Jacksonville

Five of My Favorite Blogs

Bored with what his RSS reader has been feeding him, Kent Newsome is rebuilding his reading list from scratch using the recommendations of others. He's asked me to suggest five blogs, which is a good excuse to pimp some sites I follow that deserve a bigger audience. Retrospectacle, a blog by neuroscience postgraduate student Shelley Batts, consistently finds great stories in science before the mainstream media. She won a blogging scholarship last year and answers questions I didn't realize I ... (read more)

2007/09/20

Lee Padgett, the Blogger to Be Named Later

I'm pretty thick-skinned when it comes to criticism, because in eight years of blogging I've made the occasional gigantic mistake that sends my credibility crashing through the guardrails into a ravine like Toonces the Driving Cat. But a recent cheap shot by Paul McNamara, editor and blogger for Network World, has stuck with me: Cadenhead is a former newspaperman ... who appears to have forgotten a lot about the journalism business. (By the way, I worked for 20 years as a local newspaper editor ... (read more)

2007/03/23

Putting a Blogger's Identity on the Record

Network World blogger Paul McNamara covers the St. Augustine Record's attempt to out a local blogger, calling me a "former newspaperman ... who appears to have forgotten a lot about the journalism business." The Record, believing Padgett to be part of an organized political group out to unseat Rich, not merely a lonely pamphleteer voicing his displeasure with a public official, decided that making public Padgett's identity was the right to do. They were correct. While there may be a long-held ... (read more)

2007/03/11

Newspaper Asks Public to Identify Local Blogger

A Florida newspaper appears to have hit an all-time low in the relationship between bloggers and the media. The St. Augustine Record is asking the public to help expose the identity of a local blogger who recently started a site critical of county politicians. This evening, the paper's home page has a grainy surveillance photo of a man accompanied by this text: Who is this man? Believed to be connected to a politically charged but anonymously-run Web site targeting the character of members of ... (read more)

2007/03/08

Saturday at the ACC Championship Game

I attended yesterday's ACC Championship game between Wake Forest and Georgia Tech in Jacksonville, picking up two $125 lower deck tickets near the 50-yard-line. I wanted to see whether seats that good at Alltel Stadium are worth the price. The game wasn't even close to a sellout, so there were giant packs of unhappy scalpers outside. One thing I didn't need to hear as my son and I walked in: "Lower deck seats, $5!" The section we were in, 237, has its own entrance and a Carrabba's, Outback ... (read more)

2006/12/03

Hallowed Be Thy Republican

During every election, the Wonders of Truth Christian superstore reminds locals that the road to hell is paved with Democratic politicians. In honor of today's vote, here's the front and back of their signs: ... (read more)

2006/11/07

You Stay Classy, Indianapolis Colts

Indianapolis Colts punter Hunter Smith took a weird shot at the Jacksonville Jaguars after their game Sunday: Jacksonville is like a stand-up comic who can only use vulgarity and curse words because he lacks intelligence and lacks class. He really doesn't have anything to say. Our intangible is our class and our intelligence. A team that gets personal fouls the way they do, the roughing penalties, they just don't have any material. That may be the most haughty insult I've ever heard from an NFL ... (read more)

2006/09/26

Air America Struggles to Stay Afloat

I'm a day one listener to Air America Radio, yearning to hear liberal talk since Rush Limbaugh first slouched towards a microphone in the '80s. I've never understood how there could be no market for it, especially in places where conservative gasbags saturate the air. In Jacksonville, at least three different stations broadcast Limbaugh's show live, so you can travel the length of the area and keep up with the latest world crisis or societal moral collapse caused by the Clintons. Air America's ... (read more)

2006/09/15

Ernesto Hits Florida as Tropical Depression

Most of Florida is under hurricane watch for Ernesto, the hurricane that weakened to a tropical depression and will hit the Florida Keys later today. Jeff Masters' prediction: The latest forecast models are all in excellent agreement, calling for a landfall in the Everglades tonight, a long passage up the spine of Florida, followed by a re-emergence into the Atlantic and possible re-intensification to a Category 1 hurricane before a second landfall in the Carolinas. Riding out a tropical storm ... (read more)

2006/08/29

Hurricane Ernesto Eyes Florida

Northeast Florida is in the projected path of Hurricane Ernesto, a category 1 storm that Weather Underground meteorologist Jeff Masters expects to strike Florida's west coast and move northeast across the state: I think it is unlikely Ernesto could affect the Keys as anything stronger than a Category 2 hurricane with 105 mph winds. A hit as a tropical storm or Category 1 hurricane is more likely. If Ernesto spends another day or two traversing the warm waters along the west cost of Florida, ... (read more)

2006/08/27

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