/dev/random

Two years ago today we got hit by Hurricane Wilma. Although Hurricane Katrina got more press, Wilma was the bigger disaster for south Florida. I lost power early in the morning and was without power for 10 days. Almost the entire county lost power when many power lines and substations were damaged.
We had a cookout [...]

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The guys made a lot of progress today. The microwave oven and most of the cabinets are in. The stove is in place but not connected, along with the bottom cabinets on that side. The wall is uneven, so they need to fix it before they install those cabinets.

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The guys finished painting, picked up the kitchen cabinets, and started installing them. One of them fixed my doorbell, which hasn’t worked since I’ve lived here. A piece was stuck and it took less than a minute to fix.

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The guys did more electrical work, closed up the walls where they could, applied textured surfacing to the walls & ceiling, and picked up the stove. They’re making lots of progress - if everything goes according to schedule, the cabinets & floor should be in by the end of the week and the washing machine [...]

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The guys took out the old tile today, sprayed the ceiling, closed up the walls (except for places they still needed to access pipes), and prepared the supports for the cabinets. They’re taking tomorrow off and will finish the plumbing work Monday & get ready to put in the cabinets.

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They had planned to replace the tile today, but the machine they needed to remove the old tile wasn’t available. They had reserved it yesterday, but it had been given to someone else. Instead, they moved the pipes behind the sink, did some electrical work, and put up supports for the cabinets.

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The guys did more work on my kitchen today. The sink & remaining cabinets are gone, the washing machine & dryer have been removed and the wall opened so they can move the pipes. Tomorrow they’ll work on the pipes and hopefully get started on the re-wiring.

In a completely unrelated incident, a pipe outside my [...]

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The contractor surprised my by starting a day early on my kitchen. All of the cabinets & the stove are gone and he set up a temporary kitchen in the corner of my dining room. He got a lot done in only a few hours. Tomorrow the sink is being removed and the washing machine [...]

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Today was Oakland Park’s third annual Oktoberfest. It was lots of fun, with lots of food, music, and entertainment. I took about 300 pictures and I’ve uploaded 42 of the best here.

My Nikon L5 is really starting to annoy me. The image quality is great, but it’s painfully slow. It takes 10-15 seconds after I [...]

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This story points out what’s wrong with Florida’s educational system. There’s too much emphasis on preparing for the FCAT (a standardized test), rather than actually learning.
One teacher told parents that there would be no curriculum other than FCAT practice until after the writing test in February. This is for a class of the most advanced [...]

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Via Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire:
Marc Ambinder has a copy of a letter DNC Chairman Howard Dean sent to each Democratic presidential candidate today, strongly urging “to do
your part and support the action of the Rules and Bylaws Committee” finding Florida’s advanced primary in non-compliance with delegate selection rules last weekend.

They can go f*** themselves. They [...]

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The first storm this season that may threaten us. It’s still too early to tell what’s going to happen, but the maps show it becoming a Category 3 hurricane early next week and heading in our general direction.

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We can always count on Fort Lauderdale mayor Jim Naugle for making a dumb statement or stirring up controversy. Thanks to term limits, he can’t run again, so he’s being more outrageous than ever. His latest pet idea is a $250,000 robotic toilet aimed to prevent the “homosexual activity” that he said plagues other public [...]

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The courtroom spectacle over Anna Nicole Smith is taking place not too far from here in the Broward County courthouse. One of my friends works for a law firm, so she happened to be at the courthouse today. She ended up getting stuck there over lunch time because of the crowd. She even got to [...]

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Residents who paid half a million or more for new hi-rise condos in Downtown Fort Lauderdale are complaining about the noise. Now I’m sure these people knew what they were getting into when they bought those condos. They wanted to live downtown for the night life and now they’re complaining about the same night life [...]

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Snow in South Florida!

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Sun-Sentinel: Florida was 31st out of the 50 states in a ranking of how well they are preparing young people to achieve success in their academics and careers, according to a new assessment released Wednesday by Education Week magazine.
We can thank the FCATs for this. The only thing our schools teach the kids is how [...]

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On October 24 last year, Hurricane Wilma hit us. We were without electricity for 10 days, many roofs were damaged, and we lost a lot of trees. Several roofs have already been replaced, but we’re still waiting for the rest of them. Thankfully we had no major storms this season.

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We were lucky this time. We got some rain and very little wind. There was no damage, no flooding, and we never lost electricity. Only one small tree with very shallow roots fell down.

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Here we go again!

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