(Photos by Richard Banks)

Wakeboarding combines the gravity defying, aerial marvels of gymnastics with the ramps, speed, and whacky jargon of skateboarding. While working on a story on an Orlando-based wakeboarder, I visited the Air Nautique Wake Games at the Orlando Watersports Complex and saw first-hand just how incredible the sport is. While being pulled by a boat like a water skier, wakeboarders flipped backwards and forwards, twisted, whirled, jumped ramps, rode rails, and seemingly flew just yards off shore. It was jaw-dropping, crazy wild, baby.

George Rodrigue's Blue Dog paintings and silkcreen prints have nosed their way into our American visual iconography. Ask anyone anywhere if they know the Blue Dog and chances are you'll get a bright-eyed yes. In recognition of such a colorful, distinguised, and massive career, the New Orleans Museum of Art and Rodrigue gather a 40-year retrospective "Cajuns, Blue Dogs, and Beyond Katrina," showing until June 8. What visitors realize when roaming the multiple rooms and viewing the 200 plus original works: this man treasures Louisiana. And, judging by reception in NOLA, the feeling is certainly mutual.

(Photo by Tanner Latham)

Kyle Busch burned up the track at the Aaron's 499 on Sunday, but that wasn't the only thing on fire around there this weekend.

A hazy smoke hung over the air at Talladega Superspeedway when I drove past it Friday afternoon. My first and ignorant thought was that there might be a forest fire.

(Photographs by Scott Suchman)

In the May 2008 issue of Southern Living, we highlighted an urban chic pizzeria in Washington, D.C., called Comet Ping Pong, where you can get top-notch pies and practice your topspin at one of their three ping pong tables. With great food and a laid-back atmopshere that appeals to 20-something hipsters and Baby Boomers alike, this neighborhood joint is perfect for a Friday night out with the kids and for date night. How many places do you know that fit into both categories?  Chuck E. Cheese this is not. 

And it seems the District locals agree. Washington City Paper, in its annual "Best of D.C." edition, gives kudos to Comet Ping Pong for Best Family Restaurant. Well-done, Comet.

Here are a few more photos from the restaurant:

(Photo by Joshua Carpenter)

"Pigs will eat ANYTHING," said my host Jamie DeMent (a little proudly) about her Farmers' Hybrid hogs at the 55-acre Coon Rock Farm, a sustainable family farm that provides food to several restaurants in North Carolina's Research Triangle area. 

"I'm calling about the prom.  My daughter bought tickets for her and her boyfriend, but she lost them.  What she wants me to do is buy her more tickets so that her boyfriend doesn't think she is stupid.  Can I do that?"

-Overheard in the Nashville airport and spoken by a goateed, bespectacled gentleman.  Mission accomplished, because I heard him give his credit card number. 

How do you deal with an overly friendly seat mate on an airplane?

It’s enough to make me want to wear a mask, gloves, and blinders. But seriously. I work for a polite magazine, and when I’m on the road I try hard to be pleasant. Still, most of the time when I’m ferrying between destinations I prefer a little quiet time to prepare for work or to transition into being back home.

While I’m not a testy flyer, these are my top five ways to enjoy the plane ride by myself:

(Photo by Jean Allsopp)

Pumpkin Lee at Journeymen Saddlers in downtown Middleburg has done the tack repair work for equestrians--many of them Olympians--for over 30 years.  Pumpkin, huh?  So I ask her given name.

Dance

(Photos by Richard Banks)

No, it’s not a pile up, it’s art, my friend. Titled Dance, the 12-car choreographic sculpture is one of 20-plus works that together comprise Season Four of Sarasota Season of Sculpture. Mostly located in or adjacent to the city’s Bayfront Park, the works grace the waterfront until May 26, 2008.

Coffeehouses in Nashville go by many names. Breakfast spot. Reading place. Study corner. Freelance headquarters.  Depending on the time of day, you'll see bed-head musician, traveling salesperson, and college student all standing in line at various beaneries in every pocket of the Tennessee capitol. As a former resident, I took some time to pass out some faux hardware for what makes each shop pretty special.

And in This Corner…

Up the road a piece in St. Petersburg, the Ringside Café serves delicious burgers, cold beer, and frequent live music. During the recent Tampa Bay Blues Festival, the Ringside hosted Texan Lucky Peterson and the place was packed with music fans from as far away New Jersey and Texas. It was so crowded that the club was at capacity when my buddy and I arrived. As a result, we spent the first 30 minutes of Peterson’s show watching from the club’s windows (see photo).

Even as busy as they were, the staff remained exceptionally accommodating and efficient throughout Peterson’s two-set show. And even with the out-of-towner infusion, the Ringside still had an air of neighborhood hangout, with locals happy to offer inside tips on other area must-see restaurants, clubs, and attractions.

2742 Fourth St.
St Petersburg, FL 33704
Google Map

(727) 894-8465

Currently, Ringside Café doesn’t have a web site.

