THE SUN BEATS DOWN; AN UNDENIABLE COMbustion engine that in the afternoon gives way to mighty electrical storms. In response, nature works full-throttle, foliage replicating and growing exponentially.
Many of Southwest Florida’s barrier islands, spanning the coast from Marco north to Manasota Key, deliver seclusion — without the three-hour tour or that dunderhead Gilligan. The best are those accessible only by boat, chartered ferry excursions and, in some cases, a helicopter or seaplane.
Summer is far from a snooze when it comes to Southwest Florida arts and culture.
It’s not the smorgasbord of season, but a surprisingly wide array of art, theater, museum exhibits and other performances are on the menu at venues throughout Lee, Collier and Charlotte counties through Labor Day.
There are three things that reign supreme in summer, aside from sunshine and rain: Fire, smoke and meat.
After all, they are the main components of any great cookout.
Floridians don’t stand on ceremony. Now that summer is here, folks just want to relax.
Whether you’re watching a hot, stormy afternoon drift by on a river of strong cocktails or hosting a midnight dinner party on a yacht, delicious drinks are the perfect accompaniment to the rainy season in Southwest Florida.
>> Def Leppard with Styx and Tesla
7 p.m. Thursday, June 25
Coral Sky Amphitheatre, West Palm Beach
>> SummerJazz on the Gulf
The Betty Fox Band
6:30-9:30 p.m. Saturday, June 27
Free at the Naples Beach Hotel &
Golf Club
>> Elvis Fest 7
Saturday-Sunday, June 27-28
Seminole Casino Hotel Immokalee
Thus far, the 2015 summer movie season has seen two of the highest-grossing domestic opening weekends of all time, with $208 million going to “Jurassic World” and a not-too-shabby $191 million to “Avengers: Age of Ultron” (only “The Avengers” stands between them at $207 million).
With summer and its warm sunny days with us once again, it’s prime time for pool and beach parties. And any self-respecting event such as this needs a soundtrack. Fortunately, summer fun has long been a favorite topic for songwriters. So in that spirit, here is a playlist that has some all-time great summer hits, mixed in with a few newer favorites and a wild card or two.
Fishermen’s Village
Collier County MedFlight achieved a prestigious tip-of-the-hat earlier this month when the Commission on Accreditation of Medical Transport Systems awarded its accreditation to the 40-year-old emergency transportation division of the county’s Emergency Medical Services Department.
The morning after a white man pulled a .45 pistol out of his trousers in a Charleston church and killed nine praying people because they’d been born with black skins in the land of the free and the home of the brave, I went to the park.
The last time Jeb Bush ran for office, it was 13 years ago. Barack Obama was serving in the Illinois state Senate. No one had heard of Obamacare or the tea party, and wouldn’t for years. It was before the invasion of Iraq, before Hurricane Katrina, before the financial meltdown. We had just invaded Afghanistan, and Saddam Hussein still ruled Iraq. It was a political epoch ago.
The commercials started appearing several months ago on cable television, and full-page ads popped up simultaneously in major newspapers across the country. The blitz is part of a $10 million dollar public relations campaign by Sea- World to counteract the negative publicity it received from the documentary film “Blackfish.”
Barry Nicholls, the owner of Paradise Jewelry, has employed sign holders outside his business for the last five years and says 80 percent of his new customers tell him they learned about his shop because of the sign holders.
A 2014 graduate of Florida Gulf Coast University has been awarded a full scholarship to the University of Oxford in England.
Andres Machado, 25, a Naples resident and native of Colombia, will pursue a master’s degree in global governance and diplomacy. He was awarded the only fully funded scholarship for 2015-16 in the highly selective program.
Charity for Change presented awards to individual students, classrooms and teachers during year-end assemblies at four schools.
Goodwill and the Boy Scouts of America are combining resources to collect used, soiled or damaged U.S. flags.
On Sunday and Monday, July 5-6, select Goodwill stores in Collier, Lee and Charlotte counties will collect unserviceable flags for a proper, dignified retirement.
Everglades City is always the first to salute Independence Day. This year’s family festival takes place from 10:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Saturday, June 27, and includes a patriotic parade, pet competitions, arts and crafts, raffles and playground games, all leading up to fireworks at twilight. For more information, call 695-2695.
What cannibals can teach us
Anyone who is interested in learning about the inner workings of the Collier County Sheriff’s Office should consider applying for the CCSO Citizens Academy. Participants ride along with deputies, shoot at the gun range and get a close look at various aspects of CCSO operations.
Classes meet from 6-8 p.m. every Thursday, with the next session running Dec. 10-March 10, 2016.
If you’re like most people — about 95 percent of adults who can work — you have to get up and go into the salt mines each day. So there hasn’t been a lot of time to sit around and think about “attainment equity.”
Considering that Florida has long been considered the country’s gold standard destination for retirement living, it’s surprising that Naples’ senior community did not have a place it could use for socialization and resources until about a year and a half ago. Instead, services were cobbled together through several agencies.
