October 9, 2014

Transcription

October 9, 2014

KEY NEWS
n TROPIC CINEMA
17 SHOWTIME!
Konk Life’s Political Questionnaire:
Konk Life has invited every candidate in the upcoming elections to answer the following questions about themselves and their candidacy.
Geoff Bailey
the overall budget. I feel that our
Mosquito Control has been running
efficiently for many years now on a
budget that has already been significantly reduced. Having a scientific
background, I’m most concerned with
finding fundamentally better ways to
eradicate the mosquito population in
Monroe County. When I first moved
to the Keys the mosquito situation was
much worse than it is today. Since then,
Mosquito Control has started to implement more scientifically-based programs
rather then relying strictly on pesticide
spraying. We now have proper entomology lab and state of the art surveillance
software. We have introduced the more
effective larvacides and have expanded
the air fleet to facilitate timely treatments. My opponent, Mr. McDonald,
was on the board at this time and opposed these changes, which have proven
to have saved us millions of dollars and
has led to a smarter, more effective
mosquito control.
some of the newer technologies that are
available to us. I believe that we should
Interview conducted by
be working with outside universities and
MARK HOWELL
entomology labs to keep us on the
Tell us your age, what office
forefront as these technologies are
you’re running for and any
developed and establish pilot projects
previous offices held.
when appropriate in order to
Dr. Geoff Bailey, DVM; age
test these technologies in the
44; first endeavor into the
field. I believe we should be
political realm.
attending and speaking at
continuing education events
Explain your platform
to ensure our place on the
in and why you are
cutting edge of our
running.
industry. I believe that we
As a veterinarian, I deal with
should constantly be looking
mosquitoes and their transfor ways to do our job more
missible diseases on a daily
cost effectively with more enBAILEY
basis. I am confident that my
vironmental
friendliness and
knowledge and experience
with
a
greater
degree
of
success.
will be an asset to the board, particularly
in the implementation and utilization of
the newer biologically based protocols I
think we should be pursuing. I believe
that Monroe County is at a crossroads
right now and that we need to adopt
Detail how you differ from your
competing candidates.
Tom McDonald, my opponent, is an
accountant. He states that his main
concern is reducing spending to lower
3
www.konklife.com • OCTOBER 9 - 15, 2014
ROYAL HAPPENINGS!
King and Queen
candidate events
• ursday, Oct. 16, 5:30–7:30 p.m.
Key West Innkeepers Association’s
Annual All-Candidates Party at TBD
Entry fee suggest donation $10. All
proceeds split evenly between candidates.
• Friday, Oct. 18, 6–10 p.m.
Coronation Ball at the Southernmost
Beach Café, 1405 Duval St.
| Continued on page 22
Tell us your personal history —
education; professional career;
family life and how long you’ve
lived in the Keys or the county
and your relationship to the
Florida Keys and/or Key West.
I’m originally from Pennsylvania where
the rest of my family still resides. I
graduated from the University of Hawaii
with a degree in zoology and marine
biology, after which I attended
veterinary school at Ross University.
While practicing in New York my first
year out of vet school, I came down to
Key West on vacation. I immediately fell
in love with the Keys and promptly did
what my good friend David Sloan
advises in his book: “Quit your job and
move to Key West.” I practiced in Key
West for a few years, did relief work
up and down the Keys, and finally
settled in Key Largo where I have been
practicing for the last eight years.
october 9-15
Published Weekly
Vol. 4 No. 41
PUBLISHER
Guy deBoer
MANAGING EDITOR
Ralph Morrow
NEWS WRITERS
Mark Howell, John L. Guerra,
Pru Sowers, Sean Kinney, C.S. Gilbert
PHOTOGRAPHERS
Larry E. Blackburn, Ralph De Palma
DESIGN
Dawn deBoer
Julie Scorby
CONTRIBUTORS
Guy deBoer Key News
Mark Howell Howelings
Rick Boettger The Big Story
Tim Weaver Bone Island cartoonist
Louis Petrone Key West Lou
Albert L. Kelley Business Law 101
Christina Oxenberg Local Observation
Kerry Shelby Key West Kitchen
Ian Brockway Tropic Sprockets
Jenessa Berger Get Your Wellness
C.S. Gilbert Culture Vulture
Harry Schroeder High Notes
Morgan Kidwell Kids’ Korner
JT Thompson Hot Dish
Diane Johnson In Review
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CIRCULATION
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William Rainer ASSISTANT
KONK Life is published weekly by KONK
Communications Network in Key West, Florida.
Editorial materials may not be reproduced without
written permission from the network.
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Political Questionnaire:
Konk Life has invited every candidate in the upcoming elections to answer
the following questions about themselves and their candidacy.
GEOFF BAILEY
tend to create problems where none may even
exist. I think it’s a rare candidate who could believe
in 100 percent of the stereotypical ideals that his
or her party represents. One solution is to eliminate the partisan aspect of more offices, including
the Mosquito Control Board. ese important positions should go to people with appropriate backgrounds, experience and vision. I promise that if
I’m elected I will do my best to kill both Republican and Democrat mosquitoes
with equal prejudice.
| Continued from page 3
Touch on your personal passions in addition to the above.
Being in the veterinary industry, I donate a lot of
my time to helping animals. I have served on various animal rescue boards in the Upper Keys. I like
to spend as much time as possible on the water:
Fishing, diving and enjoying the company of
friends. I recently took up playing the drums
again; I guess that’s my version of a mid-life crisis.
Your Favorite Movie One of my favorite cult
movies is “Starship Troopers.” It comes down to
the human race versus the bugs and, as they say,
the only good bug is a dead bug.
Describe where, in your view, we might be
going wrong in the Keys and/or Key West.
We have it good here in the Keys, there is a unique
and eclectic mix of personalities that meld together
to create a wonderful island community. ere is
always room for improvement as far as our mosquito control goes. I believe it should be a dynamic
force and Monroe County should continually be
striving to be the gold standard of innovation and
effectiveness.
Favorite T.V. Show Back in the day, I never
missed an episode of “e Sopranos.” Mosquitoes
can’t be negotiated with, so we’ll just have to
whack ‘em all. Bada bing bada boom.
Favorite T.V. Talking Head
Max Headroom
Favorite Newspaper Columnist
Tell us the political flash points you expect
to encounter if elected.
Why, you are, Mark...of course :-)
Favorite Book “ e Hitchhiker’s Guide to the
Galaxy” changed my outlook on life when I was a
young teen. It remains my policy to travel light, always carry cash and not to forget my towel.
e biggest controversy involves genetically- modified mosquitoes. is entails the introduction of
males of the species (who do not bite or spread disease) that have been altered so that they are unable
to produce viable offspring. With their continued
release into the environment over time, the natural
mosquito population will steadily decline. is in
turn will result in a reduced need for pesticide
spraying as well as aid in the prevention of some of
the diseases that are currently threatening our
community. Dengue fever has already established a
foothold in Key West, and the chikungunya virus
will most likely be here shortly, having already invaded the Florida mosquito population just to our
north. Any good medical professional will tell you
prevention is much more desirable than treatment.
Favorite Character in American History
I’ve always been a big fan of Teddy Roosevelt. He
was no nonsense, never beat around the bush, and
did what he set out to accomplish.
Favorite character in local history
If you walk by the intersection of Duval and Margaret, you’ll find a nice little bar called e Porch,
one of my campaign banners, and a plaque honoring the birthplace of Dr. Joseph Yates Porter,
Florida’s first public health officer. is was a man
who, in addition to setting up hospital treatment
facilities, was absolutely integral in the eradication
of the mosquito-borne yellow fever outbreak here
in the Keys.
Tell us anything you feel you need to explain or any misapprehension you believe
voters may have of you.
Favorite Quote “Shit happens.”
Most likely my challenge will be that voters haven’t
heard of me since I am new to the political arena.
Is there any secret strength you’d like
to reveal about yourself at this point?
Give us your view on the partisan divisiveness in politics today and any solution to it
you might have.
My girlfriend asked me not to divulge my secret
strength. Seriously, if I told you, I’d have to kill
you. n
e main problem with parties today is that they
4
COMMUNITY
New truths about
President Truman
BY MARK HOWELL
KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER
strikes and economic upheaval
and an assassination attempt in his second
term. He also boldly
desegregated the
armed services
and he revealed a
taste for the
semi-tropics,
spending many
months playing
cards with the
boys at his Little White
House in Key
West.
Attlee was the
seventh of eight
children whose father
was an attorney in Putney, south of the London
ames. As deputy prime minster in Winston Churchill’s coalition
government toward the end of the war,
Attlee presided over a decidedly leftward
lean in the nation akin to the anti-aristocracy resentment that afflicted Downton Abbey following the First World
War. Attlee, writes historian Michael
Jago, author of the just-published “e
Inevitable Prime Minister,” had an
enormous nostalgia for the London of
Sherlock Holmes, the horse drawn carriages and the smell of manure in the
streets. Whenever he traveled to America he’d catch up on the cricket scores
while on the plane. e first Oxford
graduate to become a socialist Member
of Parliament, he seemed something of
a freak (although he would be followed
by many left-leaning graduates).
————————
It was not only the
United States that went
through a seismic
shock when Democrat Harry S Truman,
with ratings hovering around 36 percent, won the
presidential election
over a much-favored
Republican, omas
E. Dewey.
Great Britain, three
years earlier, was just
as stunned when a socialist candidate for Prime
Minister, Clement Attlee,
won the election by a huge majority over the incumbent Winston
Churchill, a war hero for his leadership
in the victory over Hitler.
Whatever the surprise for each
other’s nations, these two leaders now
had to deal with each other as the top
two individuals in the free world. And
in the wake of a hot new TV series
called “Manhattan” — it’s about 600
British and American men and women
yanked out of the war to share space
and time in the desert at Los Alamos to
develop or subvert the atomic bomb, in
the lab or between the sheets — comes
a new biography of Clement Attlee that
spills some new beans about Harry Truman.
ey came from quite different backgrounds and had quite different career
experiences. Truman was the son of a
southern Baptist farmer and became a
haberdasher and professional Missouri
politician. As president after the death
of FDR, he approved the atomic bombing of Japan. He faced national labor
Inset photo (above):
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee
5
C I T Y N E W S
UPFRONT
Medicinal marijuna?
You’ll decide Nov. 4
L E T T E R S TO T H E E D I T O R
Annotation
rejected
BY DR. LARRY MURRAY
| KEY WEST
Fiscal Watchdog and Citizen Activist
(A letter sent to members of the Monroe
County Board of Education)
Gentlemen: Chairman Emeritus
Griffiths has informed me that, at your
last Board meeting, when you revised
two dozen policies and procedures,
you rejected my suggestion that you
annotate the published version as to
the date of revision. I am disappointed
at your decision, but not surprised.
