Well how was your weekend? Hopefully it didn't include being near a naked guy chewing the flesh off another naked guy on a bridge, as occurred on a causeway heading into Miami Beach this weekend.
That's where this reporter was, ostensibly to see my hometown San Francisco Giants take on the Miami Marlins in their spanking new $634 million home (which we intend to report on soon). What I didn't realize until days before making the trip South was the fact that it was Urban Beach Week – which meant that Miami Beach was going to go into lock-down, a veritable police state as tens of thousands (hundreds of thousands?) came down for the weekend long hip-hop festival.
I won't go into the details of how this affected me deleteriously, but never before has a missed exit resulted in so much pain. Thanks, MB Police!
Okay, let's move (slowly) into the working week.
Some RNC news for you, as we now approach 90 days until the convention: Members of the Bob Buckhorn administration will soon be going back before the city council asking permission for the board to sign off on the city's latest announced purchase from that $50 million federal grant for security for the RNC – this for an insurance policy for any civil rights lawsuits that will be filed by people alleging misconduct by local law enforcement at the convention.
Late Friday afternoon before a three-day weekend is generally one of the slowest times ever in a newsroom, which is why it was even more dramatic when we learned that Hillsborough area state Senator Ronda Storms was going to challenge Rob Turner in his bid for re-election for property appraiser. Click here to read exactly what Storms said on Friday about why she's challenging Turner, whose world has turned upside down in the past week as his attempts at damage control regarding his sexting to a former colleague has rocked the Hillsborough political world (with Tom Lee and Rachel Burgin now announcing their both running to replace Storms in the legislature).
And for those of you who like to run and/or ride a bike in downtown Tampa, you've got some more smooth real estate to enjoy with the extension of the Tampa Riverwalk.
This article appears in May 24-30, 2012.