Alloting

Montel Williams is a well known star and his face has been on everyone’s television through the last couple of decades. However, knowing what is real and what isn’t real about a celebrity can be hard. Here are the facts to put aside the rumors. Montel Williams has a fascinating story, one that not a lot of people know. Overall he was privileged as a boy, going to a good school, and being for the most part well liked. In the early seventies he joined the military and after some initial training was accepted into the Navel Academy. When he graduated he was the first African-American enlistee to graduate from both the United States Navy’s Academy Prep School and Annapolis, a huge achievement, and it meant he could now be assigned as a ensign. It would be twelve years later before he would step out of the military and into the spotlight on television screens.

Although few people knew who he was when he first started his show on CBS , by 1996 he was not only well known, but was award winning. It was a simple day time talk show, but it often had interesting guests. The key to it’s success is something that Montel has kept with him, and that is his integrity as well as his probing questions and understanding answers.

Another thing he took from his time being regularly on the television screen was the desire to promote products that he truly believed in. This lead to a series of infomercials as well as some serious endorsements for products such as MoneyMutual a cash advance loan company that holds itself to a certain level of integrity. This means not taking people for more money then they agreed to, as well as helping people out in a time of need. This lead to the infamous Montel Williams tv commercial because he felt that out of all of the other companies they provide quick and easy services for people who are in a vulnerable place already, which is the majority of what he said in the commercial.

He has been in a few tv shows, usually in a cameo role. Other than that, he has not been on the screen a lot since his show went away.

Well if you have found yourself in the town of Palmdale and are staying in a nice hotel looking for something to do. No worries, there are somethings to see and do in and near town. Well there are always golf courses to hit a few rounds in like the Rancho Vista Golf Course which will turn you sights from a more traditional desert motif to a sunny oasis in the desert. They have a beautiful grounds with ponds and waterfalls around a nice golfing experience. They have all the amenities with a great restaurant for entertaining.

If you are into a little flying adventure check out Joe Davies Heritage Airpark Palmdale Plant 42 where you can let your imagination wonder while you see some of the most outstanding aircrafts ever built. Plant 42 is were many of these and other incredible military aircrafts were created, tested, and built. Now they have a great display for all to come and get a closer look along with a history lesson and some stories. Bring a good hat, sunscreen and plenty of water because it is usually a bright sunny day out there.

If you and your family are getting warm and need a little chill and thrill then head over to Dry Town where it is anything but dry. it is a never ending tunnel of watery fun that is going to keep you and your kids laughing and definitely cooled off. With water slides call the Devils Punch Bowl and the Rattler’s Revenge you are sure to have a blast. If you can’t handle that much sun but you still want to experience the Dry Town fun there are some Friday nights in July and August that stay open until 9:30. Otherwise, you may have to take a break from the sun and head for some shade and lunch at Dusty’s Grill. So find a cozy hotel such as this and stay a while.

In your travels to Florida, don’t overlook Miami’s only publicly owned and operated National Historic Landmark, the Vizcaya Museum and Gardens.  This is not just another home tour of an historic mansion.  The elegant 1916 winter home of the vice president of International Harvest, James Deering, created a mansion meant to resemble a centuries old Italian Renaissance villa, making it one of the best places in Florida to enjoy art, music, and film, as well as other cultural events which take place three hundred and sixty-four days a year.  Set on Biscayne Bay, the home offers amazing gardens and historic buildings as well as a view.

As one of the cultural offerings, just recently, there was a showing of D.W. Griffith’s Intolerance, which starred Lillian Gish.  In her time, she showed up regularly to Vizcaya as a house guest.  Next week, on February 29th, you can go out for an afternoon of music listening to something few people get a chance to hear anymore: a 1917 23-rank Welte-Mignon pipe organ.  There’s very few friends and neighbors who can lay claim to having heard an historic musical instrument, especially a pipe organ.  There will be visiting organists at the console and the host, Michael Barone, will talk about the meaning of pipe organs in homes in the early part of last century.  The show is titled, “Pipedreams.”

