WITH MARCH MADNESS fast approaching, I must make a painful, soul-bearing confession. It’s long overdue, more overdue even than Mark McGwire’s steroids mea culpa, so I may as well just get it out there:

I cannot shoot a basketball.

Let me amend that. Technically, I can shoot a basketball. I have “played” the sport—or at least something resembling it—since I was young. I even ably warmed the bench for the high school junior varsity. To this day, I occasionally play pickup games with other flabby office drones. Running up and down the court, there are moments when I actually delude myself that I know what I’m doing.

And then I shoot the ball, and it horrifies people. Remember that episode of Seinfeld in which Elaine danced at a party, and everyone recoiled in fear? That’s what my basketball shot is like. It disturbs humanity. When I grab the ball and heave it toward the hoop, players on both sides look it me aghast with a mixture of fright and pity.

I know I’m not alone in this affliction. One of the most popular grievances with the current college and pro game is the deterioration of shooting. Fans complain that players don’t have the touch that they once did, that the game exists too much above the rim, that shooting fundamentals aren’t prioritized like suffocating defenses. This is not merely the groaning of nostalgic cranks. For every pure jump-shot artist, like Boston’s Ray Allen or Golden State’s Stephen Curry, there is a legion of brick tossers barely competent from more than 12 feet out. It’s one of the things that invariably makes me nuts during the NCAA tournament. Yes, it’s a thrilling sports event. But there are always long stretches of blundering offensive play when I wonder if the battered rim should file for workmen’s comp.

Of course, I’m one to talk. My own basketball shot is ugly and artless, devoid of grace or technique. Summon an image of a classic jump-shooter—Larry Bird, say, or Reggie Miller. Then imagine the total, ham-handed opposite. I grip the ball with 10 fingers tightly, cock it violently behind my head like a backhoe, and then hurl it like I’m throwing a burning log out of a car window.

The ugliness would be tolerated if my shot were accurate. But it is not. It’s not even close. My spinless knuckleball usually clangs off the rim violently. Even the backboard laughs. Not long ago, I was staying at a hotel with a spiffy basement court, and I thought it would be fun to try free throws. I went three for 25, which means I should be fired from playing pickup ball—or signed by the New Jersey Nets.

My terrorshot is a source of great shame for me. It makes me embarrassed to play a sport that I love. Sometimes I try to play without shooting, and for a while it goes well—I stick to rebounds and passing, and my teammates think I’m a generous guy. But I can never totally escape my hideous shot. Every so often I find myself with an open look at the basket, and I have no choice but to launch it, praying only that it stays in the gym and that I do not maim anyone for life.

So I’ve decided to get my shot fixed. It’s a weird, difficult thing to try to relearn in your late 30s. Most people are taught how to shoot a basketball when they’re very young, around the time they learn how to ride a bike, how to swim and how to play No-Limit Texas Hold ’Em (or was that just me?).

But you’re never too old to learn, I say. At my age people think nothing of taking a golf lesson from a swing coach or getting one of those private sessions with a Pilates instructor. If I can learn French wine and how to julienne vegetables like a proper bourgeois sophisticate, why can’t I reteach myself how to shoot a basketball?

So I get in touch with Jim Murray, a hoops maestro at New York’s Chelsea Piers gym, and we meet on a cold Monday afternoon. Jim, who played Division III hoops and whose father is still a basketball coach, begins by telling me we aren’t going to need a ball for a while.

We’re going to work on form without a ball. This is like arriving at a steak house and being told you will have 20 minutes of knife-and-fork practice.

But Jim is a lot bigger than me, so I go along. The main thing people ignore about shooting, Jim says, is their legs.

I must bend my legs, and use them as a launchpad, he says. Jim then takes my right arm (I’m a righty) and bends the elbow into a sharp L. He puts an imaginary ball on my fingertips and bends my wrist.

“Knees, elbows, wrists,” Jim says. “Repeat that: Knees, elbows, wrists.”

I do this three-bend drill for about three minutes on an empty court, looking like a reject from community ballet. The kids playing next door are thoroughly confused as to what I’m doing. Then Jim allows me to hold a real basketball. He shows me how to use my left hand as a guide—not an accomplice, the way I used to do with my knuckleball shot. He has me lie down on a bench with the ball and practice spinning it off my fingertips in the air, getting that pretty backspin. Finally he brings me to the court and lets me start practicing on a real hoop. From two feet away.

“Larry Bird used to come out and shoot two- to three hundred of these before every game,” he says.

I surely look silly, but it’s working. The ball leaves my fingers with an elegant rotation, and more often than not it goes in. Jim asks me to step back another two feet and shoot some more. More swishes. I notice I’m getting those “shooter’s rolls,” too—those misfires where the spin is gentle enough that the ball rolls off the lip of the rim and into the hoop. It’s the beginnings of a touch.

Jim admits he doesn’t usually get clients like me. Mostly he teaches school-age kids. Adults don’t usually have the hours for daytime lessons, and when they get out of work, it’s easier to find a league or a pickup game. Over time, bad habits worsten. It’s rare that the freaks like me seek help.

But now I’m really starting to stroke it. I’m back at the foul line, and by Jim’s count I’m hitting somewhere between 60 and 70 percent of my shots—not quite Ray Allen, but a lot better than Shaquille O’Neal, whose lifetime free-throw percentage hovers around 50. Less than one hour of practice, and I’m already better at free throws than a guy who’s made more than $250 million playing ball.

“You’ll be teaching the lessons next year,” Jim says. Yes, I’m sure he says that to everybody.

On my way out of the gym, I’m hot and sweaty, so I buy a sports drink. As I gulp it down, I think about the art of shooting and how it’s never too late to master it, how even some pros could use a tutorial like this. I am renewed with enthusiasm for the NBA season, March Madness and basketball in general. Then I toss the empty bottle toward a trash can and miss by a mile.

Contributing writer JASON GAY switched to playing squash in high school, and he wasn’t any good at that, either.

BIG SHOTS

Basketball has evolved dramatically since the game was invented in 1891, thanks, in large part, to three legends and their signature shots.

“GRANNY SHOT” HOMER STONEBRAKER 1919

“SKY HOOK” KAREEM ABDUL- JABBAR 1969

“SPACE JAM” MICHAEL JORDAN 1984

IT MAY SEEM OBVIOUS, but it’s always bugged me: Luxury SUVs are too expensive to risk taking off-road, where they perform best. Take the Range Rover Sport, a fantastic off-road vehicle that only a complete wastrel would actually take off-road—unless he was being chased by molten lava. In 3-D.

Luckily, the 2010 model I’m driving in the Green Mountains of Vermont doesn’t belong to me (though I know it costs $94,275, plus tax). It was loaned to me by the company, and the publicist warned me to please refrain from taking it off-road. At first, I was happy to oblige. I love the way the Range Rover feels on tarmac, and it has a timeless look: The soft leather seats and wood paneling give it a luxurious, rustic feel, and the “Range Rover” letters above the grille might as well say “I’m Classy.”

What pleases me more, though, is the seriously upgraded engine, which sits on a sophisticated suspension system that the driver can convert to “Off road” settings with a flick of a switch (the Rovers are so popular in the Middle East that there’s a new traction control setting to “launch” the SUV on sand).

I’m looking at the Dynamic Control switch at the head of a trail in Vermont when I succumb to a sudden urge. I switch to Offroad, turn onto a muddy, rocky, root-strewn pathway and goose the throttle. The Rover, on 20-inch tires, is stable in the roughest spots. When I pass an old Jeep CJ-5 (what a Vermonter would call a “mudder”) spinning its tires, its driver looks at me with astonishment.

Fortunately, the Rover emerged from the woods unscathed. But it goes without saying: Even if you live in a Beverly Hills mansion, don’t try this at home.

Executive editor MIKE GUY’s other car is a pair of Tevas.

1 LED headlights grow dimmer as they sense oncoming traffic, then brighten again when it passes. Brilliant.

2 510-horsepower supercharged V-8 grinds out 410 pound-feet of torque.

3 The Dynamic System uses “predictive” technology, so it knows what you’re going to do wrong before you do it.

4 Surround cameras offer a 360-degree view of the exterior, so you don’t crush your neighbor’s car trying to parallel-park.

Parrot Cay, Turks & Caicos

Just before dinner at the Lotus Restaurant bar, a cozy open- air pagoda at the exquisite retreat on Parrot Cay, in Turks & Caicos, three thirtysomething doctors are discussing insurance coverage of MRIs versus CAT scans. Then a much older man with salty, matted gray hair, his tanned skin as beaten up and lined as an old saddle, enters, accompanied by a stunning blonde.

The doctors stop talking. One whispers, “Is that Keith Richards?”

Indeed it is. The grizzled guitarist from the Rolling Stones is here with his wife of 27 years, Patti Hansen. This languorous and luxurious cay is Richards’ winter redoubt, and his villa shares beachfront with Christie Brinkley, Bruce Willis and Donna Karan. And he can be found at this bar on any given night chatting amiably over drinks with visitors.