You may recall that I proposed that
whenever the School Board adopted a
new policy or procedure, the published
version be annotated to say “Adopted,
Date.” Similarly, when you revised a
policy or procedure as you did last
week, the published version be annotated to read “Revised and Approved,
Date.” at way, anyone reading one
of your Bylaws & Policies would know
that it was valid and in force.
Mr. Griffiths said that the proposed
annotations were not necessary because such annotations were already
being done. Now, Mr. Griffiths knows
that that is not true and I do not know
why he would say that, except that
there is a disposition within the District to say what is convenient rather
than what is truthful. If you examine
the revisions that you recently approved, you will see there are no annotations regarding approval date. Most
importantly, if you will review all of
your Bylaws and Policies, you will
quickly note that none have an approval date. Occasionally, you will
come across a “Rev. Date”, but no “Approved, Date” to confirm that the revision was ever approved and thus is
valid and in effect. A pedant might
argue that just because something was
“revised” that does not mean that it
was approved as well. Similarly, can
you revise a policy that was not properly adopted in the first place?
e beauty of not annotating an
approval date in the published version
is that it permits you or your counsel
to dispute the substance of any policy
or procedure whenever convenient.
Without an annotation in the published version of your Bylaws & Policies, there is no way to determine if
anything has ever been approved. e
only alternative is to review the minutes of every Board meeting over the
years to see what can be discovered.
Slick!
at is exactly what you are doing
now over your published “Community
Use of Facilities and Equipment,
Schedule of Rental Rates.” e District
has been caught improperly applying
rental rates in various Facilities Use
Agreements, especially that with Eagles Rest Ministries and Poinciana
School. Your retort is the “Schedule of
Rental Rates” was never approved and
thus, by definition it is impossible to
apply them improperly. As I said,
“Slick!” You can’t hit a moving target!
BY SEAN KINNEY
On Nov. 4 voters will head to the
polls to decide, among other
questions, whether Florida will join
23 others states and the District
of Columbia in letting physicians
prescribe medicinal marijuana to help
patients manage chronic pain and
other afflictions.
e ballot language informs voters
that, if approved, the so-called
Amendment 2 to the state Constitution would “allow the medical use
of marijuana for individuals with
debilitating diseases as determined
by a licensed Florida physician.”
If passed, the measure would also
allow caregivers to assist patients in
using medical marijuana.
On the regulatory end, the Florida
Department of Health would oversee
production and distribution centers
and provide users and their caregivers
with identification cards.
Also noted directly on the ballot is
the unknown increased governmental
costs associated with administering
such a program as well as any potential tax- or fee-based revenues.
Here in Monroe County, former
State Attorney Dennis Ward, a candidate for a seat on the Islamorada
Village Council and a former Miami
cop, is throwing his support behind
Amendment 2.
In a recent interview, Ward told
Konk Life that “what’s really important here” is the possibility of helping
sick people.
He recalled speaking with a Key
Largo breast cancer survivor who had
a relapse and took to applying hash
oil, a concentrated derivative of marijuana, directly to the tumor with positive results.
Secret Service
failures
BY ROGERT KOSTMAYER
| KEY WEST
e S.S. failures are so many, so
egregious and so ineptly handled, they
require immediate action. e resignation of the Director is a good first
step.
It’s clear from facts that keep dribbling out that the S.S. has a systemic
problem that can’t be fixed by those
who caused or tolerate it. e failure
6
“She swore by it,” Ward said,
noting the potential to share those
benefits with other cancer patients,
people with HIV or AIDS and those
with ALS, the recently hyped
ice-bucket challenge fundraising
recipient.
“If it works for a patient and a
doctor thinks it’ll help a patient,”
Ward said, “why not try it? at’s the
way medicine should be prescribed —
by a doctor. I don’t know what
medical school these people went
to,” Ward said in reference to the
measure’s opposition.
at group is organized into the
Drug Free Florida Committee, which
has received $2.5 million in funding
from Sheldon Adelson, a gaming
billionaire who put $150 million into
Republican campaigns in the 2012
election cycle.
at group has distilled their
message into four “loopholes,”
described on its website,
www.voteno2.org
e first is the “pill mill loophole,”
in reference to the walk-in clinics
concentrated in Miami-Dade and
Broward counties partly responsible
for the prevalence of opioid drugs
in South Florida, that doesn’t regulate
location of “pot docs,” as the
opposition group refers to them.
en there’s the “drug dealer
loophole,” which notes that caregivers,
who would be licensed to help patients use medical marijuana, “can be
felons — even drug dealers. It will be
easier to get a caregiver’s license than
a driver’s license.”
e “teenager loophole” places no
age restriction so “teens and children
will be able to legally purchase pot
without their parents’ consent.”
MARK HOWELL‘S
HOWELINGS
Ever been tear gassed?
BY MARK HOWELL
stood.
ey work primarily by activating
pain-sensing nerves, particularly in the
eyes. Prolonged exposure can cause dangerous respiratory problems (as for Mr.
Boozy King) as well as heart attacks. It
can kill people who suffer from asthma
and can cause pregnant women to miscarry. And, points out Baboulias, it is
today used quite irresponsibly.” One
hundred or 150 canisters can be used to
crack down on a rowdy protest.” And
the gas can linger for days, leaving local
residents waking up with red eyes,
burning nostrils and throbbing
headaches.
After World War One, when the
Germans were using xyllyl bromide and
the French ethyl bromoacetate, such
weapons were banned for use in warfare
by the Geneva Convention. But not for
use among civilians! When the Chemical Weapons Convention was finally
signed in 1993, it, too, included exceptions for domestic use, on which the
United States among other nations had
insisted.
e manufacturers of the 15 capsicum-based tear-gas products on
today’s U.S. market warn of the toxicity
of their products on the labeling but
come up short on warning of their dangers and what to do about dangerous
dosages. e basic instruction is to wash
your eyes and leave the area.
Trouble is, points out Baboulias,
people being tear-gassed rarely feel any
inclination to move on from where
they’re demonstrating, such as in Zuccotti Park in Wall Street’s financial district.
Demonstrators in Athens, Greece,
claim on the Internet that lemon juice is
a good antidote for scorched eyes, while
tweeters in Tahir Square favored
splashes of Coca Cola. Others recommended a solution of antacids such as
Maalox mixed with plenty of water.
But the labeling on the actual products
themselves offers neither comfort nor
he only time I was ever personally tear gassed was
when my18-year-old son and I decided,
along with a whole gaggle of other
country yokels, to enter the World’s Fair
at Tunbridge (population 1,300), held
every September in central Vermont, illegally by way of a maple tree branch
that hung over the barb-wire fence.
As we all tumbled headfirst onto the
tree’s roots I experienced what felt like a
big ball of pepper tossed into the eyes.
ank you, Tunbridge constabulary.
My only other experience of poison
gas was via a gentleman nicknamed
“Boozy” King, the librarian at Cheltenham College boarding school in the
west of England, who earned his nickname from a speech impediment caused
by mustard gas during World War One.
What I did not know until I found
out just last week is that my experience
of being incapacitated by mace was of
the same order as Mr. King’s throat
being disabled by the Germans in the
trenches.
In an informative article recently
published in Britain, Yiannis Baboulias,
who was himself tear-gassed in Athens
in 2011 (or maced, pepper-sprayed,
mustard gassed, it’s all the same stuff)
reveals why scientists are now warning
the public about what happened to so
many innocent civilians — including
journalists —in Ferguson, Missouri,
during its recent police riot.
ese incapacitating, eye-scorching,
mucus-making, breath-blockading,
panic-inducing products are based on
(wait for it) 2 –chloro-benzal- malononitrile, a compound found in chili peppers. As a consequence, they all
function like nerve gases and in in high
doses can cause effects one-hundredtimes more severe than the most powerful onion, causing extreme pain and
other health problems still little under-
T
7
advice to either the user or the target.
All we know for sure is that the tear gas
market is currently estimated
to be worth $1.6
billion.
And know
this, too: If you
are being gassed
in Egypt or Palestine, your inability to breathe is
MARK
likely due to an
HOWELL
excess of mucus
caused by capsicum, chloropicrin,
dibenzoaxazepine, bromoacetone and
benzyl bromide that originates from the
United States.
Clint Bullard performing at the Sunset Tiki
Bar at the Galleon Resort, 617 Front St.
CITY N E W S
C O UNTY NEWS
Monroe County: Comp
plan still in discussion
Pastor trial set for Nov. 17
BY SEAN KINNEY
Trustees of St. James First Missionary Baptist Church are scheduled to
give depositions Oct. 7 in the case
of the pastor accused of stealing
church funds.
e Rev. John W. McKenzie, who
prosecutors said stole more than
$54,000 from the historic church, will
get his day in court Nov. 17 if he does
not receive another postponement.
After eight pretrial hearings and five
trial postponements — McKenzie was
arrested on June 18, 2013 — parishioners of the Bahama Village church
are ready to close this troubling
chapter of its long history.
“Some church members have been
asked to give pre-trial depositions next
week,” said a church official who asked
not to be identified. “It’s been a long
time coming.”
McKenzie has pleaded not guilty;
his lawyer, Alan Fowler, has said he
does not want to comment.
e alleged theft came to light after
the church found it didn’t have enough
money in its accounts to finish extensive renovations to its building and interior. e missing money would have
paid for the church’s completion,
church members contend.
e Monroe County Commission
was expected on Tuesday to put off
transmitting a redrawn comprehensive
development plan to state officials for
comment and feedback.
Growth Management Director
Christine Hurley told Konk Life that
a number of points in the plan, which
guides land use and future development on the 1,700 islands of the
Florida Keys, are still under discussion.
“ere are still a lot of policy questions we think the board is going to
discuss,” Hurley said, primarily
whether to extend rate-of-growth-ordinance (ROGO) allocations until 2023
or 2033.
ROGO is a building permit allocation system mandated by the state,
which ties development in the Florida
Keys to the ability to evacuate everyone on the island chain within 24
hours in case of an impending hurricane.
Essentially, ROGO assigns allocations to a development or redevelopment project. Different types of
structures — single family homes compared to hotel rooms — receive a different type of allocation that’s affixed
to a number of vehicles that would be
on the road for an evacuation.
Hurley explained that, based on
current projections of the existing
number of buildable lots and available
allocations, the county will reach a
24-hour evacuation time by 2023.
at would curtail the need for new
allocations.
“Assuming no other changes,”
she said, “We would be built out.”
But that could change. For instance, the county could totally rethink
evacuation strategy to shave time or
the population decrease in the Keys
BY JOHN L. GUERRA
could continue on its current trajectory or even increase.
Hurley said extending the system
past 10 years would allow for the results of the 2022 U.S. Census Bureau
to be included in an updated analysis.
“It’s a huge issue and I think it’s
going to be debated,” she said. “A lot
is riding on the allocations.”
