Peach of an event for patient fruit fans
If you’ve got the patience, there’s no better way to devour a Palisade peach than slowly. Slow enough to tantalize the taste buds and to feel the sweet juices trickling down your chin.
Slow enough, perhaps, to gain the approval of Slow Food International, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving traditional methods of eating and obtaining food.
Slow Food salutes the princely peach today with “A Colorado Peach Party,” an event near Carbondale that makes peaches the focal point of gourmet cooking and food demonstrations.
Palisade has had a bumper peach crop this year, and so has its lesser-known but equally proficient peach-producing cousin, Paonia.
For more information on the event, call 970-963-6107 or visit www.slowfoodroaringfork.org.
Homebuilder wants to send you on a safari
A visit to a KB Home community could be your passport to an African safari.
KB Home is sponsoring the National Geographic Channel’s Most Amazing 2005 Sweepstakes.
The grand prize winner will receive a 13-day trip to Zanzibar and Tanzania.
The package includes a round-trip coach plane ticket, visits to game parks, ground transportation and standard hotel accommodations for 13 days and 12 nights.
For a chance to win a variety of adventure-related prizes, including the safari grand prize, visit any KB Home community in the Denver area to complete an entry form.
Entries also can be submitted online at www.kbhome.com and www.nationalgeographic.com/channel.
Here comes a standup product for women
Here’s one from the “I’m not making this up” file. If a Broomfield company has its way, men will no longer have exclusive rights to pee standing up.
Newly launched Go Your Way last week announced it has reached an agreement with Joe Product Promotions of London to become the sole U.S. distributor for P-Mate, which apparently frees women from the awkward task of squatting when there’s no toilet in sight.
“This is a revolutionary product that has taken Europe by storm,” said Karen Diamond, president of Go Your Way. “It allows women to pee standing up, just like the boys, giving a whole new slant on equal rights for women. It can easily fit into your pocket or handbag, so it goes with you wherever you go.”
Diamond describes P-Mate as a boat-shaped device made of waterproof cardboard. Even she admits that the concept is a bit difficult to get used to. She laughed when a friend introduced her to the product.
According to a release by the company, P-Mate is designed to be used when camping or hiking, or when a public toilet is simply too filthy to sit on.
The company plans to sell P-Mate at various retail outlets and through its website at www.goyourway.net.
Ride and surf with high-tech bicycle
If you thought you couldn’t multitask any more than you already do, you haven’t heard of the ExerGame.
The high-tech stationary bike, which made its American debut last week at the Health & Fitness Business Conference in Denver, allows riders to check e-mail, surf the Web and even compete against other ExerGamers around the world – all while burning calories.
The bikes will be available in mid-October at specialty home fitness stores around the country. Toronto-based neXfit, the bike’s manufacturer, said the machines will retail for about $2,495.
One man’s view of reality television
Vonage chief executive Jeffrey Citron was caught speaking about his sister and reality television at a recent telecom conference in Aspen.
Citron had spent the night before spinning through a drab succession of cable-TV channels before settling on reruns. “My sister and a video-cam recorder may very well be able to produce better television,” he said.
His remark came after a panel debate between Citron and executives from phone and cable companies, which are spending billions of dollars on high-speed Internet networks that will soon pump TV into millions of American homes.
Citron says the cable and phone companies will block video content on their networks from competitors. That, he said, will stifle the innovation of the Internet.
“If you want to have a true revolution in video, you should let everyone provide it,” he said. That includes, of course, Citron’s sister.
Angel Fire douses annual shovel races
Angel Fire ski area in New Mexico is nixing its tradition-rich annual shovel races, citing “liability concerns.” Thus ends the annual springtime spectacle that featured scoop-mounted daredevils reaching 79 mph on Angel Fire’s 1,000-foot shovel track.
Born in the early 1970s when tired lift operators rode their shovels down the mountain after a shift, the race was formally organized in 1975. This year, more than 150 racers from around the country competed in Angel Fire’s 30th annual World Shovel Race Championships.
Shovel racing peaked in 1997 when ESPN inserted “modified shovel racing” into its X Games. Participants were never invited back. With Angel Fire’s announcement, it appears that the sport is officially dead.
“The bottom line,” said Angel Fire’s general manager Jon Mahanna, “is if we can’t host this event in the tradition that it was founded, then we have to step aside.”
