Things To Do In SW Florida

By TOM MURPHY, AP Health Writer

CVS has finished buying customer prescription files from hundreds of closed Rite Aid drugstores and is now running 63 of the defunct chain’s locations.

The company said Wednesday that it is operating former Rite Aid and Bartell Drugs stores in Idaho, Oregon and Washington. It also has transferred customer prescription files from 626 pharmacies in 15 states to nearby CVS locations.

CVS Health did not say how much it spent on the stores and prescription files.

Rite Aid recently announced on its website that its stores have closed. The company said in May that it was seeking bankruptcy protection and would look to sell substantially all of its assets.

Philadelphia-based Rite Aid once ran more than 4,000 stores mostly on the East Coast. It initially filed for bankruptcy protection in October 2023 after struggling with debt and posting annual losses for several years.

The chain emerged from that Chapter 11 reorganization in 2024 as a private company. It said then that it had less debt, was more efficient and now operated a “rightsized store footprint.” read more

Five Central Florida restaurants shut down the week of Oct. 5-11, according to data from the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation.

Orange

Little Saigon Restaurant at 1106 E. Colonial Dr. in Orlando shut down on Oct. 6. Inspectors found 12 violations, two of which were high priorities for raw food stored over unwashed produce and roach activity. Officials revisited the restaurant the next day. They found nine violations and issued a time extension for raw food stored over unwashed food. The restaurant met inspection standards.

Okayama Sushi & Hibachi at 2320 S. Kirkman Road shut down on Oct. 3. Inspectors found eight violations, two of which were high priorities for roach activity and operating without a business license. A second inspection occurred on Oct. 6. There were three violations, two of which were the same high priorities from the previous inspection. A third and final inspection took place the same day. There were no violations, and the restaurant met inspection standards. read more

San Mateo County social worker Aldo Quintero and his wife, Liza, make respectable salaries in their government jobs, but in a region with a median home price of $1.4 million and a county where the figure reaches $2.2 million, a home for the couple and their two kids in the community they serve was out of reach.

For years, Quintero commuted an hour-plus across the Bay from Hayward, and though they later found a small rental in the San Mateo County town of Belmont, their pay wasn’t enough for them to afford a home of their own.

“Even as I got raises and better-paying jobs, it’s like I couldn’t catch up to where prices were,” said Quintero, who earns $144,000 not including benefits.

Each year, the Quinteros entered a program sponsored by the county for its employees — a lottery awarding 20 loans of up to $100,000 toward the purchase of a home in San Mateo County. In 2023, they won. Along with the loan, they scraped together their savings plus money from their family to put in an offer of $780,000 for a two-bedroom, one-bath condo in Foster City, just a 10-minute drive from work and their children’s school. read more

By STAN CHOE, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — Most U.S. stocks rose Wednesday following another topsy-turvy day on Wall Street.

The S&P 500 added 0.4%, but only after jumping toward one of its biggest gains since the summer, erasing it all and then climbing back.

The Nasdaq composite climbed 0.7% after earlier pinballing between a drop of 0.4% and a rally of 1.4%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lagged the market and edged down by 17 points, or less than 0.1%.

The erratic trading followed Tuesday’s roller coaster, where the Dow careened between a loss of 615 points and a jump of 455. The dizzying moves go back to the end of last week, when President Donald Trump shattered what had been a remarkably calm and strong run for Wall Street by threatening much higher tariffs on China.

Technology stocks helped lead the way Wednesday following a better-than-expected profit report from ASML, a major supplier to the semiconductor industry. It expects its revenue for 2025 to be 15% above last year’s, while next year’s should be at least as high as this year’s. read more

Walt Disney World is giving Disney’s Hollywood Studios visitors a miniature peek at the resort’s expansion plans. It’s a salute to three projects, but mostly Tropical Americas, the under-construction land at Disney’s Animal Kingdom.

Near the rear of the Walt Disney Presents attraction at DHS is a formidable scale model of Tropical Americas, which is flanked by 2D artist concepts for the “Monsters, Inc.”-inspired land set for Hollywood Studios, and the Frontierland expansion, featuring “Cars” attractions at Magic Kingdom.

It isn’t newsy news. The model was unveiled at D23 event in California in August 2024, but it’s nice for WDW visitors to get a look. It’s fun to stare and go into Magic Eye mode, imagining where this all fits into Animal Kingdom. (Mentally align past and present entrances to get your virtual bearings.)

Also enjoyable is eavesdropping on the comments of passers-by, who display a wide range of Disney World knowledge, from shocked to informed. There’s usually one self-appointed expert in each group (and there are placards for each land to fill in key facts). read more