Another part of the comp plan still
under consideration are building
height limits. A current model allows
for one foot of elevation above flood
level to correspond to an additional
foot of height up to five feet.
e genesis of comprehensive planning came in 1979 when the state designated the Keys as an Area of Critical
State Concern, which requires many
development decisions to go through
Tallahassee for approval.
From back-up materials for the
Tuesday session: “e designation is
intended to protect environmental or
natural resources of regional or
statewide importance…”
Broad goals of the pending comp
plan are to eventually continue without state oversight; protect shorelines
and marine resources; protect upland
resources; sound economic development; limit water quality impacts; enhance natural scenic resources; protect
historical heritage; create affordable
housing; and manage public safety
in the event of a disaster.
In terms of guiding future development, plan goals are prevent encroachment into native habitat; continue and
intensify existing programs; focus on
redevelopment and infill; and increase
efforts to manage the resources.
Hurley said Growth Management
staff is considering two dates in January for transmission of the comp plan
to the Department of Economic
Opportunity, the successor of the
Department of Community Affairs. n
e modest concrete church at 312
Olivia St. remains as it was when work
was halted in mid-stride in late 2012,
and parishioners continue to meet
elsewhere to worship. e displaced
church members at first held services
in the Frederick Douglass Gymnasium
in Bahama Village but now worship at
the Roosevelt Sands Center at 105
Olivia St.
e trustees have not given up
hope on returning to their sanctuary;
the City of Key West will not allow
parishioners to return until it is made
safe. A heavy, cast iron church bell had
to be secured until it can be mounted
permanently.
Trustee Peggy Ward and other
church members have raised enough
money through public appeals to pay
for architectural drawings for continued renovation work, but it’s not
enough to finish the project. A St.
James First Missionary Baptist Church
restoration fund is available at Keys
Federal Credit Union for donations,
Ward said.
e church also applied for Tax Incremental Fund money, which is raised
through property taxes in distressed
neighborhoods. e Key West City
Commission approves those funds
each year. e church — through a
misunderstanding of how long their
n Oct. 18
Making Strides starts 9 a.m.
Making Strides Against Breast Cancer, a 5K non-competitive celebration
of survivorship, will be held beginning
at 9 a.m., Saturday, Oct. 18, beginning
at the White Street Pier in Key West.
e fight to end breast cancer starts
with a single step. When you register
online you’ll be joining thousands
across the nation in making the greatest impact in the fight to end breast
cancer. Some 35 local teams and 142
8
participants have already raised more
than $5,000.
To get started, log in at
MakingStridesWalk.org/floridakeys
For more information, contact Carrie Helliesen, Specialist, Distinguished
Events, American Cancer Society, Inc.,
1010 Kennedy Dr Suite 303, Key West
33040; (305) 292-2333. n
INFO
(305) 292-2333
THE BIG STORY
Smell the Ylang-Ylangs
BY RICK BOETTGER
bombed out of three other forms of
gainful employment by the tender age
of 26. I’d mostly flunked out of nuclear
chemistry at MIT, dumped my Top
Secret security clearance and left that
kind of work in an inappropriate fit of
morals, and busted out at the card table
after two years of supporting myself as a
bridge and poker player. “Reading
books” is an euphemism for cashing in
on the GI Bill. English was the easiest
major. I was lazy.
So I was 25 for the only time in my
life, gorgeous — that didn’t last long —
and in what I now realize was a magical
living situation. But my soul concluded
I was a permanent loser who would
never make anything of myself, because
I would always blow any opportunities
by quitting and running away to find an
easier, lazier path. So while, yes, I indeed
had a lot of fun, I spent way too much
time in a troubled state of mind.
Of course, by my being here now,
you know I eventually got my stuff
together and ended up in Paradise. So
did everyone reading this, in your own
equally amazing ways. ose of you
who are like my wife, Cynthia, can quit
reading right now because I have no Big
Story to tell you. Cynthia spends her
days in a fog of metaphorical ylangylang. She is utterly retired into a life
of lush indolence. We should all envy
her, like the Buddha.
But those of us stuck in a web of
Citizen’s Voice-type irritation or the
angst I had as a 25-year-old need to take
a step back and ask what in the hell are
we doing in our present glory days.
People who take the trouble to write in
to complain about parking on their
street, a “messy” cemetery, 25-mph
“speeders” down their street, losing their
second trash pickup each week, loud
bikers on Truman or Duval, not enough
free parking near your house, having
to wait at a single traffic light, men with
pony tails, dogs in bars, grammar errors,
eople in the Keys find
so much to whine about.
For example, Rick Boettger, a writer
for KONK Life, is always complaining
about the school board or FDOT’s
“sharrows” on the Boulevard, etc. To
him and his ilk, I say, hey, wake up
and smell the
delicious ylangylangs, if you can
find one.
I say this
from my hotel
bed in San Francisco, looking
out the window
at the Golden
Gate Bridge.
RICK
I lived here in
BOETTGER
the 1970s, and
COLUMNIST
though I was not
writing a column
as a professional complainer, in my
personal life I was not smelling the,
ah, fresh sea breezes as much as I should
have. It all seemed so overwhelmingly
difficult at the time.
I had the same kind of 20s that I find
most of my Key West friends had. We
are interesting now. We were interesting
then. At some point, and for me it’s 66,
it’s time to reflect and appreciate where
we’ve come from and what it took to get
here, living in one of the most desirable
places on earth.
It seems now like a magical story
about someone else, but somehow I
found myself living in San Francisco’s
North Beach with my girlfriend and
my best college buddy with a view of
Alcatraz. My share of the rent was $50.
He and I had a 38-foot ketch docked in
Sausalito, and she owned a Volkswagen
Squareback, so we could drive there.
I read books for a living.
But my gosh, was I worried. I was,
ha ha, “reading books” because I’d
P
9
LOCAL
OBSERVATION
Dirty Brian
BY CHRISTINA OXENBERG
irty Brian was a white boy with Irish
roots who missed out on the fabled
luck. Starting life in the projects of NYC, he was
raised by his mother, a mean spirited drunk. ey
shared a one bedroom apartment in a slum high
rise. She hated him, and frequently told him he
was the reason his father abandoned them. Brian
tried in vain to earn his mother’s attention, affection, dare he long for her love?
For his 18th birthday, she gathered his possessions and rammed them into a garbage bag and
scooted him and the bag out her front door, for
the last time.
Dirty Brian moved to a friend’s sofa and took a
job stocking parts for a motorcycle dealership.
When he bought a bicycle, on his very first day
pedaling around northern Central Park, a band of
thugs jumped him roughed him up and took his
ride.
When he was waiting on a subway, a hollering
lunatic came barreling down the platform and
slammed into Dirty Brian, knocking him onto the
tracks in front of a train. Dirty Brian got a bit
mangled but miraculously survived.
He saved his money and eventually bought a
used car. He phoned his mother and asked her for
lunch. “I’ll be taking you out in my automobile!”
he boasted. She didn’t believe a word. On the drive
over, smoke and flames from under the hood obstructed his view and he crashed into a wall. e
car exploded to a fireball. “I’m lucky to be alive!”
he told his mother when he phoned to explain the
D
CHRISTINA
OXENBERG
LEiGH VOGEL photo
e Lost Soul
Former Key West baseball star Khalil
Greene finds solitude in South Carolina
e following story on Khalil Greene,
one of Key West’s greatest, if not the
greatest baseball player, appeared on
StL Sports Page.
PART II
By Rob Rains
Greene left Clemson for life in
the minor leagues with the promise
of a successful major-league career
on the horizon. It took less than
two seasons, and just 191 games
spread across four levels of the minors, before Greene found himself
in San Diego, making his debut for
the Padres on Sept. 3, 2003 against
Arizona. His first starting assignment came two days later.
All of those who had been part
of his journey, from Carey to
Corbin, Leggett to Rikard and
countless others, expected it would
be just a matter of time before
Greene established himself as a star
at that level as well.
None knew, however, the seriousness of Greene’s personal anguish that would force him from
the game only six years later.
‘A quiet guy’
Mark Loretta was the Padres’
second baseman that night 11
years ago, the man who would be
the closest to Greene on the field
for the next two seasons. He saw
Greene’s talent, but he wonders
now about what he didn’t see.
“I have nothing but fond memories of playing with him and
knowing him,” Loretta said. “He
was very quiet, an introverted sort
of guy that took baseball very seriously. I tell a story pretty often
about how he would be in the
weight room maybe a half hour before a game. He had these mats set
up and he would be diving and
sliding, pretending that he was
making great plays.
“I asked him what he was
doing, and he said, ‘if you are
going to make these kinds of plays
you’ve got to practice them.’ I had
never seen that before and have
never seen it since.”
Another time, Greene actually
wrote a rap song about the players
on the Padres.
“He performed it in front of us
in the locker room in Arizona,”
Loretta said. “I’ll never forget it.
He mentioned different players
and coaches and had a rhythm and
beat to it. at kind of brought
him out of his shell a little bit.”
at moment was an unusual
exception, however.
Loretta, who now works in the
Padres front office, said neither he
nor his teammates ever saw indications that Greene was struggling
with social anxiety issues but heard
about it a few years later.
“Baseball is an anxiety producing game with a lot of failure,”
Loretta said. “Every player kind
10
of deals with that performance
anxiety, and that failure, differently. In his case, I think it was
probably more difficult for him
than others to deal with that.
“We kind of understood that he
was quiet and introverted and went
about his business in a professional
way … Players kind of get tunnel
vision, during the season. You are
concerned with your own performance. at was part of the reason
even his teammates didn’t see exactly what he was going through.”
People saw the broken fingers
on his right hand, injured while
playing defense in 2004 and 2005,
and the toe he fractured while diving for a ball. ey also saw the
torn ligament in a finger hurt
while batting in 2006.
In one of his infrequent interviews, Greene discussed injuries
with a San Diego Union-Tribune
reporter during spring training in
2007.
“I don’t look at it as I’m unlucky or that this is unfortunate, I
look at it as a test,” Greene was
quoted as saying. “ere are things
that happen to you — whether it’s
in your profession or outside of
your profession. ings happen for
a reason and it’s not for me to analyze it and find out a reason why.
“Sometimes it’s for you not to
figure out, you’re not necessarily
to know everything.”
K E Y W E S T L OU
COMMENTARY
Banks, divorce, porn stars . . .
hyposcrisy
BY LOUIS PETRONE
bank that handles a checking account
for a porn star. e other is to avoid
what the banks describe as witch huntanks are at it again.
ing by the federal government. U.S.
