Kiss Java

Is there anyone else still stuck in the Dinosaur Age? You know when you still had to turn on lights without clapping, press buttons to dial a phone and actually go camping in the woods if you wanted to catch sight of a bear! Technology seems to be moving at the speed of light these days. Americans have gone from digital cable to HD to 3D in just a few short years. The new 3D televisions have already hit stores! Technology has pushed special effects trying to give you the ‘real experience’. Has the day come where you no longer have to physically be outdoors to have the ‘real experience’? Not only are things so ‘real’ indoors, but there seems to be gadgets that can play music, call friends, and surf the net without even having to lift a finger!

Apple seems to be at the head of technology when it comes to everything ‘touch’. i-pad, i-phone, i-pod…… Well, if you are an everything ‘i’ fan you will be very disappointed. Apple has announced that it will postpone the release of its newest gadget . The ipad should be released in the U.S. early next month and in other countries by the end of April. What happened to the payphone? Or waiting for someone to call right at that moment they get home? Now we have GPS trackers to make sure they are going home, and 3D films that beat going to the zoo!

It is amazing that so much technology can come out of a place that is surrounded by natures undeniable beauty. Apple headquarters is located in California’s very own Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley is not only the Home of major companies such as apple and google, it is the epicenter of American Technology. The city of Fremont , located in the East Bay Area, is bursting with nice hotels and great activities in doors and out. It is also home to Lake Elizabeth and Coyote Hills regional Park where you are guaranteed a ‘real’ outdoor experience! It is also just a short drive from famous cities such as Berkeley, San Francisco, and of course, Sacramento.

While you may have seen alligators in a zoo, it’s an altogether different experience to see them in their native environment, such as the Everglades outside Miami, Florida.  In fact, Miami is one of the few places you can go and see any number of amazing things — from dolphins to sea lions, even parrots on bicycles.  In Miami, you can explore the world above the Earth and the world beneath the ocean.  It can be an ideal place for travelers with an interest in history, marine life, or nature in general.  All you need do is check into one of the many hotels that Miami offers and start planning in which direction you want to go next.  For alligators, for instance, you may like to check out the Everglades Alligator Farm.  This farm began in 1982 simply as an attraction offering airboat rides in the Everglades; however, from 1985, it’s developed into an actual operating alligator farm.

Fifteen years ago, the State of Florida allowed the farming of alligators, and this site was the first in Dade County.  When the American alligator faced extinction in the 1960s, and was on the list of endangered species, commercial farming was seen as one method to help preserve this creature and its ancient ancestry.  The alligator is one of the few animals on Earth that have been around for two hundred million years.  When you see one, you’re looking into the ancient past, well before humans appeared on the planet, and into the time of dinosaurs.  An adult alligator weighs in at around eight hundred pounds and may be thirteen feet long, although they have been known to be much larger, although nowhere near the thirty-eight foot size that some monster movies from the 1980s, such as John Sayles’ Alligator would suggest.  The largest alligator on record is an inch under seventeen and a half feet long; although if you check with the Florida Fish and Wildlife conservation Commission, the state record length is established as just under fifteen feet long.

If you go to the Everglades Alligator Farm, you’ll find nearly two thousand alligators, of various sizes, and other wildlife from the Everglades, including crocodiles and caimans, the latter of which may be defined as a crocodilian type of reptile.  If you want to stay closer to town, you may still see a great deal of wildlife, just by going to the beach, where you may find sea lions and manatees and dolphins; although, if they don’t appear, check out the Miami Seaquarium.

It’s always been a hot ticket to get a seat at Late Night with David Letterman, because many people just like the idea of it.  It seems interesting, there have to be some celebrities there, and there will certainly be some unexpected things, all of which can give a solid New York experience.  There are great hotels here to begin this interesting journey, and even if there’s no seats at Late Night, there’s a lot that awaits a guest here.  One of the truly interesting things about New York is that, considering the amount of people and the small space, it’s so well run.  Another interesting thing is to watch for breaks in the patterns of everyday reality.

They are actually very frequent, which is another testament to the city’s resilience, because there are plenty of creative minds here that are looking to change reality as we know it in some significant way, something that people will remember.  One of the greats in this regard, in terms of numbers of people influenced, is Andy Kaufman.  In his absence, the only other person who comes close, and may ultimately top him for weirdness, is Crispin Glover.  Most people think of this star of Back to the Future, and god-daddy of grunge, as a West coast kid, but he’s a New Yorker through and through, born here in 1964.

It’s true that he has lived in L.A. since he was five, but it’s hard to get the concrete out of the cells if that’s where you were born.   His life has been a rather spectacular series of performances, which sometimes seem to be a cover for a private life that’s twice as interesting as the public one appears to be.  It’s difficult for some of us, of a certain generation, to forget his appearance on Letterman, because it suggested that everything was about to get much much weirder than we had imagined.

