Sunday, November 1, 2009

Another side of Fantasy Fest

Just when you thought it was all fun and good times, someone had to go and spoil the fun.

The following report is from the Miami Herald, detailing an incident that occurred Friday nite during Fantasy Fest. I was out until 3 AM that nite and was in the area where this happened, but I saw nothing other than good times and friendly people (see the pix in the previous post). It just goes to show you that you never know - one minute it's all fun, but that can change in a hurry...


Man dies in street fight in Key West
BY CAMMY CLARK

A former Key West High School track and basketball star was stabbed to death during an early Saturday morning altercation in the heart of Key West's tourist section, according to the Key West Police Department.

Marques Butler, 23, was stabbed in the abdomen during an apparent fight between a group of locals from Key West and a group of men from out of town. Butler was taken to the Lower Keys Medical Center, where he underwent surgery and died soon after.

Key West detectives are investigation the case as a homicide. On Saturday, detectives questioned a 23-year-old man from Fort Lauderdale. As of Sunday morning, no arrests had been made in the case.

The altercation took place in the vicinity of Caroline and Duval streets during Fantasy Fest, Key West's annual 10-day debauchery that draws crowds of 50,000 or more annually. This was the first death to occur during the festival's 30-year history.

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Fantasy Fest 2009
































Fantasy Fest is here

From KWTN:

Fantasy Fest Is Here! Couple Arrested for Having Oral Sex in Middle of Street
CROWD GATHERS AND APPLAUDS PERFORMANCE. LOTS OF PHOTOS TAKEN TO RECORD EVENT FOR HISTORY
by Dennis Reeves Cooper

Let us paint a mental picture for you. It’s about 11 o’clock on Tuesday night of Fantasy Fest week. You are down in the middle of the action, on Greene Street, just steps from Duval. There’s music and noise all around you. You see a large crown gathered in the middle of the street. There’s a lot of shouting and applause and bright flashes of light as people in the crowd take pictures.

That’s the situation that Key West police officer Nicholas Revoredo found himself in last Tuesday night. He pushed his way into the crowd and, according to his police report, he saw a female “performing oral sex for a male while being watched and photographed by the crowd.”
Revoredo reported that he took both the male and the female into custody and hauled them off to jail. His report does not say, however, if he waited until the couple finished or if he interrupted them in the middle of the act.

The man arrested was identified as 44-year-old Paul Benjamin Mayes, a tourist from Williamsburg, Virginia. Officer Revoredo’s police report described Mayes as 6 feet, 3 inches tall, 170 pounds, with a mustache and goatee. And, oh yeah, he was wearing only a plaid loin cloth.
The woman was his wife, 42-year-old Susan Mayes. Revoredo described her as a blue-eyed blond, about 5 feet, 4 inches tall, 140 pounds. She was wearing plaid lingerie.

On the police report, there is a list of questions to aid the officer in describing a person being arrested or witnesses. One of the items on the list is “hand use.” In describing Susan Mayes, Officer Revoredo wrote “unknown” beside “hand use.” Maybe he didn’t stand there an watch long enough to see how she was using her hands.

The couple was charged with lewd and lascivious behavior. According to the police report, Paul Mayes kept telling Officer Revoredo that he was sorry and that he and his wife just got “caught up in the moment.”

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Sunday best

It's the greatest thing to happen to the NFL in ever, at least as far as watching it on TV. Better than the score/time ticker at the top of the screen. Better than the scrolling stat line at the bottom of the screen. Better than the yellow first-down line that is digitally inserted onto the field. Even better than cheerleader close-ups in HD.


I'm talking about the NFL Red Zone channel.


Thanks to the NFLRZ channel, instead of waiting for the action or (worse!) suffering through 3 hours of a Redskins/Chiefs snoozer, you're always watching something exciting. If a team is close to scoring, they take you there live and you watch that game. If another team in another game is also close, well then they split the screen for you and you watch that one as well. You do not miss a single TD all day. It's rapid-fire action, and no punting!

The best part? No commercials! The worst part? No commercials! It becomes a challenge to find 45 seconds to take a bathroom break, let alone 4-12 minutes (dang chili!). I'm gonna have to invest in a bathroom TV...

There is not a better way to spend $5 a month, never will be. Thank you NFL.

Monday, October 12, 2009

The Office wedding: Jim = Pam

I am a huge fan of 'The Office'. I can't say that I was happy to see Jim and Pam get married though. I mean I see their relationship the same as Sam and Diane on Cheers, with a central part of the week-to-week storyline being "will they or won't they?" etc. Now that they got married, that mystery is gone and the show will surely lose something. Besides, why get married??

So here's a funny look at what happens to you when you get married. I won't take any photoshop credit, I just found it in the blogoshpere. Good stuff!

Monday, October 5, 2009

Sun vs moon, part 1: the sun

This weekend delivered one of the most picture-perfect weather days that I've ever experienced. It started with a very colorful sunrise over the water, included a full day of paddling through the mangroves on flat calm water, and closed with a full moon rising as dramatically (and from the same spot) as the sun did 12 hours earlier. Keys living at its best.





Perfect reflections + flat water = which way is up?













As soon as this guy left, I finally set off in the canoe to enjoy this picture-perfect day.



Sun vs moon, part 2: the moon

About 12 hours after the sun rose, up pops the full moon from the same location. The first pic was taken just moments after the sun had set; the second pic was taken about 30 minutes later, as the moon took full possession of the sky.




This is a zoomed-in version of the photo above. Look at how the blurriness and colors combine to make it look just like a Monet painting. I love this picture.
























Sun vs moon? The verdict is in: We win.

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

Whatnot

Yeah it's been forever since I've posted, so here are a few pix to enjoy while I figure out what I feel like writing about.

From my work, the calm before a storm:


From my house, waterspout during a storm:




Somewhere in between:

Sunday, July 5, 2009

July 4th



Obviously I still have to work on my night photography skills, not to mention I was being assaulted by a trillion skeeters as I took these, but still you gotta like fireworks over the water.

Happy 4th of July to all!