FREE CLINIC GROWS UP

$1 million gift gives Andes Clinic a permanent home


IT’S BEEN FOUR YEARS SINCE DOCTORS started a full-fledged volunteer medical clinic and pharmacy in Port Charlotte — an offshoot of an earlier nonprofit that helped provide medicine for the needy. Since 2008, Charlotte County’s community clinic has grown deep roots in its community. The nonprofit organization has saved lives with diagnoses of serious illness and alleviated chronic pain in […]

FCAT scores plummet — many wonder what to do



Preliminary grades on a ramped up statewide writing assessment are so bad that state education officials said Monday they will hold an emergency meeting Tuesday to figure out what to do next. Passing scores on the FCAT writing assessment plummeted from 81 percent to 27 percent for fourth graders and showed similar drops in eighth and 10th grades, according to […]

The un-American award of the year




One of the terrible burdens sometimes placed upon me as a columnist — weightier than the mortgage, grimmer than a draft notice, even less appealing than cleaning the chicken coop — is this: I have to cast the first stone. That’s right, I often criticize my fellow Americans for doing exactly what I have done, in direct disobedience of the […]

The end of China envy?




China-envying New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman likes to muse about how wonderful it would be if the United States could be like China for a day. The scandal engulfing former rising star Bo Xilai, the cashiered Communist Party boss of the city of Chongqing, suggests how this magical day might go down. A popular governor who rose to prominence […]

Coal, foreclosures and Bank of America’s extraordinary event




Shareholder meetings can be routine, unless you are Bank of America, in which case it may be declared an “extraordinary event.” That is what the city of Charlotte, N.C., called the bank’s shareholder meeting this week. Bank of America is currently the second-largest bank in the U.S. (after JPMorgan Chase), claiming more than $2 trillion in assets. It also is […]

Common bird bounces back from man-made disasters

THE LIVING GULF COAST


As you travel up and down the coast, it is impossible not to spot this large, easily recognized bird feeding on the threadfin herring and glass minnows that gather along the shoreline and in the shadows cast by the numerous bridges ferrying you across to the barrier islands. What is harder to grasp is that the ubiquitous brown pelican was […]

Garden Ware features sneaky, surprising critters

KOVELS: ANTIQUES


Art pottery made by Weller is a favorite among collectors. The company made art pottery in Zanesville, Ohio, from 1893 to 1948. From the 1920s to the 1940s, Weller also made less sophisticated pottery for the yard called “Garden Ware.” Stone-colored birdbaths, sprinklers, fountains, toadstool seats, sundials and urns were available. Large, colorful Garden Ware figures were the most unusual. […]

THIS WEEK ON WGCU-TV



¦ THURSDAY, MAY 17, 9 P.M. Secrets of the Dead The Airmen and the Headhunters Investigate the extraordinary survival story of a crew of airmen shot down over the jungles of Borneo during World War II. ¦ FRIDAY, MAY 18, 10 P.M. American Masters Johnny Carson: The King of Late Night Johnny Carson was a fixture of national life, a […]

COMING UP AT THE RENAISSANCE ACADEMY



¦ Success Camp for Writers 1-2:30 p.m. Thursdays, May 17, 24, 31 and June 7, 14, 21, 28 Fee: $20 per class Instructor: James Abraham This course is designed to help you get your writing project rolling all the way to learning how to wrap up your writing in a literary bow. The modular design of this series is such […]

Plan ahead

Preventive care, pet health insurance save lives, money

Do you know what you spend on your dog? Some of us prefer to remain blissfully unaware, while others track every penny. Most of us are probably somewhere in the middle, with a general idea of annual costs that we don’t think of much — unless we’re hit with something out of the ordinary. Trade groups that track these things […]