As we’re entering the summer travel season, the subject of vacation is sure to crop up in conversation: at dinner parties, at the office, at a business lunch. Wouldn’t it be nice not to bore everyone to tears? Why yes, it would. A few years back, I wrote a story about how to tell a [...]
Archive for the ‘Subjects of Curiosity’ Category
How to Tell a Vacation Story (Without Putting Everyone to Sleep)
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, Daybook, On Places & Travel, On Teaching on May 18, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Rilke’s Failures and the Importance of Thinking Big
Posted in On Teaching, On Writing and The Media on April 17, 2012 | 1 Comment »
“There is only one way. Withdraw into yourself. Explore the reasons that bid you write, find out if it has spread out its roots in the very depths of our heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if writing was denied to you. Above all, ask yourself in the stillest hour of [...]
Chekhov is Homesick – Perceptive Travel/USA Today
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, On History, Travel to Europe on April 6, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Midway through Anton Chekhov’s first trip to Western Europe, after he’d been blown away by Venice, pictured above, he started to get a case of homesickness. I immediately recognized this as “that mid-trip feeling”. “I’ve seen everything and dragged myself everywhere I was ordered,” Chekhov wrote in a letter home. “When I was offered something [...]
Chicago Hotel Stories – About.com
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, On Places & Travel, United States Travel on April 6, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Most travelers book one hotel per destination and stick with it. It’s certainly easier not to change hotels each night, but writers don’t always get to make the easy choices. (I know, I know, your tears of sympathy would fill Lake Michigan.) I stayed at three different hotels on my recent trip to Chicago. All [...]
The Joys of Chinglish – Perceptive Travel/USA Today
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, Asia Travel, On Places & Travel on March 15, 2012 | 1 Comment »
The small print says this: Welcome you to visit Mutianyu Great Wall. For your and others’ security, Please pay attention to the following items: 1. Please don’t carve arbitrarily on the Great Wall. Protect one brick and one stone consciously. 2. For your personal safety, Please don’t climb crenelated wall. 3. Please walk carefully on [...]
Is Travel Narrative Bullshit?
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, On Culture & Trends, On Places & Travel, On Writing and The Media, United States Travel on March 5, 2012 | 2 Comments »
Las Vegas, as a city, has long been a reliable creative irritant to the sensibilities of travel writers who work in a genre called “literary”, “narrative”, “nonfiction-creative”. The city’s shiny surfaces candy-shell over a variety of social cankers, plus real people live their lives there, and any of these conditions alone, or all of them [...]
Eat, Drink, Smoke in Denver – About.com
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, On Food & Drink, On Places & Travel, United States Travel on March 3, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
A new feature package on About.com which covers eating, dining and eating your smoke in Colorado: Craft Beer in Denver Denver Dining Picks Marijuana Edibles in Denver The Cruise Room at The Oxford Hotel Food Festivals in Colorado Ski Country The Westin Riverfront Resort & Spa in Beaver Creek
Of Essay Writing and Myth Making
Posted in Daybook, On Writing and The Media on February 3, 2012 | 1 Comment »
For an essay in progress, I’m reading A Short History of Myth by Karen Armstrong. She writes about myth, as in the ancient stories told to explain the human experience and its meaning, and not myth, as it is commonly used today as a synonym for “lie”. It’s striking me that literary essays and myths [...]
Canadian Honey — About.com
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, Canada Travel, On Food & Drink, On Places & Travel on February 3, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Honey, slowly spooned into a bar glass — could there be anything quite so lovely? From my perch at the pounded metal bar at TOCA at the Ritz Carlton, I could not think of a serious competitor for the beauty of that backlit pale amber syrup. While the smartly dressed clinched their coats and whooshed [...]
Hawaii – About.com, Perceptive Travel
Posted in Alison's Portfolio, On Places & Travel, Travel to Islands, United States Travel on February 1, 2012 | Leave a Comment »
Sunset from the cottages at Travaasa, Hana, Maui, Hawaii, the Pacific Ocean, the United States. This was the last trip of 2011 for me, and it was a very good one. Many more stories are coming from this trip — in the works, a story of a mule that hated me, and a love affair [...]
