1. 21C Hotel, Louisville, Kentucky–
This uber modern, avant guard contemporary art gallery/ hotel MIGHT pass in San Francisco, but deep in the heart of the South?? I couldn’t believe the naked, anatomically correct statuary and puzzling installation pieces that abounded. Getting to the concierge desk meant stepping over the video of a couple in bed, and the chandeliers in the lobby made a kookie racket as they came to life at random intervals. Girl, I had to keep reminding myself which side o’ the Mason-Dixon I was on!

Centrally located downtown near several ‘other’ museums including ye olde Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory, 21C is the building on the corner with all the giant red penguins on it. You heard me. Penguins. Red. My sweet suite had its own phabulous deck complete with, you guessed it, red penguins, and if I felt like it, I could let folks in the office building across the street watch me pee if I left the blinds up. I didn’t, of course, but it was nice to have the option…

2. Hotel Donaldson, Fargo, North Dakota–
My dear friend Lisa made this reservation for me when I came out to visit her. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but this super chic oasis in the Dakotas complete with hip bar, gourmet restaurant and a suite of epic proportions certainly surprised. Like 21C, this hotel also takes art seriously and prominently features great pieces by local artists in the 17 suites. The suites have different themes, and mine was Japanese due to the low-slung platform bed and bathtub in the middle of the room that filled via a spout on the ceiling. Wow!

The restaurant was celebrating wild game one night and I ended up with some rattlesnake quesadillas. Delicious and quite well-paired with the ensuing wild boar…Yee-haw!

How CUTE!! I learned at the Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory that players can go pink for Mother’s Day and today played with official LS bats dipped in a special pink dye. The autographed bats then go for online auction to raise money for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation!

Bid now for that ultimate gift. Father’s Day is just around the corner, doncha know! And if these major league prices are out of your budget, did you know that you can order custom Louisville Sluggers for that special someone? What a fun gift idea!

After running the race of her life, she lost her life. Eight Belles…20-1 odds, the only filly in the field at the 134th running of the Kentucky Derby, and yesterday at the Kentucky Oaks, her trainer, Larry Jones, saw his other star gal, Proud Spell, take the Oaks by storm and bring home the victory.

In the betting lines today, if you asked any woman bedecked in a gorgeous hat which horse she was rooting for, it was a resounding cry for EIGHT BELLES! I was waiting to make a bet up in, yes dear fans, Millionaire’s Row—where everyone who is anyone like Chelsea Clinton and Terrell Owens hangs VIP style—as a guest of the fabulous Bourbon purveyors, Woodford Reserve (so smooth even a champagne drinker like me can stomach it!), when an adorable young man asked me who my favorite horse was.

I said, the FILLY! And the woman behind me and also in the line next to mine, said, “Yes, the filly!” We were united behind her, and even poor, devastated Larry Jones, fighting back tears, acknowledged that half the spectators here today, all the women, were rooting for his lady horse.

(Don’t I know it! There were tons of vendors selling Derby horse buttons for $1–you could buy Big Brown, Pyro–all of ‘em! But no where at Churchill Downs that morning could you find a single Eight Belles button. I looked. She was the only one who totally sold out.)

I was on the rail at the finish line thanks to the fabulous and unstoppable Jane Dempsey whose Kentucky Derby Junket is so superb in every way that I vote it the Best Tour Ever, and the horses flew by thundering hooves and shocks of saddle colors. They were all there at the line–Eight Belles second, beating out 18 boys, bested only by Big Brown (watch for him in the upcoming Preakness and Belmont Stakes–he’s rumored to be a Triple Crown contendor!).

We cheered and screamed, and the great thoroughbred beasts ran down the track and then doubled back, nostrils flaring, trotting elegantly by us towards the paddock for de-saddling and cool down. My very observant friend said, “Eight Belles didn’t come back.”

Well of course she came back, I thought. There were Derby 20 horses plus all their horsey handler buddies and owners and press photographers racing by. We probably just didn’t see her. Then the Equine Ambulance roared by.

