Things To Do In SW Florida

Walt Disney World has confirmed that its Frozen Ever After ride will reopen at Epcot on Feb. 12, sporting familiar (but updated) faces on the key animatronic figures of Elsa, Anna and Kristoff.

The attraction has been closed since Jan. 26, and the effects area are currently being tested in anticipation of their debuts.

“I was in awe and got chills seeing Elsa, because it’s literally like she stepped off the screen and it’s standing in front of you now. You will notice the improvement,” said Ken Ricci, executive creative development. He oversees show quality for Imagineering at Walt Disney World.

The change for the heads of three of the attraction’s figures comes with advancements in technology, he said.

“This is a more lifelike articulated head that has a silicone skin,” Ricci said. In the past, their faces were created with projections.

Disney: Theme parks set quarterly revenue record to the tune of $10 billion

“The technology advanced, and there was opportunity to improve the quality of the show and the guest experience,” he said. “As we saw these figures progress for [Disney parks in] Tokyo, Paris and Hong Kong, we saw that as an opportunity to leverage that technology for Walt Disney World.” read more

By PAUL WISEMAN and CHRISTOPHER RUGABER, AP Economics Writers

WASHINGTON (AP) — Looking back on the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump boasts that he has resurrected the American economy by imposing big import taxes on foreign products.

He made his case in a recent opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, chiding the paper and critics, including mainstream economists, who predicted that tariffs would backfire, raising prices and threatening growth. “Instead,” the Republican president wrote, “they have created an American economic miracle.”

But the proof he offers is often off-base or wrong altogether.

Here’s a look at the facts around Trump’s assessment of tariffs:

CLAIM: “Just over one year ago, we were a ‘DEAD’ country. Now, we are the ‘HOTTEST” country anywhere in the world!’ ’’

THE FACTS: This is a standard statement from Trump. But the U.S. economy was hardly “dead’’ when Trump returned to office last year. And in Trump’s second term, it’s performed strongly — after getting off to a bumpy start. read more

By STAN CHOE, AP Business Writer

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is roaring back on Friday, as technology stocks recover much of their drops from earlier in the week and bitcoin halts its plunge, at least for now.

The S&P 500 jumped 1.7% Friday and was heading toward its best day since May. The Dow Jones Industrial Average soared 1,102 points, or 2.2%, and topped the 50,000 level for the first time. The Nasdaq composite was up 1.9%, as of 2:30 p.m. Eastern time.

Chip companies helped drive the widespread rally, and Nvidia jumped 7.3% to trim its loss for the week, which came into the day at just over 10%. Broadcom climbed 7.2% and fully erased its drop for the week.

They were the two strongest forces lifting the S&P 500, and they benefited from hopes for continued spending by customers diving into artificial-intelligence technology. Amazon, for example, said late Thursday it expects to spend about $200 billion on investments this year to take advantage of “seminal opportunities like AI, chips, robotics, and low earth orbit satellites.” read more

One of Florida’s earliest manmade tourists attractions, and the oldest marine attraction in the country, is Marineland Florida, located in northern Flagler County. It opened in 1938 for the purpose of collecting scientific data on sea mammals and other creatures, producing movies about them and letting the public view all that was going on.

Even before it opened, Marineland was making news. Here’s an Orlando Sentinel story from December 1937 with the headline, “Another Wonder For Florida: Marineland Takes Form South of St. Augustine”…

“There is indeed a surprise awaiting those who travel on the Ocean Boulevard, between Daytona Beach and St. Augustine, to find the new community of Marineland being erected about 20 miles south of St. Augustine in the extreme north end of Flagler County. Much steel is going up and a great activity is going on in preparing the grounds with the proper naturalistic setting.

“It seems that long ago someone had the dream of building an aquarium large enough to house the big sea creatures, seldom seen, in order to have controlled conditions whereby unusual moving pictures could be taken. It was their dream to arrange the conditions in such way that motion pictures could be taken of the mother porpoise suckling her young. of big sharks feeding, of sail fish and the dolphin, and many, many others of the some 85,000 underwater species, all in natural habitat unaware of being observed.” read more

By Karen Bennett, Bankrate.com

The thought of saving money may feel overwhelming, especially if you have nothing saved and struggle to afford necessities like rent and groceries.

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If you don’t have a healthy emergency fund, you’re not alone. In fact, only 30% of Americans would pay a $1,000 emergency expense from savings, a recent Bankrate survey found. Other survey respondents said they’d go into debt to afford such an expense through credit cards or personal loans.

Saving certainly isn’t easy and we won’t pretend it is — but here are some practical steps you can take to get started. read more