Money laundering is big
banks are required to “…know their
business. Mexican and Latin American
customers.’ at means banks should
drug cartels must clean billions of dolnot do business with bad guys. Otherlars in order to make their illicit profits
wise, the government will start investiusable. Middle East terrorist groups
gating, examining the bank’s books, etc.
receive billions from all over the world
All this is a pain to bankers. ey do
to finance their operations. Donors
not fear government investigation. ey
require the money to be processed to
dislike the added cost for attorneys,
the terrorist groups without notoriety.
accountants, and other specialists that
Major banks engage in laundering
must be hired to assist with the investidrug and terrorist dollars. Knowingly.
gation which the bank describes as a
e banks have been arguing for years
witch hunt. It is an additional cost of
that they merely provide a service; they
doing business and detracts from profit.
are not responsible if their customers’
e de-risked customer needs bankmonies are illegally obtained or are to
ing services to exist in today’s society.
be used for improper/immoral purposes. A black market in banking is developing
Whores. I tell you why. Recently,
to assist these persons. More costly, of
major banks have started terminating
course. Also, not subject to government
their relations with certain type cusregulation.
tomers. A letter is sent to the customer
e banks’ formal position re deadvising an account is being closed efrisking is a lot of gobbly gook. It is that
fective almost immediately. e process
the banks are aware of the government’s
is called de-risking. e bank says we
concern that banks may be facilitating
no longer will do business with you.
payment processing for merchant cusJP Morgan Chase (Chase) is a perfect tomers engaged in high risk activities
example. Chase recently closed the bank which pose risk to financial institutions.
accounts of hundreds of porn stars. e
Money laundering is of major consilent message was take your dirty
cern. e banks want the government
business elsewhere … we are
and public to know they do
good people and do not do
not deal with shady people
business with the likes of you.
who might be prone to such
Chase and other banks
activity. e banks are much
have not only cut off porn
like little Jack Horner. He sat
stars, but some in addition,
in the corner eating his pumpdating services, gun sellers,
kin pie, he stuck in his thumb
coin dealers, fireworks suppliand pulled out a plum, and
ers, Muslim students, diplosaid … Oh, what a good boy
mats from third world
am I.
LOU
countries and casinos.
Jennifer Shaskey Calvery,
PETRONE
We live in an age of politiDirector of the Treasury DeCOLUMNIST
cal correctness. e banks
partment’s Anti-Laundering
want to be politically correct. Or, so
Unit, recently said that de-risking is
they infer. ey de-risk for two reasons.
problematic when a bank
First, to avoid public embarrassment.
Who would want to do business with a
B
11
PRESIDENT TRUMAN
No peacetime British prime minister,
points out Jago, had ever faced so bleak a
prospect as Attlee did in winning the
election of 1945, with “a bankrupt, halfruined country, unable to feed itself and
hugely in debt.” When Churchill went to
make his seminal “Iron Curtain” speech
about the Soviet Union in Fulton, Missouri, he did so on a government allowance of £10 a day, no exceptions for
anyone.
But the greatest difficulty for any
British prime minister visiting America
at the end of the war, insists Jago, was
the difficult new president. “Harry Truman relished his reputation for straighttalking, tough dealing and shooting from
the hip, a man wholly without Franklin
Delano Roosevelt’s sentimental attachment to Britain and all too determined
to show where the buck stopped.”
e biggest problem between America’s President Truman and Britain’s
Prime Minister Attlee would be the post
Hiroshima-Nagasaki nuclear understanding between the two allies known
as the Quebec Agreement, signed by
Churchill and Roosevelt on Aug. 19,
1943, two years before the end of World
War II, in Quebec City, Canada. It defined the terms of a coordinated development of the science and advanced
engineering related to nuclear energy
and, specifically, weapons that employ
nuclear energy. e joint agreement was
between the United Kingdom and the
United States and it effectively bound
the United Kingdom, Canada and the
United States to share all nuclear information. Further, the U.S. had effectively
bound itself not to use atomic weapons
without Britain’s consent.
Truman and the Republicans were totally opposed to this and came up with
the Atomic Energy Act of 1946, which
forbade the sharing of nuclear information with any other power. Attlee was
against this and insisted that all AngloAmerican relations had to be on the basis
of absolute equality.
Writes Jago: “Truman for his part
saw himself as the lone sheriff facing various bad hombres at high noon and was
in no mood to have mere members of his
posse make such demands. So Attlee decided that Britain would build its own
bomb.”
Attlee visited the U.S. only twice,
both times concerning the atom bomb.
e second time was because Truman
was making noises about using nuclear
weapons to settle the Korean conflict.
However, discussions about the bomb
apparently occupied just one meeting
between the two leaders.
However, a witness to the meeting,
Norman Brook, later Lord Northmanbrook, a cabinet secretary who accompanied Attlee to Washington on that trip,
told the late biographer Philip Williams,
who in turn told W. W. Johnson (who reviews Jago’s biography of Attlee in the
latest London Review of Books), made
the claim that the meeting was a very big
deal indeed.
“It was all about the bomb and began
disastrously,” he told Johnson, “with Attlee sharply reminding Truman of the
Quebec Agreement and that British
troops, too, were in Korea, so that on
both counts no escalation in the use of
nuclear weapons could be considered
without the consent of the British government. Truman,” Brook continued,
“in equally direct and terse language,
made it clear that the decision would be
his. After a quarter of an hour, complete
deadlock had been reached.”
Brook continues, in the words of reviewer Johnson, his story of what happened next. “I ventured that it was not
often that one found two Allied leaders
together who had served in much the
same part of the Western Front in the
Great War. Truman, though exempt both
by age and as a farmer, had volunteered
and fought with distinction in the
Meuse-Argonne, rising to captain. He
had an enormous regard for fellow volunteers and quickly discovered the
salient facts of Major Attlee’s equally
meritorious career.
“Before long, both men were at the
piano, drinking and singing First World
War songs. e evening ended in complete amity. Attlee explained that he just
needed an assurance that Truman would
not use the bomb without his say-so.
Truman happily agreed but both men
saw that it would be best to say as little
as possible about their agreement since it
could be damaging to the alliance if Attlee admitted that he had to restrain the
president and damaging to Truman if
word reached the Republicans that he
had given the Brits veto power over the
American bomb.” n
MEDICINAL MARIJUANA
Finally, there’s the succinctly titled
“pot-for-anyone-who-wants-it-loophole.
Amendment 2 authors define ‘debilitating medical condition’ from back pain to
trouble sleeping. As a result, anyone who
wants pot will get it.”
e measure defines that key language — debilitating medical condition
— as cancer, multiple sclerosis, glaucoma, hepatitis C, HIV, AIDS, ALS,
Chrone’s disease, Parkinson’s disease
12
IN THE ARTS
Art! Key West! celebrates cultures over anksgiving
SPECIAL TO KONK LIFE
for the “People’s Choice” award.
e Black Friday Fine Art Fair at the
Westin pier will be on Friday, Nov. 28
with a VIP private brunch overlooking
the Fair site, and an hour’s access for
early shopping before the Fair opens to
the public at 11 a.m. More than 15
galleries and artists will participate. e
day on the Pier continues with a Canine Couture fashion show by Florida
Keys SPCA featuring their adoptable
dogs.
On Saturday, Nov. 29, multiple
gallery openings and VIP events take
center stage. Rick Worth and artists
from e Studios of Key West will be
on hand to help kids (and their parents)
create street murals at Ocean Key Resort Harbor Walk, with panels being
displayed as they are completed to
make one giant mural. e afternoon
e third annual ART! Key West!
will escort visitors and locals alike
through a whimsical tour around the
artists’ paradise known as Key West
over anksgiving weekend. Friday,
Nov. 28, through Sunday, Nov. 30, with
more than 50 events.
While the event is free and open to
the public, there will also be VIP tickets
for special events.
Returning this year is “Giants in the
City,” inflatable art sculptures that will
“pop up” throughout Key West.
New this year is the 2014 International Sand Art Competition by SandIsle at Casa Marina, a Waldorf Astoria
resort. Six internationally renowned
sand sculptors will compete with viewers voting for their favorite sculpture
“or other conditions for which a
physician believes that the medical use
of marijuana would likely outweigh the
potential health risks for a patient.”
Based on recent data from the California Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, encompassing 7,525
adults, 92 percent of medical marijuana
users said the drug helped alleviate their
symptoms.
From the physician side, a 2013 poll
conducted by the New England Journal
of Medicine, 76 percent of 1,446 doctors are “in favor of the use of marijuana for medicinal purposes.” n
HOWELLINGS
*****
Quote for the Week
You could roll a bowling ball
All the way down Duval
And never hit a single soul at all
To the Gulf of Mexico.
And on the Atlantic end
Just a couple of fools gathering
To catch a wave
as the storm rolls in from the coast
of Africa.
We don’t need no damn evacuation.
Welcome to our island home staycation.
While it’s just us here, I bet we share a
beer, Maybe shed a tear then laugh the
night away. It’s been a perfect day in
every way.
When this town takes a rest,
On nights like this
We own Key West.
Big boats cleared the docks
‘Buggin’ out like the fighter jocks,
ey’ll never know the tiki bar rocks
When it’s just us chickens!
Generators kickin’ in,
Cory Heydon’s gonna pick and grin,
Crowd is thin but it’s thick with friends
Still alive and kickin.’
We’re all in this thing together.
If it ain’t one thing it’s the weather.
— Clint Bullard, “We Own Key West”
13
and evening will include a culinary
demonstration by Chef Beaumount
at the Casa Marina as well as performances from the Fringe eater and Waterfront Playhouse.
e Festival concludes on Sunday
with the Key West Outdoor Artisan
Market located at the Restaurant Store.
Local art, crafts, and specialty products
will be on display. In addition, tours of
artists’ studios will take festival-goers
into the world of local artists in an
once-in-a-lifetime experience.
VIP Tickets, allowing admission for
multiple festival events, will be available for purchase after Oct. 10. A full
calendar of events, as well as additional
information on VIP tickets, is available
at www.artskeywest.com n
Right, Rick Worth, mural artist
during ART! Key West!
CULTURE
VULTURE
By C.S. GILBERT
Key West’s culture
of fashion — or not
he type of culture I’ve
not wanted to touch with
a long stick in this column is fashion,
haute couture, if you will. But on
third or fourth thought, it’s clear that
of any city of any size with the saturation of the fine arts including fine
dining that Key West offers, we have
the most diverse dress code in the
world. Or maybe we just don’t have a
dress code.
We’re not really heading into high
season yet, but it is late September
and dollars to donuts the heat’s still
high. Tourists (and maybe some locals) still stroll or stagger Duval in
teeny bikinis and Speedos. But most
of us will throw on a sundress or
clean shorts and a Jams shirt for an
evening out, which usually means
dinner somewhere a cut above our
usual haunts.
Come closer to season, though —
say anksgiving — and the variety
broadens (and that most definitely
does not speak to the hip size of our
snowbirds, most of whom are in better shape than we Conchs, original or
freshwater, are). ink of the 201415 opening of the South Florida
Symphony Orchestra, or even of the
opening of the new SFSO Pops with
e WannaBeatles, who will perform
an all Beatles program with the
South Florida Symphony at the Tennessee Williams on Feb. 5, 2015.