On behalf of all 19.2 million Floridians who haven’t yet had time — on behalf of the state’s Greater Chambers of Commerce, its Better Business Bureaus, its various parties (Republican Party, Democratic Party, Tea Party, Tupperware Party, Beer Party, Birthday Party, Beach Blanket Bingo Party, Frat Party, Pool Party and Spa Party to name only a few) — I want to extend a wa
Every time Hillary Clinton makes a left-wing policy pronouncement, it is, in effect, another eulogy marking the death of the coalition and style of politics that twice made her husband president.
My inbox can be a frightening place sometimes, and when I get around to clearing and organizing it, I often find some gem of an item that totally flew past me. In my mind, those emails anthropomorphize into cold limp fish, accusing me of neglect with their dilated, jellified eyes.
I told you my email is scary.
On behalf of the Conservancy of Southwest Florida and our more than 6,500 supporting families, we hope the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission will abandon its black bear hunting proposal.
Living small
Goodwill Industries of Southwest Florida recently honored Mike Drouin of Naples and Jennifer Glawe of North Fort Myers with its annual Breakthrough Award for businesses and individuals who have assisted others or themselves in overcoming disabilities or barriers on their path to employment and independence. Mr. Drouin received the Breakthrough Graduate award, and Ms.
Nearly two-thirds of people injured or killed in a car crash involving a teen driver are people other than the teen behind the wheel, according to a new report released by the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety. In 2013 alone, 371,645 people were injured and 2,927 were killed in crashes that involved a teen driver.
AARP offers classes to help older drivers learn about new traffic laws, refresh their driving skills and reduce their risk for tickets and accidents. Drivers over age 55 might be eligible for a discount on auto insurance.
Here’s where Collier County Sheriff’s Office traffic-enforcement deputies will be the week of June 22-26:
Monday, June 22
Vanderbilt Drive and 111th Avenue North: Aggressive driving
Green Boulevard and Hemingway Lane: Speeding
Rattlesnake Hammock Road and Charlemagne Boulevard: Speeding
To combat summer learning loss, Boys & Girls Club of Collier County offers its Summer Brain Gain program at its main campus in Naples and its Immokalee locations. Through Aug. 4, area youngsters ages 6-18 can participate from 7:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. The program, is made possible with help from the Naples Children & Education Foundation.
Sea turtle nesting season is underway in Florida through October. Guided by instinct, female turtles swim thousands of miles, often to nest on the very same beaches where they hatched. They make their way high on the shore, dig a hole, deposit up to 120 eggs and cover them with sand before lumbering back into the gulf waters. Incubation takes about 60 days.
Champions For Learning invites rising ninth-graders to “Making it Real: Preparing for High School and Beyond” from 8 a.m. to noon Monday through Friday, July 13-17, at the Champions For Learning office. Participants will gain insights into preparing for the transition to high school, exploring career possibilities and finding volunteer opportunities.
Who says you can’t do two things at once and do them both well?
I recently attended back-to-back meetings — the annual conference of the American Hospital Association in Washington, D.C., followed by a gathering in Des Moines, Iowa, of the first 26 communities participating in the Blue Zones Project across the country — and was struck by the profound differences.
Naples hosts the only Gus Macker 3-on-3 basketball tournament in Florida this summer. Made possible by the Greater Naples YMCA, Rotary Club of Immokalee and the One By One Leadership Foundation, the nationwide tournament comes to Gulf Coast High School on Saturday and Sunday, June 20-21.
Dogs and cats adopted from Humane Society Naples come with vaccinations, sterilization surgery, ID microchip and 30 days of health insurance. Visit the animals ready for adoption at the main shelter at 370 Airport-Pulling Road N. (11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.
With their dark-green shells, green legs with yellow stripes and green heads with a red stripe behind the eye, redeared sliders are popular pets for kids whose parents may not want to commit to a dog or cat, and people interested in reptiles. Problem is, not everyone who gets them realizes that they need a large aquatic environment to thrive.
¦ The Gulf Coast Runners annual Firecracker 5K sponsored by Moe’s Southwest Grill sets out at 7 a.m. Saturday, July 4, at Fleishmann Park and makes two loops through the neighborhood of Naples Lake Park. Proceeds benefit the organization’s youth development fund.
A BLACK BEAR HIT UP A SOUTH Fort Myers resident’s trash can twice last month in the hours before dawn, enjoying a used-up bottle of maple syrup, an ice cream container, and possibly some leftover seafood.
Say you’re a person who is wheelchairbound but has a burning desire to play baseball. What are your options?
It nailed my birds, which is why I now know: There’s a two-ring debate unfolding under Florida’s big-top these days about the little lions that live virtually unseen among us — the Florida panthers.
In the first ring, we have the ongoing numbers show: How many panthers are left in the wild, really?
A new season of uncertainty is unfolding in Tallahassee now that the state legislature has convened to do business in a special session. The lawmakers returned to work because they failed to adopt a state budget — by law, their major job responsibility. Floridians look upon the debacle helplessly, unlikely to enforce accountability among those guilty of irresponsible behavior.