“Oh, he’s very kind and very funny, and he thinks he’s a pirate,” says a resort employee recently arrived from Malaysia, who had never heard of him before she got to Parrot Cay. “I was at his villa and I heard him playing guitar and said to him, ‘You play guitar very beautifully, Mister Richards.’ He said thank you. As I later learned, evidently he is a very legendary musician.”

A few people mingle at the bar, and a friend finally arrives. “Hello, love,” Richards says, digging into a hamburger (no bun). The topic of late-night TV comes up. Jay and Conan both have their supporters.

“Now I really liked Johnny,” Hansen says.

“Yeah. ‘Heeeeere’s Johnny!’” Richards rasps. “That guy was flash. Real class.”—MIKE GUY

Chicago

“Every time I’ve done something serious, I’ve gotten laughs,” says funnyman Fred Willard, strolling the red carpet during the 50th anniversary of famed Chicago comedy cabaret Second City. “So why not try to be funny?”

Being funny comes naturally to Willard, as it does to the scores of alumni here to perform classic scenes for a couple hundred lucky ticket holders during a one-night-only show. But the man who ad-libbed his way through movies such as Best in Show and A Mighty Wind is still nervous about returning to the hallowed ground where improvisation-based sketch comedy was essentially invented.

“It’s like walking a tightrope,” Willard says of the freewheeling improv method that’s turned Second City into a de facto farm team for Saturday Night Live (alums include Bill Murray, Chris Farley and Tina Fey). “If you make it across, you’re wonderful. But if you get out there and the wind blows, people will say, ‘He used to be so good.’”

Throughout the weekend festival—which features panels, performances and film screenings, the small Second City theater complex is brimming with boldface-name comedians. There’s ’60s icon David Steinberg lingering in the alumni lounge near a buffet of chilled seafood. And Steve Carell, star of The Office, wearing a puffy ski jacket and kibitzing with talk show host Bonnie Hunt.

The warm and nostalgic mood is not unlike that of a college homecoming—that is, if a single university graduated the funniest people on the planet. Indeed, there’s a reason Second City is called “the Harvard of Comedy.”

Kicking back in the cramped lobby less than an hour before show time, Harold Ramis—the actor/writer/director responsible for such landmark laugh-fests as Stripes and Groundhog Day—appears relaxed. If he’s worried about five decades’ worth of yuk-artists shaking off the dust onstage, he isn’t showing it.

“It’s not without any fear,” says Ramis. “But these are people who are not stopped by their fear. That’s what defines the successful Second City actor. Everyone’s afraid to improvise. But we do it anyway.” —ROD O’CONNOR

Prague

THE ONLY THING missing from the Old Town Square’s picture-perfect Christmas markets just before 8 p.m. on December 17 is a flurry of white stuff drifting gently to the ground. That is about to change, however.

Amid the throngs of tourists and locals perusing the stalls selling mulled wine and handicrafts below the square’s astronomical clock are several hundred people hiding feather pillows. And they aren’t planning on napping.

Five minutes before the hour, a whistle sounds, and the square explodes into a massive pillow-fighting free-for-all.

What astonished onlookers may not have realized is that they’d stumbled into a so-called “flash mob” event organized through Facebook. In its second successful year, the fight had seen nearly 3,000 sign up via the social networking site. The biting temperatures deterred all but the most dedicated, but the 60-second event still succeeded in taking over the square, however briefly. Some pillow-toting bandits were so enthusiastic—and had come sufficiently well- armed—that the eiderdown continued to fly half an hour later.

“It’s a brilliant idea: You can beat so many people with pillows!” participant Zdenek Hrebejk told local reporters, as surprised passersby watched with amusement, many documenting the event on their cameras and phones. “It’s the most original concept possible.”

As the mob dispersed, Old Town Square took on a lovely holiday appearance—providing no one looked too closely. “It’s a really nice atmosphere,” said student Blanka Havlickova. Of course, for the city workers left with the task of sweeping the square, the spectacle might have seemed somewhat less than magical. —FIONA GAZE

Pleven, Bulgaria

“You cannot tell that there is a farm here,” says Krasimir Kostov, a top Bulgarian snail breeder, as he walks the length of his large free-range snail farm in the northern Bulgarian village of Pleven. “Snails do not moo.”

Like many of his countrymen, 45-year-old Kostov has no gastronomic interest in escargot—if you mention it he makes a face like he’s swallowed a lemon. But inquire about the economic prospects of his booming farm, and his expression instantly brightens. For him, and the rest of the snail breeders in this modest Balkan nation, the burgeoning escargot industry is all about maximum output. One nation’s critters are another’s gourmet treasure.

In 2009, Kostov exported upward of a half million of his Helix aspersa—one of three common edible species—to aficionados throughout Western Europe. Some 300 new farms are reportedly set to open in Bulgaria in 2010, which is good news for the country (Bulgaria is the poorest nation in the European Union), and also for French and Italian snail lovers, who’ve developed a taste for the Bulgarian imports.

Bulgaria’s success is also good news for the snail population, which has been declining steadily for the past decade as other industries (most notably pharmaceuticals and cosmetics) have found uses for the mollusk meat. Despite a predilection for more unpretentious cuisine—think cabbage, pork and tripe soup—Bulgarians such as Kostov are happy as clams with their new partners in slime.

“I love the snail,” says Kostov. “It makes me money, and it never complains.” —JORDAN HELLER

Stilton, England

The village of Stilton, in the English countryside, is in a pickle. Though an aromatic British cheese bears the town’s name, a recent European Union ruling determined it can be made only in Derbyshire, Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire—and not in Stilton. Stiltonians, unsurprisingly, think the rule stinks.

The Stilton Cheesemakers Association (SCA)—which is not associated with the village—claims the cheese is named for the town where it was first sold to the public. Richard Landy, a historian and potter who specializes in cheese ceramics, disagrees. “Many objective people have been skeptical about the cheese originating in Leicestershire, as the SCA claims,” says Landy, “because they would not have dragged their cheese over 30 miles of bad roads to Stilton just to sell it. And even if they did, why call it Stilton?” Landy spent 400 hours in libraries and research offices and online studying the cheese’s history, and he discovered that Stilton was, in fact, made in Stilton in the 17th century.

Landy’s bombshell rocked the town, which already hosts a “cheese-rolling” championship, a port and cheese festival and various other cheese-based events. “The whole village is excited that we no longer have to put up with caustic comments from the places that currently make the cheese,” says Olive Main, chair of the Stilton Parish Council.

Though the SCA now mentions Landy’s research on its website, the law remains. Pending a new petition of the EU by the association, Stilton still can’t be made in Stilton. —JEANETTE HURT

WEIRD. THAT’S HOW AUSTIN SEES ITSELF. It’s part of the local identity, a way for this proud city to distinguish itself from the Lone Star State’s other high-profile, large-personality towns. You see it on bumper stickers and in boutique storefronts, on University of Texas backpacks and affixed to the insides of cabs: “Keep Austin Weird.” It’s an effective battle cry and an admirable goal. And so far—if the Viking-costumed klezmer band you see dancing in the street is any indication—Austin seems to be doing a pretty good job.

Austin is Texas’ capital and in many ways a direct expression of the state’s rough-and-tumble Ranger spirit. But there are other forces at work in shaping the city’s character. There’s UT, a local tech industry and, perhaps most notably, it’s the self-proclaimed “Live Music Capital of the World,” with more venues per capita than any city in the U.S. It is also home to filmmakers and actors (Richard Linklater, Robert Rodriguez, Sandra Bullock and King of the Hill creator Mike Judge, to name a few), along with hordes of chefs who’ve come to join a barbecue and Tex- Mex revolution. Austinites also embrace the skeletal aesthetic spilling over from Mexico’s Day of the Dead celebration, reveling in their city’s haunted hotels, bizarre “moonlight” towers and appreciation for the occult. With all these overlapping quirks, weirdness abounds. May it stay that way.

Rowing down
Barton Creek;
Image – Blake Gordon

DAY ONE Start your day like a local. Have breakfast at Magnolia (1), a casual roadside restaurant, draped in Lone Star–Love Child décor, that spoons out a mean breakfast. Try the Love Migas, a scramble of eggs, peppers, onions, cheese, salsa and shards of tortilla cooked in a garlic and serrano concoction Magnolia calls “love butter.” Scrumptious, and just slightly better than the Frisbee-size whole-wheat blueberry pecan pancake you’ll want to order for dessert. (Already, you’re figuring out that Austin’s food is so delicious and varied you’ll have to wake up early and stay out late to squeeze in four meals a day.)