(Call (954) 522-8445 to reserve your
seats for this fun concert. Don’t forget to ask them about the opportunity to attend a private party with
e WannaBeatles, Maestra Sebrina
and some of the SFSO musicians, according to their press.)
T
I recall with joy other symphony
openings: Founding President Elena
Spottswood and I (and some others)
in long, formal ball gowns with appropriate accessories. What I call
business drag — something between
the general attire of, say, First State
Bank managers and those few people
who still wear pantyhose — is entirely appropriate for workaday Key
West. However, I confess, without
shame, to having gone on assignment
to cover a story in denim Bermuda
shorts and a clean shirt. Gods bless
Key West!
Even local college administrators
(and surely professors, although I
don’t know any of those any more)
ditch the sport coats and especially
the mandatory neckties, something
forbidden in South Florida even in
the unair-condidtioned 1960s. What
was then Miami-Dade Junior College, South Campus (now Kendall),
even had fashion police, judging the
length of my hems and the dip of my
bodices and (this was a surprise)
whether or not I interrupted a lecture
to berate a student for coming in
late. (I did not. Busted.) I am eternally grateful to that institution for
being so administratively horrible
that I was willing to risk starving for
a career on the wicked stage in Manhattan just to get the hell out of
South Miami.
In its defense, faculty-wise, I rediscovered an Ohio State and England chum named Lee Dodez and
met a lifelong dear friend named Jay
Lampus while teaching there.
A recent Washington Post Review:
“Feminism Unfinished” by Dorothy
Sue Cobble, Linda Gordon and
Astrid Henry (8/29/14), offered by
prominent activist and scholar Elaine
Showalter (professor emerita at
Princeton), notes from the book,
“Twenty-first-century feminism is
multiracial and multicultural; it links
to LGBT groups and protests the
global issues of sexual oppression and
violence against women. At the same
time, it enjoys and endorses new
14
Braising
Taking it low and slow
BY KERRY SHELBY
low cooking is as old as fire
but the technique seems to
be enjoying a new popularity. ere are
all sorts of clever (and often expensive)
devices that will cook your dinner while
you are at work or running errands, but
you really don’t need those things unless
you are amazingly busy and can only
slow down long enough to wolf down
your slow-cooked dinner — a bit ironic,
isn’t it?) All you really need is a couple of
hours, a sturdy Dutch oven, a warm
stove and the right cuts of meat.
I’m a big fan of slow cooking in the
traditional ways. I love to build a fire in
my Weber smoker and smoke a pork
shoulder overnight. ere’s the primal
appeal of maintaining the fire at just the
right temperature (around 225 degrees)
while the meat slowly breaks down into
juicy, fall-off-the-bone goodness. But a
simpler and just as effective way to cook
slightly tougher cuts like lamb shanks
and beef short ribs is braising the meat
S
cent of boeuf bourguignon but I find it
more elegant. If the ribs in the meat case
look small, ask your butcher to cut some
bigger ones so that two ribs per person
are about right.
Braised Beef Short Ribs
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Bind
8 short ribs (about 2-2½ pounds) with
cooking twine and season with salt and
pepper. Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in
a large Dutch oven. Working in batches,
brown the short ribs on all sides. Set
aside.
Add about ½ cup each of chopped
onion and carrot along with 2 peeled
whole garlic cloves to the pot. Sauté until
the onions soften. Add 1 teaspoon
in a flavorful stock. Braising is incredibly
easy and only requires a little patience.
e results are amazing. Braising transforms a cheap, rather ordinary cut of
meat into a rich, complex dish that
seems to have required 10 times the
effort and expense.
e short rib braise here is reminis-
15
tomato paste and 1 tablespoon flour.
Stir to incorporate. Add an herb bundle
of rosemary and thyme. Deglaze the pan
with 1 cup dry red wine and 2 tablespoons of port. Reduce by half and return the ribs to the pan (it’s all right to
layer the ribs). Add just enough beef or
veal stock to almost cover the ribs, leaving some of the meat exposed. Bring to a
Kerry Shelby is a food enthusiast, cook,
forager, adventurer and a hungry
consumer of life. He is creative director
and host of Kerry Shelby’s Key West
Kitchen, a food and lifestyle brand
appearing at kwkitchen.com and on the
Key West Kitchen channel on Youtube.
women rely on e-mail, blogs and Twitter
to attract followers and build community awareness.” Oy.
My only hope is that these intelligent
young women are not wasting big
chunks of their lives to model themselves into a feminine stereotype that requires Broadway-quality make-up and
uncomfortable clothing and footwear
that are, ultimately, going to cause substantial pain. Life is more precious than
that. What’s wrong with whoever you
are? I think the key is in Conch Republic Secretary General Sir Peter Anderson’s self-chosen epitaph: “I had fun.”
Whatever I wear, fun is what I wish
for myself. And, dear reader, for you.
(Columnist’s note: for the next
weeks, as I and my trusty 2007 Honda
Civic Hybrid, Bonnie Blue, wend our
way up the northeast coast to visit people I love who haven’t gotten to Key
West this year, I’ll be submitting Culture Vulture on the Wing. I’ll hope it
will be as interesting as back when the
daily paper paid me to file theater reviews as Citizen on Broadway. Stay
tuned.)
at’s all for now. Gotta fly! n
PASTOR TRIAL
application was in effect — was unable
to get TIF funds in 2014, the church official said. ey hope to win TIF money
next year.
e Rev. W. (Bill) Strange, who is in
Miami, is overseeing the church’s operations, the church official said. Strange
did not return calls for comment.
St. James, one of Key West’s most
historic African American churches, was
founded in 1876 by freed slaves from
Georgia, according to Visitflorida.com.
e 51-year-old McKenzie told investigators he accessed the church
money because collections during services were down, investigators wrote in
their complaint. According to investigators, McKenzie repeatedly asked for, and
received, advances on his pay, in some
cases three times in one month. e advances exceeded his annual salary.
Prosecutors are looking into whether
McKenzie may have used church money
for a farm owned by his family. According to Florida’s Division of Corporations, McKenzie is president and
chairman of McKenzie Brothers Farms
Inc., which was incorporated on July 31,
2012. e company’s address is 2007
Staples Ave., Key West.
Articles of Incorporation list other
members of his family as officers: Willie
J. McKenzie is listed as director; Alonzo
McKenzie is vice president; and Alfred
A.; James A.; and Danny L. McKenzie
are officers without title. n
KEY WEST KITCHEN
KERRY SHELBY
simmer, cover and set the pot in the center of the oven. Cook about 2 ½ hours,
turning the ribs once during cooking.
When the ribs are falling off the bone,
remove them and strain the cooking liquid. Return the liquid to the stove and
simmer over low heat until slightly
thickened, about 20 minutes. Remove
the twine from the ribs and return them
to the pot for 2 minutes and carefully
toss to coat. Serve over warm, creamy
polenta. n Serves 4
CULTURE VULTURE
Wine pairing: A big, full-bodied red,
such as Cabernet Sauvignon or Chianti
images of women in pop culture, and
plays with fashion, make-up and personal style as self-expression.
“Unlike my first- and second-wave
predecessors,’ one fashionista explains,
‘no one force-fed me femininity. . . I had
to fight for it tooth and nail.’ ese
Kerry Shelby is a food enthusiast, cook,
forager, adventurer and a hungry
consumer of life. He is creative director
and host of Kerry Shelby’s Key West
Kitchen, a food and lifestyle brand
appearing at kwkitchen.com and on the
Key West Kitchen channel on Youtube.
16
and life changing, involving the sudden
death of their infant son.
Eleanor is taking a walk in New York.
Leaning over the guardrail, she hurls
herself into the Hudson. Connor visits
in the hospital.
Eleanor vanishes. Months pass. Life
goes on. Conner has his own cafe. A bar
and grill with a mediocre following.
Sadly, he has time on his hands and
he cannot stop thinking of his lost love.
Connor’s chef (Bill Hader) sees
Eleanor on the street. Connor gets the
idea to pursue her.
Chastain is excellent as is McAvoy.
e two actors are the adhesive that
holds this film together, smoothing over
what might have been a bit too geometric, lugubrious and somber. is is a true
ensemble narrative and these two
especially give the film tension and fire.
As a pair, they are unavoidable and
compelling.
Some of the vignettes do appear dry
and flat, yet this clinical condition is alleviated by some quick cutting in flashback
which makes it satisfyingly like Richard
Brooks’ “Looking for Mr. Goodbar.”
e doltish father (William Hurt)
doesn’t carry much heart; he is a sad
sack. e mother (Isabelle Huppert) is
petty and uninteresting. We have seen
these identical parent roles stuck in
melodramatic molasses before. Ditto for
Connor’s monotone father (Ciarán
Hinds), owning a famous restaurant long
past his prime with no real zest or worry.
An exception is a sarcastic and earthy
professor played by Viola Davis.
e thrill of the story is in McAvoy’s
droop-eyed face, Picasso-like with tears,
coupled with Chastain’s lost Ophelia
shock that sometimes hardens to a gray
metal.
“e Disappearance of Eleanor
Rigby” focuses more on the sadness
of loss rather than love found, but it
is a film that is often first rate in its
minimalism and melancholy.
In one long shot showing Cooper
Union, the beams of stainless steel
become a pair of scissors that can impale
a heart, and also blanch a Cupid’s face
into shards of silver ice.
While the film borrows heavily in
tone from 2010’s “Blue Valentine” and
the work of the late director John
Cassavetes, it is impossible to look away.
TROPIC
SPROCKETS
n I N R E V I E W W IT H
Ian Brockway
Disappearance
of Eleanor Rigby
ed Benson’s debut film “e
Disappearance of Eleanor
Rigby,” (originally designed with three
alternate perspectives) is an unflinching
window into both a heaven and a hell of
loss, or more specifically, the emotional
experience of romance and intimacy.
Ned Benson’s debut film “e Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby,” (originally
designed with three alternate perspectives) is an unflinching window into
both a heaven and a hell of loss, or more
specifically, the emotional experience of
romance and intimacy.
In this film, love is twined in
adventure and tragedy.
James McAvoy is Connor, a restaurateur. Jessica Chastain is an aspiring
anthropologist with dreams of a Ph.D.
At the start, they are Romeo-eyed and
Juliet-flamed as one. ey get married.
en an accident happens. One is left
to make up his/her own mind as to what
precisely happened, yet it quickly
becomes clear that it was devastating
N
17
And it is a credit to Ned Benson that
under his lens the audience is forced to
make a conclusion as to what happened
and who, if anyone, is most at fault.
e final scene of “e Disappearance of Eleanor Rigby” is a film in itself
with as much eerie apprehension and
haunt as anything I have recently seen.
