Edge Management

Dating to 1876, the Calhoun Mansion at No. 16 Meeting Street in Charleston, South Carolina represents one man’s effort to restore pride and grandeur to post-Civil War Charleston . This is not the former residence of the legendary John C. Calhoun (1782-1850). Rather, the Calhoun association with this home is in the personage of grandson Patrick, husband of Sarah Williams, who inherited the home from her parents. George Walton Williams is the man who provided the vision and wealth that produced this magnificent structure. It sits on hallowed ground, having been one of the innumerable places claiming that “George Washington slept here.” In this case, Washington visited a previous structure on this site in 1791.

The Calhoun Mansion is the largest home in Charleston , with 35 delightfully painted and adorned rooms covering over 24,000 square feet of floor space. The Victorian-era mansion includes elements of the Charleston Single House with two-story verandas (locally called “piazzas”) located along its side, yet the home retains a formal front entrance. Inside there is a towering stairwell that rises 75 feet to a dome, a sky-lighted grand ballroom, standard 14-foot ceilings with ornate molding, and a seemingly endless collection of furniture, art, and antique decorative pieces. Though the rooms may feel busy, the ornamentation is captivating when you place it in the context of its owner’s interests and the time periods being portrayed.

Should you wish to stay somewhere equally captivating during your visit, charleston luxury hotels provides a range of choices. Hopefully your surroundings will be as lush and tranquil as the Calhoun Mansion’s grounds which offer an oasis of nature’s charm and man’s ingenuity. Artfully composed pathways flow through a formal garden, fountains, statuary and sculpted greenery. It is easy to forget that you are in a residential neighborhood and feel you have been transported to another time.

Having passed through several owners after Mr. Williams’s death, the home fell into disrepair. It was condemned for occupancy but saved from destruction by a loving owner and resident, Mr. Howe, who spent 25 years and millions of dollars to restore the home in the image of Williams’s dream. We are all richer for that beneficence. In 2004, the ownership shifted to Mr. Stahl who graciously reopened the Mansion and its spectacular contents to the public.

Only a short walk away is Battery Park which looks out over Charleston Harbor toward Fort Sumter, a good destination to charter a cruise to . We must remember to be thankful for sites like Sumter and the Calhoun Mansion that serve to instruct us in our history. Charleston is a beautiful city and the Calhoun Mansion is a gem to be cherished.

He’s looking at her and she’s looking at him and that might be enough, just enough, to start things into wonder.  It rolls into wonder, and she wonders some things about him, and he wonders about her, and some of the somethings are exactly the same.  There is a life of adventure behind them as vast as the beach, and adventure before them as vast as the sea.  One holds more adventure than the other, and they are both about ready to wonder if the one they’re embarking on is less.  They will find out that their suspicions are correct, if they decide to go forward with the suspicions.

This is another story that takes place in Santa Monica hotels where the dreams from the night before turn out to be true as the day wears on, and this is the price paid for leaving adventure behind.  It’s as small as a sand dollar, but larger than anything that can be measured with the human hand.  This is the same afternoon that the smell of garlic coming from the local restaurant will remind her of a favorite Thai place, one that she has forgotten about.  She forgot because it’s been here, waiting for her all along.

This is the same afternoon the leads into the evening when he finds out that his very favorite folk musician is in the same cafe they are.  These sudden surprises should be misleading them, forecasting adventures to come, and tempting them to take this road.  But they are not mislead, and see that although these adventures are large, the next ones, the ones right around the corner are very small.  But they take it anyway, because they can see that this is like the sea, and as far as they can see, there is an immanent threat of calm, and they like the calm so much that they assume that it has something to do with taking this trip together.

A couple of years ago I visited my friend Robert in New York.  The great thing about visiting him is that each time I do, he lives in a different part of the city, and at that time he was living in Brooklyn.  He had a three story house that was rent controlled, and he had an extra room open to rent out.  I was considering a move, but wanted to go there and hang out for a little while to see if I was ready to live in such a huge city.  I really wanted to live there, as I am a painter and there is something that makes being an artist very real when you are in New York.  In my small hometown, art was seen as something of a hobby, with most people not realizing that yes, artists can make it their living, their livelihood and their world.

So, on that trip one of the first places we visited was the Brooklyn Museum.   This is one of the largest and one of the oldest art museums in the United States, and when you walk through the doors and are surrounded by everything from contemporary work to that of the ancient Egyptians, you become aware that art is history.  It is the history of the soul of the artist and it documents the history of their times, of their societies.  The truth is I was overwhelmed with a sense of belonging.  In my hometown, artists are viewed as a bit kooky, a little on the nutty side, but here in Brooklyn it is the others, the rest of the people outside of the art world that are the nutty ones.  So although I was far away from home, I had finally found my people.  This makes sense to feel this at the Brooklyn Museum, after all it is their mission, to bridge the gaps of time and culture by bring all of the together in one place.

So, after a few hours, Robert and I went to one of the restaurants in the city, and had a talk.  I was overcome with emotion when I told him that I was going to take his extra room.  I knew that I was about to make an immense journey in life, and that I was about to leave a town that I had grown up in and lived my entire life.  But even though I was getting ready to leave that hometown, I knew that what I was actually doing in moving to Brooklyn was in fact coming home.

