Good morning!
It’s Friday and you know what that means! It’s POET’S Day, at least in the U.K. and Australia. POET’S meaning, “P** Off Early Tomorrow’s Saturday.” Those Brits! A little veiled, mild profanity, stated with a proper smile, to start out your day. And obviously that doesn’t include those of us in newsrooms.
Today’s weather: If the forecast from the good people at the National Weather Service Office in Ruskin holds, today is basically “Welcome to a good day in the normal summer forecast in Florida” Day:
“Isolated showers and thunderstorms after 2pm. Mostly sunny, with a high near 90. Northeast wind 5 to 7 mph becoming light and variable in the afternoon. Chance of precipitation is 20%.”
We will be diving (OK, kneeling down a little) to an overnight low of 74.
Personal forecast: That slow-dried in a sauna look.
Eye on the tropics: A large number of people make it their hobby, sometimes intensely so, to track tropical storms. Alas for them, they will have to wait. According to the National Hurricane Center:
For the North Atlantic…Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico:
Tropical cyclone formation is not expected during the next 5 days.
What to do?
The Tampa Bay Summer RV Show runs today and through the weekend at the Florida State Fairgrounds on U.S. 301 in Tampa. Admission is $4 for those over 16.
MOSI, the Museum of Science and Industry, 4801 E. Fowler Ave. in Tampa is offering free admission to exhibit galleries to active duty military personnel and up to five immediate family members from today through Aug. 13. Proof of service is required. https://www.mosi.org/explore-mosi/plan-your-visit/special-offers/
The Southshore Regional Library has a host of things to do from non-impact aerobics at 10:30 this morning to a World Wide Knit-In-Public Day on Saturday, along with something for artists pint- to full-sized. Visit http://hcplc.evanced.info/signup/calendar?lib=10
Check out a weekend blockbuster movie at the Ruskin Family Drive-In.
“My Cousin Rachel” is playing at the historic Tampa Theatre.
Happenings in Hillsborough:
At 1 p.m. today, Hillsborough County is offering a free event to get the lowdown on road construction contracting for small and minority owned businesses. Visit http://www.hillsboroughcounty.org/en/calendar/02-business/2017/20170609-hillsborough-county-road-to-success
At 9 a.m. on Saturday, the county is offering a three-hour workshop entitled “Going Into Business.” The workshop covers the basics to help a future small business get started. The workshop will be held at Entrepreneur Collaborative Center, 2101 E. Palm Ave. (Parking at 2109 E. 11th Ave.) in Tampa. There is a $15 fee. To register, visit http://www.hillsboroughcounty.org/en/calendar/02-business/2017/20170610-going-into-business
Do you have some hazardous waste lying around? Saturday is for you, then! Hillsborough County is providing for household hazardous waste disposal at the collection site on U.S. 41 between Gibsonton and Apollo Beach. Visit the following website to ensure that your waste isn’t too hazardous to be considered hazardous (and yes, they do specify that things explosive or radioactive will not be accepted). http://www.hillsboroughcounty.org/en/calendar/04-publicevents/2017/20170610-hhw-south-county
By cjh1452000 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6983878
And, in the end:
It seems a lot of people think our political system has gone insane, regardless of what side of the aisle you choose (or not choose, as the case may be). The truth is that what we have going on today is nothing compared to any number of events in history.
Consider this: on this day in the year 68, Roman Emperor Nero committed suicide, demanding that his secretary slit his throat.
Why would he do that, you may ask?
To avoid a Roman senate-imposed death by flogging. Slitting being a good bit faster to the same end than flogging, obviously.
Nerō Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus was the fifth Emperor of the Roman Empire. His reign last for 13 years. He was just 30 years old when the slitting versus flogging decision came about.
He was just a kid when he became the emperor and things apparently started out OK. But behind the scenes, things were a mess. His mother was implicated in a murder, which added some baggage that Nero decided to shed by having her murdered.
OK, then.
Prone to breaking out into song or poetry, some claimed that he undermined the dignity and authority of his position, but then again what 17-year-old running an empire wouldn’t?
He raised taxes, spending the cash on public and private projects across the empire. Unfortunately, not even the middle class, let alone the upper class, was overly excited about that. He was pretty popular among the so-called “commoners” of the time, though. Some believed that his death had been faked and that he would actually return one day.
In 64 A.D. he supposedly started singing in public, hoping to improve his approval ratings. He ordered the construction of numerous theaters and other public buildings. He later cut taxes, nearly in half, and made once-secret government tax records public. But, in the end, it surely must be difficult to get past that whole “having-your-own-mother-executed” thing.
And, of course, in that same year, Rome started on fire. The cost to rebuild was more than the Empire had in its coffers, dragged down further by a few other massive public works projects.
And no, Nero didn’t fiddle while Rome burned over an estimated five days. He couldn’t have — it would be a few hundred years before the violin was even invented. He reportedly paid for some of the reconstruction with his own money and opened his palaces up to those made homeless by the fire and arranged for food relief efforts to prevent starvation.
All sounds good but things, much like today, were complicated. There were battles, suicides, taxes, government problems and all of that stuff… and on this day 1,949 years ago, Nero chose his own fate rather than having one imposed upon him. Right or wrong? Well, that’s lost to history now.
All things considered, these days we live in seem relatively tame in comparison, no?
Have a great weekend! I hope to see you on Monday.
