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2015 September

Saturday, September 12, 2015

The-Coconut-Telegraph-w-Coconuts

Since 2002. Published Wednesdays and Saturdays

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tumeric

[Inflammation] Years ago, a friend told me that she had eliminated her arthritis pain by taking Turmeric supplements. After a few months of tolerating pain in my knee when climbing stairs, I tried turmeric supplements 3 weeks ago. The pain has reduced to almost nothing.  I wondered why it mattered. It turns out it is an anti-inflammatory. Link

[Crooks] A Big Pine resident recently reported what he believes to be felony criminal activity by FKAA to the Florida State Attorney General. The AG, Pam Bondi, forwarded his report of felony to the perpetrators for whatever action they feel appropriate. No FDLE investigation was instigated. They just fingered the whistleblower who’ll now get fired or in trouble. Incredible! You just can’t make this stuff up
knight helmet

 

[Count Monroe] Ninth century Emperor Charlemagne divided his vast empire into counties, each ruled by a Count, hence the name “County”. If we had been a part of Charlemagne’s empire we would have been ruled by the Count of Monroe.

[Crooks] FKAA manipulated data!  Laudicina vs FKAA preliminary forensic analysis of FKAA water consumption databases. Video
ark giraffes

 

If you ever feel real stupid, remember that there are people who really believe that two penguins walked all the way from Antarctica to the Middle East to get into an ark.

[Blast From The Past] Beany’s Drive Thru – Long Beach, CA  1952-53. Really cool. Fats Domino singing, 20 cents for a burger, old cars, and the cute girls in skirts all the way down to their knees. No body piercings or tattoos. This will bring back some memories. Good ole days, for sure! Enjoy the Sunday drive. Video
cushman8

 

Cushman Silver Eagle

Erin Brockovich now helps the Indians. Video
farmer crows hoe

 

What does it take to set up a small farm with animals and a few helpers and is it allowed in the Lower Keys? I want to raise pigs and chickens.

[“Monroe County corrupt”] Instead of bending over you can vote. It is amazing how many people are not paying attention to the things that effect their life. Listen to the local news, read the paper online, and just basically pay attention.
star trek3

 

Star Trek Continues is a pretty good knock off indi film of the 1966-69 TV series. Sometimes I even forget that Vic Mignogna isn’t William Shatner. He even has Shatner’s staccato delivery. Video

Subtitles: [Grunt of effort]
forest fire[Controlled Burns] Bob Dylan tells us that “It doesn’t take a weatherman to tell which way the wind is blowing.”  Were that true for everyone!  The staff at the Key Deer Refuge, particularly the controlled burn unit, has had its problems over the years determining which way the wind is blowing.

In September, 2011, Key Deer management planned a 18 acre controlled burn just north and west of the Blue Hole.  During the burn, the wind shifted and over 100 acres was scorched. At one point, there was fear that Port Pine Heights subdivision might be engulfed as well and serious consideration was given to evacuation.  There was insufficient staff to control the burn.  Today as you drive along Key Deer Blvd., you will see a mile long forest of 25’ high black pine cadavers as a testimony to what happens when a controlled burn is no longer under control.

In a post mortem after the 2011 debacle, a lot of promises were made by the Key Deer Refuge about future controlled burn behavior.  Few have been kept.  For example, a promise was made to have a helicopter onsite to drop water if necessary.  Last year, they said that a helicopter was too expensive.

Of course, there is no one left at the Refuge from the 2011 disaster.  Is the new staff any more skilled than the old?  Time will tell if today’s novices can do any better than their predecessors.

This time around the Refuge has 3 areas in their sights to be burned.  One is behind the Winn-Dixie Shopping Center.  It will be interesting to see what precautions center management will take to protect its property.  Do you think that they will idly stand by and allow Refuge management to have its way without any proactive efforts?

