Extravagance hidden from view
The deli at the back of Park Avenue Wine & Cheese Cellar is one of the best-kept secrets in Winter Park. It’s the source of extravagant takeout fare, the likes of which normally must be mail-ordered from sources like Dean and Deluca in SoHo. Sure, you can have a corned-beef melt or a veggie hero.…
Feel the burn
The Central Florida Fair, whose 88th annual edition began an 11-day run last Thursday at the Central Florida Fairgrounds, doesn’t lack for diversion. Acres of vertigo-inducing thrill rides, greasy snacks and informative exhibits (“The Amazing Dairy Cow!” ) compete for the attention of eager customers. With old-fashioned amusement going on all around, someone would have…
Not waving, but drowning
Movie: Drowning Mona
Next to nothing
Movie: The Next Best Thing
Southern rose thrives in infertile soil
Movie: Tumbleweeds
It’s Garry Shandling’s planet
Movie: What Planet Are You From?
A kid’s best friend
Movie: My Dog Skip
Not waving, but drowning
Movie: Drowning Mona
Next to nothing
Movie: The Next Best Thing
Southern rose thrives in infertile soil
Movie: Tumbleweeds
It’s Garry Shandling’s planet
Movie: What Planet Are You From?
A kid’s best friend
Movie: My Dog Skip
A serf exiled from Mouse monarchy
In the summer of 1993, a year and a half after I began working as a principal performer at the Disney/MGM Studios, I attended my first contract negotiations between the company and my professional union, Actors’ Equity Association. After a long night of talks, subsequent to a hot day of work, I sat in the…
High Spirits?
A couple of friends stopped by Shaina Lotu’s house last year hoping to entice her to go to a party. When they tempted her with pot and booze, the eighth grader grew nervous. So she bluffed. She told her friends she’d have to skip the party because her school might give her a drug test…
A plan far afield
How do you like the Lady Liberty — it’s a trip, isn’t it?” Greg Asbed, leader of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, smiles and looks at the group’s creation — an eight-foot Hispanic-looking replica of the Statue of Liberty, precariously perched atop the bed of a beat-up truck in the parking lot of a Fort…
Whistling in the wind
Last week, a federal jury voted against Donna “Chris” Lindamood in her sexual-discrimination suit against the Orange-Osceola State Attorney’s Office. She argued she was fired in 1998 for blowing the whistle on pay inequity and favoritism; the state attorney’s office argued she was fired for being a nuisance. Lindamood plans to appeal.
Internet insults
Say this for George W.: the Texan knows how to stay ahead of his enemies. One of his strategists, Karl Rove, has registered a number of Internet domain names as the presidential candidate tries to prevent mock websites from besmirching his good name. According to Harper’s Magazine, the following sites are registered to Bush’s campaign:…
Presidential handicap
Forget the presidential horse race on the nightly news. Forget CNBC, MSNBC, C-SPAN or Ted Koppel riding around on George Dubya’s tour bus. Florida’s March 14 presidential primary is fast approaching. If you want to discover who fits your profile of the ideal president, try the Internet. Selectsmart.com has a web page dedicated to helping…
Following the herd mentality
“Holistic herding,” also known as “low-stress livestock handling,” is “changing the whole face of the West,” according to a U.S. conservation official who was quoted in Canada’s National Post in December. Cattle are happier, healthier and more obedient, he said, if they are not shouted at or subjected to stress, and are instead allowed “to…
In the dark
Movie: Pitch Black
In the dark
Movie: Pitch Black
Wine Brats dust off the bottles
If a trip to a wine shop is like a reluctant expedition to the unknown Planet Grape, first pick up a copy of “The Wine Brats’ Guide to Living, With Wine” (St. Martin’s Griffin, $16.95). The irreverent guide to wine culture was penned by the organizing trio behind Wine Brats, a California-based group of Gen-Xers…
Back in the old days, any…
Back in the old days, anyone in search of a viable local music scene had to stub their toes up and down the curbs of the downtown entertainment grid, littering cover charges and plastic drinking bracelets along the way — and get out at least three times a week to keep up. These days, there’s…
Crawl in the family
We are listening to Marty Reames wheeze a little as he pulls a sealed, 20-gallon fish tank off a high shelf in a back room of Underground Reptiles in Deerfield Beach. Marty is not the only thing making a sound. The tank is, too. It sounds like rain. But it’s not rain. It’s legs. As…