Back in our VIP bus, as we waited for our police escort and some overly Mint Juleped fellow guests to arrive, we listened to the radio. And that’s when we heard it:

Eight Belles fractured her two front ankles just after winning the race and was put down. I was stunned. Tears welled. I had bet her to win, place and show. I had WON for backing my girl.

She was gone.

One bone break pushed through the flesh, the other took her down. Trainer and jockey were shocked. They would NEVER have run her if there was even the faintest inkling of physical weakness or trouble. Not only is she worth a fortune, but she is a part of their family, beloved.

She gave that race her all, captured our imaginations, and fell seconds after her victory. Her legs gave out, and because she was not able to stand on her own, they immediately put her down. Everyone agreed–they had never seen anything like this–a horse to have two legs give out at once. There will be an autopsy.

Amidst the glory, the pomp, the romance that is the Kentucky Derby, there does lurk a darkside beyond poor hat and dress choices.

So what do you do for a horse of such passion and drive? A moment of silence? A monument in Louisville? A new synthetic track forced upon the Downs? I’m not sure. But this Kentucky Derby for me will always ring for Eight Belles.

So there I was in a private car driving home from stunning Lexington-area horse country with famed restauranteur Danny Meyer. Between his business calls, I was hoping to talk to him about food, restaurants and travel.

Earlier, we had blown our minds on the realities of stud farms at elite Three Chimneys Farm. The 2000-acre farm is picture perfect–just how you would imagine Kentucky to look. Perfectly manicured lawns! Acres of them!

And boasting some of the greatest blood lines per bluegrass ratio in the world. Now in the human world, men pay WOMEN for sex, but in horseland, the best boys get paid upwards of $100,000 per session. And they are productive with scheduled sessions at 9 AM, 2 PM, 7 PM. Jeez. We met sons of Seattle Slew, paid tribute at his grave, and met Smarty Jones.

As we twisted and turned down perfect fenced lanes, the rolling green hills of horse farms offering up a bounty of new baby foals running alongside their mommy mares (awwww…), I started to feel dizzy. My head swam. I only had a single Mint Julep at a lunch party at the GORGEOUS Woodford Reserve distillery. WTF?

So there we were, Danny and me, him handicapping in advance of the Oaks race today (fabulous fillies-only–second most famed race at Churchill), and me, concentrating fiercely on the horizon, cursing the ten Pepto Bismal tablets that didn’t seem to be working.

A note on my Diva constitution–lived in a village in India for months, traveled with Bedouin across southern Jordan, even spent a weekend at the Jersey Shore and survived!

So I ignored my tummy like a puppy-dog lover nudging me for more. No more. No time. Big day today. Darling Danny, so handsome, so soft-spoken, sat next to me pouring over his Racing Form.

I whispered to the driver–instead of Churchill Downs, could ya take me to my hotel first? I’m a resourceful gal. With our without this private car, I could probably get to the Downs before the Oaks race at 5:45.

Danny got off his call and wanted to know what’s up. I said I felt sick. He wondered if we should pull over. “You’re the boss now,” both driver and Danny agreed. So I told ‘em to pull over on the Interstate outside Louisville. The rain was starting to pour. I crouched down on the highway’s shoulder and tossed my cookies. Kentucky Barfeyed. Up-chucked.

Poor Danny, his whole career dedicated to getting food DOWN people. You know?

And what can you say after that? Sorry. “It happens to all of us,” said Mr. Meyer. Said I–but I’m an iron-stomach travel Diva!

Happily, now sitting bundled in a towel plus PJ’s in my hotel bed, shaking with chills, watching Ginger Punch come in first in the 6th race today (honey, do you need another win? Ya already won over 2 million…), thunder cracking outside, I feel okay about not being at my finish line box seat outside in the rain. You know?

So, Danny, fair Manhattan-cornering restaurant owner and author, sorry that I barfed outside your car on the way to the Oaks race. So who did you pick to win? We never got to that. Awesome Chic? Pink-clad Rasierra? Well hopefully I brought you some luck. I mean, gamblers love omens, right? Right?

Omigosh, dreamy trip!! They say the Derby isn’t the race–it’s the whole week or more of festivities leading up to the event. They were like totally right!