The other two sites are further north straddling Key Deer Blvd.  Each site is approximately 50 acres, well beyond the promise of no more than 10 acres in any controlled burn.  Burn Unit B (love the euphemisms) is immediately north of the Eden Pines Colony Subdivision and just east of the Pine Heights subdivision. Directly across the road is Burn Unit A, which has not been burned in 45 years.   Unit B, the area closest to housing, has not been torched in 15 years and the vegetation, read fuel load, is extremely dense.  Drive by and look for yourself.

My reading of the geography is that there is no margin for error.  Any change in wind speed or direction would be catastrophic to one or both subdivisions.  As it is, the smoke inundation will be substantial.  You had better have high quality air filtration as part of your air conditioning system if you live in the area.

On top of everything else, much like 2011, we have a rookie staff in charge.  Who will be there to help, to provide expert advice?  We all know that the West is ablaze and every available federal firefighter is long gone.  As for the poorly paid ($27,000/yr.) 606 Florida State firefighters, approximately 500 have joined their federal brethren.  I ask again:  Who will be on Big Pine Key to help?  And, how many local volunteer firemen will be available for a worst case scenario?

I am very pleased that I live in Port Pine Heights, 2 miles from the ignition point.  Our friends who live in Eden Pines Colony can measure the distance between the flames and their homes in tens of feet.  As I said, the margin for error is minuscule.  Plus our lots are but 50’ wide.  Should a perimeter home become engulfed in flames, there is nothing to stop the conflagration from spreading.

Illegitimi non carborundum.” ~St. Lawrence O’Toole, Bishop of Dublin, and a favorite quote of Jimmy Hoffa

~ Dr. Larry Murray, Fiscal Watchdog and Citizen Activist.

A guy answered the question, “What is life” and gave the most succinct answer of all time: “Everything!”
Redneck-roof

 

Redneck portico

I’ll like it when I buy a new TV or stereo receiver and just plug it in without any wires or cables to figure. Bluetooth could do that now if they wanted it to happen.
sound-88

 

For What It’s Worth –Buffalo Springfield

Marathon TV88. Video
Female-Recruit

 

[Women in combat at disadvantage, Marine Corps study shows] CBS News has the results of a one-of-a-kind Marine Corps experiment that will help determine the future of women in war. The study compared men and women fighting side by side, and the final report released Thursday says men performed significantly better and got hurt less often. Video

[Date Rape] Four college students from North Carolina State University developed a nail polish that changes color when exposed to date rape drugs, including GHB, Rohypnol, and Xanax. The wearer can stir her drink with a finger. II her drink was tampered with, she’ll know within seconds
sheeple7
In China, if you hit someone with your car you pay for their medical care. Killing someone, however, is a one time fine. For that reason, people have gone back to kill someone they accidentally hit.
AFLAC!

 

One more duck and this AFLAC deliveryman might quack up!

[9/11] I try to stay away from controversial issues. 9/11 is my only exception. I’ve already debated the events of that day face-to-face with one of Larry Silverstein’s attorneys. After about an hour, all he kept saying was, “Who are you?” If any of you are interested in learning the truth, Google “Dominick Suter” or “5 Dancing Israeli’s” and start there. Or go watch Survivor and Fear Factor. After fourteen years, I really don’t care.
computer memory

 

The next meeting of the Big Pine Computer Club is coming up this Saturday, September 12, 10 am at the senior center.  Hope to see you there.

[Turkey] In Turkish, the bird we call a Turkey is called “Hindi” (from India). In India, it’s called “Peru.” In Arabic, the bird is called “Greek chicken”; in Greek it’s called “French chicken”; and in French it’s called “Indian chicken.” The bird is indigenous to none of these places.
59-Caddy-Camper

 

1955 Cadillac — camper?

Where are the official details of the FKAA bust, besides the newspapers and what is the latest on the sewer fiasco?
rubble5[Using Rubble to Rebuild Living Reef at Cheeca Rocks] This week, a team from Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary finalized a project to restore living coral colonies on a damaged patch reef near Cheeca Rocks that was injured when a rogue buoy dragged across it. Boat groundings, anchors, chains and other items that drag along the seafloor can damage or destroy a reef’s complex formations — which take decades to grow into a rich habitat for fish — in just seconds. Fortunately, hard work can sometimes speed a reef’s recovery.