Now you’re ready to explore. The scrubbed-clean main strip of trendy South Congress, or SoCo, includes some of Austin’s best shopping, but you won’t find a Pottery Barn or Barnes and Noble. Austin has remained somewhat immune to massive chains, mostly because the local restaurants and shops are such tough competition. You’ll stroll past emporiums such as Uncommon Objects (2), which houses dozens of top notch vintage vendors, folk art and crafts stores, and Western wear mecca Allen’s Boots (3). Be sure to stop in Lucy in Disguise with Diamonds (4), a vintage costumer that leads you to ponder what kind of city can support an 8,000-square-foot store whose main business is renting and selling Elvis jumpsuits, elf costumes meant for adults and Queen Guinevere gowns. “Austin’s just a town that likes to dress up,” the woman at the counter tells you. “All part of keeping Austin weird. Everyone’s out there doing their part.”

Gary Clark Jr. at
Lamberts Downtown
Barbecue
Image – Courtesy of Lamberts

All that eccentricity has worked up your appetite for some Tex-Mex. Just a few doors down is Guero’s (5), Austin’s best-respected purveyor of tacos, enchiladas and all things tortilla. You snag a spot on the patio, ideal for people-watching, and dig into tacos al pastor (marinated pork and pineapple on fresh corn tortillas).

Afterward, go for a stroll through the historic Bouldin Creek neighborhood, peering at the eclectic assortment of Victorian and Mission-style homes lining the streets. You slowly make your way across the river to the comfort of the Four Seasons (6). Take a minute on your balcony to enjoy the view of the Colorado River. Then get going. It’s happy hour downstairs at Trios, where the combination plates—beef carpaccio, truffled arugula and manchego, and steak fries in truffle aioli—are too refined to pass up. So are the scorched Padrón peppers. You watch the sun set over Lady Bird Lake before heading out for the evening.

Magnolia Cafe
Image – Courtesy of Magnolia Cafe

On any given night, there are upward of 100 good bands or solo artists on Austin’s many stages. A fixture since 1957, the Continental Club (7) just happens to be one of the oldest and best venues. The beer is cheap, and the crowd is feisty, attractive and happily on its feet for the cross-border groove of a local band called Charanga Cakewalk.

Before turning in, grab a cab to a nuevo Mexican restaurant called La Condesa (8) in the Warehouse District. With sleek light fixtures and cool concrete floors, this is a destination for the slick set. If you’re more interested in grabbing a stool at the bar, consider ordering one of more than 80 different tequilas and digging into a soft, crisp and utterly delicious huarache with pork belly and apple topping.

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Photography Spencer Heyfron

WHO JOHN JAMES JENKIN / 43 / Design Sales Consultant

WHY I’M TRAVELING I’m going home to Princeton, New Jersey, and I’m actually here early. I’m a fanatic for being on time. I can spend hours in the airport. Thanks to technology, it’s really easy to work here. I also like shopping.

NEVER LEAVE HOME WITHOUT IT My watches, scarves, perfumes, glasses and rings. I’m in love with rings right now. I like the idea of mixing cultures. Rings belong to sort of an ancient culture, and I like mixing that with my more modern, European style.

ABOUT THAT STYLE I don’t work on Wall Street; I sell hand-designed furniture.

If I were trying to sell mutual funds, I’d change my look, but I am what I am.

AFTER YOU SAY ‘HIGH’

IF YOU FILL IN THE CROSSWORD PLEASE TAKE THE MAGAZINE WITH YOU SO IT’S REPLACED

BY GREG BRUCE

ACROSS

1. Overcharge
5. Throw casually
8. Shape with an axe
11. Quick on the uptake
14. Venus de Milo’s lack
18. reflection
19. The night before
20. Time period
21. Apply
22. Castle defense
23. Famous Italian bike race
24. Hearing protection
26. Type of whiskey
27. Insect stage
28. Reindeer feature
30. Power system
31. Diplomat’s forte
32. Wrinkly fruit
33. Kingdom
34. Nitrous
36. Irreligious
38. Open
42. Cross
44. Binge
47. For one
48. The good life
49. Chompers
53. “I challenge you to a ”
54. Fatigued
56. Mudguard
59. Game piece
60. Aroma, in the U.K.
62. Zinger
64. Knowing about
65. Rare find
66. Look down on
68. Intense anger
69. Wander
71. Freudian topic
72. A periodically repeated sequence of events
75. Female antelope
76. Baseball’s nine
80. Objective
81. in a teapot
85. “Who we kidding?”
86. Navy commando
87. Hullabaloo
89. New Mexico’s state flower
90. Chicken
91. A forgotten office worker
93. Web site?
95. “Take !”
96. Reply to a knock
98. Allocate, with “out”
100. Bit
101. Hither’s partner
102. Fuel volume measuring tool
105. A drama set to music
107. The legal dissolution of a marriage
110. Educate
112. The soft tissue of the body
117. Pass over
118. Shot, for short
120. Catch
122. Record player
123. Wise men
124. Future fish
125. Winter tanning solution
127. Pavarotti solo
128. Support
129. Slip
130. Miner’s find
131. Luau souvenir
132. Dance partner
133. Nitwit
134. Hair colorer
135. Part of a price
136. Bristle
137. Deuce topper

DOWN

1. Brown or white maybe?
2. Express a thought
3. It comes from the heart
4. Small hill
5. Lecherous look
6. Egg cells
7. Shipping hazard
8. Coil
9. Learned
10. Happy dogs do this
11. Heavenly glow
12. Consciousness
13. Wobble
14. Person with a limb removed
15. Unsmooth
16. Syrup flavor
17. A symbol of disgrace or infamy
25. Foretelling events as if by supernatural intervention
29. Relative of an ostrich
31. Make fun of
35. Conscription
37. Study of celestial bodies
39. Fishing aid
40. terrier
41. One to grow on?
43. Secreted by certain snakes
44. Martial art
45. Ages
46. Protein
50. Fringe or border
51. Wedding cake feature
52. Fold over and sew
53. A Word file maybe?
55. Small boat
57. Some forensic evidence
58. Short composition for a solo instrument
61. Record holder
63. Review
67. Bank contents
70. Second to the Sheriff
73. Former Italian currency
74. Worked up
76. Caddie’s offering
77. Counter call
78. Cumberland
79. Lowlife
81. Humdrum
82. Lingering effect
83. Glance over
84. Tit for
85. Gibbon, for one
87. Give voice to
88. Mounted on
92. Melee
94. Elevator part
97. Swellhead
99. Wipeout?
103. Frightened
104. Computer storage
106. Back on board
107. Vaulted
108. Insect stage
109. Watch
111. Kind of tube
113. Smallest
114. It may get you to first base
115. Saint-Germain’s river
116. Hero sandwich
119. Being nothing more than specified
121. Apple variety
122. Wheel of Fortune choice
125. Absorb, with “up”
126. Kitten’s cry

SUDOKU

BY REIKO MCLAUGHLIN

ANSWERS

THE CHIEFTAINS TEND to make friends wherever they go. In a career that now spans 48 years, Ireland’s premier traditional band has not only exported the folk songs of the Emerald Isle all over the world, it has jammed with everyone from Van Morrison and Elvis Costello to a who’s who of like-minded musicians from Nashville, Cuba and around the globe.

“Everything we’ve done has a connection to the heritage of the Irish people, though,” says Paddy Moloney, the four-piece band’s piper, accordionist and cofounder. “We never really depart from who and what we are.”

The story behind the music on San Patricio, the Chieftains’ new album, is a case in point. A mix of traditional Mexican dances and ballads featuring numerous Mexican collaborators, the record is a tribute to the St. Patrick’s Battalion, a group of mid-19th century European conscripts (many of them Irish) who deserted the U.S. Army to fight for Mexico during the Mexican- American War.

When America won the war, grabbing Texas in the process, many San Patricios were tried as traitors. But the battalion has long been lionized in Mexico. “Back in 1997, the Mexican government issued a postage stamp commemorating them,” Moloney explains. “And one of the places we recorded is a convent in the town of Churubusco, where a battle was fought. It’s now a museum, and we were able to play with Banda de Gaitas del Batallón de San Patricio, the military pipe band that’s in residence there.”

The album blends the two cultures, bringing the Chieftains’ style to traditional songs the San Patricios might have heard. In addition to Mexican stars such as Los Tigres del Norte, Lila Downs and Mariachi Santa Fe de Jesus Guzman, the album features Linda Ronstadt (whose father is Mexican) and guitarist-producer Ry Cooder, a friend and longtime collaborator whose original song, “The Sands of Mexico,” fits nicely with excavated tunes such as “El Chivo” and “Persecucíon de Villa.” “Some pieces sound like our own Irish folk dances,” says Moloney, astonished by the similarities.

The album’s epic centerpiece, “March to Battle (Across the Rio Grande),” combines thundering Irish martial rhythms with narration by Northern Ireland–born actor Liam Neeson, who saw cinematic potential in the story of the forgotten fighters. Moloney laughs while remembering Neeson’s rather pointed comment during the recording process: “‘If you ever want to turn this into a movie,’ he told me, ‘count me in.’”

