Real Estate Feast

Archive for the 'South Florida Food Fun and Happenings' Category

South Beach restaurants desperate for your business

So I took a 25 pound turkey downtown to Camillus house today to do my good deed and help feed Miami’s homeless population (if Don King can give away 100,000 turkeys every year, I can give away one.)  Camillus House is a wonderful organization that has been helping feed and care for homeless people in Miami for years.  And, since I was almost half way to Miami Beach at that point and it was a beautiful day in South Florida and the real estate business is what you might charitably describe as slow, I decided to pay a visit to South Beach.  I parked on Washington Avenue and walked over to Ocean Drive, the road closest to the beach where all the sidewalk restaurants are.  With the exception of the venerable News Cafe, every single one of the others had “1/2 off menu prices”, “50% off” or some such variation of sign out front.  This along with good looking girls hawking the places and waving menus at largely disinterested passers by.  I sat an an outside table at Prime Time, the cafe in front of the Waterford Towers hotel.  I watched the cute young thing at the neighboring Caffe Milano really try hard to get anyone to sit down for about 45 minutes as I ate lunch.  She must have smiled broadly at 100 people and the only person that stopped to talk to her was asking directions to another restaurant.  I finished half of my very bad reuben sandwich with a side of coleslaw and asked her how long she had been doing that job.  She said about a week and she was going back to waitressing.  She’d rather wait tables than be ignored.  Tough job. 

If you’d like to find out more about South Florida real estate or homes in easy-living South Miami/High Pines, you can reach me at 305-401-8058 or bishopric.r@ewm.com.

South Florida Real Estate Feast goes mobile!

The Feast has gone mobile with these fancy new magnetic signs for my car.  Even the Wife Extraordinaire thinks they aren’t quite as tacky as the plain old ones that said “Buy Sell Rent”.  New York Daughter might now deign to drive the car when she comes down for the holidays.  People ask me why I chose Real Estate Feast for the name of my blog.  Couple of reasons.  Nothing sells like sex and food and since I’m not very sexy, that left food.  Also, food is important to me and it’s a big deal down here in South Florida. 

If you’d like to know anything about South Florida real estate, or tacky magnetic signs, you can reach me at 305-401-8058 or bishopric.r@ewm.com.

Our screech owls are nesting again

We’ve got a lot of wildlife here in easy-living South Miami/High Pines.  We’ve got hawks, possums, raccoons, even the occasional fox.  And screech owls.  It’s one of the reasons this is some of the most desirable South Florida real estate.  Last year I put up a screech owl nesting box and we were fortunate enough to have a pair move right in.  They begin nesting about this time of year and in March the hatchlings start coming out of the box.  This summer a swarm of wild bees took over the box, so I put up another one nearby.  The bees have left the old box and last night my wife and I noticed that owls have moved into the new one.  I don’t know if owls have moved into the old one or not.  But I’ll keep looking and let you know.  The owls are little, about five inches tall, and look really cute standing on their skinny legs with their feathers puffed up against the cool night air.  (It’s been cold for us Floridians–night temps in the fifties!).  One of the best things about these owls is their distinctive call.  You can hear it here.  Scroll down that page until you find the Eastern screech owl.  I like the “a song” recorded in Winnepeg, Canada.

If you’d like to talk about our wildlife or real estate you can reach me at 305-401-8058 or bishopric.r@ewm.com.

It’s official South Florida Hammock Season

We down here religiously observe the official beginning of South Florida Hammock Season, which occurs on the third Sunday in November or the day of the second cold front of the year, whichever comes first.  This year we were very fortunate to have the second cold front of the year happen on the third Sunday in November, so we hammockites were especially happy.

South Florida Hammock Season is the calendar opposite of Washington, D.C. Porch Season, which is observed by my brother-in-law Joel Achenbach, who writes for The Washington Post.  You can read Joel’s blog here.

This is also the time of year when I begin tormenting my older daughter Read the rest of this entry »