The nights are getting longer. The weather is getting cooler. So, what better way to warm up on a cold winter night than with a hot drink? Question is, what hot drink do you prefer: hot cocoa or hot apple cider?
Personally, I’m more of a cider kind of person. Which is why, around this time of year, I love to prepare wassail.
What’s wassail? Essentially, it’s a hot spiced apple cider. The drink was so popular during the holidays they even wrote songs about it. Ever heard of, “Here we come a wassailing”?
And what, exactly, is wassailing? Essentially, it’s a medieval form of caroling where people would go door-to-door singing Christmas songs and sharing hot drinks.
Anyway, like I said, this time of year, I love to prepare wassail. Nothing warms you up after a long cold day than heating some apple cider on the stove with cinnamon sticks and apples with cloves.
Actually, I stand corrected. The only thing that warms you up more is drinking the wassail you prepared.
I’ve been using this recipe for the past few years. It combines apple cider with different fruit juices and spices like cinnamon and nutmeg. The result is a warm brew that’s perfect on a cold winter night.
***
Wassail (from Tastes Better from Scratch)
Ingredients
· 2 apples
· 8 cups apple cider
· 2 cups orange juice
· 1/3 cup lemon juice
· 4 cinnamon sticks
· 15 whole whole cloves, or ½ tsp ground cloves
· 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
· 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
· 1 Tablespoon light brown sugar, optional
Directions
1. Poke the whole cloves into the apples on all sides.
2. Add all of the ingredients, including the apples, to a large pot over medium-low heat.
3. Bring to a simmer. Simmer for 30-45 minutes.
4. Remove the apples and whole cloves. Ladle into mugs and enjoy!
The nights are getting longer. The weather is getting cooler. So, what better way to warm up on a cold winter night than with a hot drink? Question is, what hot drink do you prefer: hot cocoa or hot apple cider?
Personally, I’m more of a cider kind of person. Which is why, around this time of year, I love to prepare wassail.
What’s wassail? Essentially, it’s a hot spiced apple cider. The drink was so popular during the holidays they even wrote songs about it. Ever heard of, “Here we come a wassailing”?
And what, exactly, is wassailing? Essentially, it’s a medieval form of caroling where people would go door-to-door singing Christmas songs and sharing hot drinks.
Anyway, like I said, this time of year, I love to prepare wassail. Nothing warms you up after a long cold day than heating some apple cider on the stove with cinnamon sticks and apples with cloves.
Actually, I stand corrected. The only thing that warms you up more is drinking the wassail you prepared.
I’ve been using this recipe for the past few years. It combines apple cider with different fruit juices and spices like cinnamon and nutmeg. The result is a warm brew that’s perfect on a cold winter night.
***
Wassail (from Tastes Better from Scratch)
Ingredients
• 2 apples
• 8 cups apple cider
• 2 cups orange juice
• 1/3 cup lemon juice
• 4 cinnamon sticks
• 15 whole whole cloves, or ½ tsp ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 Tablespoon light brown sugar, optional
Directions
1. Poke the whole cloves into the apples on all sides.
2. Add all of the ingredients, including the apples, to a large pot over medium-low heat.
3. Bring to a simmer. Simmer for 30-45 minutes.
4. Remove the apples and whole cloves. Ladle into mugs and enjoy!
A 57-year-old man was arrested by the Polk County Sheriff’s Office on Thursday, December 19, 2024, after an investigation determined that he intentionally and repeatedly touched the buttocks of a 16-year-old girl at the Chick-fil-A restaurant at 4625 South Florida Avenue in Lakeland.
Awny Abdel Malek Basta of Lakeland was booked-in at the Polk County Jail, and charged with Lewd & Lascivious Touch (F3). The investigation remains active.
PCSO deputies responded to the restaurant at 2:55pm, but Basta had fled on foot; he was located near the Imperial Swan Hotel, less than a mile away.
According to the victim, she was seated at a table in the restaurant doing schoolwork when Basta sat down directly behind her. She told detectives that she felt something touch the upper part of her buttocks several times. When she turned around to see what was touching her, she saw that it was Basta’s hand.
After the suspect was confronted by the victim, he fled the restaurant. Restaurant staff followed and provided ongoing updates of his location to PCSO dispatchers. The suspect boarded a city bus and it drove north on S. Florida Avenue. Restaurant employees flagged down the bus at which time it stopped, and the suspect was asked to leave the bus. Patrol deputies located the suspect in a nearby parking lot and detained him.
Detectives obtained security video from the restaurant which confirmed the victim’s statements.
Basta refused to speak with investigators.
“Awny Basta is a pervert, and a sex offender with an extensive criminal history. Because of his history, our detectives believe it’s possible that there are additional victims out there. If anyone thinks they may have been a victim of this man, please contact the Special Victims Unit of the Polk County Sheriff’s Office at 863-298-6200. We want to make sure he’s held accountable for everything he has done.” – Grady Judd, Sheriff
Basta was incarcerated three times between 2006 and 2011 in Tennessee for sexual battery charges.
