If you ever find yourself in south-central Nevada with a day to spare, you could impress your friends with stories of your drive along the Extraterrestrial Highway. Here’s my version of an impressive tale. I hope to read yours soon. It all begins in a small town called Caliente in central Nevada, about 240km north of Las Vegas. I think…
A few gratuities for Brand USA
I see President Obama’s plan to increase selective tourism to the USA is about to commence next month with the launch of a marketing campaign called Brand USA, according to this recent New York Times article. The objective of the Brand USA campaign is to stimulate inbound tourism to the states from a select bunch of countries. According to the NY…
Restaurant Lapérouse
Restaurant Lapérouse – History Four years before Captain James Cook bumped into the eastern coastline of terra australis in 1770, a bloke by the name of Lefévre, purveyor of alcoholic beverages to king Louis XIV of France, purchased a grand Parisian townhouse on the left bank of the river Seine and converted it into a bar, wineshop and eatery. The precise…
Doing the Mâconnais
Four hundred km south of Paris and 75km north of Lyon, the small city of Mâcon on the west bank of the river Saóne is the southernmost outpost of the French region of Bourgogne (Burgundy) and the capital of the department Saóne-et-Loire. A population of 35,000 swelled by two recently when we sat in a cafe on Esplanade Lamartine to…
The Pisco King
Meet Johnny Schuler, Peruvian restaurateur, celebrity chef, tv personality, master distiller and Medal of Honour winner for his work in promoting the uniquely Latin American spirit, Pisco. We bumped into Johnny one freezing Friday over lunch in The Plaza Food Hall by Todd English when we stepped in from the cold to enter the Plaza Hotel in our dining ‘brag book’. We’d…
Mulholland Muddle
I’m not a big fan of Los Angeles. To me, the conurbation is a large collection of villages connected by a lacework of freeways with very little attractiveness or interest in between. This often presents a dilemma as sometimes we’re in LA on a stopover with time to explore the Greater LA area, but no hire car. Other times we…
The Art of Modern Restaurant Dining
Six months ago Michelle and I had dinner at The Modern – the flagship restaurant of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City. It was a day, pretty much like any other, if your typical day includes… A 90 minute haircut resulting in a tonsorial crop shorter than your typical marine grunt. Or … Getting married in…
Acquisitions & Takeovers
Apropos of nothing at all, we bought a new bed a couple of weeks ago. The previous fun palace had given up the ghost after nigh on 20 years of service useage, and we agreed months ago that it was time to upgrade. We decided (on zero medical or scientific grounds, it must be said) to postpone the acquisition til…
A cat with schadenfreude
I live in an apartment on a major arterial route in Stonnington; an inner-city suburb of Melbourne, with my wife and fur-kid Macchiato. A tram passes our door, which means that, during peak hours, the road is designated a clearway and parking is forbidden so that traffic flows as smoothly as possible and trams can (theoretically) pass unimpeded. The afternoon no-parking…
114 Reasons Why I Love Nigella
Every second of this juicy piece of editing