Many people consider getting away to Los Angeles for a weekend or longer a great opportunity for fun and some relaxation. Okay, maybe not relaxation, but definitely fun. Meanwhile, having been born and raised in Los Angeles, and still living there as an adult I recently got away for the weekend and went to Irvine for a some fun, excitement, and you guessed it, relaxation. Los Angeles is a great city and full of exciting entertainment and cultural options. However, one is unlikely to get a lot of rest while visiting that city. In addition, it can be a little difficult to get a lot of rest when one lives there. This is why I stress the importance of the peace and relaxation I experienced while staying in Irvine. People like me do the same thing every year, which is why the Irvine hotels and resorts remain full throughout the seasons.

I went with my good friend Charles. The two of us try and get out of the city at least twice a year though frequently we end up making the road trip up to San Francisco because it’s also a great place for fun and exciting adventures. However, last month we only had a two days and we just needed to get away. He had a friend who is a music student at UC Irvine and mentioned a concert that the school’s symphony was putting up that weekend. It sounded interesting and we could stay with Charles’ friend Mike, which meant that the whole weekend would be kind of cheap. UC Irvine has a really high quality music program, according to Charles and Mike, I’m not a musician, and the symphony is supposed to be really terrific. Well, I might not be one to give a critical evaluation, though I can certainly said I was impressed and really enjoyed it. The concert took place in the Irvine Barclay Theatre, which was a cool place to hear and see it. The next day we spent the afternoon relaxing and enjoying tossing a Frisbee around in the park. It was a beautiful afternoon and it felt great to alternate a bit of running and lying around in the grass. It was really a great weekend.

Central Park is huge.  Unless one takes the time to wonder through slowly, or unless one is lucky enough to have a knowledgeable guide, there are many smaller sections of the park that may get missed.  One such section of the garden is the Shakespeare Garden, known to be one of the best spots in the city to stop and literally smell the roses.  One of the things about New York that so surprised me the first time I visited, was the gardens.  The gardens located in the abandoned spaces between the high rise skyscrapers, and the gardens that hung off of the fire escapes throughout the city.

This was not the concrete jungle I was expecting, it was a bunch of people living in a very small area, who valued beauty, even if was just a pot of geraniums outside the kitchen window.  Many of the parks in New York went through times of neglect and disrepair, be it whether the country was consumed with the happenings of the Second World War, or whether the people were to distracted trying to survive during the Great Depression.  By the middle of the 1970’s however, many parks got renovated, such as Washington Square Park in the East Village, and Prospect Park in Brooklyn.

So too, did the Shakespeare Garden of Central Park, start to be tended and cleaned up.  William Shakespeare wrote about many aspects of life in his prose and his plays, and this garden in the park, is dedicated to him.  Only plants and flowers that he had made mention of in his writings, are located within the garden.  Hotels are plentiful on the Upper East side, and if you are traveling to the city in the spring time, look here for those that will ensure you close access to the park, as this is a blooming time that you really do not want to miss.  Who knows, you may be able to time it in order to see a play, Shakespeare in the Park, in Shakespeare’s Garden…what a better way to celebrate the life of the beloved Bard?

My boyfriend planned the most romantic adventure for us today and not only did it really surprise me, as he’s not typically a romantic acting individual, but it was also incredibly touching because I know how much attention and thought he put into the whole thing. Anyway the day started with a phone call. He innocently and casually asked what I was doing. I had just finished doing some laundry so while that wasn’t terribly exciting that’s what I told him. Then he asked if he could stop over later and asked what I would be doing. I didn’t think anything was odd and just said it would be fine though I would be going to the store in a minute. As I walked out of my house there was a beautiful vase of roses sitting on my car with a large box of chocolates.

I had to smile and thought Paul must have called me from out there and wanted to get me to walk outside. I looked around and didn’t see him when suddenly a large plum of red and white balloons floated over my carport.
A moment later he walked around from the side of the house carrying a picnic basket and a smile.

That would have been more than enough for me as I was already so touched and pleased that I really didn’t expect anything else. However, we got into his car and headed out of town in the direction of Boulder. We met at the University of Colorado during our senior year and our first date was at a place called Frasca Food and Wine. Sure enough we pulled in to their parking lot and went in for lunch. I asked what the picnic basket was for if that’s where we were eating and he told me not to worry about it. We had a great lunch and passed by the Boulder hotel we planned to return to one day after we’re married. We went out to a beautiful country area and he threw down a blanket and we had a great conversation and enjoyed the strawberries, cheesecake and wine he had in the basket. It was really an amazing day.

Okay, I’m only 21 but I think after last summer I have much of the rest of my life planned out. No one takes me seriously when I tell them this so I’m confiding it to you though I express my plans to manifest these elements in a more relaxed fashion. It all started when I spent a week in Santa Rosa last summer with my parents. I almost didn’t even go with them because it was an incredibly busy summer for me and I had some important performance dates coming up. I’m a music performance major and will graduate next year with a degree in violin performance. I have played the violin since I was seven and don’t remember ever not loving it in the last fourteen years. Okay, that’s a lie, I have actually hated it a few times but it’s one of those love hate relationship things.

Anyway, they really wanted me to go and I was able to rearrange my schedule and I don’t think I could have done anything greater for myself that summer. We spent a week in one of the Santa Rosa hotels that was in an older section of town. It was really cool and had a nice historic feel. I absolutely fell in love with the city almost from the moment I arrived there and am one hundred percent sure that this is where I want to move when I finish school. We attended a performance of the Santa Rosa Symphony and I really enjoyed it and respect the company. Of course I would love to audition for them and earn a spot but I’ll just do some freelance performance until that happens. This is where people tell me I’m naive, but I feel like I’ll be able to make a living, at least pay my bills by doing some private teaching and also working freelance performance jobs. Meanwhile, I definitely plan to move to Santa Rosa and maybe live there for the rest of my life, who knows. It’s a beautiful city and I love it and I also believe that things will just work out fine with continued hard work and commitment.

