October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month

The very best website with the most comprehensive information on all types of breast cancer is:

National Breast Cancer Awareness Month

Twilight Pediatrics

Did you know:
Bert Fish Medical Center offers after-hours Pediatric Care:
Monday thru Friday 6pm-10:30pm
Saturday and Sunday 10am-5:30pm

No appointment is needed and my neighbor has had to use it several times, she said they had very little wait time.

Bert Fish

Envision Edgewater

Our neighbor to the south Edgewater has some interesting things going on. They have a new planning initiative going on called "Envision Edgewater". This series of workshops that started September 8th are designed to follow the CFSCI (Central Florida Sustainable Communities Initiative). In simple terms, land use, transportation and urban design planning should all be done smarter. So envision Edgwater is having a series of workshops that include regular citizens who are interested in being part of what Edgewater looks like in the future.

There is a community meeting planned tentatively for October 20th in which the results of these workshops will be presented. The links above have some very interesting information on CFSCI and the Edgewater Project.

Even the Manatees Want Obama

After watching the Katie Couric Interview I can see why. The SNL Parody this week is great. Scary part is Tina Fey is probably more qualified than Palin.

Eldora State House

The Canaveral National Seashore is gorgeous. This is the Eldora State House, Eldora is an abandoned town at the very end of Canaveral National Seashore, on A1A south of New Smyrna Beach. The museum is now open on Saturday and Sunday from 10a-4pm. You can learn more about the resoration of this house here.

The picture above I took today from the water. It is beautiful, no crowds and a nice piece of our history.

Beautiful Day!

What a gorgeous place we live! Enjoy and appreciate this beautiful day.

Shells Bites The Dust

Another local restaurant has apparently closed. WESH channel 2 reported this morning that our beachside Shells has closed its doors, when you check the Shells website, it is no longer listed. In fact there are only four of these seafood restaurants left.

South Atlantic Grille closed a few weeks ago after being open only a few months.

It is sad for the many people that are now out of work, and sad that our local economy cannot support these establishments.

Weekend Events

Another beautiful sunrise in New Smyrna Beach. Lots to do this weekend. The Jazz festival starts tonight, the monthly art walk on Flagler is this Saturday from 10am-5pm. The weather is picture perfect and should stay that way thru the weekend.

The surf is still rough so be careful on the beach.

Enjoy the weekend!

Vote

The deadline to register to vote in Florida is coming up in the next two weeks. In order to vote in an election you must be registered in your state at least 29 days prior to the election. Here is some helpful information from the Volusia County Department of Elections.

Both presidential candidates have information and forms on their websites as well:

John McCain

Barack Obama

You can also go to Rock the Vote for online forms and registration

Whatever is easiest, just do it. Every vote is important!

Jazz Festival

Make your plans early for the New Smyrna Beach Jazz Festival. It starts Thursday with the kickoff party at 5:30 at the OM Chill Bar. The entire schedule can be found here. This is a great time with excellent performers, food and fun.

Happy Monday

Greeetings and Happy Monday to all.

The Battle of the Badges fishing tournament and event raised well over $100,000 this weekend. Great news for the youth it supports. Nice article about it here, if you read down on the comments you can get differing opinions on it, personally I think the whiners should be quiet and be glad someone is doing something to benefit our youth, they need all the help they can get.

The surf was high at the beach, windy and big waves, not all the lifeguard towers are manned this time of year so be sure to swim near a staffed tower.

The Gallery Walk and Jazz Fest is this week, stay tuned for more on that later in the week.

Volusia Family Living

Take a minute and check out Volusia Family Living Magazine. This relatively new publication can be picked up at 7-11, K-Mart, Blockbuster Video, Food Lion, Winn Dixie and many private businesses and doctor's offices. I got my first copy today at the Battle of the Badges at Riverside Park. It is a great mix of local business information, community events and stuff. You can also keep up with what is happening on Sarah's new Blog.