TROPIC CINEMA
416 Eaton St. • 877-671-3456
Week of Friday, October 10, 2014
through
Thursday, October 16, 2014
Hector and the Search for Happiness
(R)
Fri - Thu: (1:30), 6:00
My Old Lady
My Old Lady (PG-13)
Fri - Thu: (3:45), 8:15
oted playwright Israel
Horovitz (Author, Author)
directs an adaptation of his play “My
Old Lady” starring the iconic Maggie
Smith and Kevin Kline. e story of a
man (Kevin Kline) spiritually at sea,
starts out as a farce involving an older
woman who comes with a spacious
Parisian apartment complex, and grows
more intense despite some over the top
melodrama that gives mixed results.
A down and out Mathias (Kline)
hopes to get back on his feet financially
by selling his inherited Paris property.
Mathilde (Smith) is the headstrong lady
who has a lifetime occupancy on the
N
Dolphin Tale 2
(PG)
Fri - Thu: (2:00), 6:10
Tusk (R)
Fri - Thu: (4:00), 8:10
One Chance (PG-13)
Fri - Thu: (2:15), 6:05
To Be Takei (NR)
Fri - Thu: (4:05), 8:05
Guardians of the Galaxy 3D
(PG-13)
Fri - Thu: (1:45), 4:15, 6:35, 8:55
a
KEY BUSINESS
C O M M U N I T Y
KEY WEST
n The Naked Girl in the Tree House
All is True
‘If you can’t see them, join them’
in the appalling language of Murray the K
on 1010 WINS New York, had us singing
along right away.
“When I’m home everything seems to be
right…” And the humor of Alun Owen’s script!
Reporter to John: “How did you find America?”
John to reporter: “Turn left at Greenland.”
en the key scene with Ringo to the tune
of “at Boy,” as he strolls the docklands deliciously alone and is charged by the police with
“wandering abroad.” And for me, that most
plangent line of all, from “If I Fell,” mooning
back to my lost love whom I left back home in
England: “Love is more than just holding
hands.”
But the funny thing about the premiere, with
the theater packed by young people, more boys
than girls amazingly, is that some of the kids had
brought guitars into the house. We’d never seen
such a thing. e nerve of it, playing along with
the Beatles! My new friend, David Carpenter,
had a guitar himself — in its case it was like a
third passenger on our way over — and was
quite good on it, in fact he accompanied our
sing-alongs with the girls on the ship’s deck, but
he’d never have dreamt of breaking it out in a
movie theater. We laughed at the idea, yet the
seed of an idea was born.
And then there were the Rolling Stones. One
evening when I was off the night shift at my elevator-operator job, we heard it announced on
1010 WINS that the Stones had arrived
on their first U.S. tour. Supposedly they were
going to put in a quick appearance in Manhattan
at the Peppermint Lounge.
is was news too huge for David to ignore.
e Beatles movie was big, but the Stones in
early 1964 were the next big thing.
My own taste in pop — I didn’t play an
instrument, I liked to sing — leaned mostly
toward the bespectacled thrills of Buddy
Holly (“It’s a-getting’ closer/Goin’ faster than
a rollercoaster”) and the strings and choirs
A Serial Novel by
MARK HOWELL
CHAPTER III
One of the wonders of writing a serial novel
like this is the chance to interact with the
audience.
Already one reader has asked us why there’s
a naked girl in the title, but no such person
has made an appearance.
e fact is, she has already made her
appearance.
But now we’re getting ahead of ourselves.
If truth be told, the first title of our tale was
“All Is True,” the original title of William
Shakespeare’s play about Henry the Eighth,
although the whole truth about that is it was
actually written by Francis Bacon.
Our point is this. Here is a true story about
make believe. David Carpenter and your storyteller, om One, have arrived in New York City
in 1964 for their first and most glorious adventure before returning to England and, for better
or worse, higher education.
Already they’ve scored more cash than they’d
ever seen in their native land and have purchased
from a couple of beatniks a car of dubious provenance so they can drive across country to who
knows where. In other words, to the girls at
Lake Erie College whom they’d met on the
boat coming over.
But first, a couple of missions to accomplish.
I insisted we attend the American premiere of “A
Hard Day’s Night” in Times Square. en David
wanted to catch the Rolling Stones live at the
Peppermint Lounge. I was a Beatles fan and a
good boy. He was a Stones fan and a bad boy.
At least that’s how we saw ourselves as new pals
and our opinions were subject at any moment
to change if not to complete reversal.
“A Hard Day’s Night,” with that alluringly
long opening chord and its black-and-white
cinematography immediately instilled a deep
blast of nostalgia. ose “loveable mop tops”
18
SHORTANSWERS
BY J E F F J O H N S O N n P A U L A F O R M A N
LETTERS
SECRET SERVICE FAILURES
is collecting the funds. $?$?
Dear $?$?: Understand. However
we don’t think it’s rude. If you REALLY want to connect with the kid
and/or charity, then ask for more information. If you are just looking for
a way out, you don’t need to get in a
huff about saying “No thank you, I
don’t choose to give at this time.”
What’s
cheating?
Dear Short Answers: Why does
my girlfriend lie to me about hanging out with other guys, then sneaks
around to hang out with them. Is she
cheating? Confused
Dear Confused: We don’t think
cheating is only about sex. We think
it is about dishonesty.
What do you think?
Exceptionalism
Dear Short Answers:
My partner and I are
both over 60, gay and
have no children. When
we were younger, all our
friends were having kids
so we didn’t see much of
Dear Short Anthem and when we did,
swers: Do you have the
all they talked about
right to be mad when
was their children so
PAULA FORMAN &
friends don’t stay in
that wasn’t very interestJEFF JOHNSON
touch or disappear for
ing. When their kids
an extended time? Is it unreasonable? grew up and left home, we re-conPeeved
nected and started to develop strong
Dear Peeved: Yes, you have the
friendships again. Unfortunately,
right to be mad. But why not call
they’re now all having grandkids!!!
and say “whassup with you?” ere
Which, apparently, are the most immight be a good reason.
portant and fascinating human beings in the world. We can plan a
dinner or movie date for months in
advance, but it gets broken at the last
Dear Short Answers: What’s the
minute when the kids call and need
best pickup line to get a girl’s attenan emergency babysitter (probably so
tion in a bar? Joe
THEY
can go out to dinner). Do I
Dear Joe:”Tell me about you…”
need
to
find new friends or is this
en listen! It’s a show stopper.
normal behavior in America?
Bob’s the Uncle
Dear Bob: You need new friends.
Or tell the old ones that you need to
be a priority. We don’t like any of the
“normal” behaviors that routinely asDear Short Answers: Is it rude
sume that their choices (this includes
for people at work to collect money
work, dates, children, grandkids) are
for their children’s charities? Even if
more valid than yours. n
it’s a good cause, I feel like I am giv-
Benefit of
the doubt
Since you asked
e answer
is yes or no
ing money “anonymously” because I
have never even met the person who
SHORTANSWERS SHORTANSWERS
Life is complicated. “Short Answersisnt. Send a question about whatever is bothering you to
[email protected] or go to www.shortanswers.net and a psychologist and
sociologist will answer. A selection of the best questions appear in Konk Life.
19
of leadership, morale and effective management must be swiftly turned around.
Any S.S. security plan should be implemented by carefully selected, trained,
motivated and courageous individuals
who are required to exercise life or death
judgments in a fraction of a second, and
they must trust their leaders.
Here’s what happened with a security
plan that had seven protective redundancies: Plain cloths agents recognized
Omar Gonzales as a potential problem
from a prior arrest, yet failed to stop
him from climbing over the WH fence;
the attack dogs were not released, allowing Gonzales to advance toward the
WH; the armed agents on the grounds
failed to stop the threat; the alarm system designed to alert all hands and lock
down all doors was muted and failed;
the rooftop snipers whose sole job is to
stop any unauthorized individual, failed
to act; the entrance to the WH is supposed to be locked, and it wasn’t; and
the armed agent at the entrance failed to
stop the attacker from running into the
WH interior. What if Gonzales had explosives or a high powered weapon instead of a knife?
Going from the top down, everyone
involved with the numerous failures
should be replaced from outside the
S.S. Failure of the S.S. mission is not
an option. n
• Roger C. Kostmayer
Key West
october 9-15
inside!
COUNTERCLOCKWISE
FROM LEFT
Schooner Wharf
Rolling Nowhere
Happy Dog
Hog’s Breath
Jonell Mosser
20
FUNTIMES
Schooner Wharf Bar
Raven is a talented guitar player and
singer, and is backed by some of Key
West’s favorite musicians. Eclectic
mix of jazz, country, blues.
Sunday 1012
Marty Stonley/Ken Fairbrother
7-11pm
Monday 1013
Happy Dog 7-11pm
Tuesday 1004
Raven Cooper 7-11pm
Wednesday 1015
Tim Hollohan 7-11pm
202 Williams St., 292-3302
n
Thursday 1009
Island Time Duo 7-11pm
Long time Keys resident and one of
the area’s favorite steel drummers,
Dave Herzog is joined by his friend
Chuck Fox on guitar and steel drums.
This entertaining duo adds their
sparkling vocals and tight harmonies
to perform a vast repertoire of island
hits, beach music, and oldies that will
have you singing along and dancing
the night away.
Friday 1010
Rolling Nowhere 7pm-Midnight
.Schooner Wharf debut! Born in the
North Georgia hills and defying current genre classification, Rolling
Nowhere has been described as a
Psychedelic Junkyard Roots band
with a sound that evolves with every
show. Their sound combines Classic
Country, Old Timey Folk, Blues Roots
and Psychedelic Rock ‘n Roll. The
band has down home 3 part harmonies, a mutual love of songwriting,
and a wide array of instrumentation
including; the Canjo - a washboard
percussion experiment, upright bass,
telecaster guitar, drums, dobro, banjo,
and mandolin. (7pm-midnight)
Saturday 1011
Raven Cooper Band 7pm-Midnight
La Te Da
1125 Duval St., (305) 296-6706
n
Friday 1010
Cabaret: Randy Roberts LIVE! 9pm
Saturday 1011
Cabaret: Christopher Peterson’s
EYECONS 9pm
Piano Bar: Fabulous Spectrelles,
9:30pm
Sunday 1012
SHANE FOR KING Tea Dance, 4pm
Piano Bar: Larry Smith, 9pm
Monday 1013
Piano Bar: Larry Smith, 9pm
Tuesday 1014
Cabaret: Randy Roberts LIVE! 9pm
Wedneday 1015
Piano Bar: Fabulous Spectrelles,
9:30pm
Schooner Wharf
Island Time
21
FUNTIMES
Sunset Pier
Hog’s Breath
Jonell Mosser
Hog’s Breath Saloon
400 Front St., (305) 296-4222
n
Thursday-Sunday 1009-12
Cliff Cody 5:30-9:30pm
Jonell Mosser Band 10pm-2am
Monday-Wednesday 1013-15
Holt & McAdam 10pm-2am
McConnell’s Irish Pub
900 Duval St., (949) 777-6616
n
Mondays
8-11pm — Eric from Philly
Tuesdays
8-11pm — Fiona Malloy
Wednesdays
8-11pm — Tom Taylor
Thursdays
7-9pm — Trivia Mania;
9pm-1am — Chris Rehm/Open Mic
Fridays
8pm-Midnight — Love Lane Gang
Saturdays
9pm-1am — Eric from Philly
Sundays (Brunch)
11am-2pm Rick Fusco/Oscar Deko/
Kerri Dailey
9pm-2am — Industry Appreciation
Zero Duval St., (305) 296-7701
n
Thursday
C.W. Colt 1-4pm
Rolando Rojas 6-8pm
Friday
Rolando Rojas 1-4pm
Rolando Rojas 6-8pm
Saturday
The Doerfels 1-4pm
Sunday
The Nina Newton Band 1pm
Robert Albury 6-8pm
Monday
C.W. Colt 1-4pm
Robert Albury 6-8pm
Tuesday
Tony Baltimore 1-4pm
Wednesday
Robert Albury 6-8pm
ROYAL HAPPENINGS
CANDIDATE EVENTS
$5 admission gets one free vote. $50
priority seating includes one vote
and buffet. VIP seating reservations,
visit www.aidshelp.cc All Candidates
Ongoing Events
• Drag Queen Bingo, 801 Caberet
Sundays until Oct. 12, 5 p.m.