I’m here on the fabulous Jane Dempsey’s Kentucky Derby Junket. Her family has been running Derby tours for over 60 years, and having grown up in the horsey world, she is an unending fountain of knowledge and true Derby Diva.

We are a group made up of mother-daughters, senior couples, and legendary Derby-winning jockeys and their families. WOW! I am now buddies with Dave Erb (’56 Derby Winner on Needles) and Braulio Baeza (’63 Derby Winner on Chateaugay). We happily attended their Gallop to Glory tribute at the Galt House Hotel. Visit it to check out their newly cemented hand prints!

Now naturally I was all about my HAT and getting my nails done before the Derby. So when I got into town last night, I did an Internet search and found KY Nails (502-636-5857) near to my Executive West Hotel near the airport, Churchill Downs. WHY am I not staying at a 5-star hotel? Cuz this one is super convenient, the staff is friendly, and there is a mega milliner right in the building.

The hat shop to die for is called In Bloom Again, and there is a male Diva who makes all the hats on the premises, and they have an entire goodie room of feathers and flowers, which allows them to EXACTLY MATCH your outfit!! Love it!

(Oh, and the hotel offers free Wi-Fi, and oh, free shuttles all over, and is rumored to have ragin’ Mint Juleps. Oh, and will shortly become a Crown Plaza or something soon.)

Today we had a VIP tour of the Backside of the Downs watching Derby and other horses practice. We ate breakfast at the awesomely authentic Wagner’s Track Kitchen where you grab a tray and stand in line for biscuits and grits while watching the horses fly by on the track outside. PINCH ME I’M DREAMING!

Then we hit the Galt House with our luminaries and THEN the Kentucky Derby Museum, a MUST SEE. Feel what thighs of steel jockeys have to have as you try to make it through a whole virtual race whilst assuming the position–ass off the saddle, girl! Yowch. Or check out whatever race footage you desire. And DON’T miss the show. The surround-wall movie totally rocks and inspires.

Ladies, I LOVE IT HERE!! Interesting stuff I learned? That the famous race the day before the Derby is called the OAKS, and it’s the race that the girl horses run. They call it ‘Lillies for Fillies’ cuz the winning fillie wins a cape or lillies, not roses.

Have any fillies run in the Derby? You bet your pocketbook they have. THREE have won: Regret (1915), Genuine Risk (1980) and Winning Colors (1988). This year, three cheers for EIGHT BELLES, who is giving the boy horses a run for the money — 2 million point two to be exacta!

The Derby is for Divas. Do come, and wish me no rain on Friday and Saturday! This is your Diva Belle saying good-bye, girls!

Happy belated International Women’s Day and Hinamatsuri, Girls’ Day in Japan! What is it about March, spring, rebirth, and women and girls?

International Women’s Day is on March 8, and Hinamatsuri is on the third day of the third month every year. It’s one of the things that made me fall in love with Japan when I was living there. Hina means doll (some of you may know that I am an avid doll collector), and suddenly, Tokyo was overflowing with exquisite doll displays. My favorites were at department stores like Takashimaya–level after level of courtly splendor as the emperor, empress and their minions, furniture, flowers and favorite symbolic fruit are displayed on a red carpet.

But be careful!! If you leave your Hinamatsuri displays out for too long, bad luck will come and you won’t get married!

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Beauty queen reveals real thoughts on Body Drama!!

This just in: have you checked out former Miss Virginia, Nancy Redd’s, book Body Drama: Real Girls, Real Issues, Real Answers? Brava to this brave Diva for debunking the beauty myth once and for all.

As you flip through the pages marveling at the photos of all the various women of various body types, surely you will love your own self more. That’s what Nancy hopes! She wants you to see yourself in the unique beauty of other women and realize that you are not alone. Why is this beauty queen so concerned about how we feel? After all, isn’t she the pinnacle of beauty herself? Redd reveals that she, too, though a swimsuit contest winner, felt the same insecurities that we all do. Seriously? Seriously!

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Baby gifts from Bubble! I loooove this store, and they just went national with a website, so you, too, can order your friends the most cool, hilarious and edgy clothes this side of baby land at GotBubble.com.

