The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

I went to the "Treasures of Tutankhamun" exhitibiton in Fort Lauderdale yesterday. As the title of this post suggests, the experience was a mixed bag. The original plan was for me to take my dad to the exhibition as a Christmas present. I had talked with my ex-wife, Bekki, over the holidays and she said that it sounded like something she'd like to see, too. I told her that she was welcome to come along. I ordered tickets for the three of us last week, including a Senior ticket for my dad, since he's over 65.

Well, on Friday, my dad called me and told me that he had bronchitis and was as sick as a dog. He wasn't able to go, which was disappointing. I called Bekki and told her that we had an extra ticket if she knew someone 65 or older who wanted to go. Alas, she didn't, so I ended up eating the cost of the ticket.

We met up as arranged at 10:00 yesterday morning and drove across Alligator Alley to Fort Lauderdale. I'd gotten the driving instructions off the Ticketmaster web site, and I also pulled the map up on Mapquest. I knew exactly where I was going, and we had no problems at all finding the parking garage across the street from the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art, where the exhibition is taking place.

The weather was ugly, very ugly. It rained hard most of the drive across the state. Fortunately, we both brought umbrellas. By the time we arrived, it was only drizzling in downtown Fort Lauderdale. We got there around 12:30, about two hours early, and the plan was to have some lunch and then look around the trendy Riverfront area, which has cafes, restaurants and shops.

We went into the Museum box office to get our tickets at Will Call, and then I discovered that I'd left the paper on which I'd written down the ticket order number in the car. I had to go back across the street to get it. As I went out the door, the skies opened up and it began to pour down rain. Having an umbrella doesn't help much when the rain is blowing in diagonally. I went back to the car and got the paper, then went back across the street. In that short period of time, puddles about two inches deep had formed along the curbs by the crosswalks. By time I got back inside, my legs and shoes were soaked from the driving rain and puddles.

I got our tickets and then we went back out into the deluge to find lunch. We ended up having subs at Quizno's. Well, I had a sub; Bekki had a salad and one of those SoBe energy drinks in a pastel purple flavor. I think it was raspberry-blueberry, but I wouldn't swear to it. Then we went and looked around a couple of the eclectic shops nearby, before going to the Museum's gift shop to look for souvenirs.

Finally, the time for our entrance approached. Bekki didn't want to go up the stairs (she broke a leg a dozen years ago and doesn't like stairs), so she took the elevator. I took the stairs and waited in the line that snaked up to the door. I made it inside a little after 2:30. She was waiting inside, wondering what had taken so long.

A word of advice: If you go to see this exhibition in Fort Lauderdale (or Chicago or Philadelphia, when it comes to those cities), be sure to pay the extra $7 per person to get the audio tour headset. The narration goes into a lot of detail about many of the objects on display. Bekki told me that she felt bad for the people who didn't have the headsets, because they were missing out on a lot of information.

The other bad thing, besides my dad not being able to go, was how crowded the exhibition was. There were a LOT of people moving through the halls, and it took us about and hour and a half to make it through. I would have liked to have gone through on a day when there perhaps half as many people in order to be able to move from item to item more quickly.

The Treasures themselves, however, were dazzling. The Boy King got a splendid send-0ff into the afterlife. Who says "You can't take it with you"? Tutankhamun did. It would be hard to go into a lot of detail about all of the items I saw, or rather, it would take too long. One of the most amazing items a saw was a child's chair, with a woven seat that looked like it was made of something similar to cane. It was more than three thousand years old and still intact due to the dry climate of Egypt.

The most visually stunning item was probably the golden mummy case. This one didn't belong to Tutankhamun, however. Also dazzling was a golden dagger which was found on Tutankhamun's body, as well as the golden crook and flail (with detail in faience, carnelian and glass) that were his symbols of authority, and the golden head-dress with the heads of a cobra and a vulture at its crown. There was a large ointment jar showing Tutankhamun trampling on the heads of Nubians and Syrians. There was a little game board for him to use in the afterlife, which was engraved with hieroglyphs telling how powerful he was (slightly intimidating if you were playing against him, as the narration pointed out).

There were many little shabti statues, which were engraved with spells from the Book of the Dead so that they would stand in for their maker in the afterlife if the gods demanded difficult labor. The shabtis were made from a variety of different substances, including clay, stone, copper, faience and gold.