But perhaps, best of all, is the Moonlight Garden Tour of Vizcaya.  They begin at six thirty at night and cost fifteen dollars (but ten dollars if you’re a student or a senior).  The Moonlight Garden Tours don’t happen every night, so you’ll need to plan ahead and arrange for one of the hotels on the Florida beach.  Spend the days at the beach, and then head out to the Deering estate of Vizcaya and take in a tour under the stars on March 3rd, 30th, 31st, and April 27th and 28th

Fort Wayne is an idyllic city in the heartland of the U.S.  It has an ongoing love-hate relationship with its own reputation as being one of the places where the 1950s idea of the American Dream still exists.  The city itself is really lovely, and there are many different nooks and crannies where you certainly have the sense that the nuclear family is alive and kicking it old school style.  You can imagine sleds going down the hills in the winter, ice skating in the park, and a song in every heart.  Those things certainly do exist here, but there is much more to it than that.

Staying at a Fort Wayne hotel is a lovely experience that can offer a sense of what the city is like.  There is an almost old-fashioned sense of hospitality and grace, and yet there are also all of the contemporary conveniences that suggest that the world does come through here.  It also enters into the world, with artists like Bruce Nauman, drawing on expectations only in order to disrupt them.  Nauman was born here in 1941, and he left to study art in Madison, Wisconsin, and then at UC Davis, before embarking on what everyone would consider to be a remarkable career.

His themes are rather large, and even daunting.  He uses language to comment on language, to undermine how we make meaning.  The influence from Beckett here is very clear, but his work speaks in different frequencies.  He also works in multiple media, and seems to be quite adept at all of it.  Working on that difficult dividing line between art and life he sometimes seems to have overcome the distinction altogether by joining them to each other.  There is a lot of Fort Wayne in him, and the work demonstrates to the world that things are never what they seem on the surface.

Have you ever been to Florida? Well, I have. I’ve been all through it and I’m here to tell you that it’s really an incredible state. My husband and I decided to take an extensive road trip for our summer vacation last year and in doing so we thought it would be really cool to just drive all across Florida and stay wherever we wanted for as long as we wanted. The first day we started out very early in the morning and by noon I had begun to be afraid that we had made a mistake. However, after we stopped and had a great lunch in a little road side café I relaxed into the ride a bit. I mean, after all, I had two weeks of that ahead of me and I thought I should make the most of it. But soon I remembered that we could do exactly what we wanted to that meant we could go ahead and spend our entire trip on the Miami beach because by late afternoon we had already reached Miami.

Of course we didn’t do that and only spend the following day in Miami. We did go to the beach and had a great time overall but it suddenly became exciting to get back in the car and explore more of the state. That night we stayed in an out of the way Florida hotel and resort and it was really fun to be just out there in the middle of nowhere without a care in the world.

The next day we toured the Coral Castle of Ed Leedskalnin. This was such an amazing place and though I had read about it and even studied some of the electromagnetic theories that are associated with how he did all this, there really is just no way of understanding how incredible awesome those sculptures are without seeing it live and in person. Both my husband and I had our mouths dropped open in wonder through most of our visit there. It’s funny because we were always catching each other in mouth agape poses and we even have a couple pictures of each of us looking like that. It was absolutely amazing and I still think about that place constantly and like everyone else who reads about it or visits it I’m determined to crack the code that’s supposed to be in A Book in Every Home and discover how he was able to do all of that.

It is a beautiful drive up the Pacific Coast Highway to spend some time at the beaches of the rich and famous. You never know who you  might see and see them doing. Not only do many entertainment business people live along the beaches of Malibu but sometimes they film there as well. There is some great hiking in the mountains that line the east side of the highway. This area is called the Malibu State Park and it has a large lake and some waterfalls with nice views. This is were they filmed footage for many of the Tarzan movies. They also filmed episodes of M.A.S.H in the area as well. The latest is the reference to Malibu on the hit TV series Two and a Half Men staring Charlie Sheen and John Crier.