Somedays I just want to relax and do nothing at all; some of the best days of my life, in fact, I’ve spent doing just that, often lounging on a grassy hill or under a tree in a park.  One of the best parks in which to do that might just be located in the Salt Lake Valley in Utah.  Considered a prized jewel amongst the regional parks of this valley, there’s Sugar House Park, about 110 acres of rolling greenery.  Is there an irony that this site was also the site for the old State Prison?  An area once used for incarceration is now available for public use:  There’s seven pavilions that you may reserve for groups, there’s soccer and baseball fields, regulation-sized.  Three’s a cement basketball quart that was donated by the Utah Jazz, as well as a couple of areas designed specifically for children to play, seven volleyball courts, a hill for sleigh-riding, and an amphitheater capable of holding about 220 people.  You’ll find all this in the Sugar House area in Salt Lake City, with two entrances for automobiles off 2100 South, at about 1400 East and 1500 East.

With all the things you might do here, it’s possible to forget that you can also just take a walk and enjoy the views.  In addition to everything else, there’s a park road that’s about a mile and three-eighths long.  Its sixteen foot wide inside lane is popular for walking, but also for runners or bicyclists, and, since it’s winter now, cross-country ski trainers.

I have a feeling that many people arriving in town and just hire a van or rent a car and speed on up to Park City to ski or watch films.  But these folks might one day find it worth the time to grab a hotel in Salt Lake City, and see the sights closer to town.

Growing up in Philadelphia I couldn’t help but be a sports fan. And when asked which is my favorite many people are surprised to hear that it’s baseball. I love baseball and am extremely passionate about the Phillies and growing up I would attend games at the Veteran’s Stadium, or now it’s the Citizen’s Bank Park where they play, as often as I could, which was actually pretty often. Those were always great afternoons when my best friend Bobby and I would get to head down to the stadium. My grandparents would usually give me a couple of extra dollars to get a hot dog and a soda. Bobby always wanted peanuts and only peanuts.

I’m also a big fan of the Philadelphia 76ers and basketball is probably my second favorite sport. I did get to see as many 76ers games growing up but that’s also probably because I really never made the effort. I went to a few and enjoyed them but was always my dad’s or uncle’s or somebody’s guest. I think this is also because it just seemed so easy for a couple of kids to get some cheap ball park tickets and head out to Saturday afternoon baseball game, but basketball games are usually in the evening and it just didn’t feel practical or something.

Of course sports in Philadelphia don’t end there and I always get track of the rosters and success of each season though I honestly never had the passion for something like the Eagles though how can a person not enjoy football season. And of course Philly is one of those towns that has a team in all four major sports and the Flyers are our hockey team. I was interested in the Eagles and the Flyers and always watched the football games but you have to understand you just don’t grow up in Philadelphia without becoming an Eagles fan. It’s un patriotic, you know? As far as I can tell it’s similar to what I understand about growing up in the state of Nebraska and being a Cornhusker’s fan. People from outside Philly, like in the surrounding region, will come in and stay in one of the cool places find rooms to see the games.

With coral reefs, everglades, and limestone just beneath the surface, the mysteries of Key Largo are larger than what meets the eye.  This is a place that can teach one to live in the moment, because when one is living in the here and now, one is one with all of the things in the world that celebrate oneness.  It’s wonderful to feel such oneness in Key Largo, and to enter into this world where one is always at oneness.  For places to stay in the oneness, this link can get you on your way, and the rest is adventure, and if you happen to like Bertie Higgins as much as I do, then please take some of my words as a a cautionary tale.

If you happen to fall in love, and find yourself dressed like a pirate and staying with your loved one, also dressed like a pirate, be careful when you are on a ship.  This is common sense for some, and certainly for me now, but at the time, we figured we were safe at sea, because the sea was our home, our mother, and we were her eternal orphans.  We did have it all, and we had a plan to pillage and plunder, and live off the fat of the land, along with the fat of the places we plundered.  But the stars were different than we had imagined, and the stars had far more complicated plans for us.

We were not exactly pirates in the technical sense.  We had little plastic eye patches, and she wore a plastic peg leg and folded her leg under it.  We weren’t on our own ship, but more like a cruise ship, or perhaps better to call it, a canoe.  We sang that song over and over, and talked about what we would do when we got our first booty.  We loved life so dearly back in those days, or perhaps it’s better to say, that weekend.  Spiced rum was our love potion, and spiced rum is what done her in.  It’s hard to balance in a canoe.  It’s hard, sometimes, not to fall.  I don’t know if she is still angry with me for rowing back to shore before she had a chance to surface,  but I know that she thinks about me, because people tell me that when she hears my name, she turns all the colors of the rainbow, like a parrot.

Well, sure I encouraged Paul to apply to Columbia University and thought it would be great choice for him. Meanwhile, I really only considered the quality and reputation of the theater department and the importance of his graduate degree. I really didn’t think about the reality of his life there, well and that part is great. What I mean is, and this is sort of difficult to admit because it feels selfish, but what I didn’t really consider is how much I would miss him and how I kind of wish he had never been accepted. Well, now I’ve said it, but instead of feeling better, which I thought was supposed to be the case when you admit things, I feel worse and am slightly paranoid I’ve jinxed the relationship. Too bad I didn’t think to jinx his application before he sent it off. Oops.