"What is faience?" you ask. Faience is a glazed non-clay ceramic material, typically made from quartz, and the characteristic bright blue-green color comes from copper used in the glazing process. There were numerous faience items on display; especially common were the large ankhs which were the symbol for "life."

Also interesting were a number of symbolic model items that were expected to magically become real in the afterlife, including jars, toy boats and even a non-working camp chair. There was a glass headrest of the type that Egyptians wrapped with cloth and used instead of pillows when they slept. This one had a spell from the Book of the Dead to protect the mummy's head.

There were also several alabaster canopic jars, which held the entrails of the body when it was mummified. One of Tutankhamun's canopic jars bore a disturbing resemblence to Michael Jackson, which I pointed out to Bekki. Maybe it's the other way around, though; perhaps Michael Jackson was using it for his model for plastic surgery. Either way, it was kind of creepy.

All in all, we had a good time. My pants had even dried out by the time I finally got home. My shoes were still damp.

The Weekend is Here

The weather's supposed to be cloudy and rainy for the next couple of days, but I should still have a good time this weekend. Tomorrow, I'll be going over to Fort Lauderdale to see the "Treasures of Tutankhamen" exhibition, which should be really interesting; I'll blog about it when I get back. And Sunday is the Super Bowl (Go Seahawks!) so I have plenty of things to do, all of which will disrupt my normal sleep schedule. But sometimes you just have to say, "What the heck."

Time for some breakfast. More later...

More Weirdness

The buzz at work last night was about the shootings at the postal facility in California. I didn't really get much detail on it until I got home and turned on the cable news. They reported that the killer shot seven people, killing six, and then took her own life. The shocking word in that sentence was "her," of course. Most of the psycho killers are male. Chalk another one up for equal opportunity, I guess. Word is that the woman was an ex-Postal employee.

Didja see ol' Ayman al- Zawahiri is back with a new videotape in which he taunts President Bush, trying to out-Cindy Sheehan Cindy Sheehan? Maybe he wants to run for Diane Feinstein's Senate seat this year, too. He claims that Al Qaeda is winning the war on terror. Tell that to your dead lieutenants in Damadola, Diaperhead.

Speaking of which, what's the difference between Punxsutawny Phil (the groundhog) and Zawahiri? Punxsutawny Phil can stick his head out of his hole, see his shadow and not have to worry about being blown up by a Hellfire missile fired from a Predator drone. Just sayin'. Turban-boy's looking mighty pasty in his latest video. He's probably holed up so far back in the mountains that they have to pack sunlight in by mule team. If that's winning, Ayman, I'd hate to see what losing looks like.

Clyde Reads the News (So You Don't Have To)

Sometimes you read two news stories and you just say, "Hmmmm."

Story #1: Tampa Bay Devil Rays baseball team could change team name for 2007

Seems the new ownership is looking to make as many changes as possible, both on and off the field, to try to improve the perennial last-place team. Which brings us to:

Story #2: Humuhumunukunukuapuaa Dethroned in Hawaii

The Aloha State's official state fish may be in the unemployment line, since its designation back in 1984 was only supposed to be for five years. And if it's willing to relocate?

The Tampa Bay Humuhumunukunukuapuaa? In the name of all that is holy, no! They'd need two lines to get it all across the front of their jerseys!

Elsewhere in the world, Uzbekistan has banned fur-lined underwear as "too sexy." No, really!

Uzbekistan gives fur-lined undies the slip

Authorities [in Uzbekistan], citing the "unbridled fantasy" that the newfangled thermal undergarments could spark if left unchecked, have ordered an immediate halt to sales of men's and women's underwear lined on the inside with animal fur, apparently the brainchild of a local entrepreneur.

Oh, you crazy kinky Uzbeks! If taken to its logical conclusion, it won't be long until the Uzbeks are only allowed to wear scratchy burlap long-johns. That'll teach 'em!

The Uzbeks aren't the only ones with a strong sense of decency, however. From Zimbabwe, we get this story:

Twins detained for loincloth outrage

Zimbabwean twins who became media celebrities for appearing in public wearing nothing but traditional African goatskin loincloths have been detained pending trial for indecent exposure.

The men, Tafadzwanashe and Tapiwanashe Fichani, raised eyebrows last month when they went to an upscale Harare shopping mall clad only in brief loincloths -- leading several shocked shoppers to call the police.

The twins said they were making a statement by appearing in traditional African clothing dating back to pre-colonial times.