K. LEANDER WILLIAMS likes his corned beef with a smidge of pico de gallo.

MOST OF US ARE surrounded by so much clutter that a book about someone else’s junk sounds, frankly, a little silly. (Where would we even put it?) But Lisa Tracy’s Objects of Our Affection goes beyond the belongings themselves into their history, which is where she found real worth.

“The impetus for the book was to discover why we hold on to this stuff,” Tracy says. “I mean, Americans are spending about twelve billion dollars annually on storage facilities.”

Tracy and her sister contributed to that total for years, paying hundreds of dollars a month to store family furniture. About 10 years after their mother’s death, they decided to auction it off. The women didn’t know what else to do with centuries of family history in the form of Chippendale sofas and cut-glass salt dishes.

Her forebears, many of whom served in the military, had picked up pieces in far-flung locations. Some items dated to the 17th century, when her ancestors first came to North America. When it came time to type up the auction catalog, an appraiser had questions about the provenance of all that furniture and bric-a-brac. For instance, did the piece her family called “the George Washington chair” ever actually belong to the first president? Tracy investigated, digging through historical society records in southern New Jersey and Philadelphia, and ultimately found ties to Washington. She took a similar approach to other items, uncovering the fascinating backgrounds of everything from a pair of antique dueling pistols to a set of Canton china.

Every piece had a story to tell. But the real takeaway was a new perspective on her own belongings, including those heirlooms she held on to. “At this point, I could really let go of it all,” she says. “We love our stuff, but I think what we really love is the stories behind it.” Take heed as you start your spring cleaning.

Associate editor LAYLA SCHLACK stores her parents’ old furniture in her living room.

MR. HOSPITALITY

A new book remembers business pioneer Fred Harvey

Long before Starbucks, McDonald’s and Marriott Hotels, a dapper Englishman named Fred Harvey invented the modern hospitality industry. Starting with a chain of restaurants serving the Santa Fe Railway in the 1880s, he created the first national brand, a sprawling empire spreading from Chicago to California. As author Stephen Fried writes in his absorbing biography, Appetite for America—which comes with recipes, including the tempting Butterscotch Pie Chantilly—he helped settle the American West along the way.

GENERALLY SPEAKING, less thought goes into salt than into the shakers used to dispense it. That is, except when the seasoning is under assault, as it were, by health advocates, who remind us that too much sodium can lead to high blood pressure, which leads to increased incidence of heart attacks and strokes.

A study published by The New England Journal of Medicine found that as many as 92,000 deaths could be prevented each year if we simply lowered our salt intake by just over half a teaspoon per day.

New York mayor Michael Bloomberg recently began an anti-salt initiative designed to cut sodium intake by 25 percent over the next five years, and California and the federal government are considering similar measures.

The good news for the crystal crowd is that not all salts are created equal, so rather than simply pouring it on, diners are increasingly training their palates to appreciate the nuanced flavors that artisanal salts bring to food and moderating their intake in the process. Certain kinds of fleur de sel, a sea salt from France’s Brittany coast, for example, have a subtly seaweedy taste, while some black salts confer a pleasantly eggy, sulfurous note. Maldon sea salt from Essex, England, comes in big white flakes that add a distinct crunchy texture. And Himalayan pink salt consists of tiny crystals that dissolve more easily into food. Other salts are smoked over various kinds of wood, mixed with spices, or spiked with other ingredients such as white truffles or hot peppers to add more assertive flavor.

The majority of exotic salts are used in professional kitchens, where they’re finding their way into everything from hors d’oeuvres to desserts. But home cooks are adopting the trend as well. Take a glance at the spice aisle at any local gourmet shop, and you’ll find that those old cylindrical boxes of table salt—the ones with the girl holding the umbrella with the mysterious rubric, “When it rains, it pours”—are no longer monopolizing the salt section. Instead, sea salts from Greece and France, among other places, are in ever-greater supply, along with row after row of other artisanal salts hailing from every corner of the planet and every point on the color wheel.

SaltWorks, a company based in Woodinville, Washington, and specializing in imported salts from around the world, has seen annual growth ranging from 30 to 50 percent over the past few years, says president Naomi Novotny. The company, which launched in 2001 and moves upward of 25 million pounds of salt per year, now sources more than 50 varieties from 20 countries—everything from Bolivian rose salt from the Andes mountains to black lava salt from Cyprus.

“When we first started nine years ago, people were getting interested in gourmet salts because they were new” to the market, Novotny explains. “Now people are becoming much more educated and even more interested.” But the increasing demand can present a challenge, Novotny points out, since many specialized salts undergo delicate harvesting processes that are subject to climate conditions. For instance, to gather France’s fleur de sel—one of SaltWorks’ top sellers—harvesters begin by channeling the Atlantic waters into clay-lined salt ponds where, if sun and wind conditions are favorable, the minerals form salt crystals on the surface. The crystals are then raked by hand off the top. This is the first year, after a two-year weather hiatus, that newly harvested fleur de sel is on the market, says Novotny.

Regular table salt, by contrast, is collected from subterranean salt mines—which are found worldwide— or harvested by drilling deep wells underground. The salt crystals are then processed to remove trace minerals and dried out to eliminate cakiness. But though it’s plentiful and inexpensive, regular salt doesn’t bring the flavor subtleties or the added texture many chefs and ambitious cooks increasingly crave.

Lately, chef Matthew Accarrino of the acclaimed Italian restaurant SPQR in San Francisco is partial to salt smoked over applewood. “I love it because the flavor is so intense,” says Accarino, who uses it to top off his spiced ricotta fritters. For home cooks, he suggests adding a dash of smoked salt to give a quick, flavorful finish to grilled fish, meat or chicken.

At Boulder’s renowned Frasca Food and Wine, chef Lachlan Mackinnon- Patterson likes Murray River salt from Australia because its fine flakes dissolve quickly, letting the flavor of seafood shine through with no salty aftertaste. He uses it in his hamachi crudo, a sashimi-like seafood dish he makes with thinly sliced raw hamachi (or another high-grade fish) and seasons with black pepper, lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil and that Australian salt. For home cooks, he recommends making an easy party canapé by dipping apples or apple slices into caramel and sprinkling them with Murray River salt.

Chef Mikey Price of New York City’s Market Table, a West Village restaurant that’s jammed nightly thanks to its ingenious twists on comfort food, favors flaky, coarse Maldon salt from England. He sprinkles it on his appetizer of hush puppies with clover- honey butter, to create a sweet-salty contrast and extra crunch.

“With Maldon salt you get not only the salt hit but the texture too,” notes Australian celebrity chef Pete Evans, who owns six restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne and appears regularly on television in Australia and stateside. “The thing about it is that it’s a nice way to finish off a dish, but people can be heavy-handed with it, so you have to be careful,” he notes. Evans makes an impressive three-minute crudo by cutting raw sushi-grade scallops into thin slices and drizzling them with a fruity olive oil and a squirt of lime, then sprinkling shaved lime zest, minced chili peppers, chopped mint and a sprinkle of Maldon salt on top.

Maine chefs Mark Gaier and Clark Frasier of Arrows restaurant and MC Perkins Cove in Ogunquit like what they describe as the “clean, vibrant taste” and the higher iron oxide levels of Hawaiian red sea salt, which gets its color from the clay in the tidal pools where it’s harvested. They use the salt on prosciutto-wrapped melon and mango.

Sometimes salt choices reveal hints of patriotism or nostalgia. In New York, Italian-born chefs Odette Fada of the new SD26 and Cesare Casella of Salumeria Rosi Parmacotto opt for sea salt from Trapani, a fishing town on the western coast of Sicily. “I’m Italian; I want to use Italian!” says Fada. “For thirty years I’ve been cooking with that salt.” Casella uses organic soffidi sale (which means “whiffs of salt”) from Trapani in his seven-bean salad and pork belly with dandelion greens. He also sells it at his restaurant, which doubles as an epicurean shop.

Seattle chef Mark Fuller of Spring Hill gets his signature salt through a family connection. Fuller’s maternal relatives have been harvesting their pink Kauai Salt Ponds salt for more than four generations on Kauai island in Hawaii—but because of the state’s legal restrictions, salt from family- owned properties can’t be sold in retail shops. “It can only be gifted,” says Fuller. “So they gift it to me, and we use it as a garnish at the restaurant.” The salt is put on the dishes before bread and butter are served, and Fuller occasionally uses it in other dishes, too.

Chefs are also playing around with blended salts, which are mixed with other ingredients to create added layers of flavor. Chris Santos, a star on the Food Network’s Chopped series and chef- owner of The Stanton Social in New York City, makes a fantastic jalapeño salt that he uses to add a spicy kick to grilled vegetables, pastas or burgers, or for lining the rim of margarita glasses. (The salt is easily replicated at home: Just mix one cup of kosher or sea salt with a half-cup of jalapeno powder and an eighth-cup of sugar.) Fada of Manhattan’s SD26 likes to top some fish dishes with a Sicilian citrus-spiked salt, made with bits of orange, bergamot and lemon. She also sprinkles seaweed- studded salt from Italy’s Adriatic coast on her sea bass poached in fish broth.

