Retoxing and Detoxing in Las Vegas: TheStreet.com, 1/27/09

Based on intensive first-hand research, herewith are my suggestions for the best places to get a cocktail in Sin City, and the best spas at which you can wash away those sins.

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Bad Trip#2: When Javelinas Attack

I had never seen a javelina before this fine October morning, captured with my BlackBerry camera.
I was staying at the Boulders resort in Scottsdale, Arizona, whose guest rooms are spread out over the property’s 1300 acres in the Sonoran desert. As I stepped out my door,  I spotted another guest, a woman of a certain [...]

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Obama Can Save Women’s Lives –This Afternoon

I’m already covered in goose bumps anticipating the inauguration of Barack Obama later today, but there’s something else that I’m looking forward to more: the expected reversal of what’s known as the Global Gag Rule, also known as the Mexico City Policy.
Conceived of during the Regan administration, the Global Gag Rule prohibits US tax dollars [...]

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My Chinese Love Affair

There’s one of those memes going around on Facebook right now called “25 Things You Don’t Know About Me”, in which you’re supposed to list, well, 25 little known facts about yourself. I’ve been tagged but haven’t participated because I over think things: I don’t know who knows what about me, and the mental macrame [...]

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Why Magazines Suck–The Huffington Post 1/16/09

Here’s a little blog post/essay/catharisis that is also my analysis of what’s wrong with magazines today.

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The Proper Way to Taste Chocolate

Last summer, on a trip to research a food story in Portland, Oregon (did you know that it’s a city that makes your jeans shrink? ) one of my stops was at Cacao, where I learned the proper way to taste chocolate.
Just as you don’t chug down wine to properly taste it,  you also don’t [...]

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Bad Trip: Traveling in a Dangerous World

As I’ve mentioned before, several times, I have a morbid fascination with the things that go wrong –and I mean, really wrong –while traveling.  On a practical level,  I think it’s good to be aware of risks and hazards, even though I firmly believe that these are NOT reasons to stay at home. Bad things [...]

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Ice and Snow International Sculpture Festival in Harbin, China

One of the places that’s very high on my list to visit is Harbin, China. It’s in the very north of the country, has a heavy Russian influence, and in recent years has  apparently become a hot (so to speak) winter resort destination for said Russians.
Its best known for its Ice & Snow International Sculpture [...]

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I’m Interviewed on The Golden Pencil

Last week, Jenny Cromie, of the highly useful blog The Golden Pencil, interviewed me for her “Successful Freelancer Spotlight”.
This is a nice extension to my bio, I think, so I’ll be adding a link to the interview there as well. Speaking of “well”, well, I can see in this interview that I use that [...]

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The Jewish Pirate of Barbados?

I’m waiting in the airport in Barbados to fly home, but I thought this was pretty funny.
I spent some time yesterday at the Nidhe Israel Museum, Synagogue, cemetery and archaeological site in Bridgetown, for an upcoming story. Michael Stoner, the archaeologist on the site, told me that ever since Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean by [...]

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