I guess that Afro-centric stuff doesn't go over well in Africa. Go figure!

Bucking the CW on Hamas

Okay, time for a little politics. Like just about everyone else, I was surprised to see the Hamas party win the majority of seats in the Palestinian parliamentary election. Unlike a lot of people, I don't necessarily think this is a bad thing. That bucks the conventional wisdom, of course, but hear me out.

First of all, the Palestinians didn't have really have much of a choice: They could choose between the kleptocratic Fatah party (which had impoverished the Palestinians for decades under Yasser Arafat while the Fatah party functionaries stole the aid money sent by the foolish Europeans) or the terrorist Hamas party (known mostly for its suicide bombing attacks in Israel). Corrupt kleptocrats or Jew-killing terrorists. Some choice.

But it was a choice, and it makes it clear that the so-called "peace process" is as dead as Arafat.

Now, instead of a situation where Fatah runs the Palestinian territories while the Hamas terrorists blow up Israelis, Hamas itself will be the government. Before, when a Hamas terrorist attack would occur, the Fatah government would say, "Hey, we can't control what they do, we're not in charge of Hamas." But now, with Hamas running the government, an attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists would not just be a terrorist attack, it would be a state-sanctioned act of war. Anyone want to guess how that war would come out, given the Arabs' history of wars against Israel since 1948?

Then there's the question of whether Hamas is capable of changing from a terrorist organization or not. Can the leopard change its spots? Probably not. Now, Israel itself was founded by people who engaged in terrorism (Menachem Begin's Irgun), but those Jewish terrorists only attacked British military targets, not civilians. Their goal was only to have a state of their own. Hamas' goal, on the other hand, is the complete destruction of Israel. Expecting that to change is about like expecting Fidel Castro to give up communism.

Some critics of the Bush administration will be quick to say, "See, here's a case of democracy where the new democracy isn't peaceful. Bush was wrong!" But of course, the Palestinians won't have a real democracy. They may have had a free election, but none of the candidates were democrats. It was like a choice between neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klansmen: Nothing but evil on both sides.

It's going to be interesting to see how it all plays out. The Palestinians have chosen the path of further conflict with Israel. I suspect that they will rue this day in the future.

Going Up!

Here's the view from my front yard of the launch of the New Horizons spacecraft a few minutes ago. Next stop: Pluto, July, 2015...

Stamps and Stuff

I've noticed that when there's a postage rate increase, old oddball stamps come out of the woodwork. Today, for instance, I saw a letter with five old stamps whose face value added up to 39 cents, but were probably worth at least a couple of bucks to a collector. Three of the five stamps are older than I am: 1948 3-cent stamp - Moina Michael, Founder of Memorial Poppy; 1957 3-cent stamp - America and Steel, Growing Together -- Steel Centennial 1957; 1948 3-cent stamp - 100th Anniversary of the American Turners - 1848-1948 - A Century of Health. The other two were a 10-cent Bicentennial Era stamp from 1976 showing Carpenters Hall, and a 20-cent McGruff the Crime Dog stamp from 1984. I later saw a 1957 3-cent stamp honoring those who fought polio.

The other day, I saw one of "those" names on a letter that was being returned to the sender. The name: Mrs. Yu Suk. No, I'm not kidding. I guess it lost (or gained!) something in the translation.

Round Two, Ding-Ding!

I've been watching the Senate's confirmation hearings for Samuel Alito the last couple of days, and have found them to be rather entertaining. Now, all of the legalese mumbo-jumbo might seem to be a bit boring and dry, but it's been quite instructive to watch the Senators at work. To listen to the Democrats and the Republicans, you'd almost think they were talking about two different men. I've found it especially droll to listen to Senator Joe "Kinnock" Biden and Senator Ted "Splash" Kennedy sitting in judgement of anyone else's ethics or morality.

And then there was the spectacle of Senators Patrick Leahy and Kennedy, both "men of pallor," decrying the fact that the President didn't nominate someone who would make the Supreme Court more "diverse." This despite the fact that they are members in an exclusive club that has exactly one black, one Hispanic, and only a handful of women among their 100 members. If Sens. Leahy and Kennedy are THAT concerned about "diversity" in our society, I'd recommend that they immediately announce that they will not run for re-election the next time around, and instead will throw their support behind a candidate who is a "person of color," preferably a woman, since they are more "diverse" than men. Fat chance, eh?

