Your Moment is Now

There’s something special about a star when the news about their houses start spreading like wildfire. It’s perhaps one of the most obvious signs of success, because suddenly, everyone in the world knows how rich they are, and what a luxurious life they lead. So when Lenny Kravitz’ house in Miami goes up for sale, it is big news.

It doesn’t have a lot to do with the price tag, although the exact amount is interesting for some. It’s easy to assume, however, that a home here, in this dazzling city, will cost quite a bit. Add the easy access to the beach, because it’s in the back yard, along with thousands of square feet of beautiful space, then the price tag rises even more. It doesn’t matter that there are designers that work on the house, and have been paid a million for the services, because it’s obvious that this is someone who makes a good living.

In this city, with the gorgeous restaurants and the best Miami spas , celebrity homes are nothing new. It is rather refreshing, though, when a star of this stature can hold on to their prominence. With a long history of good deeds, and a continually evolving involvement in all sorts of charitable works, Lenny Kravitz isn’t someone who’s resting on his laurels, and in fact, he’s selling some.

If you have had your car long enough, you recognize that you will eventually need to repair the shocks. While some people may feel like this is too big of a hassle, it is honestly easiest with some cars like the Chevrolet Cavalier and the Dodge Caravan to do your own work. All you need is to get the right Chevrolet Cavalier repair manual . The real trick is knowing when you need to replace the shocks and struts.

It is hard sometimes to know if you need to replace the shocks and struts, however. There should be some kind of advice in the repair manuals, but that doesn’t change the fact that the truth is that the longer you drive on the bad shocks the more it feels like that is ok. This is because they wear so gradually that you will probably not really notice a difference from how they were six months ago and how they are now.

With Dodge Caravans, the easy way to tell if you need to crack open your Dodge Caravan repair manual is to do the bounce test . Sit on the hood and bounce a couple of times then get off. The car should only bounce one more time before leveling off. If it bounces more than that, it needs new shocks.

The tradition of dressing up for Halloween comes from multiple sources, and the origins are rather difficult to pinpoint to one location at one time. Chances are pretty good that it’s a combination of cultural traditions over the course of history that makes the holiday what it is today. The idea of people putting on Halloween costumes one night out of the year is certainly appealing. For many people, it’s the very top of the list for holidays, because dressing up is fun.

The origins are every bit as spooky as one would suspect from the popularity of horror costumes. That’s not a coincidence at all, because the time of the year is a traditional one for celebrating the dead in many places. In Mexico, the Dia de los Muertos celebrations are major events that last the better part of a week. The actual day isn’t spent dressing up like monsters, however, but is spent tending to the graves of family members who have passed, and holding a ceremonial meal in their honor.

The tradition is very similar to Samhain in Ireland, where the ancestors are revered, and for that matter, also finds a place in Poland with Forefather’s Eve . There’s something about the time of year, when the days start to get darker, and colder, and gathering together to remember the loved ones is a way of bringing in the winter.

Alki Beach Park is one of Seattle’s true treasures. The views are abundant and spectacular and it’s all due to Seattle’s efforts to make this area pedestrian-friendly, which they have succeeded. When you visit the Park, you’ll see throngs of people with the same idea as you; just wanting to hang-out at a nice, peaceful place, or grab a bite to eat at one of the many restaurants along the path leading up to the beach.

At the Alki Beach, you’ll find that this 2 ½ mile strip of sand to be one of the most popular beaches in the area. Located at 1702 Alki Avenue Southwest and within walking distance of several 5 star hotels Seattle offers its visitors. Alki Beach is now one of the highlights of staying in West Seattle. If you’re not staying in West Seattle, the best way to get to Alki Beach is by boat, because parking can be a hassle

Alki Beach is a great place to people watch; there are plenty of sunbathers when the weathers warm, plenty of athletic types, swimmers and families. The beach is also lined with a path that is great for jogging, biking, walking or skating. In the evenings, walking along Alki is wonderful and refreshing.

If you like a little more action, then check-out Alki on Friday and Saturday nights, Alki becomes a hotspot for hot rides to show off their wheels as they cruise up and down the strip. But, if it’s the peaceful aspect you’re looking for, head over anytime during the week day or week night.

The entire state of Ohio has been home to a number of musical revolutions and evolutions, and still might be one of the most overlooked places in the country. It’s either a very unfortunate oversight, or a result of the way the people of the state tend to understate their own accomplishments. It’s the part of the midwest that almost verges toward the east coast, but they’ve still maintained a very solid identity.

