Uplifting Story…..

When I write stories for the community paper, I have a target word count of 450-800 depending on the story. The paper is a weekly and if something isn’t time sensitive, it may get slipped to the following week due to lack of space. There are times when we know the story will “go long” and we make allowances for that. In a few cases, we set up a 2-part story to adequately portray the person/group/subject.

My intent when I went to write about the new Krab Kingz was a regular story of a touch of irony along with the extra difficulty in opening a restaurant under current economic conditions. I’d spoken briefly with the husband half of the couple, but when I was able to sit down with them both, I knew I would need to “go longer”. The finished article is here: http://www.southdadenewsleader.com/eedition/page-a03/page_c2d14d6c-1224-540e-bb7e-60744a393581.html

I wasn’t able to include as much as I wanted about how each on their own has been a shining example of achieving the American Dream. They’ve both worked hard all their lives, committed to community and church and always on the lookout for opportunities. An element that adds to this is their personal story of having known each other in their youth and then gone separate ways. Whether one believes in destiny or coincidence, they met again as adults, both single parents and still working hard. (I did not inquire as to what circumstances caused the single parenting – it wasn’t relevant to this piece). They took their time though and allowed a few years before entering into dating and ultimately marrying.

I feel confident they will succeed in this endeavor and can attest to the quality of the food. It’s interesting that they have a “fried” and “boiled menu” and they do recommend if you want fried as carry-out, you come in to order so you can then carry out as soon as it’s taken from the fryer.

 

Excellent Coffee and More….

I am always cautious about recommending specific brands, especially when they are more expensive than other options. In cases like I have done for the Olive Morada, it is because they provide an excellent product and we are willing to pay more to support a small business. I don’t recall when I first started seeing promotions for Black Rifle Coffee, but that’s not important. I have never been a particular fan of Starbucks and only patronize them when someone else asks me to meet there or they happen to be the only easily accessible choice. I was curious about Black Rifle Coffee and went onto their website a few times. Initially, they did not offer whole bean and we do prefer to grind our own. I guess it was about three months ago when I saw they had whole bean. I talked to Hubby and we decided to give them a try. They do come in about the same price as Starbucks and shipping is involved.

They are a veteran-owned company, specifically former SOF (Special Operations Forces) veterans. In addition to coffee there is other merchandise and affiliations with groups that shouldn’t be surprising considering their background. I ordered two different types of coffee and both were excellent. They have a Monthly Coffee Club where you set up for regular delivery and that does come with free shipping. We selected that and although I did designate two bags per month, I think I will be able to cut back to one per month and augment with an extra bag as needed. Again, this is not the place to save money, but it is value for what you pay and support an interesting small business. Do check them out to see if it is something that might appeal to you. https://www.blackriflecoffee.com/pages/about-us

 

The Three Celebrities Pattern….

Sigh. We are all familiar with “three celebrity deaths in a row”, and this has been no exception. While Ken Spears, who helped create Scooby-Doo, wasn’t someone I knew anything about, there were many episodes of Scooby and the gang watched when son was at the cartoon age.

And to be fair, Sean Connery did make it to 90. Despite him having grown up in poverty, how could he have not achieved basically everything he wanted in life? Well, okay, he was a fierce proponent for Scotland’s independence from the United Kingdom, and that hasn’t come about. What wonderful movies from him though and what class over the decades. He was the quintessential James Bond, and others were from okay-to-good, but none could truly match him.

Which brings us to Alex Trebec. If you caught the Monday, Nov 9th intro to the episode, there was no way to not tear up as the studio VIP paid his tribute and explained all thirty-five of the final episodes with Alex would air. The fact he was able to do as well as he did during his battle with cancer was remarkable enough. That he taped his final show only two weeks before died was symbolic of why he was admired by so very many. I suspect no one will ever know the thousands of youngsters (and perhaps adults) he inspired in all those games of Jeopardy. RIP, gentlemen, and thank you for what you shared with us.

When Willing To Pay A Little More….

This is one of those fun things to hear. I may actually have previously posted about this  but if so, it’s been a while. As I have discussed before, I am not into spending money for the sake of doing so and those times when I have bought a “luxury car”, it has been a pre-owned, low-mileage one. The same goes for dining. Yes, we can afford the really high end places for special occasions, but quite frankly, we don’t care to special the extra money to encounter the attitude that too often comes with those.

On the other hand, there are times when spending extra is worth it, especially when it does support a small business. As we came back up from Islamorada this afternoon we heard an ad on the radio for a second location for Key Largo Chocolates.The couple that opened the store are hard working and have established a business that is pure, 100% discretionary. No one actually needs specialty chocolates.To succeed in such a business is impressive enough, but to be able to open a second store with everything going on right now – how great is that? Their secret isn’t really secret; it’s making this work the old fashioned way. They started with an excellent product of hand crafted chocolates. I won’t list the many types because you would start drooling. Yes, they cost extra, but they are fabulous. They added more kinds and create novelty shapes. Then they added an ice cream section. Apparently they also offer cakes now although it has been a while since I was in. They market well and attend many big public events as vendors.

