Last night my friend Deborah took me to a fabulous hotel in Beverly Hills called SLS to have cocktails with friends from Singapore. It’s definitely one of the hotspots in LA at the moment. SLS is owned by the uber hip SBE group which owns and operates lots of trendy restaurants, hotels, and lounges around the country.
The hotel has a really cool rock and roll vibe, its dark and rugged yet has all the amenities of a five star hotel. The lobby bar feels a bit like a velvet treehouse with glass bars that have televisions embedded in the tables. And there are weird fixtures such as monkey art and monkey chandeliers.
If the Hard Rock Hotel or Planet Hollywood was a five star hotel, this would be it. There are even pool tables in the elevator lobby of each floor. I would definitely recommend staying or visiting this hotel. Its packed with pretty people and makes for great conversation and people watching. It is also has a great location. The bathrooms here alone, make the trip worth it — they are some of the prettiest hotel bathrooms I have ever seen in my life. Book reservations or learn more here.
We then went to dinner at Cecconi’s, an upscale classic Italian eatery with amazing food. We sat outside on the patio and stayed toasty via the heat lamps. We ordered grilled octopus with lemon, capers and olives, wood oven baked meatballs, rib eye steak, lots and lots of Dom Perignon but my favorite part was the baked gnocchi! It was sooo delicious! The swanky scene of travelers and business people enjoying meals is as appetizing as the setting itself. I hear this restaurant is always full of famous faces, we spotted Chelsea Handler last night.
They are open for breakfast, lunch and dinner and for as many celebrities as you see here, it actually can be very affordable if you choose the menu right. Look at the full menu and make reservations here.
The best part of dinner is conversation. The journalist in me is constantly asking questions because I love to learn about other people’s experiences. I asked our friends from Singapore what they suggest to do well in business and life. Everyone said the key to success is “don’t get caught!” Haha. Just kidding. They said to work “really really hard.” They also advised me to wake up early and to get emails and calls out early in the day. To them, the early birds get the worm statement proves to be true. They also said to take time to enjoy the nature around me and praise the sun every day.
Here are my thoughts: I think this is a well done video that captures the direction of which our digital economy is headed. I dont like the negative tone of the video, however. If you know me, you know I love any tech company doing good things to improve our world and make it a little bit smaller and more understood place.
Google is a pioneer and an amazing company. But it’s not the first pioneer or the last pioneer. I think people should focus less time on how much they are succeeding and more time on WHY they are succeeding, and apply those tactics to your own company or workplace.
I am fascinated by web semantics and pragmatics. The future of advertising is content we want to see. The future of our identities are on the web. This gives us a safer, more efficient, connected planet to live in. Australia never seemed so close.
I am spending some time in LA for a few business meetings and visiting friends. Last night was my friend Michelle’s going away party and we ate at Gyu-Kaku, a fabulous restaurant in Sherman Oaks. This food is AMAZING! I can’t recommend this experience enough!
It’s a Japanese BBQ restaurant with a cool interactive approach to dining. It’s great for big groups who want to interact and share, or have a high quality meal in a more fun, hip atmosphere. There is a fire grill in the middle of the table and you cook the array of meats you order right at your table. We had everything imaginable, all sorts of chicken, pork, and beef. Think of it as upscale camping, in a hip setting.
They also bring you rounds of side dishes to pass around the table and share. We had edamame, sesame rolls with cream cheese, fried calamari, ahi tuna, and cheese wontons. Oh, and several pitchers of beer! As my friend Michelle demonstrates below:
Gyu-Kaku has locations in three states, check them out at www.gyu-kaku.com. Perfect for a date, dinner with the family, whatever. Just go eat there! I loved it!
Michelle also got a loaf of bread as a going present lol (I have no idea).
Elizabeth Banks wins my nomination for look of the night. She looked stunning in grey and stood out with a unique color and look, while making it seem effortless.
Grey takes a lot of guts to wear on the red carpet, you rarely see it. She looks beautiful and I thought she radiated class and perfection as she took the stage to present. Her skin glistens like ice! This woman makes me want to cancel my spray tan membership .
If you haven’t heard about Chatroulette, it is a new social video website where you can log on and live video chat with random people. You can literally flip through videos of strangers as if you are window shopping. Lots of celebrities and lots of perverts have showed up using the site.
Jon Stewart does a hilarious piece about the buzzing website. Major network TV journalists, Katie Couric, Diane Sawyer, Brian Williams, among others, all show up for the spoof. It’s hilarious! Check it out:
It is great to see these broadcasting legends having fun, especially when not many people are watching their evening newscasts these days. Diane Sawyer is from my hometown, Louisville and in my opinion, is one of the prettiest women on the planet. I first met her when I was 18, while visiting ABC in New York. She is so kind and collected, I admire her so much. She is a remarkable woman and a huge inspiration to me.