When You Hear the Bell Ring…

If you’re in Sarasota and in need of live music, try the 5 O’Clock Club. Located on Hillview, on the southern edge of downtown, the club offers classic rock and rockabilly to dance and reggae. The night I visited, Tampa-based Democracy cranked up the Rastafarian groove with covers of reggae icons Bob Marley and Peter Tosh, and a few of their originals.

Sporting the slogan “the neighborhood club with a national sound,” the 53-year-old 5 O’Clock advertises live music seven nights a week and is managed by – check out this name – Sally Majestic. No, she doesn’t leap buildings in a single bound, but she does run a sizeable nightclub – which could certainly be considered a superhuman effort – and answers the same question night after night, as patrons query if hers is the name her parents gave her.

1930 Hillview St.
Sarasota, FL 34239
941-366-5555
http://www.5oclockclub.net

I live in Birmingham. In fact, all of us editors live here. And one of the city’s lesser-known treasures, even to travel writers, plays jazz every Wednesday night at a little Crestline neighborhood café called the Open Door. His name is Cleveland Eaton. Cleve was Count Basie’s last standup bass player, which makes him a living legend in jazz circuits, and the Alabama Music Hall of Fame inducted him to their Montgomery space barely two months ago. I first met Cleve two years ago when, researching a feature story for another magazine, I covered the Birmingham vanguard of players, several of whom drop in on the Wednesday night jams.

(Portrait by Jason Wallis)

Dierks Bentley, dubbed the "hardest working man in country music" for the number of live shows he performs each year, stopped in Birmingham, Alabama, this past weekend as part of his "Throttle Wide Open" tour.  Before the show, I got a chance to spend a little time with the man himself.

I have a confession. I hoard hotel room amenities. There. I’ve said it.

Shampoos. Lotions. Mouthwash. Matchbook-sized sewing kits I never use.

If I’m in a hotel room more than one night, I’ll hide the cute little bottles I’m using so the staff will re-stock the bathroom counter right next to their dazzlingly artistic display of folded wash cloths.

Here’s a Travel Tip:

Most of the hotel-sized liquid items pass through airport security swimmingly, so that’s a bonus. Knowing that information helps me justify my problem. At least that’s what my therapist has offered.

The above image is a picture from my shower. No doctoring. Well, I did hide the Hello Kitty loufah sponge. I see it as an art installation called “Decadence in Miniature.” I buy shampoo from the store roughly once a year, and it’s only as a backup. I smell like roses, orange blossoms, and sandalwood. Why? Because it’s free.

(Photo by Tanner Latham).

Sometimes St. Sara N. Dippity reminds you she’s keeping an eye on you on the road.

I unfolded an ironing board in a Hampton Inn off I-20 near Madison, Georgia.  After hearing the piercing squeak of the never-oiled legs, I saw a pair of ankle socks fall out.  Laundered.  They smelled like a Bounce sheet, and one had a hole worn in the heel. 

Of course I smelled them.  Wouldn’t you? 

I decided to leave them behind.  The next soul to inhabit room 106 will have a decision to make.

(Photo by Taylor Bruce).

Renowned abstract expressionist sculptor Mark di Suervo is the man responsible for the large, apple-red anchor to the Dallas Museum of Art on Ross Avenue. It's becoming iconic in a city gone wild for the arts. His pieces – made mostly from welded I-beams and heavy guage metal - can also be seen in other  spots in Dallas: Meyerson Symphony Hall; Northpark Center; and the Nasher Sculpture Center in the thriving downtown arts district.

(For more of Urevbu's work, click here).

If you’re in the Memphis International Airport and need a change of scenery or perhaps some artistic inspiration, check out Ephraim Urevbu’s paintings in the connectors between concourses A and B, as well as B and C. The Nigerian born artist who now calls Memphis home portrays such subjects as drummers from his homeland to bluesmen of his new hometown with an intensity of color and a style that borders on the Modern with hints of Impressionism and Cubism.

I was recently in Charleston, South Carolina, where, one evening, I had the pleasure of sharing conversation and some Basil Hayden's bourbon with Randolph Stafford, a Charleston-based chef with Iverson Catering—and a veritable pork aficionado. As the evening came to an end, he cocked his head, pushed up his glasses, and wished me in his slow Virginia drawl “World Peace and Bacon Grease.”

(Photos courtesy of Poe's Tavern.)

Poe would be proud. A namesake palmetto tavern on Sullivans Island, South Carolina, honors its literary past with its ode-to-the-burger menu. But, in true bowing to a brooding poet, its beer selection outnumbers food items. There are no hungry poets on Sullivan's though, save for the last burger on the menu, a bunless patty, aptly named The Starving Artist, topped with your choice of pimiento, garlic blue cheese, or sweet pepper goat. Others to try: the Tell-Tale Heart, Hop Frog, Pit and Pendulum, and, my heart's content, the Annabelle Lee, a crabcake-topped burger wither red pepper remoulade.