A few years ago when my cousin brought her daughters down, she commented about wanting to get something special to take back for the lady who was looking after their dogs/checking on the house. I explained I knew just the thing. They were, of course, captivated and purchased a box as the present as well as some for themselves. Halfway back to our house my cousin remarked that perhaps she should have doubled up on what they bought.

It’s https://keylargochocolates.com and yes, they do ship.

Launching To Space……

Hubby was disappointed Wednesday when the joint NASA-Space-X launch was postponed until today due to weather. All was well at approximately 3:44 p.m. this afternoon though as engines fired and the ship streaked upward. This was an especially significant moment because of the public-private nature of the effort. The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched a Crew Dragon spacecraft on its first test flight with NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken on-board to be taken to the International Space Station (ISS) as part of the  NASA’s commercial crew program. The Crew Dragon will return to a splashdown at sea later in the weekend. NASA astronauts previously went to the ISS on regular shuttle flights, but that program was discontinued in 2011, leaving only Russia capable of delivering individuals to the station. By way of quick facts, 15 nations contributed to the station that was completed between 1998 and 2011, although the station has been continuously occupied since late in 2000 with more than 230 individuals from 18 different countries spending time on it. Several years ago my sister asked us to go with her to a launch because her Swedish neighbor was finally getting to go up. He’d been training in Houston for years and part of the tour that day was watching other pieces of the ISS being assembled. Different modules and capabilities have been continuously added to it.

Anyway, Elon Musk and his Space-X teams have had failures as always happens when working in this level of technology. Today, however, if not perfect (and it may have been) accomplished the critical initial stages of the mission. Unlike Hubby, who has kept track of multiple stages leading up to this, I was not aware a woman,Gwynne Shotwell, is the President and Chief Operating Officer for Space-X. She was one of the early employees of the company and in the interview shortly before blast-off, she said she’d become accustomed to launches, but was nervous about this one.

There are thousands of individuals in hundreds of roles involved with making something like this happen; all of whom must be feeling very proud today.

 

When Kids Step Forward….

The full article about this team of kids is at http://www.southdadenewsleader.com/news/h-o-t-and-partners-reach-out/article_6c8df6fa-8fb1-11ea-af1e-a36e34c9128d.html

In essence though, a fairly small number of students, (about twelve) have truly great role models of parents who are heavily involved in different community support activities. These young people have been not only watching their parents over the years, but also participating in the activities as they reached the age when they could. There is a situation here that requires its own post that I won’t go into, but has to do with students and sometimes families who literally depend on meals from schools as their primary source of food. As I said, skipping the “whys” of that, a group of people set up a system last year to help provide food on weekends and holidays. During the process, these students came together to create their mission statement. “We are a team of students that have chosen to volunteer our time for no benefit other than to serve our community of Homestead, Florida. We care for and change lives for the better while putting others before ourselves when possible. We treat our fellow teammates with respect, love, kindness, gratitude, and above all else, the same way we want to be treated. Our four target areas to assist are the hungry, children with severe medical needs, animals in need and the military. However, we are willing and prepared to serve anyone in need at a moment’s notice. We are the H.O.T.” They also took the necessary steps and were recently officially designated as a non-profit, 501(c)(3).

Yes, they have adults who help, but they do most of the work, and have been for months now. In light of the COVID-19 situation, their focus for now is food collection and distribution. This was once again a time when learning about a new group was a pleasure.

 

Out of Time Yesterday….

I would have posted yesterday, but we had an event to cover for the paper and then had to scoot home to work the article for a deadline. Notwithstanding getting jammed up at times when I have multiple articles in one week, I (and Hubby, too) do discover all sorts of things about the community we would not otherwise. I think I may have previously mentioned the Mariachi Academy (technically Conservatory) we have here. If I forgot to, this is the link to the article I did last year. http://www.southdadenewsleader.com/a-special-invitation-to-mariachi-students/article_37c73868-9e68-11e9-bceb-e7908cf587c5.html

I did a follow-up about their performance and have mentioned them another time or two in conjunction with other events. We had been notified about a press conference yesterday because of a performance the students were going to be doing in a farm field. We were a bit unclear as to what was going on. They were somehow involved in something called Altisimo Live (https://altisimolive.com) Once we arrived at yes indeed a field, we had a chance to talk to our guys in the midst of getting ready for their performance. With Cinco de Mayo celebrations disrupted as have been lots of things, a group of people got together and said, “We’ll have this major streaming festival instead.” More than 50 celebrities signed on and as it happens, one of the co-hosts has a soft spot in his heart for the Mariachi students. He reached out and basically said if they could figure out the technical piece of linking in and handle the other logistical arrangements, they could be part of an event that would be seen/heard by hundreds of thousands (maybe millions) from coast-to-coast and internationally. Oh yeah, they had 72 hours in which to make it happen.