Well, that didn’t take long. I just got off the phone with Paul who said he really needed to speak to me about something. Unfortunately, he also said he couldn’t do it now because he had to get back to the Riverside Theater but wanted to make plans for a long conversation tomorrow. Yikes, what does he want to talk about? I think he said they were working on a production called Black Snow, but why would he want to talk to me about that? Besides, I’m kind of sick of hearing about what a great program it is and all the cool people that are in it and the great instructors there. He seems so happy. He couldn’t possibly be thinking about quitting. And I visited last October and saw the production of Lifetime Fairytale. It really is a good program, I give it that. But if he’s so happy there, dang, I don’t want to think about it. Why’d he call me to tell me he wanted to call me tomorrow? Why didn’t he just do it?

Okay, I’m back, I just called the airlines and also possible hotel reservations. They actually have good prices right now and you can find great deals here. But back to my dilemma, I thought maybe I should try and fly out tonight because I can’t top worrying about what he needs to talk about. He’s getting the MFA in Dramaturgy and expects to be finished in three years. Is he already thinking about staying in New York after he graduates? He said he was going to move back to Chicago, and come on, there are plenty of theater career opportunities here. And I’m here! This is going to drive me crazy. I have to try and get some sleep though. If I’m going to get dumped I don’t want to be sleep deprived when it happens. I gotta go, I’ll check back in tomorrow after I talk to him.

A show that I watched regularly for a few months, was “CSI Miami”, and in the opening credits the airboat careens through the swamplands with Horatio standing ever so perfect, in his suit and his shades, while the Who is blasting in the background.  One of the funnest experiences I had was when I was staying in one of the many luxury hotels Fort Lauderdale offers.  I thought that it would be bikini filled days and all night dance parties, something I was not thrilled with, but I was visiting a very good friend who had moved to the city so I was ready to “While in Rome…”.  However, he surprised me with a trip just outside of Fort Lauderdale, to the Everglade National Forest, and treated me to a high speed ride through the Everglades, on an airboat.

Not only are these rides exhilarating, but they are nature wonderlands, education mixed with excitement.  The Florida Everglades are unspoiled expanses of jungle, and swamplands, filled with creatures that for me, had existed before, only in story books and in the movies.  The natural habitat is truly one of the most beautiful and stunning in the world.  When I was young I would frequent the Phoenix Zoo, in the city I grew up in…Phoenix, Arizona.  The alligator exhibit there at once thrilled me and excited me, they were creatures so prehistoric, so powerful, and yet so still.

To see them in their natural habitat came close to blowing my mind.  Add to that the plethora of exotic birds and colorful fish just beneath the surface of the water, and I felt as though I had come to life in one of those story books of my childhood.  These animals were not part of my everyday life, I knew that they existed somewhere, and to finally be in that “somewhere” was simple breathtaking.  I spent one week in Fort Lauderdale, and I did the requisite bikini beach day, and the all night dance party, but I could not stop thinking about my trip on the airboat, careening through the Florida Everglades wearing my cool shades and being amazed at the natural world that had surrounded me.

This is going to be a great year for Indianapolis.  The city that has a midwestern heart and a cosmopolitan outlook always has something interesting and new going on.  There’s always something very exciting for the locals as well as travelers wondering what’s happening in this city.  Tourists often come to Indianapolis and find that the luxury hotels are truly world-class, and all the hospitality and style of the city are displayed here in the lodgings.  There’s a lot to enjoy in a fine hotel, but in Indianapolis, there’s a lot going on in the city as well.

This February promises to be even more exciting that normal, when Air Supply comes to Muncie.  In a time of so much 70s and 80s retro, this group often gets lost in the shuffle, being in between the decades and steadfastly refusing to belong to any.  They still record and play together, too, which means there’s never a big pr campaign for a reunion tour.  They’ve played a lot of places outside the U.S., including a show in Cuba a few years ago that drew a stunning crowd, but it didn’t necessarily make the new here.  But despite all these reasons, the long time fans from here know that we’ve been all out of Air Supply for awhile, and we really are so, so lost without you.

Thirty-five years is a long time for any band to be together, and Air Supply coming, this will be a great chance for fans from here to give Graham and Russell another listen.  They gave us some tremendous moments when we were growing up, and it was the perfect thing to hear after your love life went sour, and you found yourself thinking out loud and falling out of touch.  We’re eager to see them be exactly what we always wanted.

Traveling in Florida means never being bored by what you might see next.  You’ll find it easy to travel, just by renting a car and making some quick arrangements to to stay at very cool hotels.  The state is stacked with unusual sights and attractions, such as the Coral Castle outside Miami, a 2.2 million pound rock structure built by a single man, a Latvian immigrant named Ed Leedskalin after being jilted by his 16-year-old fiance in the first half of the 20th Century, or Dinosaur World, a park filled with 150 dinosaur replicas, in Plant City.  Two hours to the south of Miami, you may add to these, the final resting place of Flipper, the dolphin best known for its role in the 1960s television series about a park ranger, his two sons, and their dolphin.  If you’ve never heard of the show, neither its two movies and eighty episodes, nor any subsequent remakes, you may want to know you’re living well outside American popular culture. 
 
