South Florida hotels enjoyed a strong October

South Florida hotels enjoyed a strong October, as growing demand for rooms helped boost nightly rates.A new Smith Travel report showed the typical room in Broward County generated 9 percent more revenue per night than did it did in October 2011. For Miami-Dade, the gain in revenue-per-room (known as “revpar” in the lodging industry) was 8 percent. Improvements in two fronts...

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Pembroke Pines hosts winter camp for special needs kids

The City of Pembroke Pines is accepting registration for its two-week Winter Camp for special needs children ages 6 through 14.Participants will engage in indoor and outdoor activities, games, arts and crafts, and other activities.Participants must be independent in toileting skills and be able to administer, with supervision, their own medications. The...

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Online gaming firms urge EU to open up markets

LONDON (Reuters) – Online gaming companies have accused Belgium and Greece of keeping them out of their markets illegally and urged European competition authorities to take action.A long-running dispute over licenses in Belgium made headlines last week when Belgian authorities questioned one of the co-chief executives of bwin.party, the world’s largest...

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Justin Bieber Wins Big at American Music Awardss

Justin Bieber gave an emotional thank you to his mom, Pattie Mallette, who stood on stage with the pop star as he accepted Artist of the Year, his third award of the evening, at the culmination of the 40th annual American Music Awards Sunday in Los Angeles. The Biebs, who brought his mother along as his date for the show, took home the first and the last award of the night, (Favorite Pop/Rock...

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WATCH: Anderson Cooper reacts to explosion live on-air

CNNAnderson Cooper got jumpy on live TV after a bomb exploded near his report in Gaza.Anderson Cooper had good reason to get jumpy during a weekend newscast.The CNN journalist was broadcasting from Gaza City, when a bomb exploded nearby – lighting up the darkness around him and punctuating its presence with a loud boom.As the bomb exploded, Cooper ducked...

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Growing middle class feeds spirits business in Latin America

Diageo executive Randy Millian is proud of the fact that eight out of every 12 times someone pours a standard or premium whiskey in the Latin American and Caribbean region, they’re drinking one of his company’s brands.That kind of dominance is why the spirits giant is bullish on its future in Latin America, which recently has been the fastest growing region for Diageo worldwide....

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Interfaith Thanksgiving service planned for Wednesday night

Members of various faiths in Coral Gables will come together at 7 p.m. Wednesday in a spirit of unity for the annual Thanksgiving Eve Interfaith Worship Service hosted by Coral Gables Congregational United Church of Christ, 3010 De Soto Blvd., across the street from the Biltmore Hotel.The Rev. Dr. Laurinda Hafner, senior pastor of the church said, "We invite everyone - no...

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Buzzmakers: Lindsay Lohan Comes Clean & Janeane Marries

What had ET readers buzzing this week?1. Janeane Garofalo: I Didn't Know I was Married!Sometimes what happens in Vegas actually does stay in Vegas -- at least for two decades. Funny girl Janeane Garofalo is claiming she's been married for 20 years, and didn't even know it!The Reality Bites actress told the New York Post that she and Big Bang Theory producer Rob Cohen decided to wed at a Las Vegas...

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Israel-Gaza conflict grows as ground invasion looms

Israel continued to mass thousands of soldiers at the Gaza border yesterday as fighting threatened to mushroom into an all-out ground war by the end of the weekend. The offensive against Hamas broadened, as troops, tanks and other armored vehicles gathered close to Gaza while Israeli forces shut down the main roads in the area and declared it a “closed...

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Panama Canal’s $5 billion makeover could be boon for South Florida

PANAMA CITY, Panama -- Huge yellow dump trucks resemble Tonka toys in a sand pile as they haul tons of rust-colored dirt and basalt rock from a 56-foot gash in the earth that will become a new access channel in the $5.25 billion expansion of the Panama Canal.The trucks keep rumbling up muddy terraced slopes as a quick-moving storm blurs the horizon. The rain chases away workers...

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