I’ll link everyone to the article later this week, but it was a truly great experience. Since the press conference was during rehearsal time and we arrived a bit early, we were able to get the information/photos we needed and back home in time to tune into the show. I had it on YouTube and Hubby may have been on Instagram or Facebook. And that is how Eva Longoria, actress and the co-host, introduced a group of students and their instructors from here in Homestead to a whole lot of people.

 

 

Opening Acts…….

Lynyrd Skynyrd, BruceSpringsteen, and Steely Dan are among famous musicians who were once opening acts for others. Most of course don’t go on to be mega stars, but can be quite successful in their own right. Thursday, we attended the Seminole Theatre performance of Asleep at the Wheel as part of the Showcase Season. Neither of us had heard of Brennen Leigh and Hubby now has one of her CDs. Songwriter, guitar player, mandolin player, and singer, she is a two-time Texas Music Awards Best Female Vocalist and 2018 Ameripolitan Music Honky Tonk Award winner. She pairs with different people and last night was Melissa Carper who was on bass; not something you often see women play. She performs primarily with the Buffalo Gals Band and their debut album, “Brand New Old Time Songs”, came in at Number 2 on the European Americana charts in 2018. Both women have toured nationally and internationally and began their music careers fairly young. As the opening act, they provided a thoroughly entertainment stretch of music and I suspect we weren’t the only ones who purchased a CD.

Although the main show, Asleep at the Wheel, is not the kind of music for everyone, they have been around since 1970. Ray Benson, the only original member still with the band, was in fine form and the drummer, David Sanger, has thirty-five years with them. Western Swing is a combination of elements of American blues, swing and traditional fiddling even though I don’t have enough of a music background to identify how much of each element is involved. On the other hand, I don’t need to know. I’m sure that of almost 250 people in the audience, some could explain it in detail. For the rest of us, it was just a fun, lively show.

We don’t usually attend two performances in the same month, but we have been told Derina Harvey and her Celtic rock group are quite good, so we shall see about that one.

Mermaids For Real (Sort of)…..

You can imagine the fun I had with the article about the new Oceans Sirens Mermaid Academy found at http://www.southdadenewsleader.com/news/ariel-and-aquaman-you-ve-got-company/article_8096b1dc-17ca-11ea-abad-8b4cfba390e4.html

Aside from the fact I did use free diving to stage a murder (sort of) in my first scuba-themed mystery (Shades of Murder), I’ve never been inclined to go through training for free diving (also known as breath hold). Also setting aside the people who train for making/breaking records, 4 to 5 minutes underwater is more the standard for  a trained free diver. While that may not seem like a long time, it does give you a nice interaction on a reef or the ability to spear a fish if that’s your thing. Part of taking a scuba course does also involve (or used to) one quick lesson in free diving. It isn’t much in the way of training; more to give you the sensation. There is a little bit of crossover in both types of diving in the sense that how long you can stay underwater on scuba is a function of depth and air consumption.  (Those who know this can skip or bear with me). The deeper you dive on scuba, the shorter the amount of time you can stay at depth because of the risk of decompression sickness (DCS or “the bends”). You will also need to save enough air for a 3-5 minute safety stop during your ascent from anything lower than 50 feet as another precaution against DCS. But if you are diving shallow around thirty feet, how rapidly you use air is the main factor in how long you can remain underwater. In general, the more you can relax underwater, the slower you breath and therefore extend your time. The most important difference in free diving and scuba is you absolutely should not hold your breath while on scuba due to potential pressure on your lungs.

Anyway, even though I choose the “techno mermaid” option of scuba as opposed to free diving, I am thrilled with the idea of having a mermaid school close by.

What Can One Person Do?……

As I have explained previously in this blog, one of the aspects of writing for our weekly community paper is I am out and about meeting quite a few of the local non-profits. People contact the paper or me directly at times to pass on information. One of the things I always explain is there are so many different organizations that people cannot support them all. However, each time I highlight a new group, that particular cause may be the very one an individual feels strongly about. That might be the case with Project Moises. Here’s the link to the full article: http://www.southdadenewsleader.com/eedition/page-a/page_6a61b9e6-43e9-525e-9644-ed109e8a019e.html  (Story in bottom half of front page and continued on A5).

Vicky Saldivar’s first grandchild was diagnosed with Lukemia when Moises was in kindergarten. In many, many visits to the cancer ward during what was lengthy, but thankfully successful treatment for him, she was often moved to tears at the sight of so many children in the hospital. She wanted to do something, but as she said, she wasn’t wealthy. What she was soon inspired to though is amazing. She crochets and is very creative. In substitute teaching for third-graders who were reading, “Charlotte’s Web”, she came up with the idea of making “character hats”. After all, hospitals are almost always chilly and hair loss as a side effect of treatment is almost inevitable. Practical as well as whimsical, a hat was likely to bring a smile for at least a moment. She did one even better with the idea to pair a hat with a book, the hat matched to a character in that particular book. She has now created hundreds of hats and in addition to delivering locally, she has

Project Moises Hats and Books

sent them as far away as Los Angeles. The photo is of her and two grandsons with a sample of the hats. Her Facebook page is The Project Moises https://www.facebook.com/groups/1753859501559205/