Flipper is a stage name and the dolphin was actually named Mitzi.  She lived fourteen years, from 1958 to 1972, and is buried at the Dolphin Research Center, an organization dedicated to public awareness and education about dolphins, located about two hours to the south of Miami on US1 at Grassy Key, an island in the middle of the Florida Keys.  On a regular basis, Mitzi would communicate with the ranger’s sons, disarm poachers, and laugh and walk backwards on the water on her tail; okay, the last bit she actually didn’t do.  Like most of Hollywood, a few effects are best done by others.  Mitzi had a stunt double, a male dolphin who performed the tail-walking.  Apparently, it’s a trick not every dolphin can manage, although the show would give you the impression that it’s a common activity.
 
In the 1960s, the Dolphin Research Center existed under a different name: Santini’s Porpoise School.  Here, Milton Santini, who pioneered dolphin training, was responsible for training Mitzi and was chosen to star in the original movie.  You can visit the center, which is open daily from nine a.m. to five p.m. (although it’s a wise idea to call first to make certain: 305-289-1121), in order to take a tour of the facility and pay your respects.  Just look for the dolphin statue at mile marker 59.

Everyone who is interested in the events of the Civil War need to make the trip to Gettysburg. There are plenty of quaint hotels around Gettysburg that will put you close to the site were the Battle of Gettysburg took place. The town has also put together some great museums filled with artifacts and stories to help get a good understanding of what took place in this historical city. There are plenty of tours one can take to get the most out of your experience. If you decide to go on a self guided tour then try getting a CD of the history of the area to listen to while you visit the sites. There are plenty of tour companies ready to take you on a guided tour. I am not usually one to take these sort of tours but this might be the best way to go. They have double decker buses and also tours of the Jenny Wade house. Maybe one evening you would want to try the candlelight tours of the city. What a thrill to get the haunted stories in the darkness of the night.
Make sure you add the Dobbin House Tavern to your list of places to eat. It is the most famous restaurant in town so you may want to get there early. This restaurant is the old home of Reverend Alexander Dobbin who lived there in 1776. This building has been restored to its best authenticity. From the seating and the decor to the outfits the staff wears you are sure to feel like you are back in the 1776 days. So make sure you go and eat some authentic 1776 period recipes by candle light and enjoy the ambiance.
Many of the buildings around town are original and restored. From the bed and breakfast homes to the old hotels as well as many shops and restaurants you will find yourself in many historical places that have a few stories of there own. Come and see where great men such as General Robert E Lee and Major General George Gordon Mead fought each other in this famous battle. See where President Abraham Lincoln gave his famous Gettysburg Address to the people who lived through the battle and the winning northern army.

When I lived in Los Angeles, a great night out was spent usually, at least some part of the evening, at the famous Pig and Whistle Pub in Hollywood.  That is one of the great things about the city of LA, whether you are living there or just spending time in one of the fabulous LA hotels, the boundaries of the city are hard to discern, and in one moment you will be in LA, the next moment Beverly Hills, and the next moment Santa Monica.  And for a city in the Western part of the country, LA is rich with history.

The beginning of the “Golden Era” in Hollywood, began in the 1920’s.  This was once a sleepy Southern California suburb, LA, but soon became the movie industry capital of the world.  Many people traveled from far and wide to set up studios along the now famous strip, Hollywood Boulevard.  This was a time of magnificent glamour, in the dress, in the architecture and in the life styles of the residents of Los Angeles.  It was during this time that the Pig and Whistle opened their doors, in 1927.  There is an incredible courtyard, an out door patio that is extremely serene, even given the fact that it sits in the middle of a town that is all about the hustle and the bustle.

Originally, the front door of the Pig and Whistle, was just to side of the entrance of the Egyptian Theatre, a spot where names of old such as Cary Grant, Spencer Tracy, and Clark Cable were seen attending the premieres of the their newest movies.  This is the kind of history we are talking about, the traditions and the stars of the long ago beginnings of Hollywood.  Yes, there is style and there is grace in Los Angeles, and the current incarnation of the Pig and Whistle stands testament to the that, from the hand painted tiles to the carvings along the walls and the ceilings.  Should you find yourself in Los Angeles, find your way to 6714 Hollywood Boulevard.  Grab a pint, and sit in the history, sit in the same chairs wherein the Hollywood stories began.

Michael could hardly wait to get to Steamboat Springs, Colorado. He had only been there once before and that just happened to be in the summer. The town was relatively quiet at that time and he was there because his good friend Jim invited him on a kayaking trip. He had a great time on the Yampa River and though he was a skilled kayaker, his friend Jim was much better, even in an entirely different league, Michael found out. The reached Charlie’s Hole, which Jim had assured Michael he could handle and it turned out he spent more time upside down and under the water than above it. At least he was able to make good use of his rolling skills. Meanwhile, he was so exhausted from the afternoon adventure that he just didn’t have it in him to go out to the clubs with Jim, who ended up staying out most of the night.

Michael laughed a little to himself as he remembered that trip. This time, however, he was visiting Steamboat Springs in November and not only was he a much better skier than kayaker, but he was also meeting his girlfriend Janet there instead of Jim. All of these aspects pointed to a fabulous weekend and Michael couldn’t wait to enjoy it. As soon as he arrived at one of the hotels Colorado he found Janet waiting at the fireplace in the lobby. She looked beautiful as always and the two of them wasted no time getting their gear and heading for the slops.

It was a beautiful clear and crisp afternoon and Michael felt like showing off a bit. He had never before been skiing with Janet and he was extremely confident he could make an impressive jump. She asked him not to and said it looked pretty dangerous, which only further encouraged Michael. And, as you are likely to be guessing at this point, Michael was on his way and seemingly out of nowhere another skier lost control and propelled right into Michael. They both went down and Michael ended up with a broken leg. Back at the hotel he and Janet were sitting in front of the fireplace drinking some hot chocolate when Janet joked that she would have to hit the clubs alone and Michael only considered the irony.

