This week’s dining tip (see back story in the Jan. 1 TBRR): it started in Ybor City in the early twentieth century and has spread to Celebration, Sarasota, St. Augustine and, luckily for us, Clearwater Beach. The Columbia is truly a dining experience – particularly if your Clearwater server happens to be Gene, who is only in his second day there after flipping burgers for the past several years.

In search of Cincinnatus

The legend of Cincinnatus dates back to about 500 years before the birth of Christ. He was a farmer who left the plow when his nation was threatened. After noble service, he returned to the plow. Modern historians compare him to George Washington who did much the same. Over the last couple years, we have profiled two local men who provided similar public service – Clearwater’s Dick Fitzgerald and J.B. Johnson. Unfortunately, these men were the exception rather than the rule. The norm is to run for your local governing body, then a regional body, then a house or senate seat and then maybe recycle to the regional body au nauseam. Same old people - just a new place at the public trough. It might be time for individual term limits – say 20 or 25 years and then off to a real job.

Tampa Bay, politics and stuff:

1. It isn’t official, but the word on the street is Clearwater native David Allbritton will be making a run for Clearwater’s city council in the next election cycle. That is good news for our city.

2. Watching the continuing mess that is Hillsborough County education, we note they have a severe air conditioning issue in several of their schools. As a Tampa Bay area student grades 5 through 12, it occurs to us the first air conditioned classroom we experienced was in college - just saying.

3. From the 5:05 Newsletter - Media Message: “You have reached MSNBC. Listen carefully, our menu has changed. If you are calling to report an in-coming missile from North Korea press one and leave a message. If you are calling to complain about President Trump’s extended vacation please stay on the line. Someone will be with you immediately

4. Before you criticize Trump and his predecessor, Obama, for spending too much time away from the White House, consider this fact from Mark Updegrove’s excellent book Second Acts: Lyndon Johnson in his some five years as President spent right around 380 days (or over a year) at his Texas ranch.

5. You’ve lived in the bay area for a long time if you remember when it was heavily populated with Larry’s Ice Cream Parlors. There is now one left in the region – on St. Pete Beach.

The diamond, the media and other stuff:

6. Back when radio news was still radio news, there were a bunch of terrific radio journalists in the bay area – WTAN’s Dennis Crandall, WDAE’s Ronald J. Ebben, WLCY’s Clair Linn and WFLA’s Marty Giles. Giles, one of the deans of radio news, died last week at age 80.

7. If Dick Clark was America’s oldest teenager, Jerry Lewis was this country’s oldest adolescent. Known for his teaming with Dean Martin, his own solo career and his tireless work for MDA, Lewis passed away last week at 91.

8. Like the “California or Bust” of the olden days, it’s “Missouri or Bust” for the Rays this week. They absolutely must win both series with the Cards or Royals or the for sale sign will go up for several members of the locals.

9. In a 15-5 blowout in Chicago a couple weeks back, Red’s second baseman Scooter Gennett hit his 20^th home run of the season and later threw an inning to save a beleaguered Red’s bullpen. The last player to both pitch and hit his 20^th home run in a game was a fellow named Ruth.

10. ESPN has become the laughingstock of the industry with their foolish move of replacing Rob Lee from the play by play of a University of Virginia football game next week – simply because of his name. Rob Lee is of Oriental heritage for goodness sake. By the way, Robert is the third most common first name in the USA, Lee the 22^nd most common surname. Good luck guys.

Hooray for Ian Kinsler

By this time, Ian Kinsler has been taken to the woodshed for pretty much speaking the truth. After a dust up with home plate umpire Angel Hernandez, Kinsler, who’s a pretty fair country ballplayer, suggested that Hernandez seek another line of work – something that those inside baseball have been saying privately for years. Year in, year out, Hernandez has been ranked one of the worst three or four umps in baseball along with Joe West, C.B. Bucknor and Bob Davidson, who mercifully retired at the end of last season. If you’re in the bottom five percent of your profession, you usually don’t last – unless like Hernandez, you have a strong union.

SNEAK PEEK AT NEXT WEEK – THE ST. PETE ELECTION AFTERMATH