When she uses that briny, fragrant Adriatic salt, says Fada, “It’s just like walking outside and smelling the breeze from the sea.”

Whatever your personal taste in salt, though, just remember, go easy.

New York–based food writer SALMA ABDELNOUR probably takes too many things with a grain of salt.

THE GRIND

What’s the point of fancy sodium chloride if you’re using a boring shaker? These upgrades are worth their salt.

SALT MILL

Leave it to Scandinavians to design a salt mill that looks like a piece of modern art. www.dwr.com

SALT CELLAR

When shaking and grinding is too strenuous, a salt cellar and a serving spoon are indispensible. www.amazon.com

SALT GRATER

Sometimes salt is so fancy it comes in rock form. That’s when you need a grater. Just watch the knuckles. www.microplane.com

ON A NEARLY Arctic January day in London’s Soho, Matthew Harding, a slim-year-old Englishman with slicked-back sandy brown hair and fine features, sorts through a bin filled with fabric samples and rough patches of sheepskin. “I found a great old rug from the seventies,” he says, picking up one weathered square of animal hide. “But for the runway I’m trying to source pieces that are a bit, well, less nasty.”

Around him in the MA Fashion studios at Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, the storied British institution that has schooled the likes of Jarvis Cocker, Pierce Brosnan and Sir Terence Conran in everything from fine art to drama, students in black hoodies and skinny jeans are shuffling around their work spaces with stacks of patterns and swathes of fabric. The drab, freezing room three stories above Charing Cross Road is worlds away from the dramatically lit catwalks of London Fashion Week, where the most promising of these students will show their work in a month’s time.

Unlike the slick studios of Project Runway or Launch My Line, there is no “accessories wall” here, no L’Oréal Paris makeup studio, no guarantee of overnight stardom. The windows rattle in the wind, paint peels off the walls. In 2011, the school will move out of its ramshackle digs and into a state-of-the-art facility near Kings Cross railroad station. Until then, students shiver, La Bohème–style. The only hint of the stakes they face is a wall one floor down, where some of the most prominent alums of CSM’s fashion program have scrawled their names in pencil. John Galliano. Alexander McQueen. Stella McCartney.

Phoebe Philo. Zac Posen.

No pressure.

Harding’s neat, chest-high studio desk is bare but for some sketches for his masters collection, the sum of nearly a year and a half of work. The 10-plus looks he will present in the coming weeks to Professor Louise Wilson, the formidable head of the program, are also the culmination of almost “seven hard-core years” of studies at the college. Today, he jokes, running on about four hours of sleep a night, his fingers blistered, “It’s really very unglamorous. You’re up at six-thirty in the morning, cutting garments, doing five people’s jobs at once.”

Just half of the students in these rooms will be selected to show at London Fashion Week, hitting the runway on the same day as the prestigious Burberry show, when droves of international press will be in attendance.

Across the room, Cornel Bolt, a 29-year-old from Switzerland with a shock of blond hair and heavy-framed glasses, is circumspect about his chances. “I try not to think about it,” says Bolt. “People are really competitive. I mean, nobody’s going to steal my scissors from my desk. It’s not sabotage. But it’s been a really tough process. I was expecting it to be hard. I had no idea just how…” A middle-aged female technician interrupts his sentence, clearly getting impatient. “Cornel, do you have something for me to cut? Or am I just going to sit here all morning waiting for you?” With that, Bolt shrugs apologetically and gets back to the task at hand.

One floor down, Wilson, the source of the students’ skittishness, sits behind a spare desk, her hair pulled back in a plain ponytail. In her office, she scans their sketches and judges their final pieces with characteristic bluntness. Some students liken the process to an evisceration.

“I’m not the Simon Cowell of fashion,” she snaps, clearly weary of the comparison. “But we’re not clinking champagne glasses and air-kissing each other here, congratulating ourselves over making another little star. It’s not about coming here and being dusted with fairy dust. I’m an educator. I come in at eight, I work till eight or nine, I’m overweight, I go home, I lie on the bed and I eat Kit Kats.”

When some of her MA students first arrive, says Wilson, she faces the uphill battle of tearing down everything they think they know about fashion. She breaks off into one of her riffs. “We’re dealing with a group of students who say they’re inspired by fountains and silver chairs, and they carry designer handbags. It transpires that they have very few skills, and they don’t make things to wear. They’re used to seeing their fashion in a picture. I’m used to seeing fashion on a body. So they try to bully me into submission by showing me what they think they’re doing fabulously, and I bully them into the fact that they need to show me clothes on a human.”

When asked if her tactics amount to tough love, Wilson grumbles, “It’s not tough love. It’s hard, analytical teaching, one-to-one between my staff and the students. It’s got nothing to do with love, with favorites.” But even Wilson, who goes on to growl a bit more about working for an underfunded institution “where the bloody heating doesn’t work!” softens into something approximating a purr when she pauses to consider the “mystique of the place. Yes. It’s something.”

Jane Rapley, CSM’s Head of College, is thoughtful about the pressure that faces students such as Harding and Bolt and idiosyncratic educators such as Wilson. “It’s a horrible pressure, and it’s a lovely pressure. We don’t want people to imagine, ‘Oh, at CSM they’re all too up their own bottoms, too grand for me.’ We have to sometimes disabuse our students— ‘You might have been a star in your own small pool, but you have to work at it.’ You’ve got students here who have palpable ambition. A lot of them have to learn how to grow up. CSM might get the door off the latch, but I tell students, ‘It’s you that walks through. All the degree will do is maybe open the door, but in the end you are the creative force.’”

For Anne Smith, who heads the fashion program at Central Saint Martins, there is the humdrum work of educating, and then there are the moments that make you catch your breath. “I remember Christopher Kane’s graduating show,” Smith says, referring to the talented Scottish designer who now heads up Donatella Versace’s couture collection. “Sitting front row, it was a sort of spine-tingling moment, and I thought, this is new and fresh. There are always strong students, but every two or three years there is someone who makes you gasp, who you know will go all the way.”

Back in the MA studios, there’s a rack of semifinished clothes beside Harding, offering just a hint of what his final collection will look like. There are sharply tailored sheepskin pencil skirts and psychedelic structured blouses that look as though they could be worn by a time-traveling Elizabethan courtesan. “I think I’ve come to something that’s a little bit Narnia Snow Queen,” Harding muses. “I like to play with structure. I like it when you look at a piece of clothing and wonder how it works. I create nightmares for myself making these laborious things.”

At the end of the day, Harding hopes to establish his own line, but he’s willing to work his way up through the ranks of the fashion industry. “I’d love to work at Givenchy, or Lanvin. But it’s not about being bathed in the golden light and just making it overnight. In the end, you just don’t want to disappoint yourself.”

SARAH HORNE is glad to see that British eccentricity is alive and well.

ONCE UPON A TIME, DELUXE HOTELS IN NEW YORK CITY—and much of the world—followed the lead of two lodging lions. There was the Waldorf-Astoria, with its burnished brass, polished marble and presidential pedigree, and then there was The Plaza, that storied Beaux-Arts cornerstone overlooking Central Park, made famous by, among other luminaries, a six-year-old named Eloise. For much of the 20th century, every other luxury hotel in the city aspired to be like these two. Even the regal Pierre (which recently guest-starred in season three of Mad Men), stood in their shadows. But the Plaza closed down in 2005 and reopened under new ownership, with about a third its rooms converted into condominiums. (Interested? They’ve sold for as much as $50 million.) And the Waldorf, well, it’s still got that same burnished-brass-and-polished-marble look—not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Meanwhile, New York is on a hotel building spree, and where once there were just a handful of elite choices, now there are literally dozens. According to Lodging Econometrics, a company that analyzes hotel trends worldwide, in 2008 and 2009, 59 hotels opened their doors, nearly half of them in the “luxury” category. Which means visitors to the city have more high-end options than ever before, and the competition for bookings is heating up. So in a service to the traveling public, I’ve packed an overnight bag, watered the spider plants in my outer-borough basement apartment and embarked on a luxury hotel marathon, a forced march, if you will, from one swank accommodation to the next. Along with the Crosby Street Hotel, I’ve resolved to check out the Bowery, the Ace, the Jane, the Standard New York, the Thompson LES, the Smyth Tribeca, the Greenwich, the Mark, the MAve, the Vu, the NU and others—all buzzed-about spots and nearly all less than 18 months old.

After carefully stocking up on tip money, I enter the sleek Thompson LES. The second-floor lobby bar and outdoor lounge have a serious nightclub vibe. slender cocktail waitresses weave silently among the guests, and thumping dance music is set on infinite repeat. In the room upstairs I find raw concrete ceilings, shiny black floors, semigloss black walls—even some of the mirrors are black. Two giant TVs offer a combined 1,500 square inches of high-def viewing pleasure. I munch on the Dean & DeLuca chocolates and pocket a bottlette of Hou Hou Shu sparkling sake for later.