Marketing means a lot of effort and time put into a campaign for a company to improve and increase their visibility in a market.  Part of the way companies improve and increase business, especially in the online world, is though online reputation management.  Companies can be wrecked in a matter of hours by an angry employee or cranky customer who feels that they have been mistreated, regardless of whether or not those people have real reason to be offended or hurt or not.  The internet does not judge whether something is right or right, fair or unfair.  It judges based search engine results, good keywords, and quality content.  So while you’re company might be in the number one position for a certain keyword or grouping of keywords, it might not necessarily be for anything good.

SERPs, as search engine ranking pages are otherwise known as, have expanded in other ways too that can be damaging for a company.  YouTube and blog sites have search engines as well.  It’s not simply the old standbys people commonly think of, such as Google.  And these negative results can make a detrimental mark on any company’s online reputation and brand.  For a company that has the majority of its business online, it is vital they understand how manipulate search engines to their advantage, especially when a customer hurting their reputation has no founded reasons for trying to destroy them.

Part of what a company must do is monitor certain things online constantly. Constant vigilance is key.  Its brand, obviously, is very important to monitor, but also the company and the people who make up the company: its executives and its employees.  When searching out bad news in search engines, it’s a good idea to include other keywords in your search that are probably inflammatory, such as sucks or scammed, but will allow you to know where you stand on the internet.  Blogs and social media sites like MySpace and Facebook are prime places where customers or employees can try to take a company down.  This is all a part of online reputation management and search engine optimization services.  It helps companies to understand what problems might exist and thusly what they need to do fix them.

This was always the moment that she would be taking herself apart, her personality being dismantled before my eyes.  In some settings, it would happen in the mornings over breakfast when she, waffles in her pupils, would lead me to understand that she was no longer who she was a moment ago.  In Singapore it was always at night, and always with an exquisite attention to detail  I could never be sure if it was partly in my head, or completely an act of witnessing, free of my own perceptions.  And there was that day, that peculiar day, when I knew it would be more extraordinary than others.  Like an Italian film I can no longer remember, I woke up and she was already floating outside the window, attached to a string she had thoughtfully tied to the bedpost.

I’m not always drawn to details, but I have found a way to admire bedposts in foreign countries, and it is mornings that begin like this that remind me of why I like to travel.  One can always learn, and when there is no more to learn, a veil gets lifted and there is a new and unknown world again before your eyes.  This day would not be about any deep learning, however, because it was only the Bocelli concert that was holding the day together.  For her, something maybe, for me, only ghosts.  She was following his Asian tour, when she found the time to land, and this was an important day for her, but she wouldn’t say why.

For me, I was always caught up in numbering and counting, and I counted seconds, because it was a nervous afternoon, and before long I was counting steps to the Italian restaurant where we met our first accordion player, the one who would accompany us and make music whenever we walked anywhere else in the world.  It was over linguini with clam sauce that I realized how strong she resembled Bocelli, at least in that light, and at that moment, everything changed.  I would never again be able to think of her without seeing the Italian tenor in my mind, and I also saw, by the way she was floating out of her chair, that she was visiting a Singapore that I could never know.

Amsterdam is famous across the world for many of its contemporary cultural aspects that are either illegal or considered to be taboo in many other countries and regions. This alone draws millions of tourists to this capital of the Netherlands, though it is definitively not the most significant factors of the city. Amsterdam also has an incredibly interesting history and has many cultural attractions that relate and testify to it. The Amsterdam Stock Exchange, which is located in the city centre also happens to be the oldest in the world and serves as one of its icons. The Anne Frank House and the Van Gogh Museum are two the most popular visitor attractions in the city and many of the tourists who are staying in one of the luxury resorts or best Amsterdam hotel visit both of these landmarks during their visit.

The Anne Frank House is now a famous museum that is located on the Prinsengracht where Frank and her family once hid during the Nazi persecution surrounding the second world war. The actual hiding place of the Frank family is in the back of the building that now honors it. The purpose of the museum is to preserve the hiding place, known in Dutch as the Achterhuis, as well as to display various items related to the family and the period. The museum also serves to highlight and demonstrate all forms of discrimination and persecution.

The Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam contains the largest collection of paintings and drawings in the world from Vincent Van Gogh. The main exhibit in the museum also serves to chronicle the life and work phases of this great artist. Some of the highlights in this exhibit include one of the Sunflowers paintings, for which he is most known, as well as The Potato Eaters and Bedroom in Aries. The museum also houses extensive collections from the 19th Century.

Being able to walk through the world without fear is an important strategy for living an effective life.  It’s very likely that there are few truly useful things that fear can do for us, because it seems to be a holdover from a fight-or-flight mentality that has not been necessary since we started the first civilization.  It was perhaps a very necessary tool in the time of the saber-tooth tiger, but all too often comes in only at the most inappropriate moments, and hinders us more than it helps.  However, the instinct is still there, and of course, for anyone who’s ever lived in the world at all, that instinct is very strong.  It rises up at the first sign of conflict, no matter how slight.

There are many different practices that can help us to overcome fear, and most of these seem to suggest the same thing.  We can only get accustomed to it by learning how we respond personally, and that’s only possible in real life situation.  Sales training can be one very effective, and very useful, ways of dealing with our own responses to conflict.  Conflict here can be something as small as a minor disagreement with a co-worker, or even the first moments of the dreaded cold call.  However, by understanding certain principles, and having real experience, we can turn the thing that used to stop us into something that in fact can help us.