“We successfully re-stabilized every living coral colony and piece of loose rubble salvaged from the path of destruction,” said Bill Goodwin, a natural resource manager with the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

The buoy that damaged the reef was swiftly removed when a team of NOAA scientists first reported it, but it had already left 150 square feet of broken and dislodged living coral colonies in its wake and reduced 260 square feet of non-living coral reef framework to rubble. A sanctuary team inspecting the damage shortly after the incident found broken heads of stony coral colonies including brain corals, star corals, finger corals and mustard hill coral. They couldn’t re-attach the living coral at the original damage site because the porous substrate wouldn’t retain the cement needed to hold them in place. As a temporary fix, they stashed the coral colonies in a natural crevice to keep them from being smothered in sand or rolling around from the surge.

In July, sanctuary scientists teamed up with the buoy maintenance crew to build a sturdy base that could serve as a new home for these living coral heads. The goal was to create relief — the height and three-dimensional structure of healthy natural reefs — that would make for good fish habitat. Sanctuary divers built the base by using fiberglass rods drilled into the substrate before pouring a mixture of Portland cement and sand into plastic molds that Goodwin calls “reef-forms.” They painstakingly relocated dead rubble from the injury into the mix, shaping it into a form that looked and functioned like a naturally occurring reef. The rescued living coral colonies were then affixed to the newly created base.

“Using coral rubble helps new coral settle and thrive because larvae cue in on substrates that are already covered with the red encrusting, coralline algae,” explained Goodwin.

Once the cement was cured, sanctuary divers removed the mold and checked the structure’s stability. They mapped, measured, photographed and noted current conditions for each reattached coral colony as a baseline for future monitoring and took similar data for nearby uninjured corals to serve as a scientific control group.

“Not only was the reef rejuvenated but so was the team,” Goodwin said, “Restoring the reef reminded all of us why we got into this line of work.”

Follow-up monitoring is scheduled one, three, six and ten years from now to track the long-term success of the restoration. If you ever see a buoy adrift or grounded boat in the sanctuary, please report it to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission at 1-888-404-3922 so officials can respond and assess the damage

drone

[Drones and Real Estate] Instead of spending hours driving around looking for the perfect house, savvy realtors will give clients VR tours of properties. Matterport is already selling a 3-D camera system to help agents create these walk-throughs. Looks like they’ll have to find a new way to make tiny rooms seem huge.

[Round House] Looks like that abortion on Colson Drive, Cudjoe Key is going to be a landmark eyesore for the next dozen years or so. How that community let something like that be built is a wonder. The pity is the neighbors have to look at that thing and put up with the laughter, ridicule and loss of real estate values in the area. There is no accounting for good taste in the Keys.
church dollar signAsk IRS to stop favoring churches over other non-profits! The Internal Revenue Service and Treasury Department are seeking public comment about the Form 990, which secular non-profit organizations are required to file each year to retain their tax exemption. The 990 informational return requires non-profits to report their annual gross income, disbursements and other tax information to the IRS — and to the U.S. public which subsidizes tax-exempt organizations. The IRS estimates that the burden on non-profits filing a 990 return amounts to more than 25 million hours. Yet churches are automatically exempted from this onerous requirement under federal law. This discrepancy shields churches from accountability and amounts to government favoritism toward religion. The IRS provides unequal treatment to secular non-profits. Churches and religious organizations currently do not even have to send a notice to the IRS that they are claiming a 990 filing exemption! Any group that claims it is religious avoids all public transparency and accountability.

This is precisely the type of lack of oversight that allows for widespread abuse, preying upon vulnerable populations, and fraud. It is time to tell the IRS to stop privileging churches at public expense. The IRS and Treasury Department are asking the public to comment on Form 990. Among other questions, they have asked for “ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity” of the 990 information collected.
Take action. Share your comments (which will be public), by emailing them by Monday, Sept. 14, to: Christie.A.Preston@irs.gov. Be sure to note in the subject of your email that your comments relate to Form 990

drinking on curb

 

I’m not self-medicating myself with booze. The guy at the liquor store wrote me a prescription. Well, he called it a receipt … whatever.