As for Chatroulette as a whole, I think that it could be a huge waste of time, chatting with random people, or you could really accomplish some soul searching. It, like most things in life, just depends on how you look at it. Have you ever noticed how sometimes it is easier to talk to strangers than sometimes the closest people in our life? Maybe that is because we know they don’t know us, so they can’t judge us.
I get a lot of messages on Facebook with people asking about diet tips and suggestions, so I will try to step it up on notch. When I am not eating fried rabbit like in my last post, I try to be somewhat disciplined throughout the week with what I eat. The truth is, I have good days and bad days just like everybody else. My weight sometimes fluctuates depending on my schedule or what is going on in my life.
On the refrigerator at my parents house is a note that reads “Excellence is in the details.” I think that is true in almost all components of life even what we eat. The detailed decisions we make at the grocery store are the most crucial ones we make. If you don’t buy the donuts, you can’t eat them in the morning.
There is no secret method to losing weight. It’s simply burn more calories than you eat. Pay particular attention to the caloric amount on nutritional labels. When you go to the grocery, compare similar products with each other. You will be surprised how drastically different caloric intake can be based on small variables in similar products. I think 30 – 50 less calories goes a long way if it is something you are consuming every day. 50 x 7 = 350. That is 350 calories less a week for doing absolutely nothing, and still eating the things you want to eat.
Enter one of my grocery must haves:
One product I love is Silk’s Light Vanilla Soy Milk. If you have never tried soy milk, give it a shot. It is better for you anyway. It’s only 80 calories per 8 oz. serving and it literally tastes almost as sweet as a milkshake. It will definitely spice up your cereal or coffee. Mix it in with your boring whole grain cereal for a new and improved taste.
Best of all, Silk’s soy milk products keep for a very long time. They stay fresh for over a month, so if you travel a lot like me, you don’t have to worry about expiration dates and wasting food. Check out more products at www.silksoymilk.com.
My brother Richie is quite the gourmet chef, whether its French food, or true Southern country cuisine. Tonight, it didn’t get much more country than this. For the first time ever, I ate rabbit and it was delicious! It actually tastes just like chicken lol.
My uncle-in-law actually hunted the rabbit in southwestern Kentucky, and we ate the prize for dinner this evening. It’s country fried rabbit, rosemary mashed potatoes, and white pan gravy. I don’t want to think about the calories involved in this dish but the time spent with my brother was well worth it.
The actual recipe comes from an Emeril cookbook. Not sure where you can find rabbit in stores.
Being 25 is a weird age. My friends and I always talk about how we are in that difficult, in between spot. We are too old for the nightly partying scene, yet not quite in the place where we want to settle down completely. One thing we do want at this point are relationships that matter. Today I discovered what seems to great place to do that.
My brother asked me to go to church with him and his wife. We went to Sojourn Community Church, a warm and friendly place located near the Germantown neighborhood in Louisville. We went to the 5 PM service and I found it to be warm, friendly and full of vibrant young people. The church is very eclectic, with a stylish, progressive vibe (there is an art gallery in the lobby!). It was laid back with some pretty good live music too. It was not too big or too small.
I think its important no matter what you believe, that you surround yourself with nice quality POSITIVE people. A major key to happiness is to be engaged a community or group that are all moving together to grow in life. The older I get, the more I learn that life is about quality, not quantity. If you live in Louisville and are looking to connect with some young people with the above attributes, I recommend checking out Sojourn Community Church. They also have an East location off Westport Road.
This week I had the pleasure to dine at Jeff Ruby’s, always one of my favorite restaurants in Louisville. The owners call it culinary entertainment, and that it is. It has an amazing atmosphere. The loud bar and piano area always attracts a great crowd and loads of energy. Located just steps away from the Ohio River, there are always plenty of familiar Louisville faces or new ones passing through the city. Here is me and my girlfriend Shea:
The food is spectacular, we ordered the seafood platter, Kentucky Bibb Bleu salad, and the Dover Sole for an entree. I am not exactly sure what that is, but our beautiful waitress recommended it, and it was fantastic!
We had a great group together, one of the guys in our party used to work for Colin Powell, who I have always been a big fan of. I asked him why Mr. Powell never ran for President, and he told me it was because he wanted to keep his family life private as much as he could, mainly his wife. (Interesting note).
One of the best parts of Jeff Ruby’s is the stellar service and customer loyalty.. unless you are O.J. Simpson! I once was at this restaurant a few years ago, he showed up and the owner flat out refused to serve him!
I asked our friends from Singapore what they suggest to do well in business and life. Everyone said the key to success is “don’t get caught!” Haha. Just kidding. They said to work “really really hard.” They also advised me to wake up early and to get emails and calls out early in the day. To them, the early birds get the worm statement proves to be true. They also said to take time to enjoy the nature around me and praise the sun every day. 