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Oops on Samantha Power!! What was she thinking calling Hillary a monster? This uber brilliant and eloquent woman showed a shocking unguarded side recently. I am surprised that this diplomacy wizz went off like that. Pity, because we needed more women at the top. What’s up with the self-sabotage? Or was she sacrificed for the greater political machine?

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Adieu! I was in Egypt, Jordan and Israel last week and am now outbound for the Kentucky Derby tomorrow! I only had days to find my HAT and I hope that the good Derby dames approve. Don’t miss this historic race on May 3rd. Host a party and serve Mint Juleps!

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I’m talking about global powerhouses Samantha Power, Anne Firth Murray, Riane Eisler, and Annie Leibovitz! I’ve just seen or am about to hear them all speak LIVE! I just love perusing my local arts and lecture series, library and organization events. You never know who’s about to drop in on your hometown and drop a little knowledge, too! And what a great way to meet like-minded people.

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Samantha Power: Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Harvard professor, genocide expert, author and foreign policy advisor to Barack Obama! Born in Ireland, this Diva of Intellect pushed through the mostly male ranks of her fields and came out on top!

I was blown away by her talk last night in Berkeley about her new book, Chasing the Flame: Sergio Vieira de Mello and the Fight to Save the World, the story of one of the best diplomats the UN has ever known and his untimely demise in an attack in Iraq. This comes on the heels of her much lauded, A Problem from Hell: America in the Age of Genocide, which won the Pulitzer among many other awards.

Samantha Power is young, attractive, a genius, brilliant, passionate about foreign policy, and a very important part of Barack Obama’s advisory team. Wow! But whether you are Republican, Democrat, or totally uninterested in US politics, the works of this Genius Diva shed new light on the world, diplomacy and what really happens in those places we hear about on the news. So for a true window onto the international scene from a super insider, pick up these books ASAP! I did. 

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Anne Firth Murray: Founder of the Global Fund for Women, a powerful nonprofit dedicated to women’s human rights through empowering grantmaking. This New Zealand-born Philanthropic Diva visits us tonight at a Spark Speaker Series event. Her new book, From Outrage to Courage: Women Taking Action for Health and Justice, outlines the realities of being born female in poverty. She says it’s dangerous to your health! Injustice, violence and more make being female around the globe a difficult proposition. But this is a story about hope, too, and change…

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Riane Eisler: author, social scientist extraordinaire, Ground-Breaking Diva. Born in Vienna and fled the Nazis with her family at a young age, her story quickly became one of triumph! When feminists, women’s studies majors and other eye-opened women gush about their first entree into this subject, they will most likely site Riane Eisler’s internationally best-selling book, The Chalice and the Blade. It was among the first works of its kind, laying the groundwork for everything from feminism to The Da Vinci Code!

Her newest book, The Real Wealth of Nations, takes a wildly fresh view of economics in terms of the valuation of women’s work both in the house as well as on a meta-level by looking at the way our society dis-prioritizes caregiving, teaching and more. Did you know that if you included unpaid women’s household work, it would make up 70% of Switzerland’s GDP? It’s truly fascinating stuff.

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Annie Leibovitz: iconic photographer. Who am I gonna meet on Friday? None other than this Photographic Diva! Her exhibit opens in San Francisco at the stunning Legion of Honor on March 1 (just in time for Women’s Day!), organized by the Brooklyn Museum. The retrospective is based on her latest book, A Photographer’s Life: 1990 - 2005, and features family and friends as well as world leaders and landscapes, all hand-crafted with the artist’s discerning and often unflinching eye.

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Are you inspired yet? I AM!! :) 

Come join me as I represent Tango Diva at a Charbay Cocktail Cook-Off! Yummy Green Tea Charbay Vodka drinks and tons of cute boy bartenders round out this fun, super insider, industry only party. But of course YOU are invited!

Rye, the brainchild of Greg Lingren, is known for its awesome cocktail mixology. What better place to hold a Charbay Vodka Green Tea cocktail mix-off party? I don’t know how long my powers of the palate will hold out after all those great drinks, but I will try my darndest to do Tango Diva proud…

Monday, February 25, 7 PM
Rye
688 Geary (bet. Jones and Leavenworth)
San Francisco
FREE Event!