In any case, the Senators appear to be almost as overmatched by Judge Alito as they were by Chief Justice Roberts during his confirmation hearings. The judge obviously knows what he is talking about, and several of the Senators have come off poorly by comparison. Today should be fun to watch.

Plans Wrecked

I was supposed to get together with Karl and Monika this morning. I called Karl at 9:00 a.m. as we'd arranged to check in, but only got his answering machine. He called me back about ten minutes ago and told me that they were in a car wreck last night on US 41. They're a bit banged up: Karl has a broken collarbone and Monika has a broken toe. Evidently a woman pulled out in front of them from a side street and they were unable to stop in time. Karl says the car is totaled, and they were lucky not to be injured any worse than they were. They were taken to the hospital and released around 1:30 this morning. It was a bad ending to what had been a nice vacation for them. Anyway, they're leaving for New York around mid-afternoon.

One more reason to hate driving on US 41.

This is Karl and Monika when we played miniature golf on Monday. The car is the silver convertible with the black top which is visible in the picture over Karl's shoulder.

How I Spent My Monday

My brother Karl and his girlfriend Monika are in town, so we went out today and played some miniature golf. I didn't do very well. I had a lot of shots that hit the lip of the cup and caromed off. Monika had her ups and downs, but she did hit a pair of hole-in-ones on some rather freaky bounces. Bro' Karl had an ace, too. I was happy to just make par on the infrequent holes where I shot decently.

I was going to post some pictures from today's festivities, but Blogger is not cooperating right now. Karl and Monika borrowed the same straw hats that my mom and I used during her visit in November. I'm glad to see them getting some use.

Happy New Year!

I hope that 2006 is a joyous and prosperous year for all of you.

I'd have blogged more in the past week, but I was too busy playing Civilization IV. It's like crack cocaine for gamers...

Time for another hit. :-)

Merry Christmas!

No "Happy Holidays" here at Recycled Sip, oh no, no, no. Here, we're wishing people the real McCoy: "Merry Christmas!" And I hope that all of the people who read this blog have a great day.

For me, Christmas actually came a little early. My brother Karl sent me a new computer game that I'd asked for: Civilization IV. It came on Wednesday afternoon, after I went to bed. I found the Amazon.com box outside my door when I got ready to leave for work. I opened the box on Thursday morning. The game itself wasn't wrapped, of course. And nobody would know if it got opened just a couple of days early and installed on my computer. Nope, nobody at all. So needless to say, I've been noodling around with the game for a couple of days. I even managed to finish and win one game, although that was at a fairly low difficulty level.

I also got some chocolates from my mom, sent by Harry & David, on the same day. They came with an impressive set of ice packs to keep them cool. When I took them out of the box, I had to laugh: While the message on the outside of the box said "Merry Christmas, Love, Mom" the chocolates had a blue bow on them that said "Get Well." And I didn't even know I was ill! Don't you hate it when it sneaks up on you like that?

I also got a couple of Amazon gift certificates, one from my other brother Kurt and one from my mom, so that I can order another computer game that I want, which isn't coming out for another three months or so. Originally, it was supposed to be in November, but evidently there were some glitches. I'd far rather get the game a little later and have it work right.

Later this morning, I'm going over to my dad's place and do the family thing. I got him that book he wanted (a Baptist hymnal, so he could "sing my songs," as he put it) and I'm also going to take him over to Fort Lauderdale to the Treasures of King Tutankhamen exhibition next month. Everyone else got honeybells. I like that; it makes it easy to buy for people.

Let the Weekend Begin!

My work week is finally over. The bad news is that my perfect streak of going through the entire month of December without having to work overtime came to an end today. Now I know how a major league pitcher feels when he loses a perfect game in the bottom of the ninth inning. They nailed everyone today. I wasn't too happy when the supervisor came around and proclaimed, "The list is getting four hours, the non-list is getting two hours and the PTFs are getting 3-1/2 hours."

"You're fucking with my goddamned weekend," I growled at him as he left.

And so my streak came to an end on the last work day before my three-day holiday weekend. I had to stay until 9:30 a.m. I was not amused, and it would probably be accurate to say that I was not as well-motivated as I normally am. I waited until 7:31, when I was on overtime, to visit the restroom. I figured I'd do my business on their time and they could pay me time-and-a-half while I did it. I felt better afterward.