Well you can find fantastic hotels of great luxury all over Virginia including on this site www.virginialuxuryhotels.com. This is a state you could spend a lot of time in and never see all the history associated with it. There are some specific sights to see that would cover a lot of the history like a trip to Mount Vernon, home of George Washington. This is one place that seems to grow all the time. The exhibits get better as time goes on and the experience is even richer. They have collected up items from all over the east coast that belonged to the Washington’s and brought them back to the home they started in. Some how things like fine art, books and manuscripts that belonged to the Washington’s were taken away from the home and for the past 150 years there have been people collecting them up and bringing them back.

At Mount Vernon you can learn all sorts of public and private details of George Washington and his lovely wife Martha Washington. They had quite a life together and so much of it has be recaptured here on this 8,000 acre plantation that is divided into 5 different farms. Each farm had it own workforce, overseer, livestock, equipment and buildings. The Washington’s lived in the Mansion House Farm which is were visitors visit today. Washington designed and landscaped the property with specific ideals in mind and he created a beautiful country gentlemen style home. All of the grounds have been maintained for a hundred and fifty years so that visitors could come and see the grandeur of the place where their first president lived. All the little details of the place are really impressive. Not to bring up a dirty subject but the Necessary aka Toilet room is rather interesting and built with awareness of the sanitation on the property. It is all a must see really.

I have been hearing about Hawaii and it’s wonderful beaches for years, but I never imagined just how much fun it could be. It started with my mother who thinks I’m a workaholic and don’t take any vacation time. The fact that I haven’t taken a days vacation in almost four years probably didn’t help. The morning I got the call from my mom, I didn’t know what I was getting into. She was getting married and wanted me to take three weeks off and go on a Hawaiian cruise with her. Around the middle of the first week, at a stop in Hilo, would be the wedding ceremony. After that she said she didn’t care if I jumped ship and stayed on one of the islands, or if I stayed on the cruise liner and enjoyed the amazing ride I simply was not allowed to go back to work.

I must admit, I was not as excited about this as I should have been, but none the less it was my mom’s second wedding and she was paying for the cruise. Who would have known that it could be so much fun, or for that matter that there are so many activities in Hawaii I’ve never tried before. The day after the wedding we made a stop in Lahaina where I found a little shop that rented body boards, they also had a sign with the times they taught body boarding to tourists. I’m not all that adventurous, but this whole thing was beyond where I would normally be, so I signed up for the next class starting in fifteen minutes and I rented a board. You would think that this would somehow be safer than surfing, but I think I fell on my face no less than three times and on my butt at least five before getting it right regularly. It is actually pretty hard to learn. You have to find the perfect waters and jump on a moving board.

When we got to Honalulu there was a giant festival going on, complete with parades and national dance groups. The dancers were amazing, performing some of the traditional dances for native Hawaiians and they had an all day Luau going on. I did get away for a little bit and do some scuba diving. It was nice because most of the people were at the Festival and I got some personal attention. I suppose all in all, it was not such a bad thing. Maybe I’ll go on more hawaii cruises in the future.

There’s nothing like a Grateful Dead concert.  Except for maybe a Phish concert.  Or even maybe a parking lot that’s filled with hippies selling things to you because they’re trying to get money for gas to get home.  But there’s nothing like the shows on the east coast, and there’s nothing like the shows on the west coast, and actually the east coast shows were always so very different from the ones in California.  Today, you can’t exactly head to New York and stay with friends, and see the Dead play, but you can certainly find a great hotel, and hear one of the splinter bands playing out.  Fortunately, a few of the members are still hungry enough to play in many different projects, and we get to see the results of their endless creativity.

But it was very different back in the days when there was wine and roses, and bones and roses.  There was a day when roommates would put Steal Your Face stickers on the front of your guitar, and you’d just laugh, because the world was a safe place.  Even in New York, there was a sense that all of this was somehow all working out exactly the way it supposed to.  There may have been a palpably different vibe to it for the west coast Deads, and it may have been darker and more aggressive, but we didn’t notice.

There’s also that strange thing that works amongst the ones in the know, where we could notice that there’s an outward aura that showed up the differences.  They were easier to be with, and easier to convince to do things we didn’t want to do.  We dressed a little differently.  We were colder and they were warmer.  But get us all talking together, and after awhile all of this would dissolve, and all we were was a bond, a bond by a common love, and some common experiences that are too difficult to put into words.

If you’ve never been to New York City before, the most you might know about the New York Pubic Library is what you gleamed from watching the 1981 comedy classic Ghostbusters.  In that film, three intrepid ghost hunters enter the library in search of poltergeists, books fly off shelves, people run, and the actors end up in a lot of protoplasmic slime.  If you’re traveling to New York, though, you’ll want to visit this famous building (and its books) — just don’t expect the ghosts to show.

You’ll find this grand library in Midtown, on Fifth Avenue between 40th and 42nd Street.  Millions each year come through these doors and about 1.8 million people carry New York library cards.  The library was built in the early part of the Twentieth Century, the cornerstone laid in 1902 and the doors opened to the public in 1911.  In the intervening nine years, architects planned, for its time, the largest marble Beaux Arts building ever tried in the United States.  The building cost nine million dollars.  That’s nine million dollars in the early part of the Twentieth Century.   The famed lion statues that sit outside the museum are made from pink Tennessee marble, which I presume came out of Knoxville (also known as the Marble City).  On that first day in 1911, if you hate crowds, you may not have wished to check out a book: Fifty thousand visitors arrived for the library’s first day of business.