The beaches have some interesting stories both told and not told I am sure. The Pirates Cove Beach was at some point, during the prohibition in this country, used to smuggle rum. Then years later it was a popular nudist beach which is now completely illegal in the city of Los Angeles. When you are visiting the area and are looking to get out of the room your in at one of the Luxurious Malibu hotels there are some points of interest to take part in. If you are a surfer then you can catch a wave at the Surfrider Beach. But if you want to see other historical landmarks then you can head over to the Adamson’s House which is a Spanish style home that was the original home of the Rindge family who once owned most of this area. It is an exquisite decor and masterful tile work. There is a nice breezy walk on the Malibu Pier. If you plan it right you could find yourself going to the Malibu Film Festival in the Spring.

It is rare to see a great tap dance company.  For a few years the Australian group “Tap Dogs” was on tour, with a heart-stopping, rhythm driven, rock and roll/grunge kind of show.  And then the tap and hip hop show “Bring in ‘Da Funk, Bring in ‘Da Noise” hit the road with the tap dancing maestro Savion Glover in the lead.  Both show gave new meaning to the art of tap dance, and drew younger crowds, and quite large audiences.  It was then that the younger generations of today could appreciate the style, the grace and the talent of such dancers of past generations, Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.

A few months ago I had booked a room at one of the Austin luxury hotels, and after I checked in I met a friend for an early dinner.  He surprised me with tickets to a show that night, of the Austin organization “The Tapestry Dance Company”.  The company was started in 1989, and is under the artistic direction of founder and choreographer Acia Gray.  Gray is a rhythm dancer and is one of the first members to be inducted into the Austin Arts Hall of Fame.  No small achievement in a talented city such as Austin, Texas.  At the moment the company is on tour with the show, “The Souls of Our Feet” but will be back towards the end of January for two performances.

The Tapestry Dance Company is a non-profit, professional company that fuses tap with jazz, ballet and modern dance and their mission is to give a dimension to dance by combining all of the forms, and to bringing the dance to the people through not only performances, but through educational projects as well.  They have over the last twenty years, become one of the major dance forces and organizations in the city of Austin.  Should you find yourself in the Austin area at the end of the month, you should most definitely make it a point to see the shows of this dynamic, eclectic and talented group of Austin tap dancers.

For as long as Gary’s parents could remember all he ever wanted to become was a racecar driver. From the moment he saw his first big wheel he spent more of his life pedaling than walking. He first saw an actual car race on television and it was almost as though he had seen the Holy Grail. Gary’s father remembers clearly the expression on his four-year-old son’s face as the cars speed across the television screen. Gary’s interest and passion for cars and races only seemed to increase with his age and development so his parents continually supported his age level needs. They had assumed he would grow out of it at some point and his mother hoped he would eventually settle down and pursue a medical career like his father.

Gary never grew out of his fascination for fast cars. As soon as he was old enough he pleaded with his mother to be allowed to race in the local Go Kart fair. The reason he had to plead with his mother and not his father was because by that point his father had resigned himself to raising a race car driver, though his mother had strong safety concerns and still held out hope that he would become a doctor.

Meanwhile, by the time he was 15, both of his parents were accepting and supportive of Gary’s ambitions. For his fifteenth birthday the decided to take him to the Indianapolis 500. They didn’t tell him their plans and wanted to surprise him with it, though Gary couldn’t help but to have high hopes when he found out they were staying in one of the luxury hotels Indianapolis. The family had a great time on that Sunday, May 24 and each of them thoroughly enjoyed the 93rd consecutive occurrence of this major race. Gary had dreams of racetrack stardom floating through his mind and his mother had prayers of continued safety in hers. His father simply enjoyed the race and his hot dog.