Frequent Business Traveler | Hotel, Airline, Dining, Car and Tech Reviews

New York City’s Hotel Pennsylvania – Once the World’s Largest – Now Under Demolition; Fate of Famous Phone Number Remains Unknown

Big band fans take note! The Hotel Pennsylvania – which, when it opened in 1919 was the largest hotel in the world, with 2,200 rooms and continued to be the fourth largest hotel in New York City until it closed temporarily amidst the coronavirus-pandemic induced decline in visitors to the Big Apple – has been largely reduced to rubble.
Indeed, as of the start of March, the Pennsylvania has been deconstructed …

Great Moments in Travel History – March 2023

The month of March three years ago is when the travel industry began to reel from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic as major hotel chains shut down thousands of properties, banks closed an similar number of branches, airlines reduced schedules by up to 50%, and telecommuting became the way many people went to work.  Broadway theaters closed on March 12, 2020, and cultural institutions across the globe closed shortly …

Mask Mandates and the Seatbelt Interlock: You Don’t Want to Be Thrown from the Wreck

Why is it that the topic of mask mandates attracts so much controversy?  After all, the masks aren’t even injecting something into the body, they can be fashion accessories, and putting one on becomes part of one’s routine and muscle memory quite easily. Yet people carry on that mask mandates impinge on personal liberties and some Covid deniers have even attacked retail shop staff for trying to enforce mask rules.
A …

‘Grab-and-Drain’ Apple iPhone Thefts: Why Using Passcodes Instead of More Secure Biometrics Can Decimate Your So-Called Digital Life

The theft of Apple iPhones is common, but more worrisome are recent reports that thieves are not only stealing the devices but finding a way to bypass Apple’s biometric security measures – namely FaceID and TouchID – as well.
Called “grab-and-drain” robberies by authorities, it may sound scary but it’s nothing akin to the mostly apocryphal stories of thieves stealing people’s fingertips or holding an iPhone with FaceID over someone who …

Take Your Shoes Off! Fecal Bacteria is ‘Rampant’ on City Sidewalks, Study Finds

Growing up, I took my shoes off as soon as I came inside the house as did my parents, brothers, and any visitors. My mother even had Japanese paper slippers to give to visitors for their comfort (and perhaps much to their amusement). At my residence, I have blue slip-on booties for contractors to wear during a visit.
In much of Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, shoes are never worn indoors.
It can …

What’s Open and What’s Closed on Presidents’ Day in 2023

This coming Monday is known as Presidents’ Day, a national holiday that is officially known as Washington’s Birthday.  The day commemorates the life of George Washington, an American soldier and statesman who was a Founding Father of the United States as well as the country’s first president.
Washington’s actual birthday, February 22, was first declared a federal holiday in 1879 by an act of Congress. In 1968, the Uniform Holidays Act …

Review: ‘Between Riverside and Crazy’ at the Helen Hayes Theater

Having grown up on Riverside Drive in New York City, I was particularly interested in the play “Between Riverside and Crazy” which, it turns out, is about a retired, recently widowed New York City police officer and his friends and family members, who lives on a street of the same name, albeit in Manhattan, not Beechhurst.
We first see Walter (the brilliant character actor Stephen McKinley Henderson), the police officer, sitting …