Dayton is perhaps one of its most diverse places, with a lively population that’s fed with the youthful energies of the college kids. It makes for a wonderful cultural scene, but still keeps all the midwestern charms that make it so enchanting. It’s had some major talents in music, playing genres as varied as funk, hard rock, punk, and indie. Lately, Dayton’s been in the news again as the Breeders continue their bewilderingly brilliant musical output, keeping the city and the band in a position to set the pulse for indie music.

It all started 20 years ago, when Kim Deal of the Pixies and Tanya Donnelly of Throwing Muses got together to start a side project that would be more artistically fulfilling. The bands they were in were, of course, already wildly successful, so this was to be a vehicle for experiments and the pleasure of trying out new things.

The experiment continues, 20 years later, and although Donnelly has left to pursue her own brand of rhythmic innovation, the Breeders are still playing out and recording new songs. The combination of musical personalities helped to guide the music in new directions at the beginning, but now it seems to be fueled on its own momentum, and there’s little sign of it coming to a halt any time soon.

It’s good news for anyone coming to the city, looking for a hotel. Dayton not only offers wide selections for accommodation, but continues to produce great music and entertainment, and is a city worth mentioning on all the lists.

Bloody Basin Road, Beaver Flats Road, Mammoth Mine Road — Arizona has road names unlike most states. There’s much about this 48th state, a territory which joined the United States a little under a hundred years ago in 1912, that retains its Old West origins, including a reconstructed 1890s gold-mining town, the Goldfield Ghost Town near the legendary Superstition Mountains. If you want to live in the present but visit the past, then you should stay in one of the best hotels in Phoenix , then travel east, just about four miles outside Apache Junction, and find your way to 4650 North Mammoth Mine Road.

You and your family might spend the whole day here, taking a ride on the Superstition Narrow Gauge Railroad on a 36″ gauge train consisting of a Plymouth diesel engine that pulls a passenger car and caboose. The twenty minute trip circles the town for a mile and a half as the engineer tells passengers about the history of the town, the Superstition Mountains, and the desert in general.

There’s also the Goldfield Mine Tours, which takes about twenty-five minutes, consisting of a guided tour underground. The guide will tell you about the history the mine, gold mining equipment and procedures. Literally, there’s everything in this small town — from a Church on the Mount that holds real religious services on Sunday morning to Lu Lu’s Bordello, a fake bordello, which gives you a guided tour of the history of women in the 1800s. A gold historian can teach you how to pan for gold at Prospector’s Palace, and, once an hour on the streets, gunfighters will come out and shoot each other. If you want, it’s possible to arrange for friends to be “arrested” and thrown into jail, too.

Of particular interest in Goldfield, though, is Goldfield’s Historic Museum, which contains an exhibit on the Lost Dutchman gold mine , one of the most famous mines in the country, most likely because no one knows, to this day, where it’s located. There’s a power in myth and names that you can explore in the city of Phoenix (named after a mythic firebird) and out at the Goldfield Ghost Town on Mammoth Mine Road.

Killeen, Texas is famous for the large military post Fort Hood that is located right next to it. And while the post does gain most of the city’s attention and is the most prominent landmark in the area, it is not the only thing going on in this Texas town. There are a lot of interesting cultural elements, entertainment options and intriguing landmarks that attract tourists and are part of the everyday lives of residents. Guests in the hotels Killeen may be interested in the fact that Elvis Presley spent training time at Fort Hood and this adds a certain amount of sensationalism to the post, though there is so much going on with the contemporary culture that pieces of historic trivia fade into the past.

Okay, there is also the fact the US Presidents are periodically seen on the base and much of the festival and parade activities are based on the military history and interaction with the era. And the base is a major economic support to the city and it’s common to see personal in the local establishments. But this still doesn’t mean that Killeen is dominated by the events and circumstances of Fort Hood . However, it can be conceded that the base plays a significant role in local culture and that it enhances the social atmosphere of the city.

Fort Hood regularly gains national attention and most recently this was due to the tragic shooting that occurred there in on November 5 of last year. This was an extremely unfortunate and unexpected occurrence and is vastly different than the majority of events that gain attention for the base. Fort Hood was built in 1942 and is named after the Confederate General John Bell Hood. Hood gained military recognition in the Civil War for his commanding of Hood’s Texas Brigade. Since the 1970s the base has played a major role in the training of soldiers and the testing and introduction of new military equipment. Fort Hood is one of the largest United States military installations in the country as well as throughout the world.