[Performance Evaluations] These individual quotes were reportedly taken from actual employee performance evaluations throughout the U.S.
– Since my last report, this employee has reached rock bottom and has started to dig.
– His men would follow him anywhere, but only out of curiosity.
– I would not allow this employee to breed.
– This employee is really not so much of a has-been, but more of a definite won’t be.
– Works well when under constant supervision and cornered like a rat in a trap.
– When she opens her mouth, it seems that it is only to change feet.
– He would be out of his depth in a parking lot puddle.
– This young lady has delusions of adequacy.
– He sets low personal standards and then consistently fails to achieve them.
– This employee is depriving a village somewhere of an idiot.
– This employee should go far, and the sooner he starts the better.
– He’s got a full 6-pack, but lacks the plastic thing to hold it all together.
– A gross ignoramus – 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus.
man in the moon

Thanks to the poster that posted the NASA earthrise video. It reminded me of the great things this country can accomplish when it has a single focus with no political BS getting in the way. My how we have strayed. Video

David Gilmour on new album ‘Rattle that Lock’ and collaborating with his wife, the novelist and lyricist Polly Samson. Audio
coffee ice cream[“The demise of coffee ice cream”] About ten years ago I emailed Ben & Jerry’s asking why I couldn’t find Maple Walnut ice cream. They replied that it was only a seasonal flavor and not available in pints and only at their stores. I replied, “You’re not really from Vermont, are you?” They sent me a coupon for a free pint of any flavor, but not Maple Walnut
[Politically Incorrect] You find it offensive? I find it funny. That’s why I’m happier than you.
World's-Coolest-See-Saw

 

World’s coolest see-saw.

Kids in kindergarten through fifth grade are invited to join the free, fun-filled Discovery Saturday at the Florida Keys Eco-Discovery Center (35 East Quay Road, Key West) on Saturday, September 19th from 10:00 am to 11:00 am. Join special guests from Florida International University on a virtual visit to Aquarius Undersea Laboratory. Try on a diving helmet and pretend you are an ocean explorer! Build an underwater habitat to take home! For more information contact 305-809-4750. Space is limited, so please call to register. Learn more about the Florida Keys Eco-Discovery Center. Link
moon88

[Conspiracy] The Earth picture from the moon is a fake. The Earth is many times the size of the moon. It should be hugh. Look at the most recent picture caught from a satellite with the Moon between it and the Earth. The Earth is way bigger!

[“Hurricane shutters”] To the poster looking for shutters,  we used quality screening in Big Pine. They did a great job at a good price. Give them a call 305-515-0027.
happy-9-11-dayWhen it comes to radical Muslims, our government is definitely stupid. The war started in the 7th century and lasted through the 17th. I would contend it never stopped, but, historically, the facts below are correct. This is why I choke when I hear someone say we will defeat or contain these Islamic terrorists in a few years or even 30 years as stated by Leon  Panetta. If the latest batch of murders, beheadings, and killing of innocent people has shocked you, maybe you should read this compilation of historical facts about the hatred of Muslims.

In 732 AD the Muslim army which was moving on Paris was defeated and turned back at Tours, France, by Charles Martell.
In 1571 AD the Muslim army and navy was defeated by the Italians and Austrians as they tried to cross the Mediterranean to attack southern Europe in the Battle of Lapanto.
In 1683 AD the Turkish Muslim army, attacking Eastern Europe, was finally defeated in the Battle of Vienna by German and Polish Christian Armies. This crap has been going on for 1,400 years and half of the politicians don’t even know it. If these battles had not been won we might be speaking Arabic and Christianity could be non-existent; Judaism certainly would be. And let us not forget that Hitler was an admirer of Islam and that the Mufti of Jerusalem was Hitler’s guest in Berlin and raised Bosnian Muslim SS Divisions: the 13th and 21st Waffen SS Divisions who killed Jews, Russians,  Gypsies, and any other “subhumans”.