It’s a good thing that instincts are so strong, because they do help us to remember how we’re designed, and help us to understand how other people behave.  In taking real life situations, and practicing them in employee training, we are also giving our team a leg up in the world, so that they can be more efficient in the work place, and learn skills that transfer into the everyday world as well.  In theory, reason should be enough to overcome instinct, but perhaps we occasionally need to refresh ourselves on ways to become more reasonable.

There’s no better place for an enchanting meal, and it’s very possible to remain enchanted for as long as you’re here.  Singapore has an amazing selection of restaurants, and there is really no end to the scrumptious dishes to be sampled here.  If you’re in the mood to try something new every night for a month, then this is the place for you.  If you only like Chinese food, however, this is also the place for you.  The same could be said for so many other kinds of cuisine, whether it’s Indian, Malaysian, Japanese, Italian, and the list goes on.  Singapore’s swift rank to the top of the lists for the best places to eat has been a long time coming.

Many travelers have known for years that this is the place.  It makes perfect sense, because it’s proximity to other countries makes it peculiarly capable of bringing both the ingredients and the culinary artists with expertise to make the perfect meal.  It also happens to be close to different types of water, so that any kind of seafood is in ready, and very fresh, supply.  For every cuisine offered here, there are chefs who are adept at performing magical feats that speak to the centuries of tradition that go into the cooking, and it’s a great place to discover how things are supposed to taste.

It’s also a fabulous place for culinary innovation.  The culture at large here has a great love for anything new and modern, and they’re always looking ahead to see what the next trend might be.  This translates into some fantastic innovations in food, where the highly skilled and trained chefs need to meet the tastes of a very discerning public.  The quality is always high, and the level of fun is also extraordinary.  If you take your food seriously, or if you just happen to have a great love for the good life, you’ll find yourself right at home in Singapore restaurants.

It’s wintertime and the holiday season, which means families with fire places are going to be buying lots of wood and stoking fires — but what do you do once you’ve got the kids gathered around.  Staring at flames for two or three hours, as interesting as fire may be, still seems a bit unproductive.  But, with the right activities, a nearby cozy fire can help make an evening with the family fly by.

Telling stories around the fireplace is one of the oldest activities of human beings.  In the past, they may have been about the hunt of the day, or the movement of the sun or moon.  Often, around a camp fire, the stories are spooky; ghost stories seem to work well under settings of low light and crackling, flickering flames.  However, the joy of the holiday season may not lend itself to ghost stories.  In that case, the family could tell stories about the family.  It’s an excellent time to let children know the adventures of their parents when they were kids, reliving the more interesting or exciting times of life.  Sharing these memories (the positive ones, at least) can be a real bonding experience for a family.  Why not bring out your old photo albums and scrapbooks while everyone is gathered around the fireplace? There’s nothing more entertaining than looking at old photographs and sharing forgotten memories. This activity can help to bring you closer as a family.

I remember, too, toasting marshmallows in the fire place on untwisted wire coat hangers (although I’d be hard pressed to find wire hangers in my home today).  Still, making molasses cookies (a favorite of my father’s) or heating up some hot chocolate — essentially, bonding with food, seems like a decent way to go, as long as you’re not eating this way every night (in the past, we never thought about the calories, but today, it seems, it’s essential).

Consider card games or board games, too.  These activities are excellent ways to spend time with each other at a level on which everyone can relate, the spirit of friendly competition.  Considering how much time we spend on our computers and video games, we may find actual cards and boards a welcome break.

Time gathered around a hearth fireplace is not only a way to heat your house, but it’s also a way to warm up the relationships you have with your friends and family.

If you’re looking for an American city overflowing with history, you would certainly do well to investigate Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.  But if you wanted to move past the typical places Philadelphia is famous for — the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and so on — you should check out the Penn Museum, also known as the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, a place chock-full of exhibits about the past and present in Pennsylvania, as well as the Americas in general, and even examining worlds distant in time and place, such as the gold of ancient Troy.

Presently, this winter, there are a number of interesting materials on display.  Start with the exhibit, Fulfilling a Prophecy, which explores the past and present of the Lenape in Pennsylvania.  It discusses how most people are under the impression that all but a few elderly Lenape people had quit the state by the 19th Century; however, the truth is that many stayed secretly, and that some Lenape and Europeans married and had children in the 1700s, continuing their traditions in hiding, only now, some two hundred years, coming forward to tell the story.  The exhibit contains photographs and dolls, jewelry, ancient masks, and other art forms from the Lenape Nation of Pennsylvania.

Over in the Americas collection, amongst 300,000 objects, you may see a waterproof parka made from the throat lining of sea lions from 1905, or a Pomo basket made of quail feather, beads, shells and plant fiber, from the same year.  The Americas collection at the Penn Museum are amongst the largest, with collections that range from North and South America, in an attempt to document the history of human habitation in this region.

Other exhibits include His Golden Touch: The Gordion Drawings of Piet de Jong from the Gordion site in central Turkey; the Goodlands: Young Photographers Inspiring Hope in North Philadelphia; and Painted Metaphors: Pottery and Politics of the Ancient Maya.  It need not take a lot of money to see these exhibits; just make a reservation at a Philadelphia cheap hotel and come investigate the less traditional side of the city.