It is very important to buy local and support your local New Smyrna Beach businesses whenever possible, this magazine makes it easy!

Weekend Events

Lots to do this weekend at the beach! The Battle of the Badges Family Funfest is all weekend at Riverside Park. Three full days of activities for the whole family, a fishing tournament, entertainment, food and kids stuff. All to benefit the Sheriff's Youth Ranch.










The Atlantic Center for the Arts is having their 2nd annual Community Day from 10am-2pm on Saturday. They will have gallery talks, hands on projects for the kids and it is all free!








The weather will be great and the beach is beautiful! Enjoy the weekend!

We Have a Golf Course

Not only do we have great parks but we have a municipal golf course. Green fees are very reasonable making it a pretty inexpensive activity for the whole family.

According to The Shadow the golf course has lost more than 500K so far this year. This is backed up by the city budget numbers. Considering the Golf Course Manager has made almost $85,000 and the Golf Course Supervisor has made over $67,000 this year that is kind of scary.

IF you are interested in the highest paid employees in the city check this out from NSBNEWS. It is quite amazing.

Parks & Recreation

We have some great Parks here in New Smyrna Beach. We should have excellent parks, since we have two Parks & Rec Directors at a combined compensation so far in 2008 0f $198, 258.17. Yes that is so far this year, it is September. WOW. I want to be a Parks & Rec Director.

Here is a complete list of our Parks, what they offer and a map of their locations:

NSB Parks

The Front Fell Off

Although this is a spoof on Politicians it is hysterical.

School Stuff

The make-up days for Volusia County have been announced, September 26th, November 10th and Nov 24th and 25th. Get an amended calendar here. It is interesting to note that a couple of the private schools, Warner Christian Academy being one of them, do not have to make up the days. They have enough education hours built into the year to cover the time. They do not have early release every Wednesday so that is a big chunk of hours right there. Should cause some drama around my house when one kid has to go to school and one doesn't!

Open house is tonight at Coronado and the Book Fair is going on all week.

It is so quiet around town there is nothing going on! Enjoy it while it lasts!

Chomp & Other Stuff

The shark bite record has been tied in Volusia County, at least this shark chose to bite someone in Ormond and not New Smyrna, this is good, well as good as shark bites get.

The Jazz Festival is this coming weekend on Flagler. This is good stuff, more on that later this week.

The weather is getting gorgeous and there are no people around, it is so nice.

Checked out the gas prices this week, the 7-11 beachside went from 3.69 last Friday to 3.95 over the weekend. IF you see a jump of over 25 cents, report it to the Attorney General, 1-800-no scam.

You can still find the lowest prices in your area here.

Weekend Events and Other Stuff

Saturday is Kidz Day on Flagler Avenue from 10am-5pm. It is being held beachside. Events include a Hannah Montana contest, music, art and cooking classes, climbing wall and bungee ride. It will also be a gorgeous weekend for the beach.

Do you have an ex husband you never want to speak too again but must communicate with, try out Slydial. This allows you to connect to someone's mobile phone voicemail directly. So if you are short on time or just can't stand the person you are communicating with, check out Slydial.

Another good one is 1800-Free-411. My Mobile company charges 2.00 for a 411 call, with 1-800-373-3411 it is free all the time!

Have a great weekend.

9/11

Make Me Shut Up

There are days I need duct tape, for my mouth. The reasons why are many. Today, it was once again Volusia County Schools. My daughter is in a local elementary school, she is in 4th grade, first of all they have a ton of homework, ok, that is fine but the teacher needs to explain it before she sends it home.

SO today I pick up my baby girl, she tells me she forgot her planner, so I say, I will park, run and get it. If she does not have it and a parent (ME) does not sign it, there is HELL to pay the next day.