Such amenities are one way the new hotels are competing for visitor loyalty. They’re also lowering rates precipitously and offering free nights and other deals, hoping to entice guests and maintain high occupancy numbers. As I enjoy a hot shower in the LES beneath a showerhead the size of a large pizza, I feel pleasantly enticed.

I pack my bags and slink west to the Bowery, offering the bottlette of sparkling sake to one particularly appreciative soul. This street is famous for its seedy underbelly, though you’d never know it today to look at the fashionable bars and well-regarded restaurants lining its blocks. Just above Houston, I encounter two very tall new hotels—the Bowery Hotel and the Cooper Square. Passing through the heavy doors of the Bowery is like stepping into another era, with a wall of old-school wooden cubbyholes behind the reception desk to hold messages and heavy brass keys. The velvet-draped lobby is lined with ornate mirrors and peacock feathers. (The Cooper Square aims for a brighter, more modern feel.) My room at the Bowery, a corner king, is a model of simplicity, with lead-paned floor-to-ceiling windows. As I get comfortable on the bed and wrap myself in a cozy wool throw, it occurs to me how much the definition of luxury has changed. It’s no longer about gold leaf—hasn’t been for years—nor is it about a “scene.” We want economy of design, intelligence and warmth. The Bowery has all that. Indeed, it’s hard for me to leave in the morning—until I remember that I’m spending tonight at the Greenwich Hotel, a stunning new grandee co-owned by Robert DeNiro.

First, about that shower at the LES. It was amazing, but not the best that I’ll try. For that, I’m torn between those in the Greenwich and the Standard New York. At these hotels, the rainfall showerheads are supplemented by handheld nozzles, which, when utilized simultaneously, help a bather achieve “double wash”—no small thing. Another bathroom ensemble I appreciate is at the Ace Hotel, a swinging new space that is the fourth iteration of a hip Seattle mini-franchise. Here, the “double wash” shower is a prelude to a long, decadent soak in a separate claw-foot tub: the trifecta.

While we’re in the bathroom, a word on toiletries: I’m a simple man when it comes to grooming products, but having sampled my fair share of concoctions blended especially for these hotels, I may be ready to step up my game. The Greenwich’s are made by McBride Beauty, a private-label concern based in Brooklyn, and come in large white tubes. The Crosby offers bottles of Miller Harris, and the Bowery uses faux-medicinal bottles of C.O. Bigelow Apothecaries. At the Smyth Tribeca, I fill my shaving kit with an old standby, Dr. Bronner’s Peppermint soap, and at the Ace, I load up on Rudy’s Barber Shop shampoo and conditioner.

Some of the hotels try hard to reinvent the luxury hotel experience—so hard that they overshoot the mark. At one, I board an elevator and discover two flustered, luggage-laden out-of-towners trying desperately to get to their room on the eighth floor. “This elevator seems to have a mind of its own,” the man says. “You have to insert your keycard first,” I explain. “Gosh, we’ve been in here for fifteen minutes!” says his wife.

I can relate. The previous night I fiddled helplessly to wrestle not only with the elevator but with two separate widescreen TVs that seemed to have minds of their own. And some of those light fixtures would take a Ph.D. in particle physics to operate. Of course, this is a prime example of what my father would call a “Cadillac problem.” Sometimes luxury ain’t easy.

And sometimes it doesn’t appear very luxurious at all. When I enter the splendidly strange lobby of the Jane Hotel, a bellhop wearing a pillbox hat and matching red and black uniform greets me. He takes my tiny suitcase and guides me to the reception desk, where today’s weather is written in chalk on a small piece of slate. The rooms at the Jane have been designed to look like the interiors of old ship cabins (some have bunk beds, and some floors have shared bathrooms), and the owners keep the prices low (around $100). It’s a theme hotel, but there’s nothing cheesy about it. It’s a similar story at the Ace, where my “Loft Suite” comes complete with a turntable, record collection, and a Martin acoustic guitar (perfectly tuned). At first I bridle at the rock & roll theme—if I wanted that, I’d have stayed at the Hard Rock—but then I start playing “Wish You Were Here” on the guitar, and pretty soon I’m glad I’m there.

Two weeks into my hotel marathon, I’ve collected 32 bespoke click pens, a spectrum of monogrammed colored pencils, reams of flashy stationery, enough lavender and sandalwood lotion to stay moisturized through a polar winter, and enough expertise with remote controls to join the Geek Squad. I’ve learned how to get the most value out of room service (order tea, which always comes with a selection of cookies and biscuits), and I’ve become accustomed to being called Mr. Guy. I’ve learned the easiest way to the hardest restaurant reservation is through a concierge, and that bellhops aren’t always charmed by a willingness to carry your own bag. Finally, I learned that keycards are quickly becoming a thing of the past, replaced by an array of fancy gizmos (electrofobs?) you sort of wave at a lock like you’re playing a Theremin.

Eventually, my journey nearly complete, I find myself on that window sill of the Crosby Street Hotel at dawn, sipping rich coffee from a porcelain cup and trying not to think about slinking back to my lonely basement apartment. The streets far below are silent. Amazingly, there are another 45 hotels opening in New York City in the coming year. I have no idea how the economy will treat them, but I can’t wait to try them out.

Hemispheres executive editor MIKE GUY has enough high-end shower gel to last a lifetime.

BEST NEW HOTEL – CROSBY STREET HOTEL

Enter the Crosby’s lobby at your peril; you may never want to leave. This is superior lodging in every way. Upstairs, each room is painstakingly crafted, done up in appealing colors and textures that combine an almost regal superiority with an exquisite sense of comfort. Even the details are enchanting—the extra-wide window sills piled with cushions, Samuel Heath cups, heated towel racks and dressmaker’s mannequins in each room, which might come in handy, as hotel owner and designer Kit Kemp suggests, “for pinning on a brooch.” Good thinking!

COOLEST BELLHOPS

THE JANE
Friendly examples of a long-lost species (seemingly lifted straight from the set of Barton Fink), these bellhops, below, wear red and gold pillbox hats— complete with chinstrap— and a welcoming smile to match.

MOST SERENE SPA AND SWIMMING POOL

THE GREENWICH
This may be DeNiro’s hotel, but the placid subterranean pool, below—warmly lit by authentic Japanese lanterns, with a 250-year- old bamboo ceiling overhead—will soften any tough guy. The ginger and coconut scrub in the Shibui Spa seals the deal.

SWANKIEST LOBBY

THE JANE
In 1912, this space sheltered survivors of the Titanic. Today, with its vast Persian rugs, chandeliers and warm tones, it evokes that Gilded Age splendor, only without the pesky icebergs. At right, the Jane’s ballroom

MOST PERPLEXING ELEVATORS

THE SMYTH TRIBECA
No matter the actual day, one elevator sports a floor mat that says “Thursday,” while the other says “Tuesday.” Evidently, the designer wanted it that way. O-kay…

CLASSIEST BAR

THE LOBBY BAR, THE BOWERY HOTEL
Friendly bartenders? Check. Crisply made martini? Check. Sandstone fireplace, zinc-topped bar, above, and velvet settees? Check. Can I run a tab?

HIPPEST ART COLLECTION

CROSBY STREET HOTEL
Every room has its own sampling of excellent original works, below, but don’t miss the striking steel head by Jaume Plensa in the lobby or the paintings by English photorealist Peter Rocklin.

MOST IMPRESSIVE TOILETRY

THE BOWERY
The lilliputian, two-inch metal tube of Marvis Classic Strong Mint toothpaste looks a little like superglue, but its taste is strictly mint. Refreshing! (Why don’t all hotels support dental hygiene?)

BEST BATHROOM

THE STANDARD NEW YORK
If you don’t think a view of Jersey can blow your mind, you haven’t seen it from the 16th floor of the Standard at sunset, through your toes, while soaking in a bath.

CUSHIEST LINENS

THE MARK
Think once you get into the 2,000-thread-count territory, the difference between sheets is indiscernible?

Not quite. The otherworldly linens at the newly reopened Mark, by top Italian weaver Quagliotti, will tempt you to ditch those pj’s altogether.

MOST EYE-OPENING MORNING COFFEE

THE JANE
Find the right seat in the cozy Cafe Gitane satellite just off the Jane’s lobby, and you can watch the colorful collection of guests check out as the sun rises onto the buildings across the Hudson. The morning Journal just seems superfluous.

“I HAVE MANY beautiful memories of my summer holidays in the Greek Islands. In August, the sky is full of stars. I remember gazing up at them, thinking about how human beings, even with all the great accomplishments we can achieve, are so small in comparison to the vast universe out there. It’s very emotional.