Come meet Marko and taste some great new cocktail recipes! You like to cook, right? Distilled locally by 13th generation Distiller, Marko K from rare, first-growth green tea leaves, this fine, upscale vodka has the aromas of ripe green melon, sage, and honeyed green tea. Cheer on Bay Area bartenders as they compete to create cocktails with this hot new flava–Green Tea Charbay Vodka! Who will judge the worthiness of the concoctions? Moi! It’s a tough job, but some Diva’s got to do it! Come chill out at this supa cool lounge this coming Monday nite!

Hey, are you a rockin’ bartender/ bartendress yourself? You’re totally invited to enter the mix-off! Just contact Greg at 415-786-7803 or greg@rosewoodbar.com if you wanna enter our super contest. Who knows? An appropriately placed compliment, coupon or Krona might go a long way to gettin’ you my vote!

Sports fans will rush home for bedtime stories with Daddy’s Heroes–tales for kids about some of the greatest moments in sports history! What a brilliant idea–authors Tom Garcia and Karun Naga have hit one out of the park with their new children’s book series.

The inspiration hit one night at Tom’s young son’s bedside when the boy requested a baseball story. He didn’t have any baseball books, so Tom says he told the story of his favorite baseball team–the 1980 winning Phillies. His passion clearly came across as he recounted the most dramatic moments, the boy ate it up, and Daddy’s Heroes was born.

While Divas like me might have to look the details of the first book up–Gibby who? and his homerun where?–the prospect of millions of daddies (and mommy sports fanatics) jumping at the chance to bond with their kids over sports is a fine one indeed. This first book–Gibby’s Homerun, The 1988 World Series–is already available, along with a lil’ shirt that says, "my daddy reads to me". Adorable!

I can’t think of a happier ending, no, beginning, to a beautiful story. Families will definitely score on this one! Mostly reading mommies will be shocked that suddenly dad wants in on the game–who knew? A pinch reader!

After Juno and Knocked Up, I thought pregnancy was a hoot…until Romania’s bleak 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days.

It’s not fair, really. There I was fresh from that damned hilarious Juno, a movie I hoped would continue for five more hours (and it will ! cuz now I’m reading screenwriting goddess Diablo Cody’s book, Candy Girl, a memoir of her brief stripping career in Minnesota), when my mom and her erudite foreign movie-going gang invited me with them to see some Romanian movie I’d never heard of. It had won all sorts of awards–like all of them at Cannes, seriously.

Plus it was Romanian and I am crazy in love with that country, so I would have gone no matter the subject matter! Set towards the end of the Ceausescu regime and popular at the Transylvanian International (!!) Film Festival (May 30 - June 8, 2008), I thought this very femme-powered story about two young women students who deal with Communism while trying to arrange an abortion would be, well, charming like those other movies. Okay, so I’m nuts.

I have only walked out of maybe two movies in my life. And this wasn’t one of them. I SO wanted to. I had fantasies of escaping to the safety of my capitalist pig car. And some people did walk out. I yearned to be among them. But I had given my mom a ride and couldn’t strand her. So I suffered.

I alternated between depression, anxiety and horror. Exhausted and slightly nauseated, I was grateful to stumble out of that fierce flick. And my mom’s movieratti? Ravely reviewed! They went on and on about how powerful it was, the cinematography for pete’s sake. They said it would have been nominated for an Academy Award had it not been about an abortion. I said I expected a vampiric Juno-type thang. They said that I was stubbornly (and naively) sucking at the teet of America’s Right Wing Pro-Lifers.

I guess that made sense. Anyways, I would be curious to hear what any 4 Weeks-veiwing Divas have to say!

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In other non-fun foreign film news, I saw a fabulous German flick called The Counterfeiters. Wow, was this a fantastic and eye-opening experience! A true and truly fascinating story about the Nazi effort to counterfeit millions using Jewish experts in their concentration camps. It was the biggest counterfeiting operation the world has ever seen before or since! I highly recommend it.