So she gets out to go get it, her teacher will not let her back in the room. Once you leave the room, you can't come back, this is part of her "teaching organization as a life skill". So she comes back to the car crying, I am all for teaching organization, I need some classes on it. BUT COME ON SHE IS 9 and we were still in the parking lot. She very rarely forgets anything.

So I did what any caffeine deprived, perpetually late, crazed mother would do. I got out of the car and went in the office.

I used my best customer service voice and said to the secretary, I am not upset with you, nor am I upset with the teacher for attempting to teach some organization, but she made her CRY! The kid is stressed out all the time about homework, schoolwork, her desk being clean blah, blah, blah. Yes, I got on a roll. Did I mention I was not wearing shoes??

Thankfully, this particular secretary and I are friends. She is used to my ranting and raving. She actually enjoys it. On this particular occasion she reached into her desk and handed me a roll of silver duct tape.

Enjoy the day!

Good In A Crisis

I have not been a huge fan of Charlie, for lots of reasons, healthcare, schools, budgets, the list is long. But I must give him credit on his disaster relief. He has been all over this state during Fay and Hanna and now the possibility of Ike. He is great at disasters. He is at every briefing, he visits all the local emergency centers, he is calming, he asks for federal relief, he declares disaster areas, he just does a good job in a bad situation. I will give him credit for that. I am sure he would have loved to be the VP nomination, and yes, he was a better choice than the gun toting, fur loving, no sex education, right to lifer that John McCain picked. BUT...Charlie did what was right and stayed home from the RNC (SMART GUY, it was a train wreck) and tended to his flooded state.

Good Job Charlie!

This & That

Beautiful weekend, the Greenfair was a big success and the surf was high!

Sharky reports on our 20th and 21st shark bite of the year. We are surely going to tie the 2001 record of 22 any day now.

Here are some interesting sites we stumbled upon this week:

Need some etiquette? Don't we all? Check out Emily Post she can help!

How to Me is kind of interesting, I found how to's for lots of things I never thought of.

Marcia's Kitchen is awesome. Great recipes.

Looks like Ike will miss us, have a great evacuation free week!

This Weekend At The Beach

The Green Fair is this weekend at Riverside Park. It runs from 9am-6pm both Saturday and Sunday. The Marine Discovery Center will be running mini eco tours at 11am, 12pm and 1pm on both days. They will have Kayak Tours between 2pm and 4pm. A sunset cruise on the water taxi will take place from 5:30-7:30 on Saturday.

The weather will be nice but the beach will not be, rip currents and high surf expected so stay safe and out of the water.

Don't forget the benefit for Cassidee on Saturday.

Have a great weekend!

Suzanne Kosmos-Good Political News

I know what you are thinking, Good and Political in the same sentence, yes it is an oxymoron. But in this case it is true. Suzanne Kosmos won the primary in the 24th district last Tuesday and it seems she is going to give Tom Feeney a run for his money. This is good news not only for New Smyrna Beach but for Florida as a whole. Tom Feeney needs to go away, check out his voting record and judge for yourself. Suzanne has been a good steward of this community for many years and has a great vision for the future.

Are You Ready

This may or may not come our way, if so be ready, if you live in the storm surge area you will be asked to leave. That would be all of us that are beachside. Here is some good information from Volusia County on evacuations. Check out storm tips for other good information on everything from protecting your home to protecting your pets.

The Island Voice

Have you seen The Island Voice magazine around town? It is free and can be picked up in a bunch of local businesses and locations from Port Orange to Edgewater, you can also subscribe and have it delivered to your home for $18.00 per year. This publication is run by two local women who do a great job with business information, interesting articles and a really attractive format. I checked their website and it has not been updated since early this year, Nancy Brosnan, the publisher was kind enough to email me and said that it is under construction and will be updated and ready to go by the end if this month, I will add a note when it is ready! The magazine is great. Check it out!

Pretty Pictures

My Dad took these at the Flagler Ave approach a few days ago. Enjoy!

Labor Day

Have a safe and happy holiday!