A Curious Mind

Silverjet Folds, Mass Luxury Finished? --The Huffington Post, 5/30/08

The all-business class airline Silverjet folded today, provoking these thoughts from me on the demise of "mass luxury" for the Huffington Post.

A bit more info for those geekily and freakily interested in income statistics. When I was Editor-at -Large at the late, lamented American Demographics magazine, one of the side benefits was the uncanny nerdy ability to spout statistics about the US population. It's a skill I no longer have, alas, which I believe makes me less fun to have at cocktail parties.

If I thought people were engaging in too much self pity over not having a housekeeper or a new car, I liked to break out my favorite downer stat: how little money most Americans live on. I think most people of a certain socioeconomic group assume that most two-income households easily crack $50,000 a year, but, that's not true: median income today is well shy of $49,000. And because I have always either lived or spent a lot of time in New York City, I was often assured that these rules simply didn’t apply to New York where everyone simply had to earn more just to survive.

Hogwash. I had to look back to 2003 to get the kind of data I wanted, but back then, in the US, median household income was $43,564, and about 14% earned $100,000. In New York City, median income was actully lower $39,937, and only about 15% earned over $100,000.

Oh, that includes the outer boroughs though. So just in Manhattan (or New York County) it’s higher: median $47,415, and about 24% earned $100,000 or more, but that still means that the vast majority of people in Manhattan ain’t rolling in it –it’s just that the ones that are are making out really well.

You can read much, more more on this page at the Census Bureau's website.

How to Tell a Great Vacation Story --The Street, 5/27/08

Take any interesting vacations lately?

Please don't answer that question until you read my latest column for The Street. I got the idea for this story when I attended the Inc. 500 conference this past September. I overheard attendees making vacation-related but eye-glazing, snore-inducing small talk, and thought to myself: this must stop.
 

The Indy 500, or America, in the Round --The Huffington Post, 5/25/08

I attended the Indy 500 on Sunday, and it was quite a spectacle, as I relate on The Huffington Post. Here's a slide show of what I witnessed!

In Praise of Imperfect Pets--The Huffington Post, 5/21/2008

Last week, Ginger, my beloved gray tabby cat, died.  I've been very sad about it, but the one bright spot has been the adoption of a new cat, Jack. I wrote about that, and the very cool nonprofit that sheltered Jack until he came to his new home, for the Huffington Post.
Here are two pictures of Ginger, from a trip we took with her last summer. The bed she's on in the first is at the InterContinental in Montreal, the second is in a cabin we rented in Quebec. (She was totally psyched to discover that the cabin had mice! I was less so.) The darkish one is a tender moment Ginger had with our big orange cat Buzzy, and then there's one of our new guy, Jack.

Speaking of black cats, I didn't realize until today that black cats are often discriminated against because some people really do think they're bad luck. I can't imagine anything more ridiculous. You can learn lots about black cats, and all things cat, actually, at Your Black Cat, which was nice enough to link to my HuffPo piece today.

UPDATED: The charity that we adopted Jack from, the Picasso Fund, featured Jack in its May 2008 newsletter.

Pack Your Skillet--The Street, 5/15/08

I am more of an appreciator of fine cuisine than I am a preparer of it --I joke that my specialty is making reservations.  So I was out of my element to say the least when I entered Chef Nimmy Paul's kitchen in Cochin, India, for a cookery class! She actually prepared the dish that you see at the left, while I watched in awe.  Here's a story for The Street about great culinary classes around the world.

The Auschwitz Pilgrim? --Huffington Post, 5/7/2008

As I mentioned a few days ago, I visited Poland last May, and wrote a couple of travel stories about my time there. I also had personal reasons for making the trip, as my grandparents were originally from Poland, survived World War II and the Holocaust, and eventually rebuilt their lives in the Bronx.

I'm working on a larger piece about all of this, but here's the start of my thinking, for the Huffington Post, about the day I visited Auschwitz. A few images from Birkenau from that day:

A Wild Pair --Robb Report Luxury Resorts 2008

In this year's edition of Robb Report's Luxury Resorts, I report on Singita Sweni and Lembombo, luxury safari lodges in Kruger National Park in South Africa.  They definitely earned their place on Robb Report's annual 100 best places to stay list --and the spa on the property is the only place I've been where a baboon watched my massage! Read the story here. I wrote about how to to take a safari in a hurry for TheStreet earlier this year.  

Vacation in Alaska, Where a Dollar's Still a Dollar --The Street, 5/1/2008

I'm just back from London, where it now very nearly takes two dollars to buy one British pound. The situation is just a little better with the Euro ($1.50 for 1 euro) but that weak dollar makes everything so much more expensive.
I've spent a lot of time in Alaska recently, and it's a great place for a foreign-feeling adventure without having to convert currency. Here are the best ways to experience Alaska, in my latest for The Street.