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I’ll continue the theme I started last week by moving to Italy where I’m lucky enough to visit once or twice a year.  I’m always struck by the cultural differences on setting foot inside the boot.

One reads a lot about the “new normal” in spending patterns during this recession. It seems that most people have taken a good look at what seemed to be indispensable, from designer coffee to dinners out, and then cut back. Savings are in: credit card spending is out (at least temporarily). Many have said that they will not go back to old spending patterns when good times resume.

With a little more then 24 hours until the start of the 2009 Tour de France, there are many things to still get done before we start the 2009 Tour de French Cuisine.

It is rare to come across a novel that is so compelling and creatively developed that you wonder how the author conceived such a powerful idea. Mj Roë’s The Seven Turns of the Snail’s Shell is one of these books. Princess Diana has been killed in a terrible crash…or has she? From this question evolves an intricate story of unrequited love, deception, murder, and intrigue. The novel opens in Paris, revealed to us in all its beauty and its flaws.

Travel always brings opportunities to escape your reality...and feel clueless. Part of the appeal of going to a new place is the unpredictability of the environment. The feeling of being somewhere that challenges and surprises you is priceless and hard to reproduce. The standard patterns of life in your usual setting are replaced by immense curiosity and cluelessness. 'What lies around the corner?' and ‘Will the locals be able to give me directions?' Let alone, ‘Will they be able to understand my questions when I ask for directions and speak their language in my broken accent?'

…and, most important, Fraternité, in San Francisco’s renowned French Quarter. If you’re thinking it’s too early to make a reservation for Bastille Day at one of the cafés or bistros on Belden Place and the surrounding French-flavored areas— trust me, it’s not.

It’s been 64 years and Dresden is still rising from the ashes of the Allied bombing that obliterated its core in February 1945. Buildings have vanished and people still leave to find work, but Dresden’s treasure has returned and what treasure it is.