Bingo at 801 Bourbon will divide
all proceeds equally among the
candidates. All Candidates
• Aqua Idol, Tuesdays until Oct. 14,
6–8 p.m. Candidates sing at Aqua
Nightclub, 711 Duval St. 75 percent
of the monies collected will be split
among the candidates and 25
percent would go to the campaign
for which the winner is representing.
All monies will be donated to AIDS
Help. Free to attend.
All Candidates n
Pinchers
712 Duval St., (305) 440-2179
n
Carl Hatley 1-5pm
6/30am,7/2am,7/4am,7/5am
Bobby Enloe 1-5pm
7/1am,7/3am,7/6am
Carter Moore 7-11pm 7/4pm, 7/5pm
22
LOCAL OBSERVATION
delay, second degree burns stippling his skin.
She yawned and hung up on her son.
e first time Dirty Brian met with crack
cocaine he fell in love. He went in headfirst
and gorged until he hit another wall. OD,
the police said.
Dirty Brian’s friends arranged his funeral.
ey invited his mother who declined. e
funeral was scheduled for mid-morning midSeptember in NYC on a perfect clear bright
day with Tiffany blue skies. Such a remarkable day it appeared Dirty Brian’s luck had finally improved. Except no one would get to
that funeral.
is was September 11, 2001. n
KEY WEST LOU
“…cuts with a machete rather than a
scalpel.’
e problem with this whole de-risking
thing is it is a subterfuge. e banks portray
themselves as cleaner than thou in order to
cover doing business with drug dealers and
terrorist supporters.
e reason for such bank conduct is simple. Money. Money is everything. e banks
are dumping customers who at best only
make them millions. In order to keep those
making them billions.
If that isn’t hypocrisy, what is? n
THE NAKED GIRL
of Ray Charles anthems (“I’ve made up my
mind/to live in memory...”). David’s tastes,
meanwhile, seemed tainted with darker experience. He liked drums and parties that featured fake fistfights among the guests.
But who could resist a glimpse of those
notorious Stones? And, Mick Jagger was a
university lad and Brian Jones came from my
hometown of Cheltenham. And they rocked!
We marched with haste to the lounge at
128 West 45th St. on the afternoon of the
band’s supposed visit. is was going to be
too cool. Guys with long hair, a rare sight in
‘64 even in New York.
As we descended the steps to the club’s
basement entrance, however, we took note
of a thinning crowd. Where were the Stones?
“ey’re not coming,” muttered a surly voice
from among puddles of water from air
conditioners accumulating in the well
of the basement-level entrance.
“Long live the Beatles,” I murmured.
David was too pissed to speak. Instead he
knelt down and grabbed the corner of a
poster floating at his feet. “A souvenir,” he
announced as he shook it dry. A black and
white photo on yellow paperboard showed
the Rolling Stones lined up against a
limousine.
“Take a look at this,” said David back on
the sidewalk. He pointed to Brian Jones in
the lineup. “You look just like him.”
“Nah,” I said.
“Yeah, you do,” David insisted. “Blonde.
Bags under your eyes.”
“anks, I said. “Well, look at Keith,
then. You’re just like him. Black hair.
Wasted.”
“I do, too,” he said. “You’re right, om.
We got a couple of dead ringers here.”
And thus was born our nefarious plan:
Why don’t we cut out this photo from the
poster and stick it on the side of the Plymouth Savoy? With white shoe polish (we’d
seen some in the window of a Fifth Avenue
department store) we would write in big
letters: THE ROLLING STONES —
LONDON TO LOS ANGELES.
“Yeah,” I said.”
“You bet,” he said.
“If you can’t see them, join them,” I said.
“You’re bad,” he said.
“No, I’m not,” I said. “I’m the vicar,
I’m good.”
“I saw you shoplift that jar of honey from
the store the other day,” he said. “You’re
going to hell. Me, I’ve got morals.”
And so were set our places in a drama
of deception about to engulf us in the
rock ‘n roll theater of our lives. n
TROPIC
SPROCKETS
n I N R E V I E W W IT H
Ian Brockway
property. To put wrenches into
an already unattractive economic situation, Mathilde’s
off-putting daughter Chloe
(Kirsten Scott omas) also
lives in residence.
Kevin Kline does wonderfully
with some zany antics in the
mode of his performance as
Otto in “A Fish Called Wanda”
with plenty of sarcasm and exaggerated hyperbole in stubbornness. Mathias is also quirkily
self-deprecating and offhand,
which gives his role a more
believable flavor. Maggie Smith
is predictably entertaining, too,
as a very opinionated and zesty
older lady although this is no
great stretch for her.
What starts as a madcap
dilemma quickly deepens into a
boozy Sturm und Drang when it
is revealed that Mathilde had a
near lifetime romance with
Mathias’s father. Kline is very
watchable and endlessly smooth
as the snarky schemer quick
to pull the wool over Mathilde’s
eyes. With such moments, the
film almost reaches the fun
found in Frank Oz’s “Dirty Rot-
• Continued next week!
23
ten Scoundrels.” Provocative also
are Mathias’s maudlin zingers
when he blames Mathilde for his
family drama.
During the height of the
yelling, however, “My Old
Lady” feels like “August: Osage
County” with Edward Albee
waiting off camera. Kline is
much better as a gonzo alliterative punster than a indignant
sad sack. e shifts in emotional
color make the film seem like
two narratives in one, and the
farcical segments hold more
gusto than the ones with heavy
pathos.
Given that the playwright
Horovitz was close friends with
Samuel Beckett (there is a quote
by famed Beckett in the film),
one wishes for a less formulaic
narrative that owes more to the
genre of romantic comedy than
a character study. e conventions of hugging and kissing at
the finish of some scenes make
this cinematic lunch into a small
salade verte rather than a satisfying nicoise.
at said, you will not be
bored. ere is enough ramble
in Kline and Smith to keep you
on e Left Bank.
A colorful outing is delivered
by the gifted character actor
Dominique Pinon, who plays an
existentially joyful bohemian realtor who lives on a barge along
e Seine.
Despite handwringing reservations, “My Old Lady” seduces
in its charm with stunning locales of Parisian streets. Savory
cinematography by Michel Amathieu (Paris Je t’aime) rivals
Darius Khondji’s work in “Midnight in Paris.” n
Moonlight & Martini Party
ML for Queen
KAREN WALKER | PHOTOGRAPHER
24
www.konklife.com • October 9-15, 2014
25
Larry Blackburn’s 60th Birthday Bash
with Elton John
KAREN WALKER | PHOTOGRAPHER
26
27
Our ‘First Responders’
Musicians raise funds for Barbara Ann
and Mickey A. Foster at Boondocks
THE BIG STORY
| RALPH DE PALMA photographs
BY RALPH DE PALMA
No disrespect to our police officers
and firefighters, but I have to point
out a group of “unsung” heroes among
us, pun intended. I have said this
many times that whenever one of us
is stricken by accident or gets a bad
diagnosis, the call to arms is always
lead by what I call this community’s
“First Responders,” our musicians.
Barbara Ann and Mickey have been
dealt a very bad hand. Bills are mounting as Barbara Ann battles disease.
One of their friends, and longtime
Keys musician Terry Cassidy and
25 other musicians in the community
organized a fundraiser on their behalf
at Boondocks Bar and Grille.
It was a huge success.
ese First Responders are often
called upon to help and they’re always
there for us. It’s terrible to need these
events, but it’s beautiful to watch the
way a community comes together.
e Keys are special in many ways,
but one of the special facets of this
paradise we call home is our “First
Responders” who make us all proud
to be a part of our One Human Family
community.
God bless Barbara Ann and Mickey
for a speedy recovery, and the next
time you’re out listening to some
of our wonderful music, give that
musician a little more applause at the
end of song and throw a little
something special in the tip jar. n
the lack of a bowling alley and miniature
golf for our deprived kids, etc. (please
add onto this your own list of irritating
whines) need to just SHUT UP.
at was easy. Please write in under
your real name if speeders or pony tails
is what you want people to find when
they Google you. You have a great life,
but you want to degrade it with petty
carping. Maybe it makes you feel superior, a rare and precious feeling for you.
But . . .damn it, what if what bothers
you is serious? Police killing a tourist.
e county spending millions on unneeded property, dubious grinder pumps
and no-bid waste contracts Homeless
shelters in your backyard, dredging for
giant cruise ships, free tax deals for Peary
Court — this list is, sadly, longer than
the trivia litany.
And it keeps you awake nights to say
and do nothing. In that case, the Big
Story of this man’s life is that you sleep
best by calling out the unethical commissioners or foolish FDOT bureaucrats.
You fight for recycling, or the save-able
homeless. You get money for mammograms or surgically repaired smiles. You
open your mansion for every damn
righteous cause, especially those saving
the great historical heritage of Old
Town. You fight for recycling, or community gardens. You challenge your own
police department.
You use your personal “made it” to
help make our shared world a better
place for those who have not yet made it,
or who will inherit whatever we have not
ruined for them. I am grateful for the
many people I have listed -- we know
who you are -- who have inspired me
enough with their own Big Stories to try
to tell one of my own. Please use your
remaining years in our shared Paradise
to share yours, even if this means putting yourself on the line.
28
Whoosh. at was heavy. Back to the
ylang-ylangs. We had a super-aromatic
mature one around the corner. e
owner cut it down. I asked why. He said
it was rotten. I pointed out the sawed
sections were flawless. He admitted it
didn’t fit his landscaper’s plan.