A lot of Americans have become so insulated from reality that they imagine that America can suffer defeat without any inconvenience to themselves.
In 1968, Bobby Kennedy was shot and killed by a Muslim male.
In 1972 at the Munich Olympics, athletes were kidnapped and massacred by Muslims.
In 1972 a Pan Am 747 was hijacked and eventually diverted to Cairo where a fuse was lit on final approach. It was blown up shortly after landing by Muslims.
In 1973 a Pan Am 707 was destroyed in Rome with 33 people killed when  it was attacked with grenades by Muslims.
In 1979, the US embassy in Iran was taken over by Muslims.
During the 1980’s a number of Americans were kidnapped in Lebanon by  Muslims.
In 1983, the US Marine barracks in Beirut was blown up by Muslims.
In 1985, the cruise ship Achille Lauro was hijacked and a 70 year old American passenger was murdered and thrown overboard in his wheelchair by Muslims.
In 1985, TWA flight 847 was hijacked at Athens, and a US Navy diver trying to rescue passengers was murdered by Muslims.
In 1988, Pan Am Flight 103 was bombed by Muslims.
In 1993, the World Trade Center was bombed the first time by Muslims.
In 1998, the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed by Muslims.
On 9/11/01, four airliners were hijacked; two were used as missiles to  take down the World Trade Centers and of the remaining two, one crashed into the US Pentagon and the other was diverted and crashed by the passengers.  Thousands of people were killed by Muslims.
In 2002, the United States fought a war in Afghanistan against Muslims.
In 2002, reporter Daniel Pearl was kidnapped and beheaded by Muslims. (Two other American journalists were just beheaded)
In 2013, Boston Marathon Bombing. 4 people, including a child killed, 264 injured by Muslims.

Happy 9/11 Day!.

strip-hits
The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. It is also the way to his life insurance policy. (an old wives tale).
Empire_of_the_ants

 

 

Empire of the Ants with a young Joan Collins. Florida real estate investing gone terribly wrong. 1977 SCi Fi Movie

[Costumes] If you have a 1950’s Fantasy Fest, all we have to do is go to Sears for costumes, they are emptying out their old stocks of weirdo 50’s clothes.
pee makes smiley face

If you fail your pee test–urine trouble!

There is no replacement for money and power in these Keys. The only thing saving our islands is the shallow waters surrounding each potential sand pile that the developers want to make into the next Boca Raton. The environmentalists will not let them dig the canals deeper for the yachts. What is left to fill their greedy wallets is low rent housing for the inept and useless eaters to breed in. Can you see the half million used ship containers painted rainbow colors and the new mobile home sites stacked one on one? Where will these unscrupulous developers live, sure as hell not in the new debris fields called the Florida Keys. Our days are numbered
line-up

[FKAA] If somebody reports felony criminal activity to the state Attorney General and she send the report to the criminals with the person’s name, email, etc. instead of launching an FDLE investigation, doesn’t that make her an accomplice to the felony? So who do you report such a conspiracy to? You have to go federal, right?

[Captain Doom and Gloom] DEF: Idiot n, someone who thinks Muslims mean well.
DEF: Sneeze n, the action to remove unwanted nasal invaders.
DEF: Nude n, something 99% of the inhabitants of this planet should never get.
DEF: Old n, the age where you realize dying is not such a bad deal.
DEF: Stomach n, the organ with which your wife tries to reach your heart and insurance with.
DEF: Hair n, a covering that hides the lumps on one’s head and groin.
DEF: Boobs n, those beautiful containers on young women. ALSO SEE: Presidential Candidates.
DEF: Quickie n, an approach to a bar bimbo that insures short comings.
DEF: Military n, an organized madness that subsidizes useless eaters.
DEF: Welfare n, a semi-organized charity that subsidizes useless eaters.
DEF: Unemployment n, a semi-organized system to pay people who do not want to work.
DEF: Capisce n, a word used by big guys with chrome knuckles to find out if you understood their threat.
Submit anything of a positive nature, unless it’s breakthrough stuff to island@bigpinekey.com

national politics an(Click here)