Central Florida

Emack & Bolio's on 4/20: Real Ice Cream, Stoner Chocolates, Specials

Boston ice cream shop Emack & Bolio's quietly opened up a Miami outpost in South Beach inside the Sunset Harbour Shops last week. The Purdy Avenue storefront is colorful and vibrant; spaceships hanging from the ceiling; a talking moose mascot; ridiculous menu items like the midnight munchies sunda ... More >>

Miami Cocktail Company's Low-Cal Concoctions

Move over, Bethenny Frankel, and take your Skinny Girl swill with you. There's a tastier, stronger low-cal cocktail company in town. And P.S.: The makers are better-looking than you too. The dudes at Miami Cocktail Company are now plying the 305 with their zero-sugar, zero-carb, 99.9 percent natura ... More >>

30 Rock's Best Florida Jokes

Angry Over Gay Mayor's Election, Florida GOP Leader Wants To Stop College Kids From Voting

When Craig Lowe won a run-off two years ago to become Gainesville's first openly gay mayor, many hailed it as a landmark of tolerance in conservative Central Florida. But not the local county's GOP chairman. He saw Lowe's election, he says today, as a victory by a vast liberal conspiracy to use coll ... More >>

Miami Connection: The Kung Fu '80s Electro-Funk Flick of Your Dreams

Reader Mail: Long Voting Lines Were a GOP Plot

Balancing Act: Looking for Local, Affordable Produce, Part Two

Being a farmer isn't easy and it's easy to understand why being a member of a CSA can be expensive. Yet with all the supposed benefits of eating local, there's still no answer to the affordability issue and why a Big Mac is a more cost-effective way to fill a stomach than pricey heirloom tomatoes.Te ... More >>

I-4 Corridor Predicts Florida for Romney

RNC 2012: The Seven Craziest GOP Souvenirs at the Republican National Convention

Check out our slide shows: "Inside the Republican National Convention 2012 at Tampa Bay Times Forum," and "Republican National Convention 2012 Tampa Day Two." Tampa's rich with GOP swag this week as thousands of Republicans gather to show off their favorite Mitt Romney mementos and Paul Ryan tchot ... More >>

Applebee's Is The Hottest New Nightclub in Central Florida

In continuing evidence that Florida nightlife outside of Miami is a sad, depressing suckfest full of streaky highlights and Ed Hardy bought at the TJ Maxx, Applebee's is the hottest new club in Central Florida. Yes, Applebee's, the suburban restaurant staple that's known for cluttering its walls wit ... More >>

Truck Crash Spews Gallons of Sulfuric Acid Over Florida Highway

Massive semi-truck crashes can run the gamut from the comical -- liquor everywhere! and milk! -- to the bizarre -- like  that Chinese truck that spewed live fish all over the highway -- to the profitable, when a bank truck overturns and spews millions of coins. It's hard to think of too many pr ... More >>

Florida Atheists Spray Highway With "Unholy Water" to Protest Religious Blessing

​The eternal war between righteous Christians and smarmy nonbelievers has a new ground zero: rural Highway 98 in Polk County, Florida. First, a religious group called Polk Under Prayer blessed the Central Florida asphalt strip with "holy oil" to protect the county from Satan, "evildoers" and "the ... More >>

Jason Smiddie Stabbed Grandma 100 Times and Shot Her With a Crossbow, Cops Say

​Police across Florida are looking for a 19-year-old accused of killing his own grandma as brutally as possible: By stabbing her more than 100 times, beating her in the face with a wrench and even shooting her in the head with a crossbow.Jason Aristotle Smiddie has been on the run since police in ... More >>

Eight Reasons Why Florida is a Real-Life Horror Movie

photo by Logan FazioLincoln Road zombie walks got nothin' on real life in Florida.Time for a little Halloween honesty: Florida is terrifying. Serial killers Ted Bundy and Gary Ray Bowles have stalked our towns. Prehistoric, sharp-fanged creatures circle our swamps and oceans, hungry for blood. Real- ... More >>

School Sign Misspelled as "Scohol" in South Florida, Again

​Sure, there's book smarts and then there's street smarts, but the streets in South Florida have never been too bright. A road sign painted on Pine Island Road in Lauderhill has been misspelled as "SCOHOL." It shouldn't surprise anyone that this is a fairly regular occurrence in South Florida.