President Barack Obama is less than stalwart in the fight against ISIS and doesn’t seem overly concerned about Vladimir Putin’s predation in Ukraine or China’s aggression in the South China Sea. It is the fight against climate change, an allegedly dire threat to the nation’s security, that brings out his inner Churchill.
This past spring I was invited to be on a panel about networking at a meeting of the Above Board Chamber of Southwest Florida, an organization founded four years ago by Jeanne Sweeney. Its mission is to bring business people of all faiths together and to supply members with the tools that will allow them to take every aspect of their lives “above board.”
Here’s where Collier County Sheriff’s Office traffic-enforcement deputies will be the week of June 15-19:
Monday, June 15
Airport-Pulling Road and Emerald Lake Drive: Red-light running
U.S. 41 East and Manatee Road: Speeding
Pine Ridge Road and Vineyards Boulevard: Red-light running
AARP offers classes to help older drivers learn about new traffic laws, refresh their driving skills and reduce their risk for tickets and accidents. Drivers over age 55 might be eligible for a discount on auto insurance.
The Collier County Sheriff’s Office presents Summerfest 2015 with a wide range of fun and free activities for kids of all grade levels in a safe environment at various locations around Collier County. CCSO Youth Relations deputies are assigned to Summerfest activities instead of regular patrol duties.
Meals 2.0
Anyone who is interested in learning about the inner workings of the Collier County Sheriff ’s Office should consider applying for the CCSO Citizens Academy. Participants ride along with deputies, shoot at the gun range and get a close look at various aspects of CCSO operations.
Classes meet from 6-8 p.m. every Thursday, with the next session running Dec. 10-March 10, 2016.
Make-A-Wish Southern Florida will be able to grant six wishes to local children thanks to a $30,000 gift from Miromar Lakes Beach and Golf Club and the Miromar Lakes Women’s Club-Hearts of Miromar. The money represents proceeds from this year’s Viva Las Vegas casino night.
Orange Jeep Tours in Ave Maria invites dads and grandfathers to enjoy a buy-one-get-one ecoadventure tour during the month of June. Simply purchase one Jeep tour at the published rate and receive the second tour free. The free tour must be taken on the same day as the paid tour.
The Naples Airport Authority has issued a request for qualifications for firms to assist in the search for a new executive director. Ted Soliday, who has served in the position since 1994, has announced plans to retire in April 2016.
Nonprofit organizations in Collier County are encouraged to mark their calendars for “Telling the Story,” the sixth annual Thinking Outside the Box seminar presented by Sue Huff of E. Sue Huff & Associates and real estate professional Kelly Capolino.
¦ Alliance Francaise de Naples hosts it next French-speaking table and lunch from noon to 2 p.m. Thursday, June 11, at Café Normandie. Anyone who speaks French at any level and wants to converse with others in the language is welcome.
Champions For Learning invites rising ninth-graders to “Making it Real: Preparing for High School and Beyond” from 8 a.m. to noon Monday through Friday, July 13-17, at the Champions For Learning office. Participants will gain insights into preparing for the transition to high school, exploring career possibilities and finding volunteer opportunities.
At age 29, The League Club of Naples, a member of the Association of Junior Leagues International, is entering its prime. The all-volunteer group of almost 600 women is proud to have raised and donated more than $3.2 million in grants to 134 nonprofit agencies in Collier and Lee counties since it was founded in 1986.
As summer heats up, so does the need for donations of all kinds and volunteer helpers in various capacities at community nonprofits. If you have time and/ or treasure to share, you might find just the right outlet here.
Eliminating or limiting alcoholic beverages is one of the few weight-loss strategies nearly all experts agree on.
Health care for low-income workers has long been a hot topic in the U.S., but Neighborhood Health Clinic has been providing it to uninsured working people in Collier County for more than 15 years.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is predicting a slower than average storm season, with at most 11 official storms, six of them hurricanes, only two of them really big ones. Only two monster hurricanes! But as NOAA is quick to point out, it only takes one Andrew (in 1992, another slow year) or Katrina or Charley to destroy what for many is their most valuable asset.
As the year winds down this week in 4,200 Florida public schools where the halls and classrooms fill each day with a roiling stew of hope, curiosity, anxiety, excitement, self doubt, narcissism, ambition, passion, stupefaction, sexual desire, delirium, somnambulant distraction, joyous focus, generosity, jealousy, boldness, shyness, and finally the nearly universal longing of children to become
Tucked away on a side street in one of London’s toniest neighborhoods, just across the street from the sprawling department store Harrods, sits a brick, Victorian-era apartment building that houses the Ecuadorean Embassy.
The seaside town of Santa Barbara is in the news lately, but not in a good way. The pristine beaches of this California town are awash in more than a 100,000 gallons of crude oil, the result of a pipeline break that should have been preventable but wasn’t.