Everyone in our neighborhood and
who passes through it, as Cynthia did
before we moved here, misses it. I would
like to replace it with a legacy tree. I’ve
asked for years. If anyone can give me
the phone number — NOT a “hint” or
“guidance” but rather someone who can
supply me with a mature tree —
I’ll be ever grateful. n
SPORTS | KHALIL GREENE
PART II
Greene overcame those injuries and
had the best year of his career in 2007 —
hitting 27 homers and driving in 97
runs as he played 153 games — and
hopes were high for his continued success in 2008. Instead, Greene’s power
numbers dropped and his average tumbled to .213. On the night of July 30, he
struck out for the 100th time, prompting him to take out his frustration on a
dugout wall. e result was a seasonending broken wrist.
Needing to cut salary that winter, the
Padres traded Greene to the Cardinals,
who at the time only saw a shortstop
with power potential who should have
been approaching his prime. ey didn’t
know about the underlying issues.
One possible warning sign came from
Padres manager Bud Black the day of the
trade. “One of the things that people
don’t really see is how he internalizes so
much,” Black told the Union-Tribune.
“He doesn’t let it out, but he’s a player
who cares a great deal about performance, to the point where it gets to him.
“I wish he would let go and enjoy
how good he is. But for whatever reason,
he can’t do it.”
It turned out Greene couldn’t do it
in St. Louis either, where his anxiety
problems led him to twice being
placed on the disabled list.
• Continued next week!
Fabulous on Frances
by C. S. GILBERT
KONK LIFE REAL ESTATE WRITER
irst impressions
are important,
whether in real estate or in
any other business. In the case
of the historic eyebrow house
at 715 Frances St., in the quiet
neighborhood opposite
Key West Cemetery, one first
notices the soft burbling of a
small fountain, tucked into
the greenery behind the white
picket fence. The sound is
soothing and welcoming, an
immediate invitation to relax
on the front sitting porch—
the perfect place to watch the
beginning of the annual
locals’ Masquerade March
during Fantasy Fest.
There’s room for a small
party on the porch, which
extends the width of the
original 1880s structure; there
is a 1930s addition. The entire
structure has been modernized
and, with a lovely pool and
back gardens, polished to a
high, warm sheen over the past
few years. The rear sunroom/
family room/dining room has
two walls of newly insulated
windows and sufficient light
for an art studio. “There’s no
place in this house that’s
dark,” commented Realtor
Ian Whitney.
Downstairs floors are Dade
County pine, as are the walls.
Those walls which have been
painted, Whitney said,
contain only one coat of
F
Picture prefect: that's this historic eyebrow house on Frances St., ideally located to enjoy the
locals' Masquerade March on Fantasy Fest Friday.
A roomy, two-story house with only a relatively small 1,000-square-foot footprint, there's 5,000
square feet left for pool, patio and gardens.
29
primer and paint and could
thus easily be restored to the
natural wood.
Entrance is into a large
living room, with the spacious
kitchen directly ahead and the
windowed multi-purpose
room behind to the left.
While the home is
substantial, its footprint only
takes up about 1,000 square
feet of the 6,000 square foot
rear and side yards. The
poolside patio includes an
outdoor shower and lots of
room for sitting and dining,
with beautiful gardens on all
sides. A path of coral blocks
leads to a side gate, while on
the other side is offstreet
parking for one larger or two
smaller cars.
Whitney pointed out that
the house boasts “new
everything” over the last few
years, including roof, lots of
siding, gardens, an irrigation
system, two-zone heat/AC
upstairs and down, and the
nice-sized pool with hot tub
and waterfall. The decorative
tile borders in the pool are
particularly handsome.
Other especially handsome
touches are the kitchen’s
terracotta tile floors and the
unusual inset design of the
generous cream-painted wood
cabinetry and drawers,
complementing the generous
length of beige, honey and
black granite and stainless
continued on next page
Fabulous on Frances
Continued
The light, bright living room has both walls and floors of Dade County pine.
Note painted accents on the kitchen cupboards and drawers and the striking
light fixtures.
A 1930s rear addition has been turned into a family/dining/sunroom full of
windows.
The master bedroom is really a spacious bed-sitting room with lots of closets.
appliances. Tucked behind are a
laundry and a half-bath. High on the
kitchen’s soaring window wall under
the cathedral ceiling are striking
hanging light fixtures and fabric
window treatment.
furnishings, excluding the owners’
very impressive art collection.
There is, however, some delightful
shelving, as under the stairs, for
display of three-dimensional art and
decorative accessories.
Plantation shutters accent the
original windows and all others on
the first floor are dressed with fabric
blinds. Window treatments convey
and this really exquisitely decorated
home can be acquired with all
30
The first floor also features,
to the right of the front door, a
versitile room with ensuite bath
that is the third bedroom but could
serve any number of purposes,
Continued on next page
Fabulous on Frances
Continued
probably originally
four bedrooms
upstairs—and no
indoor plumbing!
Thus the two
ensuite baths (the
guest bath also has
a second door from
the hall) are ample
and contain marble
vanities, rain
showerheads and
old-fathioned,
white and blackThe upstairs guest bathroom, all white marble and tile, has
accented tile.
an unusual saloon door to access the shower.
Located in
an X Flood Zone (no flood insurance
currently a media room.
required), this home also has been
The spacious master bed/sitting
awarded windstorm discounts for the
room, with twin closets plus, extends
new shutters.
the entire depth of the house and the
“You get some very nice sunsets
upstairs guest bedroom is good-sized
here,” the realtor commented,“and the
as well. Whitney noted that there were
To every side are
lush gardens.
neighbors live here all year round.”
A tour of this unusually lovely
home is available by phoning
Ian Whitney of Doug Mayberry
Real Estate at (305) 942-1653.
31
Konk Life welcomes subjects for
other articles about Keys homes
currently for sale. Contact Guy deBoer
at (305) 296-1630 or (305) 766-5832
or email [email protected].
1
3
2
Featured Home Locations
3
Sugarloaf
Key
1
2
Key Haven
Stock Island
Featured Homes – Viewed by Appointment
Map # Address
#BR/BA
Listing Agent
Phone Number
Ad Page
1
1116 Thompson St., Key West
3BR/2BA
Brenda Donnelly, Prudential Knight & Gardner Realty
305-304-1116
32
2
1931 Sugarloaf Blvd., Sugarloaf Key
3BR/2BA
Roberta Mira, Florida Keys Real Estate Co.
305-797-5263
32
3
522 Petronia St., Key West
3BR/3BA
Dawn Thornburgh, Beach Club Brokers, Inc.
305-294-8433
800-545-9655
32
33
Key West Association of REALTORS®
keywestrealtors.org
Phone (305) 296-8259
Listing Agency
Lower Keys
Coldwell Banker Schmitt
Century 21 Schwartz
Engel & Voelkers Florida Keys
Sellstate Island Properties
SBX Real Estate, LLC
Key West
Truman & Co.
Truman & Co.
Realty World
Allison James Estates & Homes
Prudential Knight & Gardner
Doug Mayberry Real Estate
Compass Realty
Preferred Properties
Truman & Co.
SBX Real Estate, LLC
Sellstate Island Properties
Selling Agency
Fax (305) 296-2701
Sold Date
List Price
Sold Price
Street # Street Address
5 County Real Estate
Outside Of MLS
Outside Of MLS
Century 21 Schwartz
Engel & Voelkers
9/30/14
9/29/14
9/29/14
9/30/14
9/30/14
10/2/14
9/30/14
9/30/14
9/29/14
9/25/14
9/30/14
$ 235,000.00
$ 425,000.00
$ 59,000.00
$ 66,000.00
$ 299,995.00
$1,195,000.00
$ 68,000.00
$ 350,000.00
$ 349,000.00
$ 100,000.00
$ 37,500.00
$ 232,000.00
$ 415,000.00
$ 40,000.00
$ 61,000.00
$ 255,000.00
$1,100,000.00
$ 40,000.00
$ 355,000.00
$ 325,000.00
$ 135,000.00
$ 30,000.00
Seaport Realtors
Seaport Realtors
Tradewinds International
Outside Of MLS
Key West Properties
Seaport Realtors
Truman & Co.
Century 21 All Keys
9/26/14
$ 73,500.00
$ 72,000.00
5555 College Rd #15
Key West
9/26/14
$ 279,000.00
$ 266,000.00
3675 Seaside Dr #340
Key West
9/25/14
$ 159,900.00
$ 130,000.00
3314 Northside Dr #45
Key West
9/30/14
$ 143,700.00
$ 119,700.00
Key West
9/30/14
$ 225,000.00
$ 190,000.00
Key West
9/30/14
$ 399,000.00
$ 370,000.00
2800 Patterson Ave
Key West
9/30/14
$ 585,000.00
$ 555,000.00
1223 Flagler Ave
Key West
9/26/14
$3,395,000.00
$3,200,000.00
1116 Grinnell St
Key West
9/30/14
$ 879,000.00
$ 860,000.00
1306 Laird St
Key West
9/26/14
$ 700,000.00
$ 690,000.00
800 Fleming St #1B
Key West
9/30/14
$ 775,000.00
$ 750,000.00
201 Virginia St
Key West
9/29/14
$ 299,000.00
$ 279,000.00
3625 Seaside Dr #110
Key West
9/29/14
$ 749,900.00
$ 732,000.00
1100 Angela St
Key West
10/1/14
$2,395,000.00
$2,000,000.00
718 Eisenhower Dr
Key West
Based on information provided by the KWAR MLS from 09/25/2014 to 10/02/2014
31227
30438
0
16
3848
1083
10
114
24
253
5950
Avenue E
Hawk Ln
Warbler
Lobstertail
No Name Rd
Lagoon Dr
Knockem Down Key
Cutlass Ln
Jade Dr #7
Mars Ln
Peninsular Ave
Island
Built
Description
Bdrms
Wtrfrnt
MM
Big Pine Key
Big Pine Key
Big Pine Key
Big Pine Key
Big Pine Key
Summerland Key
Summerland Key
Cudjoe Key
Big Coppitt
Geiger Key
Stock Island
1989
1986
N/A
N/A
1966
2002
N/A
1996
1986
1973
N/A
Single Family
Single Family
Lots
Lots
Duplex
Single Family
Lots
Single Family
Townhouse
Mobile Home
Boat Slip
2
2
0
0
4
3
0
3
2
2
0
No
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
Yes
31
30.5
30.5
30
29
25.5
25
23
11
10
5
N/A
2000
1985
1980
1980
1958
1958
1885
N/A
N/A
2005
2004
1933
1891
Boat Slip
Condo
Condo
Condo
Condo
Single Family
Single Family
Commercial RE
Single Family
Condo
Single Family
Condo
Duplex
Single Family
0
2
2
2
2
3
4
0
3
2
3
2
3
5
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
No
5
4
3
3
3
3
2.5
2
1
0.5
0.5
0
0
0
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October 9, 2014

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