In 2015, Basta was arrested after he groped a woman at a Lakeland Panera restaurant, and subsequently served 180 days in jail for battery. In 2023, Basta was arrested for groping a woman at Starbuck’s in Lakeland and charged with violation of probation and felony battery. He was released from prison on October 18, 2024.
On December 20, 2024 @ 5:02 a.m., the Florida Highway Patrol responded to a vehicle crash in Pinellas County, FL.
Vehicle 1, a Ford F150, driven by a 21-year-old Winter Haven man, was traveling westbound in the inside lane of Roosevelt Boulevard. Vehicle 2, a Chrysler Pacifica, driven by a 48-year-old man from St. Charles, Illinois, was traveling eastbound in the inside lane of Roosevelt Boulevard. At the intersection of Rhodes Road, the vehicles collided head-on. Both drivers were transported to an area hospital with serious injuries.
You know, in hindsight, I should have known Red One was going to be a disaster. Despite its $250 million budget, the movie only grossed $32 million in the domestic box office and $165.8 million worldwide, making it the biggest box office bomb of 2024. In fact, the movie went straight to streaming, which meant I could have saved myself a ticket and watched it on Amazon Prime.
And yet, Red One had potential. It had all the biggest action movie stars: Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Chris Evans, J.K. Simmons, and Lucy Lui. And the movie certainly looked campy enough that, even if it wasn’t good, it could have been so bad it’s good.
So what made this movie so bad? Why did the movie bomb so badly that it deserves coal for Christmas? Why did this movie end up becoming naughty rather than nice?
Red One stars J.K. Simmons as Santa Claus and The Rock as his assistant Callum. When St. Nick ends up being kidnapped from the North Pole, Callum assembles a special task force called E.L.F. (Extremely Large and Formidable) to save him. He conscripts the assistance of Chris Evans’ character, Jack O’Malley, a professional hack to help track down the Red One. Will they save Christmas? Or…well, it’s a Christmas movie, so you know the answer.
The best way I can describe Red One is that it’s a movie you would get if you tasked an edgy teenage boy (the type with posters of cars and bikini-clad chicks in their room and who watch nothing but action movies and Andrew Tate videos) with writing a script for a Christmas movie about saving Santa Claus–but because they’re too embarrassed to write about “kiddie stuff”, they try to make it “mature” and “cool”: a jacked Santa Claus who lifts mad weights, scenes shot at beaches with scantily-clad women, jacked-up snowmen and Krampuses with six packs, and plenty of action movie cliches you’d expect from a teenager who’s movie diet is nothing but action flicks.
On the surface, Red One is a campy action flick with a campy premise. So, even if it wasn’t going to be good, it had the potential to at least ironically be good—so bad it’s good. It certainly had a star-studded cast to pull it off, and admittedly, some of the action scenes were impressive. This movie could have easily been on par with a Marvel movie.
Unfortunately, Red One’s biggest problem is that it doesn’t seem to know who its target audience is. On the one hand, the movie is silly and campy like a children’s movie; but on the other hand, it also has a lot of adult subject matter not suitable for younger audiences, what with alcoholic references, scantily-clad women, plenty of kicks to the crotch, and a lot of almost-swears. In the end, the movie comes across as too juvenile for adults and too adult for children.
Many other reviewers have pointed out that this movie is a prime example of everything wrong with Hollywood movies these days. The movie was undoubtedly expensive, one of the most expensive movies of the year, and yet it failed to generate box office revenue to compensate for its expensive budget. Exasperating matters even further is how this movie was originally intended to be released on streaming, so the overall quality looks made for television.
In the end, Red One is a Christmas film that prioritizes style over substance. Despite its glossy visuals, quippy comic book movie dialogue, and over-the-top action scenes, the story ends up being your typical run-of-the-mill plot about saving Santa Claus while learning about the “true” meaning of the holiday. Overall, it’s a Christmas tree that’s all bark and not real bite.
A U-HAUL Moving and Self-Storage Facility could potentially be built upon 4+ acres of land now that the Lake Wales City Commission has given preliminary approval to annex the land and change its zoning and land use designation.
At their regular meeting on Tues. Dec. 17, 2024, Lake Wales city commissioners voted unanimously to approve the first reading of three ordinances about 4+ acres of land.
The subject property, according to the city agenda memo, is located “east of US Highway 27 and adjacent to the Parc at Lake Wales multi-family development underway” in unincorporated Polk County.
The ordinances would annex the property into the city limits, change its future land use designation to LCI Limited Commercial, and amend its zoning to LCI Limited Commercial Industrial.
The new designation will help facilitate the proposed development by permitting “low traffic generating commercial and industrial uses fronting on major roadways that will not result in commercial strip development.”