All was not doom and gloom, however. I had the distinct pleasure of yelling at one of the Haitian casuals who came over and tried to steal one of my Labelle racks. The trays in the rack all had dispatch labels in them, and the racks clearly say all over them (in English) "Do Not Take!" "BCS #14 Setup" "Do Not Steal!" Obviously I need to write it in Haitian, too. Anyway, I saw this guy trying to abscond with my rack and I bellowed at him, "HEY!! DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!! THAT'S MY RACK!! YOU CAN'T HAVE IT!! NO FUCKING WAY!!" I think they probably heard me halfway across the building. Then I politely explained to him that we do NOT take labeled racks or GPCs off of people's machines, or they will be righteously pissed off. I then found a rack that wasn't being used and had him take that one instead.

It actually was therapeutic to yell at the guy. He was catching it for all of the times when weasels on other tours have stolen my racks. I'd have yelled at all of them, too, if I'd known who they were. This time, I caught the guy in the act. Very satisfying.

This and That

We have a holiday snack table at work, where people can bring in food to share. Last week, someone brought in a little green reindeer as a decoration; it looked like it was covered in artificial turf or faux chia. The next day, someone else brought in a gyrating Santa figurine, dressed in a cowboy outfit. You can guess how long it took Santa and the green reindeer to make an intimate acquaintance. Alas, the green reindeer was gone when I went in to work last night. Apparently someone has no sense of humor. A sign appeared on the cowboy Santa last night: "Brokeback Santa misses Rudolf." Heh.

I made the mistake of going out on US 41 on Saturday to buy a Christmas present at a specialty bookstore. The traffic and parking situation was just insane. I finally made it to the store, looked around and found what I was looking for. I got up to the cash register with the book and cash. The cashier asked for my telephone number. "You don't need it," I told her, handing her the book and the money. I think she was a little nonplussed by the response, but hey, I don't need to be in any more databases than I probably already am. If I'd wanted them to have my phone number, I'd have paid by check. Chalk it up as a victory for privacy rights. Well, if we actually have any of them left, which is doubtful.

Less than a week until Christmas. My string of overtime-free December days is still intact. Let's keep our fingers crossed...

I'm Not Complaining (Too Much)

Well, no, not too much. There are lots of people who have more to complain about than I do. The folks in the Mid-Atlantic who have gotten nailed with the latest ice storm, for instance. It's a truism that all politics is local, and the same goes for weather. We've had a bit of what passes for a cold snap the last few days here in Florida, but only comparatively so. I talked with a friend in North Carolina this morning, and she was pretty much marooned by the ice storm. She described her car as being "entombed" by the ice, and was hoping that the accumulation of ice wouldn't bring down the power lines. I seconded that. I remember how unpleasant it is to be without electricity.

I don't miss winter, no, not at all.

Others with more to complain about than me: The people at work who are lower on the totem pole and are being slammed with ridiculous amounts of overtime just about every day. Meanwhile, I do my eight and hit the gate. I am fully prepared to work overtime if I have to, but of course, but I've made it halfway through December without having to work any overtime at all. I'm hoping that my luck continues to hold.

I don't miss working overtime, no, not at all.

All is not sweetness and light, however. Last night, I got back my incidental leave request for a week off in March, which was denied because the maximum percentage had already been approved for those dates. It wasn't a big deal, however. I hope to be able to get a week off sometime in April when the percentage of people who can be on leave at one time goes up from 3% to 15%. The March week was a pipe dream, but hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained. I just don't want to have to wait until July for my next vacation.

Bad Stuff

Over the weekend, I was channel-surfing and caught the end of the "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" movie, featuring Peter Frampton and the Bee Gees in the Beatles' roles. It was so bad that I couldn't look away. I only saw the last twenty minutes or so (alas, I missed Steve Martin's version of "Maxwell's Silver Hammer"), but it was enough to get a renewed feel for the zeitgeist of 1978. The long hair. The horrible clothes. The music: Barry Gibb's falsetto version of "A Day in the Life," followed by Billy Preston dressed up in a gold suit singing "Get Back," with the final reprise of the title tune to close the movie, featuring a group cameo by everyone who was hot stuff in Hollywood that year: George Burns, Carol Channing, Helen Reddy, Keith Carradine, Tina Turner, Leif Garrett... It was surreal. Certainly nothing I would have paid to see in the theater, even in that long-lost year.

