4th Hungarian Festival is from noon to 11 p.m., Saturday, Oct 16 at Sarasota County Fairgrounds, Sarasota. Hungarian cuisine, desserts and wines. Children activities. Cooking competition. Live music, folk dance.

The 2010 Suncoast Jaguar Club Dan Ligas Memorial Concours d’Elegance will be held Oct. 1-3 at St. Armands Circle Park.

The Fall Garden Music Series begins from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., Sunday, Oct 10 at Marie Selby Botanical Gardens, 811 S. Palm Ave., Sarasota. A different music style will be feartured each week. Garden Music Concerts are included in regular admission. Visit www.selby.org for complete info.

The Sarasota Medieval Fair will run Nov. 13-14 and Nov. 20-21 at Sarasota County Fairgrounds. Watch the full contact joust and human combat chess tournaments. Feast on turkey legs and hearty ales from the English pubs. Enjoy Celtic music and the new artisan marketplace with more than 100 shops, food and snack booths. Call 941-365-0818 for more info.

While working away in the newsroom Monday, Sept. 20, we realized it was lunchtime and the conversation on where to go ensued. Tired of our usual fare we all wanted a change of pace, but that can be tough when our staff has very specific and particular requirements. We went down the list of options not once but twice, when suddenly Longboat Key News Editor/Publisher Steve Reid reminded me of a recent conversation with Coldwell Banker Longboat Key Broker Bob Stanley.

Longboat Key commissioners are making future plans. At Thursday’s Workshop, commissioners authorized an initial allocation of $50,000 to fund the process of amending the Comprehensive Plan. That effort dovetails with another commission initiative to incorporate the recently evolved Vision Plan into the nexus of land use regulations as well as day-to-day town operations

Nothing speaks to Sarasota’s burgeoning presence on the world’s cultural arts stage quite as emphatically as the Ringling International Arts Festival (RIAF), which is in final rehearsals before opening five exciting days and nights of original theater, music, dance and art beginning Wednesday, Oct. 13. So it’s entirely fitting that the RIAF be the event that more or less ushers in Sarasota’s season of culture; even as its opening night party takes its place among the city’s premier social events—replacing the late great Ungala Gala as The Ringling Museum’s signature annual social event.

Sign pollution and overzealous bicyclists were two hot topics at Thursday’s Town Commission Workshop.

Tuesday afternoon Town Manager Bruce St. Denis announced the appointment and promotion of Paul Dezzi to the fire chief position of Longboat Key Fire/Rescue Department. Dezzi served in the capacity of interim fire chief for the past four months after the resignation of former Fire Chief Rich Dickerson in May 2010. Dezzi originally joined the department as a deputy chief in July 2009.

Commissioner Phillip Younger this week questioned the authority of the Firefighter’s Pension Board. In an e-mail to town counsel, Younger asked under what authority the board decided to hire a firm to investigate the state of its pensions. Younger’s e-mail memo came in reaction to the firefighters who wanted a forensic investigation of the unfunded pension liability, which now stands at more than $10 million in the Firefighter’s Pension Fund.