See Miami's Most Iconic Buildings Made with Legos

​Central Florida's newest amusement park, Legoland Florida, officially opened its bricked doors on Saturday on the former site of Cypress Gardens. One of the main attractions includes massive displays of iconic skylines rebuilt with Legos, and obviously Legoland Florida's has an entire section dev ... More >>

SpongeBob SquarePants AK-47 Robbery Spree Ends With Arrests

Surveillance footage of a SpongeBob robbery at a 7-11 three months ago.​In the end, the police found SpongeBob SquarePants not in a pineapple under the sea, but hunkered down in an apartment complex off the Turnpike with three of his convenience store robbing cohorts.Last night, Orlando cops final ... More >>

Drag Queen Bandits Loot Florida Stores of Sequins, Boas and Fancy Silk

via Orange County CorrectionsThe suspects, mostly de-wigged.​A vicious crime wave has gripped Central Florida's finest fabric stores, seeding blind terror in the sequin isles, panic in the feather boa racks and knee-shaking fear in the wig department. Tell us of the horror Amanda Marshall, Orlando ... More >>

Another Tourist Run Over on Florida Beach by Police Vehicle

via WSVN​Just imagine the possible tourism campaign: "Visit Florida's Beaches: The nicest places to get run over in the world."Yes, for the second time in a month, another tourist visiting the state has been run over by a public vehicle. This incident occurred in Daytona and involves a part-time l ... More >>

Rick Scott Gets Over His Fear of Trains and Approves SunRail

​Gov. Rick Scott has seemed to overcome his hesitations about funding Central Florida's SunRail commuter train program and announced his approval of state funding for the program today. Scott's first big decision in office was surprisingly killing a federally funded high-speed train project, a mov ... More >>

Twenty-Two Men Arrested in Florida Underaged Sex Sting

​Twenty-two men have been arrested for agreeing to have sex with young children, some as young as nine, that they had met online. When they arrived, though, they were met by the Polk County Sheriff's Office. The men arrested include a UCF Student, a former television executive, a specialist in the ... More >>

Florida's Swamp Snakes Are Now Reality TV Superstars

​Could The Real Swamp Snakes of Everglades City or America's Next Top Invasive Species be coming to your television set anytime soon? Possibly. Over the next two months, not one, but two cable channels are set to roll out reality television shows based on snakes living in the swamps of Florida and ... More >>

Your Mother Likes Drugs! What the Hell, It's Roach Motel!

​Roach Motel What the Hell, It's Roach Motel (Destroy Records) myspace.com/roachmotelrules Take the Dead Kennedys' linguistically progressive rants, the social critique via saxophones of CH3, water it down with the mind-altering misused politics of Minor Threat, add a half-cup's worth of the yout ... More >>

"The Wilderness" at MAM explores man's relationship with nature

No, 70 People Were Not Trapped in an Airport Hangar Due to Central Florida's Crazy Weather

via Bay News 9​It's in the 80s and perfectly sunny here in Miami, but our state-mates in the central part of Florida aren't enjoying the same good weather. An apparent tornado that ripped through Tampa has left many areas in Central Florida in disarray. But a report carried by numerous national me ... More >>

Trouble & Bass and the Overthrow's Black Magick Party at the Castle, March 26

​Sure, you could have been at the Fool's Gold party at Grand Central -- a decent enough choice. But you would have missed out on the next-level shit. The Overthrow and Trouble & Bass' Black Magick party at the Overthrow Castle surely had a darker vibe than other festivities last night. But th ... More >>

Proposed Bill Would Make It a Felony to Photograph Farms

...and if you dare snap a photo of it, he'll make sure you wind up behind bars for 30 years, E-I-E-I-O!​State Sen. Jim Norman, a Republican from Tampa, is very concerned about a farm's right to privacy, while showing little regard for the First Amendment. He has filed a bill in the Florida Senate ... More >>

Board Games

The Magic of Art

The Wholesome Grocer Brings The Farm To The Beach

courtesy of The Wholesome Grocer​The Wholesome Grocer, a community service created by cooking instructor Cindy Hill, brings fresh, local and organic foods from farmers, ranchers, artisans and vendors to Miami Beach every month. It works like this:You start by selecting the products you want a ... More >>

Green Table Artisan Kitchen & Bistro Coming; Whisk Gourmet Moving

The future home of Green Table​Green Table Artisan Kitchen & Bistro hasn't opened yet, but from what we can tell, owner Monica Rios is serious about regionally sourced, artisanal food.Rios arrived in Miami eight years ago from Venezuela and she quickly started transitioning from accounting to ... More >>

Two Florida Firemen Resign Over Tea-bagging (The Real Deal, Not the Marco Rubio Kind)

photo by Tomasz Sienicki via Wikimedia Commons​In a story sure to outrage the Marco Rubio camp on the eve of the midterms, two Florida firefighters have resigned after an investigation into their tea-bagging while on duty. What kind of upside-down nation are we living in where two public servants ... More >>

Five Questions with StumbleDrunk's Jason Villenes and Frankie Pointless

​Most people will remember Frankie Pointless from his old days in Miami rock with the outfit Splat, a pop-punk band that touted the best in excess that dear old Coconut Grove had to offer. They gave the hippies and Bahamians a run for their money when they held down at their old Macdonald St ... More >>

