Weekend Explorer: In the Mansion Land of the âFifth Avenoodlesâ
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The Upper East Side contains the cityâs most exclusive residences, private schools and social clubs. But it has never been quite as socially exclusive as some might have liked.
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Travel: From a stay in a 18th-century farmhouse in Italy to a former winery with its own stone chapel in Corsica.
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Life & style: Today's dilemma for Beth:  My friends are off to the festivals but I'm broke. How can I have fun?
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(InfoWorld) - What makes a great geek vacation? Well, high-speed access from even the most obscure locale is a given. Then throw in some activities to stimulate the brain cells, maybe a dose of electronic entertainment, possibly a bit of techie history, and youâre most of the way there. Of course, it also helps if your chosen location is frequented by similarly techie folks and has some out-of-the-mainstream cred, meaning it would make your non-alpha geek friends roll their eyes. Our readers weighed in with their choices, and hereâs what InfoWorld editors came up with as the favorites. (And be sure to check back tomorrow for Part II, with more top hot spots.) Bangalore, India                                                     Why should Thomas Friedman have all the fun? Bangalore readily appeals to geeks with exotic tastes, given its dual status as both the Garden City and the Silicon Valley of India. While you couldnât actually visit the local offices of tech giants such as Intel, Sun, or HP, you could explore the Visvesvaraya Industrial and Technological Museum, with its exhibition halls that cover engineering, biotech, space travel, and the like. Check out the view from the southern hemisphere at the Jawaharlal Nehru Planetarium. Internet cafes and Wi-Fi hotspots are everywhere; get your fix between visits to the 240-acre Lalbagh botanical gardens or the 300-acre Cubbon Park. Ulsoor Lake offers boat rides among its many small islands. Tipu Sultanâs palace and the Raj-era Bangalore palace offer a dose of lush architecture. Hindu monuments abound: The Bull Temple is dominated by a massive, monolithic sculpture of said beast. Another bull figures prominently in the main event at the Sri Gavi Gangadhareswara Temple: Every Jan. 14, a ray of sunshine aims through the horns of a bull statue to illuminate another statue, of Shiva Linga. Buy a gadget or a sari on Brigade Road or Commercial Street, and your South-Asian geek experience is complete. Dinosaur Dig      Digging up dinosaur fossils: It's not just for stuffy paleontologists anymore! If you've ever been awed by dino-skeletons at a museum, wanted to reconnect with a youthful (or not-so-youthful) love of dinosaurs, or just wanted to see if that whole Jurassic Park thing could work for real, then are you ever in luck. You can, in fact, get right down into a real dig site. And it isn't some sort of fantasy camp-style interpretation of digging where all the hard work is done for you and the fossils are teed up for you to "discover," either -- these camps are the real deal. You get to do the actual dirty work yourself, side by side with scientists and experienced diggers. Who knows -- you might be a part of the next major fossil discovery! There are dig vacations of all sorts of durations across the United States and all over the world. A sizable list of options can be found here. CeBIT, Hanover, Germany; and Munich, Bavaria Mark your calendars: March 2008 will see the next incarnation of the worldâs largest computer-technology show. If you manage to tear yourself away from the exhibits, the Laatzen Museum of Aviation offers a less crowded dose of technology. The History of Energy Museum blasts you back to a past of radio, lightbulbs, and other electrical devices.      But the real technical center of Germany is in Munich, Bavaria, home to Siemens, Infineon, and the European outposts of many American high-tech firms. Itâs also a city that knows how to have fun. Where else could you quaff a liter of beer at HofBraeuHaus, then walk (please donât drive) to the Deutsches Museum, where you could spend several days among its exhibits of mining, electronics, engineering, flight, and more? Another huge outpost of the museum houses autos, trains, and more. With an advance reservation, you can take the BMW Factory Tour and see (but not buy) more beer, available in vending machines on the shop floor. Check out the temporary BMW Museum in nearby Olympic Park, or wait for the grand opening of the renovated museum in spring of 2008. Don your lederhosen and come during Oktoberfest to see all of Bavaria dancing on tables. Antarctica Yes, you can take pleasure trips to Antarctica, assuming you're one to define a visit to the coldest, most desolate place on earth as "pleasure." It may not be hip, sexy, or urbane, but Antarctica certainly holds quite the travel cachet      for its sheer remoteness and largely unspoiled landscape. Believe it or not, Antarctic tourism is a successful industry -- successful enough, even, to have its own association of tour operators. As for what you'll see and experience, well, that depends largely on when you go. There is, of course, lots of ice, not to mention mountains, which some tour packages will allow you to climb and camp on. You'll also get to see seals, whales, and, of course, penguins, among other flora and fauna unique to this part of the world. The most popular form of Antarctic tourism is a cruise. Yup, the same industry that promises to whisk you away to a tropical paradise also has a segment dedicated to the land of ice and snow. You can check out a FAQ and get some basic cruise info at the Antarctica Cruise and Travel Guide. Silicon Valley, Calif. The 30 miles between San Francisco and San Jose contain enough high-tech to sate even the most serious geek. InfoWorldâs hometown of San Francisco boasts two excellent examples: the distinctively hands-on Exploratorium      and the California Academy of Sciences. It would also be fun to watch the new Academy of Sciences building rise in Golden Gate Park, complete with an undulating green roof of native plantings. Hop across the bay to the UC Berkeleyâs Lawrence Hall of Science, named for Ernest O. Lawrence, the university's first Nobel laureate. Lawrenceâs actual Nobel medal used to be displayed there, but after a recent, unsuccessful theft, itâs under wraps until a safer display case can be built. Farther south, you can park the family at Stanford Shopping Center while you pay discreet respects to the HP Garage in Palo Alto, then move the party to Six Flags Great America, a stoneâs throw from Intel headquarters and its own museum. Want more? Check out the NASA Ames Exploration Center to learn about aerospace projects; visit Stanfordâs Linear Accelerator to brush up on your particle physics; or see replicas of early flight machines and real modern aircraft at the Hiller Aviation Museum. Geeks like to shop, too; around here, they flock to one of many Fryâs Electronics stores, each with a distinct decorative theme such as a Wild West saloon (Palo Alto) or a giant motherboard (Sunnyvale). The DIY crowd goes to WeirdStuff for a wide-ranging, motley supply of used equipment and parts ranging from huge servers to tiny transistors.