Tookie: Are you in the "Save Tookie!" or the "Die, Tookie! Die!" camp? Me, I'm down with capital punishment for gangsta quadruple-murderers. I don't care how many children's books they write in prison. I was listening to Matt Drudge's radio show on the way to work last night and he mentioned that some people thought that the death of comedian Richard Pryor might generate a groundswell of support for Tookie. As if people were going to say, "There! You've got one dead black man, you don't need any more!" All I can say is, "Ahnold, be the Terminator you were elected to be."

"All I Wanted Was A Pepsi, Just One Pepsi..."

Odd story of the day, especially if you think that cops have gotten "Taser-happy." Bonus points if you recognize the source of today's blog title:

Cop Said to Taser Partner Over Soft Drink

HAMTRAMCK, Mich., Dec. 8, 2005

---

(AP) A police officer has been charged with using a Taser on his partner during an argument over whether they should stop for a soft drink.

Ronald Dupuis, 32, was charged Wednesday with assault and could face up to three months in jail if convicted. The six-year veteran was fired after the Nov. 3 incident.

Dupuis and partner Prema Graham began arguing after Dupuis demanded she stop their car at a store so he could buy a soft drink, according to a police report.

The two then struggled over the steering wheel, and Dupuis hit her leg with his department-issued Taser, the report said. She was not seriously hurt.

Classic! But not Coke Classic!

Instant Karma

My sympathy meter is stuck on 'zero':

Suspect in Salvation Army kettle robberies found dead

TAMPA, Florida (AP) -- Tampa Police say the man suspected of robbing several Salvation Army bell ringers has been found dead.

Spokesman Joe Durkin says the body of Lee George was found in his car at the bottom of a creek near the Hillsborough River. The former auto-repair shop owner was pulled from the submerged car and identified through fingerprints. Police say he matches the description of the robber provided by witnesses.

...

The spokesman says police divers also found near the car a bottle of liquor and two pill bottles with small amounts of marijuana inside. Police say the crash may have been alcohol related.

Someone who'd steal money from a charity is lower than... Well, lower than a dead stiff at the bottom of a creek near the Hillsborough River. Call it what you like: Instant karma coming around, poetic justice or just God showing a warped sense of humor. Any way you slice it, this fellow's criminal career has come to a precipitous conclusion.

Bowled Over

Last night at work, I was looking at the sports section of the local newspaper during my break. One thing I noticed was a schedule of upcoming college football bowl games. I was amazed at how many of them there are these days. When I was a kid, there were only four college bowl games worthy of the name: The Rose Bowl, the Orange Bowl, the Cotton Bowl and the Sugar Bowl. Do you know how many there are now? Take a guess. Go ahead, I'll wait...

The answer: Twenty-seven. No, I'm not kidding. Starting on December 20th and running through January 4th, there are a total of twenty-seven bowl games, and that isn't including the college all-star games that take place later in January. There is at least one college bowl game every single day during that two-week period, except for the Sundays, of course, when the pros are playing.

The only problem is that with so many bowl games, not every game is going to feature a matchup of great teams. Indeed, there are several bowl games involving teams with 6-5 records. Quality or quantity, take your pick; you can't have both.

However, that Texas-USC matchup in the Rose Bowl looks like it might live up to the hype. "Hook 'em, 'Horns!"

Blinded By the Light(s)

The neighbors across the street from me really, REALLY love Christmas. They have really gone all out this year in the Christmas lighting department. Indeed, perhaps they've even gone a little overboard. Let me describe it to you: The house, the windows, the front door and the garage door are all outlined with colored lights. The two big trees in the front yard are festooned with strings of lights. There are two lighted artificial trees. There is a lighted inflatable Grinchy Claus (with the dog) that's about eight feet tall, as well as a lighted inflatable Santa and a lighted inflatable snowman of about the same size. They also have a large lighted inflatable snow globe that's about five feet in diameter. All of the inflatables have a tendency to deflate as the air turns colder, so each morning they are lying flat on the ground. There is a row of several lighted candy canes lining the driveway. There are a couple of lighted toy soldiers flanking the garage door, as well as a small lighted Santa, a lighted snowman and another lighted Santa with a pack, all in front of the house. There's an evergreen wreath on the front door. And there's a huge "Merry Christmas" in lights on the roof that has to be about fifteen feet wide .

They love Christmas. And Florida Power & Light loves them.