Read my wife Heidi's fabulouos account of Miami before we lived here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2010/jan/12/my-crap-holiday-miami
My crap holiday
Murder, mayhem and mutiny in Miami
A dozen years ago, my husband and I were winter-weary Ohioans on a trip to sunny Miami. It all began to go horribly wrong just before our plane arrived in the Magic City. The flight attendant asked me if I could walk down a flight of steps. As a wheelchair user with a severe – and very obvious – disability, this was not an option. Upon landing, the other passengers got off while we waited 45 minutes for the airline to bring a rickety lift. On the tarmac, we waited another 45 minutes for a wheelchair-accessible van to take us to the terminal. Repeated pleas to airline employees to have someone secure our bags until we arrived to collect them were met with disinterested stares. We finally got to baggage claim and our bags were nowhere to be found.
Our week's itinerary included a job interview for my husband and our wardrobe now consisted of the clothes on our backs and undergarments in a small carry-on. After two nights, we changed hotels, wanting to experience different parts of the area. This new hotel was a lovely South Beach Art Deco property. But we hadn't anticipated the all-night dance party just outside our window. My husband managed just a couple of hours' sleep before his interview.
Each day I called the airline about our bags and was told they'd not yet been found. I gave up by the fourth day when a creepy airline rep began telling me about his young daughter's murder.
The last two nights we had booked another South Beach hotel, this one quieter but much more careworn. Our final night, we were woken at 1am by the fire alarm. The two employees on duty insisted it was a false alarm. After the alarm went off two more times, we and our fellow guests were near mutiny. The final straw was when the fire department arrived, and hotel staff tried to keep them from entering the building. We packed our things and high-tailed it to the airport, sleeping overnight in the terminal.
After we arrived home (our luggage was finally returned to us after a month), we reported the hotel for code violations. A few days later, the hotel manager left a message on our home answering machine, advising us to "watch our ******* backs".
Heidi Johnson-Wright, Miami
Sunday, March 21, 2010
Friday, March 19, 2010
Support tax credit for Pet Care -- www.thepetitionsite.com/2/petcarepetition
Please join me in supporting the Humanity And Pets Partnered through the Years (HAPPY) Act -- House Resolution 3501 -- 2013 which would create an income tax deduction of up to $3,500 per year for qualified pet care expenses. Go to: www.thepetitionsite.com/2/petcarepetition
Pets keep us happy, healthy and motivated in these difficult times.
But pet care can be very expensive and very hard on a working family’s budget in this bad economy. This income tax credit could help reduce the burden of providing needed health care to the beautiful creatures that give us unconditional love.
According to the 2007-2008 National Pet Owners Survey, 63 percent of United States households own a pet and the human-animal bond has been shown to have positive effects upon people's emotional and physical well-being.
I saw the staggering cost of pet care first hand when we adopted an indigent neighbor’s dog to try to save her life.
We ran up more than $1,000 in veterinarian bills in a couple days – trying to help the suffering 11-year-old pet.
Puchy, a Chihuahua mix, unfortunately lost her fight for life – but I would like to dedicate the pet care income tax credit as a living memory of her gentle soul.
Friday, March 12, 2010
Chicas del Rock web project shows off work of emerging Colombian Artist Maria Jose Correa Gonzalez
Check out http://www.chicasdelrock.blogspot.com
It links to emerging Colombian artist Maria Jose Correa Gonzalez's black and white and color takes on influential women of rock n roll during the past few decades.
The site is en espanol (it's good for you to learn some Spanish...and of course you can figure out the art without the intros in Spanish.
Speaking of the art, I supposed a few portraits are R-rated (if you're a total prude), but heck, rock isn't exactly G-rated either, is it?
While traveling through Colombia, I had the privilege of meeting Maria at L'Etoile (the most atmospheric cafe in a land of intriguing cafes and shops in La Candelaria, Bogota's old city).