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Much more than hot dogs, beaches and long weekends.
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By Encarnacion Pyle, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio  Feb. 11--Anthony Basil always appreciated his wife's love of languages, but it wasn't until they planned a trip to Tuscany for their 40 th anniversary that he wanted to brush up on his Italian.
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By By Brian Hendrickson, The Columbian, Vancouver, Wash.  Jun.
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Travel: The Cadillacs and dance shows are fun, but real Havana - beyond the cliches - is more exciting
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A little serendipity can take you places, including where you want to go.
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Arts & entertainment: From the Republic of Congo to the drizzle of the South Bank comes a tropical villa for the people
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Not to be macabre, but we are heading into a Halloween weekend. It occurred to me that if the best way to find an apartment in a crowded city is to check the obituaries (remember this regrettable collaboration
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Tycho:  With PAX coming up this weekend (!!!), we didn't really have time on Friday to invest in Virgil's Wikiscanner - that mystical oracle that takes a raw IP range and then excretes a list of that organization's Wikipedia edits.  This is the pulsing, possibly Martian device that dished up last week's awesome Electronic Arts edits.    I wasn't sure if we should feel sorry for them or not - now that EA is situated in the number two slot, does that make them the scrappy underdog? - but I quickly realized it probably doesn't matter.  They can come right out and say "Yes, we edit it all the time," mischaracterize the nature of the edits, and by the time it's on the second page the events in question never happened.  People don't remember anything these days that isn't on the first page of their feed aggregators. In any case, the entire affair is talking place  on Wikipedia.  Kudzu will grow over the propaganda soon enough.    Though time was indeed in short supply, we did fritter some portion of it pawing through ancient email headers, scraping for filth on old enemies.  Or enemies with whom we have resumed talks.  Or enemies who are now friends!  Even people I hope to make enemies in the future by my careless commentary must fall beneath the scanner's baleful eye.    Like a chugging trawler, we hauled up net after net of treasure onto the deck, sifting it on hands and knees.  I'd never expose it, of course - sparking a desperate arms race to find self-serving commentary is a conflict I'm likely to lose.  And with the deep catalogue of nemeses we've inspired worldwide (and even below the world, in the warrens of the pale Gambrya, where hate is eternal) it's not what I'd call a fabulous scenario.  For us, at least; no doubt, our foes have already begun their malevolent harvest.
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How to uncover your own Hidden Gems.
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Down the rabbit hole for this one! Also in this week's column:â¦
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Gabe: I've gone through all the Dickerdoodle pictures I received and I've got some good ones to share. It was too hard to pick just one winner so I ended up picking a top three and they will all get a brand new Nintendo DS. First let's start with the runners up though.This mans fervor is impressive.I know I didn't ask for vagaina cookies but come on, that's awesome. The "Barbra Walters" filter on this one makes it look so classy.Is cookie porn a real thing?He just seems so Innocent. Like maybe this is his first dickerdoodle.See! Size really doesn't matter.Sadly he choked to death shortly after this picture was taken.She's ambitious and I respect that.I pretty sure this was actually their Christmas card.Alright now on to the winners. Remember each of these chefs will receive their very own Nintendo DS. -3rd Place -These guys win for sheer size. That's just a lot of Dickerdoodle.-2nd Place-This one is just awesome. The presentation alone is great but then you start seeing little details like the penis reference photos. -1st Place-I fucking love this photo. We can tell by her shirt that her dad has forced into helping make these cookies. We can also tell that she is not amused. His expression is actually unreadable. Is he confused? Is he angry? I have no idea what he's thinking but it's priceless. I also love that with some extra dough he made the Quake symbol. So rad.   Thanks to everyone who entered. I hope you all enjoyed your Dickerdoodles. Winners, I'll be getting in touch with you so I can get your info for the prizes.   -Gabe out
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Spent the last week sick as a proverbial dog. A nasty cold snap, combined with too much schmoozing and boozing, has put my heinie in a sling. So Iâve been home, nursing my few remaining brain cells back to health and perusing my favorite news sites. Itâs been an interesting few days.
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Wired's geek festival comes up big this year with lifelike robots, homes of the future and immersive games. Peep a preview of this weekend's activities.