Today, the library’s size is diverse holdings make this one of the best and most-praised libraries on the planet.  There are collection here in the tens of millions, and a few of the holdings are absolutely priceless in their historical value, such as a copy of the Gutenberg Bible and an actual manuscript copy of Thomas Jefferson’s first tries at would would later become known as The Declaration of Independence.  If I were traveling to New York, I’d first arrange for a suite, then head on over to the library and get some reading done!

Dallas is a wonderful city to visit.  There are plenty of opportunities to investigate interesting attractions, and plenty of things to do.  Those who like to plan everything in advance will find that the city has a lot to offer, with plenty of recommendations.  Those who like to go somewhere new, and follow their nose, will likewise find a lot to explore.  Dallas has plenty of hotels that can suit any taste and offer a remarkable hospitality that has tremendous cosmopolitan grace with a touch of Southern charm.  The city has changed remarkably in the past few decades, and has become a very lively urban center, with plenty of options for global explorers looking for adventure.

It’s a city of multiple cultures, and like all of these urban centers, also a place with many subcultures.  These are fascinating to navigate, and some are impossible to find, and there are many most people will be happier to skip altogether.  However, the culture of artists here is very much alive and well, and worth looking into.  The art culture also has subcultures, and for those looking for digital video work, Dallas has good news.  There are artists working in new media here, and it’s becoming a rather vibrant place to discover the digital.  Carola Dreidemie is one whose work is worth looking for.

She comes from Buenos Aires, and has lived in many places around the world before setting for now in Denton.  Her work has been shown in many different gallery spaces, with concentrations in Texas, across the border in México, and in Latin America.  Her work is complex, with textures and layers masterfully constructed to make video work that speaks to memory and forgetting.  The images are evocative and iconic, and pull you in to another universe that is very closely related to this one.  Deep moral and philosophical questions live in this margin, and there are no answers but only possibilities for a contemplation that hints at liberation.

The city of Boston has many different neighborhoods, each with their own flavor and personality.  One of those is the neighborhood of Cambridge which is located just along the banks of the Charles River.  This area, which is true for all of the various areas in the city, is filled with old world charm and beauty, mixed with some of the finest museums and educational institutions in the world.  Many throughout the world are familiar with Cambridge due to the fact that it is home to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Harvard University.

This holds with the theme of the entire city, a theme that is mixed with traditions and history, and modern cutting edge ideas.  This is one of the most culturally mixed neighborhoods of the city, combing students from around the globe, scientists and artists, writers and restaurant workers.  It is the heart of a city, that is the heart of the country.  While visiting this neighborhood one will find a variety of restaurants, shops, historical government buildings, book stores and hotels.  Great hotels for this district can be found at www.bostonhotel.net, which will put one in the center of it all.

The neighborhood is divided into five districts.  Porter, Kendall, Inman, Harvard and Central.  If Japanese food is what one fancies, then head to the Porter district,  which supports the largest number of shops and Japanese restaurants in the region.  Kendall Square is home to MIT, and thus, home to biotechnology and high tech industry.  The Inman district is home to many shops and unique restaurants.  Harvard Square as well, is home to shops and restaurants, a variety of choices for night life fun, and of course to the university of Harvard.  And finally, for a look at the seat of the government of Boston, Central Square is where this is located.  In all, there is much to see and experience in the entire city, but one must find their way to Cambridge, if just for one day.

My first morning in the Big Apple was spent sleeping off a hang-over, not very exciting, but a necessity. But, from then on, things got much better during my weeks stay and I hardly saw my bed at one of the better New York small hotels. 
 
I got in quite a lot of culture, mostly Broadway shows, like ‘Billy Elliot’, ‘Hair’, ‘The Lion King’ and ‘Mary Poppins’. I wish I was here in the summertime so I could see ‘Shakespeare in the Park in Central Park. I’ve heard many wonderful things about it, I’m not a big Shakespeare fan, but I think seeing any of his plays performed by famous people would make me want to see more.
 
I went to the Comic Strip where I got to see Collin Quinn and Dane Cook, I never laughed so hard. Then another night I went to a concert at Lincoln Center and saw Marianne Faithfull. It’s the Centers 50 anniversary, so it was the best time to be there.
 
I took a trip to the Guggenheim and the Empire State Building, shopped at Macy’s and took a walking tour of Greenwich Village all in one day. All in another day, took a trip on the Staten Island Ferry, took a walk through Central Park, visited Harlem, then traveled down to Soho and on to the meat-packing district.
 
I love New York and I could easily live here. It’s so perfect for me, but so of it’s not so perfect, the cost of living here, way out of my league. However, I’m so glad I can afford to visit here an get my fill of culture.
 
My last day, I had a lovely lunch at the Madison Square Park and my last evening I clubbed it at the Pink Elephant, which on my flight back to the UK I was once again nursing a hang-over.