Junior Bruce's Self-Titled EP Is an Explosion of Hardcore Metal and Horny Toads

Horny toadzzz!!!​Junior Bruce Self-Titled EP (Self-released) juniorbruce.com The newest breed of Floridian metalhead is a bunch of savvy mothers! These are the righteous bearers of the torch ignited in the '80s and then kept lit by the awesome sludge and power violence scenes of the '90s. No ... More >>

Local Motion: Young Livers - Of Misery and Toil

Shiny!!!​Young Livers Of Misery and Toil (No Idea Records) www.noidearecords.com I believe that the great and sorely missed Thomas "Pig Champion" Roberts was the butt of the Poison Idea joke of record collectors being pretentious assholes. That much is true dear readers, but I'm not as much a pre ... More >>

Westboro Baptist Church Will Burn Korans Now

Back when we first picked up on the story of Dove World Outreach Center's planned "International Burn a Koran Day," back before it had become a media spectacle, we mused, "The Westboro Baptist Church currently holds the title of most insane thing purporting to be a Christian church in America, ... More >>

Florida Church Hosting "International Burn a Koran Day" on 9/11

This sign proudly sits outside the Dove World Church​The Westboro Baptist Church currently holds the title of most insane thing purporting to be a Christian church in America, but could a small congregation of horribly misguided Christians in central Florida soon be taking their pla ... More >>

Rick Scott Promises to "Look Into" Obama's Birth Certificate

via Internet WeeklyBirther in chief, Lou Dobbs​Following in the footsteps of Marco Rubio, Republican Governor Candidate Rick Scott has found himself flirting with the birther movement. When speaking today at a rally in Central Florida's uber-retirement mecca, The Villages, he was confronted w ... More >>

Governor Crist Declares State of Emergency in Miami-Dade Due to Oil Threat

NASAA satellite view of the oil spill taken by NASA​On news that some oil had begun leaking into the Loop Current, Governor Charlie Crist declared a state of emergency for Miami-Dade, Broward, Palm Beach, Collier, Lee, Charlotte and Monroe counties. A state of emergency had already been decla ... More >>

Florida Mints Joe Arpaio's Dream License Plate

Bill 1070 from Arizona requires immigrants to carry residency papers and allows law enforcement to randomly pull over those suspected of being in the country illegally. ​But how will la migra know who to stop? One congressman, Brian Bilbray of California, suggested illegals can be spotted by sart ... More >>

Green Sky, Bad Actor, and Nebraska Sun Bring the Sludge to Sweat May 22

​A conundrum: What kind of sound would a morbidly obese, four-titted, screaming Cyclops make while being probed by multicolored psychic lamprey? Hmm ... That's a mind-bender so deep and twisty it could put you into a permanent coma, turning certain centers of your brain into scorched-out pudding. ... More >>

MP3 of the Day: Fireside Social - "Wristbands"

​ Empty bars with sticky floors is a pretty good way of summing Fireside Social up as far as playing with gusto and passion is concerned. And while they are currently caught between Miami and St. Augustine, it is refreshing to find out they've committed to some studio time. This track, " ... More >>

Dan Fanelli, Alan Grayson's Tea Party Opponent, Runs Pro-Racial Profiling Ad

​Hot liberal mess Congressman Alan Grayson is one of the Tea Party movement's biggest congressional targets for 2010. Respected politician Dan Webster, who served in the state legislature from 1980 until 2008, is the biggest name and presumed front runner in the Republican primary. That hasn't sto ... More >>

$5.2 Million Worth of Designer Knock-Offs Seized at MIA

​We're pretty sure the ornately logo-ed purse trend has been done with for a while. Now that we're all "recessionistas" ladies who can still afford luxury leather goods prefer to buy expensive bags with the designer brand only noticeable to discerning eyes. Touting around a purse that co ... More >>

Diocious

Is Maurice Ferre About to Mount a Senate Campaign?

Jonathan Postal​A couple of Democrats have flirted with the idea, but so far no one has stepped up to mount a real challenge against Kendrick Meek in the Senate primary. Now, though, there's buzz that former Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre will enter the race next week.Beth Reinhard says Ferre will make ... More >>

Dan Webster Added to Senate Shortlist

Charlie Crist has added former state legislator Dan Webster to his ever-growing shortlist of possible Senate appointees. The Central Florida political vet has already said he'd be open to the job, because "it would be prety cool." Webster served in the Florida House for 18 years and became ... More >>

Scales and Tails a Plus

Sham Marriage Hell

Bigamy charges and dozens of people busted after fake weddings: It must be South Florida.

Fruity World

Fruit & Spice Park