Stove for Sale the ad reads. As one reads on they get the details of how it looks and maybe how old it is and of course the price. But what is a stove really. How does it all work? Well the answer is really quite simple. There are some basic components that do certain things. Then there are the different styles that consumers can choose from so it will fit in with the rest of the home decor style. Nothing worse than spending all that time and money on new decor only to have some old green thing stilling right out in the middle of the room.

When you buy a new stove here are some things you will be getting with it. There is the hopper, which stores the wood pellets ready for burning. The auger system is what slowly moves the pellets into the flame. This is a really cool part of the design of pellet stoves because it is what keeps the owner from having to get up from his cozy chair and put on another log. It is the automation system. Then you have the burn pot or firebox. This is were the pellets get burned and the ash is stored. There are two fans usually, the combustion and convection blower fans. The combustion blower is how air is circulated into the burn pot, which the fire needs to do its job. The convection blower blows the heat out into the room for the homeowner to enjoy.

These stove and their method really do create a much better way of heating than the good old wood fed fireplaces. The fans blow the heat out into the room and it really fills it up. The fireplace doesn’t have that device to thrust the air out into the room much of the heat is lost. So give thanks to some of the inventors of the early stoves like Benjamin Franklin and James Sharp.

Baltimore has a long history of the working class.  From the beginnings of the city and those working at the port or on the ships, to those working on building the ships during both of the World Wars, to the Baltimore plumbers, electricians and police officers of today, the people in the city work hard, and so it goes that they play hard.  Not in the sense of the nightlife kind of playing, but in the sense that there are so many options when it comes to spending time away from work.

One of the most beautiful gems of the Inner Harbor is the Baltimore Aquarium. The architecture alone is one of the stunning features of the Aquarium, along with the more than six hundred and fifty species of animals.  Just about 2 million people visit each year to see the wide array of animals, 16,500, in an incredible array of exhibits and environments.  All of the staff remain dedicated to the care of the animals and to the ongoing education of the public on environmental issues.  There are two buildings that make up the aquarium and they are connected by and enclosed walkway.

One of the most popular shows is the Dolphin Show which has been an ongoing event each day, since it premiered in 1990.  In 2005 the Crystal Pavilion was an incredible addition.  This is the entrance way into the aquarium, a three story building made entirely of glass.  The Animal Planet Australia is housed in the Crystal Pavilion.  This is a great place for the entire family.  It takes about two and a half hours to make it through all the exhibits, the shows will add a bit of time to that.  And if everyone is still ready for some adventures, Harborplace, located as well at the Inner Harbor, has many more opportunities, from the shops and the restaurants to the performers on the streets.  This is where it’s at, for visitors to the city and for the families of Baltimore.

I knew that I had needed new tires for my truck for some time.  They always seemed a bit…flat, flatter than they should be.  I had two front tires with nails embedded in them, but the fact that I don’t really drive very much, kind of helped me to put it off.  But, once I really checked my tires, I realized that it was in fact, time to buy tires.  I looked at my truck’s tires each time I got into it, but I did not follow the recommendations to thoroughly inspect my tires once a month.

My under-inflated tires not only served to make them wear much faster, but affected my gas mileage too.  Although my truck was still very easy to handle, I did notice some alterations in the steering that most undoubtedly were the result of the tires not being properly inflated.  My truck never became unsafe, but for many people, this can cause some very serious consequences.   When I did have the new tires mounted, I also had the alignment checked, as I had found out on line, that just one day of driving in a vehicle that is out of alignment, can wear out the tires completely, just one day!

Some people will try to remove embedded items, which may or may not be a good idea.  I did pull on one of the nails, but heard the hiss of air.  I pushed it back in and drove very carefully to the nearest tire retail store.  When I looked at the sidewalls, I noticed that there were very worn areas, and that my tires were no longer snugly fitted to the rims.  I was nervous about getting new tires, because I had never made that purchase alone before, and was a bit nervous about my own knowledge.  But through some investigation online, I found that it is not that scary of an endeavor.  Now I do have new tires, and my mind is at ease, and my truck handles much, much better.

Dennis spent a week in Singapore last month due to an unexpected business meeting he was asked to take part in. He worked in the technological field and his company was in the major process of adding a top client. They sent Dennis as one of their top designers and asked him to prepare a presentation in a relatively short time. Dennis was a strong company oriented person with strong work ethics and a major interest in furthering his career. However, he thought of the last minute meeting, especially as it was going to occur on his daughter’s second birthday was nothing but an inconvenience and point of frustration.

That is, he thought that until he actually landed in Singapore. It seems that from the moment his plane touched down, Dennis was fascinated with the city and by the time he checked into his room at the business hotel he was in love with it. And yes, it happened just that fast and it was not the result of jet lag, which never produced this response in him. The plane had landed in the late evening and he thought the night skyline of the city, well the view of it he had while landing, was absolutely incredible and romantic. One of his first thoughts was that he wanted to bring his wife Judy there the following year.

He spent three days in extremely intense meetings and on the third day he had his big presentation. Dennis wasn’t the slightest bit nervous and just had the feeling that the entire even would go well. The next day, his fourth day there he had the entire day off and he headed straight over to the Singapore Marina, which he had heard was incredible. And it was. The views of the bay were beautiful and he had lunch in a quite little seafood café. He walked along the Esplanade and noticed some of the establishments there. At this point he was he wanted to make a return trip with Judy and he made a mental note for them to attend a production at the Theatre By the Bay, which was an Esplanade venue. He also found a great stuffed dolphin he decided to take back to his daughter.