She is a young bohemian and art school grad. inspired by an amazing range of music (many of her favorite artists were dead before she was born) spanning from old Bluesmen to Jazzmen to new Wave, 80s, etc.
My fellow native Ohioans, Chrissie Hynde and Kim Deal, show up in chicas del rock. Check out the stuff and get in on the ground floor.
Don't you wish you'd have been able to buy a Joan Miro or a Wifredo Lam back before they became legends? Well, check out http://www.chicasdelrock.blogspot.com
Strike up a friendship with Maria Jose Correa Gonzalez and acquire some artwork before she's as famous (and pricey) as Botero.
It links to emerging Colombian artist Maria Jose Correa Gonzalez's black and white and color takes on influential women of rock n roll during the past few decades.
The site is en espanol (it's good for you to learn some Spanish...and of course you can figure out the art without the intros in Spanish.
Speaking of the art, I supposed a few portraits are R-rated (if you're a total prude), but heck, rock isn't exactly G-rated either, is it?
While traveling through Colombia, I had the privilege of meeting Maria at L'Etoile (the most atmospheric cafe in a land of intriguing cafes and shops in La Candelaria, Bogota's old city).
She is a young bohemian and art school grad. inspired by an amazing range of music (many of her favorite artists were dead before she was born) spanning from old Bluesmen to Jazzmen to new Wave, 80s, etc.
My fellow native Ohioans, Chrissie Hynde and Kim Deal, show up in chicas del rock. Check out the stuff and get in on the ground floor.
Don't you wish you'd have been able to buy a Joan Miro or a Wifredo Lam back before they became legends? Well, check out http://www.chicasdelrock.blogspot.com
Strike up a friendship with Maria Jose Correa Gonzalez and acquire some artwork before she's as famous (and pricey) as Botero.
L'Etoile is the most atmospheric place in all of Bogota -- a city of intrigue and atmosphere
La Candelaria is the place to stay and roam in Bogota and L'Etoile is the place to pop in for coffee, crepes, beer, great music, art and a fabulous owner, Diana.
Anyone who has been to Bogota knows that most every day, there is a period when the sun is blotted out by haze, then mist, then rain. You can't take pictures in that ugly light and it's not much fun dashing about in chilly rain, so figure on waiting for the sun to come back while hanging out in L'Etoile.
The menu is simple -- some dessert crepes, some ham and cheese crepes, a few other snacks a veggie burger and some additions on the way.
This is not a place for a 5-course meal, this is a place to snack on crepes while enjoying fabulous coffee, or hot chocolate, warmed wine or maybe a simple beer from the bottle.
The reason you come here is the atmosphere. You don't come to Bogota for a French cafe any more than you go to Paris for arepas, but L'Etoile is worth a midday visit and an evening stop off every day.
I was drawn in, while it was perfectly nice out for pictures, by the music -- everything from Billie Holiday to Austin Powers-style fun jazz to new wave to 80s (thing Depeche Mode) to blues plus Big Brother and the Holding Company.
The music is programmed by Maria, a young artist who has musical taste and knowledge far beyond her years. She also is super-fluent in English for those of us gringos who travel to practice our Espanol, but don't mind a free-flowing chat en ingles now and then.
Diana, an actress, artist and dark-haired beauty, sets the perfect tone in her gem of a hole-in-the-wall cafe. L'Etoile is filled with art. The upstairs has cool neon and more art.
The downstairs is cozy, funky, eclectic and blessed with lovely little bar and a perfect little table right on a big window that opens onto the never-ending streetlife in La Candelaria.
The location is perfect too -- a few blocks at the most from busy Plaza Bolivar, Plaza Santander, the best museums and the majority of the accommodations for funky youth hostels to cozy inns that offer upscale service for less than $100 per night.
Speaking of stretching the dollar, L'Etoile is dirt cheap...not in quality, but in prices. My beers, cafe and hot chocolate were less than 2 bucks. The crepes and snacks don't cost much more.
