420 February 12, 2004 Mr. Michael D. EisnerThe Walt Disney Company500 South Buena Vista St.Burbank, CA 91521 Dear Michael: I’m sending this letter after repeated attempts to contact you by phone, all to no avail. I’ve noticed of late that certain parties have…
Product testingâ??s low marks
Let’s travel again to the far, far, far-out frontiers of Free Enterprise. Today, Spaceship Hightower takes you into the sometimes bizarre world of chemical research — in particular, to the world of product testing. For example, in seeking volunteers to test one of its products, the German chemical giant Bayer advertises: “You are invited to…
Band of the year: Frankie and the West End Boys
For years the best-kept secret on Orlando’s ballyhooed music scene, Frankie and the West End Boys truly came into their own in 1999, handily outdistancing all other pretenders to the title Band of the Year in a tumultuous seven days that saw their star rise, fall, and then rise again. In the West, of course.…
Sounds to savor as the best so far
1. “Mix Tape No. 14”, put together by a friend who lives in San Francisco. Arrived in the mail Jan. 2. Lots of sad and lovely songs make this the highlight of 1999. 2. Helen O’Hara, “A Night in Ireland” (New World Music). O’Hara used to be the violinist for Dexy’s Midnight Runners. This CD…
Top movies of 1999
Action, comedy, romance: In a tight seven-day schedule,1999’s slate of films had it all. The list that follows recaps the best of the best, the motion pictures we’ll still all be talking about 348 days from now. “My Best Friend’s Wedding” Not the 1997 Julia Roberts vehicle, but the Hi-8 movies of my best friend…
Man of the year: Vernon Eloysius Johnson
It’s fair to say that Vernon Eloysius Johnson would not be Orlando Weekly’s Man of 1999 if the Boola Bowl didn’t exist. But it is equally true that, without him, the post-Citrus Bowl celebration on Church Street itself would be unlikely. And thus it is ultimately true, by the transitive property, that without our Man…
1999 Year in review
Jan. 1 • Florida Department of Children and Families confirms it is investigating how more than 200 toys — many still in their original wrappers and all of them donated to the Christmas-time Toys for Tots campaign — wound up in a trash bin behind the agency’s Sarasota office. • World Wildlife Fund names Withlacoochee…
This bug’s life
Our proud but primitive society lies helpless before a multi-eyed enemy. It’s time you were introduced … Deep in the heart of Silicon Valley, the seeds of an insect revolution are being sown. Crawling beneath the wires and chips of the world’s PC-producing headquarters is a six-legged species whose impending dominance may spell the end…
A look back at ’99 — the year that was
The countdown has begun. And? You thought maybe we’d sit back like everyone else? Perhaps wait for the new year actually to expire before issuing our pronouncements on the achievements of mankind at the approaching end of a decade, a century, indeed a — shall we say it? — millennium, which we only recently discovered…
Turning the tables on Burnsideâ??s deep blues
Not much changes in the Mississippi hill country where blues artist R.L. Burnside resides. He does allow some concessions to the success he’s enjoyed during his seven-year career recording for Fat Possum Records. He now carries a cell phone with him at all times when he’s not on tour, and he has recently released an…
Writer calls foul on celebrity journalism
They’re making it easy for us,” says writer David Halberstam of TV journalists. Notes of distaste and exasperation hang in his voice. “They don’t do much reporting. With all their resources, you’d think they’d be making it more difficult for us.” The “us” refers to print journalists and authors — people such as Halberstam, who…
Lassoing the cowboy spirit
Once upon a time it was a common adolescent fantasy to grow up to be a cowboy. For Eldon Lux, that fantasy became a lifelong interest that eventually manifested itself through his art. “I enjoy incorporating the beauty of local surroundings in my work,” says the Osceola County resident. “Real people, ordinary cowboys, ranchers and…
Eternal favorite
Drive by Hot Dog Heaven at high noon, and the scene is eternally the same: Hordes of “red hot” lovers are hunched over baskets of dogs and fries on the patio tables, chowing down, generally oblivious to the noise and traffic fumes of Colonial Drive. Pull over by the landmark neon hot-dog sign to climb…
It’s a jungle gym out there
Seven reasons why our annual Sex Issue is in the form of a nonsensical jumble of lists, instead of jam-packed with salacious photos of attractive models engaged in simulated sexual congress:/p> 1) After the Super Bowl halftime fiasco, Orlando Weekly is now printed on a five-second delay 2) Staff believes that kids these days don’t…