“I love to switch off all my phones and relax with family and close friends on my boat, in the middle of the Mediterranean. If I’m not cooking my favorite risotto for dinner on board, my favorite place to dock is Mykonos, where I like to eat at Nammos on Psarou Beach.

“I also love to be at home in Italy and go to Just Cavalli Café. I personally chose the menu, so naturally I’m a fan.”

Roberto Cavalli’s women’s line, which showed last month in Milan, will be available in stores this summer.

1 Your sprint through Frankfurt starts by taking the S-bahn to Taunusanlage. (Say that five times fast.) From there, walk to the spectacular Main Tower (Neue Mainzer Straße 52-58; www.maintower.de) and take the elevator to the 54th-floor viewing terrace. Comprising two towers, one round, one square, it’s the fourth-highest skyscraper in “Mainhattan” and proof that all architects once played with Legos. (0:35)

2 Descend from the clouds and walk over to the Alte Oper (1 Opernplatz; www.alteoper.de). Its roof was destroyed in World War II, but the building reopened in 1981 with a Renaissance façade that’s faithful to the original. Have a coffee in Cafe Rosso and imagine opening night 1880: Don Giovanni. (1:10)

3 Take the U-bahn to Bornheim, a hip shopping district and the only part of Frankfurt to survive WWII intact. Stroll Berger Straße toward Merianplatz; at Gate 05 (Berger Straße 46; www.gate05.de), stock up on the travel accessories you forgot to pack (a travel-size tube of Zahnpasta, perhaps?). (2:02)

4 Hop back on the U-bahn to Römerberg. Now you’re in medieval Europe—kind of. Stroll along the city square’s picturesque half-timbered buildings and stop in at Dom Sankt Bartholomäus (Domplatz 14; www.dom-frankfurt.de), where emperors were crowned during the Holy Roman Empire. Fascinating history, but you’re getting hungry. (2:31)

5 Time for Mittagessen. Steps away from Frankfurt’s shopping mile is the delightful Kleinmarkthalle (Hasengasse 5–7; www.kleinmarkthalle.de), a teeming indoor market where every sign, jar and display is a curiosity. Grab a bite at Metzgerei Schreiber—word is, their wurst is the best. ( 3:04 )

6 For more than three decades, husband and wife Bernd and Hilla Becher photographed German water towers, lime kilns and blast furnaces. Their obsession has a home at the Museum für Moderne Kunst (Domstraße 10; www.mmk-frankfurt.de), which also includes works by German provocateur Joseph Beuys and his student Blinky Palermo. On your way out, hit the gift shop for a one-off TransparentFragmentBag, made from the exhibition banners that hang on the MMK façade. (3:48)

7 Cross the Eiserner Steg, a 19th century Fußgängerbrücke—errr, footbridge—and you’re on the museum embankment, where you could take in Old Masters (Städel Museum), old furniture (Museum of Applied Arts) and old stamps (Museum of Communication). But time is short, so pick one and get moving. (4:41)

8 Conclude your jaunt with a glass of Apfelwein, Frankfurt’s famous hard apple cider. Take the charming back streets to Lorsbacher Thal (Große Rittergasse 49-51; www.lorsbacher-thal.de), which has been making the fruity libation since 1803. While there, be sure to order a side of Bratkartoffeln. Can’t pronounce it? Hope your hosts studied English and ask for “hot delicious potatoes.” (5:00)

March is a special time in Ireland—full of clover and, thanks to St. Patrick, devoid of snakes. Enjoy the scenery with golf and falconry, then retire to an 800-year-old castle. Luxury B&Bs Dromoland Castle and Castlemartyr Resort are offering packages starting at €260 for two nights. Leprechaun sightings—and accompanying pots of gold—not included. www.carlyleinternational.us

SWEET PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND

A word of advice to patrons of Bacaro, Brian Kingsford’s joint near Brown University: Study up. There are three varieties of oyster with seven accompaniments (you do the math), 33 cicchetti (Italian tapas), a massive collection of charcuterie and 10 housemade chocolates. Fortunately, it’s hard to make a mistake. (Yes, there are entrées, too.) www.bacarorestaurant.net

TOTALLY PSYCHEDELIC

Those sporting a touch of gray will want to break out the tie-dye for the first large-scale exhibition of Grateful Dead memorabilia ever. The New York Historical Society will show concert posters, fan mail and stage props. See it before July 4, when the collection is filed away in the Dead archive at University of California Santa Cruz. www.nyhistory.org

MAXWELL, SMART

Starting this month, Seattle-bound travelers have a new option for accommodations in the trendy Victorian Queen Anne neighborhood. The family-owned Maxwell Hotel is walking distance from the Space Needle, the Experience Music Project and several theaters. www.themaxwellhotel.com

RETRO-PERSPECTIVE

You’ve seen M.C. Escher prints on dorm-room walls, but in person, they’ll really blow your mind. Through April 11, the Boca Raton Museum of Art will be holding one of the most comprehensive Escher exhibitions ever presented in the U.S. Just watch your step on the stairs as you leave. www.bocamuseum.org

JUST DESERTS

L’Auberge de Sedona is completing its $25 million renovation, which includes the gourmet L’Auberge Restaurant on Oak Creek, the Wanderlust Library and Lounge and comfy cottages. Looks like Palm Springs has competition. www.lauberge.com

MUMMY DEAREST

Move over, Egypt. China’s 4,000-year-old mummies are in such good shape you can see their hair color (blond). They’re on display alongside ancient Chinese clothing and documents at the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, California. www.bowers.org

ISLAS BONITAS

We could all use an island getaway, preferably planned with tips from locals about insider things to do. Moon Handbooks are written by people from the places they are writing about. This month, Perseus Books releases an updated Dominican Republic guide. Its canon includes up-to-date volumes on the Virgin Islands and Bermuda. www.perseusbooks.com

A PAINTED HISTORY

Spend a little “face time” with one of the most important female artists of the 20th century. “Alice Neel: Painted Truths” is a comprehensive look at the artist credited with reinventing portraiture (some of her lesser-known cityscapes are included for good measure). The exhibition is at The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston all month before heading off to London. www.mfah.org

CALENDAR MARCH

2-7 ABU DHABI

Hobnob with the literary crowd, including top authors from around the world, and replenish your library at the Abu Dhabi International Book Fair. www.adbookfair.com

6-7 LONDON

The intriguingly named Do Something Different Weekend at the Barbican Centre will stimulate your brain with interactive arts, music and theater. www.barbican.org.uk

13 CHICAGO

Though by no means the only locale that celebrates St. Patrick’s Day, the Windy City is apparently the only place devoted enough to dye its river green for the past 48 years. www.chicagostpatsparade.com

14-19 ASPEN, COLORADO

With skiwear fashion shows and nighttime concerts on the mountain, Aspen Fashion Week reminds us why the trendsetters do their schussing here. www.aspenfashionweek.com

19-21 TORONTO

As you may know via other channels, the Psychic Expo is coming up. Can you see what will happen there? www.esp888.com

21-28 CHIANG RAI, THAILAND

You like polo, and you like elephants, but how do you combine those two passions? The King’s Cup Elephant Polo Tournament, that’s how. www.anantaraelephantpolo.com

27-APRIL 18, MOSCOW

Didn’t make it to the Tony Awards? Try the Golden Mask Festival. Don’t miss the three-week performance marathon leading up to the gala ceremony. www.goldenmask.ru/eng

10-11 MOULTON, ALABAMA

It doesn’t reveal which came first, but the Chicken and Egg Festival confirms both are delicious. www.alabamachickenandeggfestival.com

AFTER RETURNING from Haiti last month, Sonya Jackson, managing director Corporate Social Investment for United and president of the United Airlines Foundation, can say first-hand that the immediate needs we all heard about were obvious: Water, medical supplies and relief workers had to be shipped in; evacuees, mostly children, needed to be transported out.

As one of the world’s largest airlines, it was clear that United was in a position to help and took immediate action to do so.

Behind-the-scenes, a team co-led by Jackson and Jim DeYoung, managing director of United’s operations control center, formulated a highly coordinated relief plan involving scores of United employees. Senior management quickly gave the plan a green light and put the appropriate resources where they needed to be to fly safely to Haiti.

“We have assets that are not easy to come by,” notes Jackson. “Planes, flight crews…there are certain things that only an airline with a global reach can do.”

Flying into Port-au-Prince—a city United normally doesn’t serve— necessitated regular contact with the military’s U.S. Southern Command, which is overseeing relief efforts in Haiti, implementing a strict flight schedule that allows flights to arrive and depart the damaged airport.

Jackson’s team, working closely with corporate and non-profit partners, quickly assembled the supplies most needed in Haiti, totaling 150,000 pounds of donated food, water, medicine, tents and other critical goods transported in six trips. This overwhelming amount of supplies that United needed to transport, including relief workers – some with up to 55 bags – was unprecedented and broke all cargo records for the company.