In the afternoon, it is low key, with the music turned down a bit to accommodate the conversations of the wanderers who step in and fall in love with Diana, Maria and L'Etoile.
During my short visit, I saw a man dressed in Moorish garb, had a soul-searching conversation with a Jewish man of great faith and joined conversations in Spanish/English with folks of African, indigenous Colombia and European descent.
They never rush you at L'Etoile and they certainly will engage you in talk about travel, art, the local culture scene, literature and all the things that make life worth living when shared with food, drink and two of the loveliest women in all of Bogota, if not Colombia.
Carrera 4, No. 13-57, Bogota, Colombia www.letoilecafebar.es.tl/
Anyone who has been to Bogota knows that most every day, there is a period when the sun is blotted out by haze, then mist, then rain. You can't take pictures in that ugly light and it's not much fun dashing about in chilly rain, so figure on waiting for the sun to come back while hanging out in L'Etoile.
The menu is simple -- some dessert crepes, some ham and cheese crepes, a few other snacks a veggie burger and some additions on the way.
This is not a place for a 5-course meal, this is a place to snack on crepes while enjoying fabulous coffee, or hot chocolate, warmed wine or maybe a simple beer from the bottle.
The reason you come here is the atmosphere. You don't come to Bogota for a French cafe any more than you go to Paris for arepas, but L'Etoile is worth a midday visit and an evening stop off every day.
I was drawn in, while it was perfectly nice out for pictures, by the music -- everything from Billie Holiday to Austin Powers-style fun jazz to new wave to 80s (thing Depeche Mode) to blues plus Big Brother and the Holding Company.
The music is programmed by Maria, a young artist who has musical taste and knowledge far beyond her years. She also is super-fluent in English for those of us gringos who travel to practice our Espanol, but don't mind a free-flowing chat en ingles now and then.
Diana, an actress, artist and dark-haired beauty, sets the perfect tone in her gem of a hole-in-the-wall cafe. L'Etoile is filled with art. The upstairs has cool neon and more art.
The downstairs is cozy, funky, eclectic and blessed with lovely little bar and a perfect little table right on a big window that opens onto the never-ending streetlife in La Candelaria.
The location is perfect too -- a few blocks at the most from busy Plaza Bolivar, Plaza Santander, the best museums and the majority of the accommodations for funky youth hostels to cozy inns that offer upscale service for less than $100 per night.
Speaking of stretching the dollar, L'Etoile is dirt cheap...not in quality, but in prices. My beers, cafe and hot chocolate were less than 2 bucks. The crepes and snacks don't cost much more.
In the afternoon, it is low key, with the music turned down a bit to accommodate the conversations of the wanderers who step in and fall in love with Diana, Maria and L'Etoile.
During my short visit, I saw a man dressed in Moorish garb, had a soul-searching conversation with a Jewish man of great faith and joined conversations in Spanish/English with folks of African, indigenous Colombia and European descent.
They never rush you at L'Etoile and they certainly will engage you in talk about travel, art, the local culture scene, literature and all the things that make life worth living when shared with food, drink and two of the loveliest women in all of Bogota, if not Colombia.
Carrera 4, No. 13-57, Bogota, Colombia www.letoilecafebar.es.tl/
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Social Media
Visit Steve Wright Communications, Inc. at Twitter: SWCOMMUNICATION and FACEBOOK:
STEVE WRIGHT COMMUNICATIONS
STEVE WRIGHT COMMUNICATIONS
Public Involvemet Communications
Steve Wright Communications, Inc. is proud to be affiliated with The Cunningham Group as a consulting Marketing and PR Specialist. http://www.thecunninghamgroup.com/index.php?page=member_details&memberId=18
La Candelaria Bogota Colombia
Steve Wright Communications invites you to visit Steve's gallery of La Candelaria Bogota Colombia at http://stevewright.shutterfly.com/1385
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