Few capital cities on the earth are quite like Austin. It’s a kind of oasis in the middle of Texas — from the air, it seems as if you’re passing stretches of dry, desert-like territory, then there’s a sudden infusion of greenery and water and life; from the ground, the city may sprawl a little, but its heart is downtown, where you’ll find Austin boutique hotels , the Capitol building, and the fine museums of the University of Texas.

One such museum is the Blanton Museum of Art , an art museum and research cetner at the university under the auspices of the College of Fine Arts. This particular university museum is one of the largest of its kind in the United States, containing about 18,000 works of art from Europe, the U.S., and Latin America. Established in 1963, 47 years ago, the museum has changed its name as it grew, moving from space to space at the university, first to the Harry Ransom Center in 1972, renamed the Archer M. Huntington Art Gallery in 1980, then moving again in 2006 to a 155,000 square foot building and renamed the Blanton Museum of Art after the Houston Endowment, chaired by Jack S. Blanton, gave the museum a donation of 12 million dollars.

A number of intriguing exhibits are available throughout the summer and into October of 2010. Presently, until August 22, you might see Matisse as Printmaker, which presents works from the Pierre and Tana Matisse Foundation. There are 63 prints here by Henri Matisse (who lived from 1869-1954), which were made by a number of techniques: etching, aquatint, monotype, woodcut, linoeum cut, and lithography.

Through October, you’ll be able to see WorkSpace: Anna Craycroft: Subject of Learning/Object of Study . This installation was conceived by Anna Craycroft, an artist based in Brooklyn, which changes the WorkSpace gallery into a series of educational spaces with sliding chalkboards, modular furniture, computer displays, educational books, all of which is meant to explore the various defintions the individual has in order to understand the structure of our institutions, and how the mechanics of that institution affect the persons within it.

One of the intriguing aspects of Fort Collins, Colorado may not be evident to the people who visit it. That is until the guests in one of the hotels Fort Collins hear something go bump in the night. That’s right, Fort Collins is reported to have quite a few haunted locations and while this is not likely to become one of the main reasons the city is so popular and well known, it is certainly an intriguing element to be aware of while you are visiting it. And for those tourists who are also professional or amateur ghost chasers, you will have your hands, or is it cameras or other instruments, full while you are in town.

Avery House is one of the public accessible buildings that was formerly a private residence and is alleged to be haunted. Public tours are available and one of the common occurrences is a specific sensation that is associated with certain rooms and areas. The kitchen pantry and one of the bedrooms on the second floor are particularly prone to have a cold and somewhat spooky energy in them, and this is felt strongly by many people who visit it. The bedroom has a distinct oppressive fee to it.

Baker’s School is another reportedly haunted location. Sadly this place has burned to the ground three separate times and has been rebuilt after each occasion. Children can be heard playing during off hours and lights will suddenly turn on and back off during the night. There is also an abandoned farm property known as Hell and it is reportedly very haunted. Shadow figures to blobby white figures are commonly seen and sometimes a more clear but still shadow figure of a man can be made out. It used to be a goat farm and many people can hear bells coming from it as they pass by at night.

If there is life on other planets, and if it is more intelligent than we are, then there might be hope for the planet if they are looking closely at Tucson. There are plenty of good reasons to see why Tucson is such a draw for people, with its luxury tucson hotels , a fantastic setting, and a lively community that is very active in arts and culture, it’s just a smart place to be. There are even cool clubs at night, where people can dress up and wait behind velvet ropes.

Lots of cultures cross paths in this little city, which always reveals more than could ever possibly meet the eye. The thought that some of these cultures might be aliens is one that might not fall into the usual pathway of standard suspicions, but it’s one that’s being talked about here because of the work of Chris Impey . He teaches in the department of astronomy at the UofA, and he’s been getting a little bit of attention lately.

While the idea of aliens walking among us is one that usually wakes up a large portion of the population who typically wear tinfoil hats, there are some interesting thoughts going around the scientific community. Impey would shun a tinfoil hat, but he is interested in the notion that the Milky Way holds billions of places where life could exist. The chances that there could be life here, then, are actually a lot higher than anyone might have suspected.

He’s written books on the end of the world, as well as on the search for life, and this makes him fairly popular among the students. They are very theoretical works, however, and reading them requires work, kind of what one would expect from a scientist-scholar. Some of the most exciting ideas start to resonate in the atmosphere when he talks about the likelihood that intelligent life would know more than we do. This means that our means of understanding things would not be able to conceive of such a thing, even if we were confronted by it. And this suggests that it might be occurring right now, at this very moment. This is an idea that is so much fun to think about, that it almost feels like Tucson.