“Jim was a great partner and led our operations effort tirelessly,” Jackson says. “Every employee who worked on our relief flights contributed a critical piece to the success of this important mission.”

Extra cargo weight required special coordination among United’s cargo, weight and balance, and ramp services teams. “Our cargo team had to ensure the aircraft was loaded in a way that maximized every inch of the aircraft,” Jackson notes. “Our ramp personnel loaded more cargo than they normally would consider for a typical flight and our load planning team had to ensure the balance of the aircraft. They all did an amazing job.”

Prior to each flight, United employees worked with the State Department and U.S. Customs and Border Patrol to bring hundreds of individuals, including orphans who had been paired with adoptive parents, back from Haiti to the United States. Employees escorted Haitian orphans to their new parents in Colorado, completing adoptions that had long been in the works. United’s airport operations team ensured passenger handling, security and international documentation requirements were met

At the Port-au-Prince airport, there are no parallel taxiways, so United’s pilots had to land and turn around at the end of the runway, taxi midway back and pull off on a narrow taxiway. The onboard crews who welcomed earthquake victims onto air-conditioned planes provided comfort in the form of water, sandwiches, and simple human compassion.

“With some of the people and supplies that we transported in and out of Haiti—orphans, doctors, relief workers, cargo—we had existing partnerships with their respective organizations,” Jackson explains. “But there were many other groups where we didn’t. In those instances, we picked up the phone and started developing those relationships.”

Jackson and her team are focused on finding the best ways to leverage United’s resources—not only aircraft and corporate relationships, but also connecting customers and employees who want to help—to respond to the challenges facing the communities that they serve. United made it easy for employees and customers to donate Mileage Plus miles and cash to the American Red Cross, a longtime United partner, just as the company did when it facilitated the donation of more than 71 million miles after the tsunami in Asia five years ago.

United is also connecting its customers and employees to another important cause—hunger. Nearly 49 million Americans currently lack necessary food, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Starting this month, United is empowering customers to fight this growing problem by purchasing an “Eat for Good” snackbox, with one dollar from each purchase going to the national organization Feeding America (see the Choice Menu on the back cover). The attention-grabbing, brightly colored snackbox was designed by a student from After School Matters, another United partner program led by Maggie Daley, wife of Chicago Mayor Richard  
M. Daley, that provides after-school initiatives for Chicago students.

“Eat for Good” is just the latest example of United making connections. Since 2007, the Hugyou Family Teddy Bear program has encouraged flyers to donate dollars or Mileage Plus miles to raise funds and deliver teddy bears to children undergoing medical treatment. Plus, the ongoing Charity Miles program makes it easy for customers to go online and donate unused miles. In 2008 alone, nearly 200 million miles were donated to help organizations like the American Red Cross to fly relief workers to areas impacted by natural disasters.

But perhaps United’s best example of connecting its employees with the community is during events like the Breast Cancer Network of Strength’s Walks to Empower and the annual Holiday Giving program, which supplies gifts and a holiday meal for those in need.

“What impresses me the most is the way our people are willing to give,” Jackson says of her fellow employees. “They care. They get involved. They could not be more generous with their time.

“’Every Action Counts’ is something we take to heart,” she adds. “We constantly look for ways to engage the hearts and minds of our employees and of our customers. We firmly believe that it’s the collective action we all take that really makes that difference.”

EARLY IN JANUARY, hordes of giddy technophiles arrived at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas to gawk at more than 20,000 cutting-edge gadgets (think Winnebago-size TVs) and, perhaps more importantly, to meet people. In an effort to make networking a little easier and a little more innovative, the organizers of CES provided all attendees with a magical plastic card with their name on the front and a magnetic strip on the back. Its purpose: to relay, with a simple swipe, one’s vital details—name, address, hat size—to the occupants of booths touting cell phones, vacuums and cell phone vacuums.

At least that was the idea. “I don’t know what to do with it,” says the woman working a booth for one of the many e-readers introduced at the show. “Do you have a business card?”

She’s wasn’t alone. For all the interest in innovation among the 120,000 buyers, sellers and just plain curious, few in the crowd seemed willing to abandon their three-by-two-and-a-half- inch rectangles of card stock, slinging business cards rather than exchanging digits, um, digitally. No matter that the gadgets on display include countless devices that supposedly allow users to collaborate from opposite ends of the globe via videoconferencing, virtual whiteboards and real-time document editing. CES itself is based on a time-honored model, virtually indistinguishable from trade shows that filled the Las Vegas Convention Center when it arrived in the desert in 1959.

Ironic as it may sound, even technology’s top evangelists prefer tried-and-true methods when it comes to accomplishing their business goals. “Technology makes our lives easier in a lot of ways, but exhibitors strongly believe that in-person interaction is essential,” says Tara Dunion, senior director of communications for the Consumer Electronics Association, the trade organization that puts on CES. But it’s not just exhibitors, it’s business people everywhere. A recent survey of executives by the United States Travel Association found that 28 percent of their business would be lost without in-person meetings. Executives also estimate that face-to-face meetings convert 40 percent of potential customers into actual customers, while meetings conducted electronically convert only 16 percent.

“It’s extremely beneficial to shake someone’s hand and to look them in the eye,” Dunion says. That’s especially true at CES, where the average attendee holds 12 business meetings during each show. After all, are buyers more likely to carry your robot dog after receiving a press release or watching it e-bark?

“You don’t know what you have until you get your product in front of people,” says Kinesis Industries president Tod Wagenhals, who attended the convention for the first time last year. He came to show off a prototype of the K3, a wind-and solar-powered portable electronic device charger. With its two- inch fan blade, the contraption looks more like something meant to keep you cool than power up your phone. But plug into one of its ports, and one thing is clear: If you’re ever stuck in the desert with a dead cell phone, this is the device you’ll want (just watch those roaming charges).

Wagenhals left CES 2009 with a long list of suggestions from attendees—make it lighter, add more connection ports— and changed the device accordingly. “These aren’t the reactions you could get from having people watch videos or look at pictures,” he says. “People need to hold it, touch it, feel it.”

This year, Wagenhals is back with an improved product. Rather than soliciting feedback, he’s cutting deals.

Melanie Pearson, the owner of Liquid Image, a company that manufactures scuba, snorkeling and ski masks with built-in video cameras, is making her third visit to CES. The reason she keeps returning is simple: the crowds. “The sheer number of people gives our products enormous exposure,” she says. “It’s integral to our business.”

Liquid Image introduced its first camera-equipped goggles at CES 2008. Pearson says the ability to show off the product to buyers, distributors and press led to more than a million dollars in sales in the first year. “We started from scratch and instantaneously had orders,” she says. Sales more than doubled after CES 2009 and if all goes as planned, they’ll triple in 2010. “There was no way to do what we did without CES,” Pearson says.

Don’t be fooled though; CES isn’t just about business. Remember the sensory overload and subsequent glee of walking into the carnival? That’s what CES is like, except Whac-a-Mole has been replaced by Halo, and six-year-olds in chocolate-stained overalls by 36-year- olds in chocolate-stained overalls.

The biggest draws and most buzzed- about gadgets at this year’s show included the technologically impressive (a laptop with a transparent monitor, super-light tablet notebooks) and the simply bizarre (a blob of slime used to clean keyboards, a 19-inch high- definition television inside of a stuffed polar bear). But the products that drew the longest lines and loudest chatter were the 3-D TVs.

Some of the credit for the fervor probably belongs to James Cameron’s Avatar, which had been in theaters for a few weeks at the time of the show. Given the demographics of the CES crowd (young, male, nerdy) it was hard to imagine that anyone there hadn’t seen the movie, twice. And by the looks of the TV companies’ overflowing booths, they were eager for more. It took much patient waiting and, when the time was right, aggressive jostling to snag a pair of the glasses needed to partake in the 3-D experience (warning: watching without glasses may cause vertigo). Once the specs were on, it was finally possible to see what the fuss was about. Images popped out of the TV so convincingly that the occasional viewer would reach out and try to grab them. It didn’t work. But for all the splendor of the third dimension, the typical color, sharpness and eye-popping clarity we’ve come to expect from 21st century TVs were mostly lost.

Still, the eager crowds didn’t thin out for the entire four-day festival.

They devoured the 3-D TVs, just as they fiddled endlessly with the digital cameras and pounded mercilessly on the fancy keyboards.

The insistence on touching and tinkering made it clear that there’s really no substitute for being there. Even the companies whose products attempt to make being there unnecessary, like Cisco’s videoconferencing software TelePresence, recognize that nothing can replace the power of touch.

“We’re not at a point where we’re going to substitute for the tactile,” says David Hsieh, Cisco’s VP for marketing and emerging technologies. “It’s much more about having an increasingly blended experience.” What that experience will look like decades hence remains unclear. One thing, however, is certain—it will almost definitely involve business cards.

At his next trade show, associate editor ADAM K. RAYMOND will wear more sensible shoes.