Lake Wales city staff had reviewed the proposal, and determined that the proposed development “will maximize existing infrastructure investments by connecting to municipal water and sewer.”
Michelle Shannon of Lake Wales passed away Monday, December 16, 2024 at AdventHealth Heart of Florida.
She was born October 21, 1962 in Meridian, Mississippi to the late Franklin Strickland and Rosie Courtright; she moved to Lake Wales from Clermont as a child. Michelle was an office administrator for Mountain Lake. She was a fan of Florida State University and enjoyed reading, fishing, and hunting, but above all else loved spending time with her grandchildren.
Michelle is survived by her husband of 43 years, Russell Shannon; daughter, Amber Shannon Apple (Leland) of Winter Haven; son, Christopher L. Shannon (Nicole) of Tallahassee; sister, Terry Joan Whitefield of Orlando; brother, James Alec Cortright of Winter Haven; and grandchildren, Liam, Lennon, Andrew, and Benjamin.
A memorial service will be scheduled at a later date.
The Polk County Sheriff’s Office Traffic Homicide Unit is investigating a fatal two-vehicle crash that occurred at approximately 7:30 AM on Thursday, December 19, 2024 on State Road 60 and Boy Scout Camp Road in Lake Wales. Upon the arrival of first responders, they discovered the driver of a Toyota Tacoma pickup truck, a 61-year-old male from Lake Wales, deceased. The driver of the second vehicle, a Jeep Cherokee, received non-life threatening injuries and was transported to a local hospital by PCFR. Both were the only occupants of their vehicles.
Deputies closed both westbound and eastbound lanes of SR 60, the northbound lanes on Walk in Water Road, and the southbound lanes on Boy Scout Camp Road, diverting all traffic around the crash while PCSO Traffic Homicide detectives investigated the crash. These roads remained closed for approximately five hours. The Toyota truck was travelling southbound on Boy Scout Camp Road and pulled out onto SR 60 westbound, where it collided with the Jeep. The driver of the Jeep stated that when the truck pulled out in front of her, due to the weather conditions, she did not see it in time to brake or maneuver her vehicle to avoid a crash. Both cars came to a final stop in the eastbound lanes of SR 60, travelling over the median, after colliding. At this point in the investigation, PCSO Traffic Homicide detectives believe that the foggy morning weather was one of the contributors to the crash.
The Polk County Sheriff’s Office has arrested 36-year-old Donald Mitchell of Lakeland for sexual offenses against a student by an authority figure (F2).
On December 10, 2024, the former student, a 19-year-old female, reported via social media that she had been engaged in a sexual relationship with Mitchell from October of 2023, when she was a student at Kathleen High School, to November of 2024, after her graduation. When contacted by detectives, Mitchell denied there was any sexual component to their relationship until after the student had graduated, but admitted to texting her often. Mitchell told detectives that he deleted a lot of text messages between he and the victim because he did not want his wife to find them.
PCSO Special Victims Unit (SVU) and Computer Crimes Unit (CCU) detectives examined the text messages exchanged between the two thoroughly. One such message from Mitchell to the victim, sent on Valentine’s Day of this year, read, “I’m here to grow and groom you into what [I] know you’re capable of being!” Other messages include: • February 14, 2024 – Mitchell to victim:“If you cared youd listen and youd let me see you” • February 15, 2024 – Mitchell to victim:“I got a lot to lose” and “Just know I love you and I want our relationship to remain solid regardless of whatever” • February 17, 2024 – Mitchell to victim:“I love you [redacted]” • February 20, 2024 – Mitchell to victim:“Please don’t play with me bruh you have my life damn near in your hands…im taking a huge risk” and “I FaceTime you because I wanna see you I reach out because I wanna talk to you. Ive always gave you game and built you up because I care about you…I told you I love you…no pressure though” • February 24, 2024 – Mitchell to victim:“you think im press for p****” and “Come outside” It was determined that Mitchell used his position of authority over the victim inappropriately. He was arrested on December 18, 2024.
Mitchell, formerly a teacher at Kathleen High School, is now employed as a Community Outreach Facilitator for the Polk County School Board. He has been placed on administrative leave pending further investigation by the school board.
“Using one’s position of authority and trust over a student is egregious. Students rely on teachers to be educators and mentors, and Mitchell abused this trust by turning the relationship between him and his student sexual. This type of behavior will not be tolerated.” – Grady Judd, Sheriff
“Mr. Mitchell had been placed on leave by PCPS when we were first informed of the allegations, and he has since submitted his resignation. These allegations describe abhorrent behavior that is unacceptable for anyone who works with students. We are cooperating fully with the Polk County Sheriff’s Office, and appreciate their work to protect our youth and community. People who abuse their trust and authority deserve to be punished for their actions.” – Fred Heid, Superintendent, Polk County Public Schools
