A Few of My Favorite Sites
Travel
Lonely Planet: I used to write for this fine website and still visit the Thorn Tree travel forum, a great first stop for planning almost any independent vacation.
Come Back Alive: Robert Young Pelton, author of the World's Most Dangerous Places, offers the Dangerpedia (like Wikipedia, but for hot destinations like Afghanistan and Myanmar) plus a travel forum that's sort of the antithesis of Lonely Planet's, should you need to know which mercenary armies...er, private security subcontractors are hiring these days.
CIA World Factbook: OK, OK, so the CIA may not know the difference between yellowcake uranium and chickenhawk pot pie (and where was that Chinese embassy again?), but they do compile the best recent vital statistics - from economic and social indicators to who's who in politics - for every country in the world.
University of Texas Latin American Network Information Center: This indispensable, no-frills site maintains an exhaustive list of websites relating to each Latin American country, broken down into categories that include academia, politics, culture and tourism.
Nica Living: This festive, searchable online forum showcases the wit and wisdom of expats (and several English-speaking locals) living in Nicaragua, and is the single best source of up-to-date information about what's on in the warm heart of Central America.
INETER: The Nicaraguan Institute of Geographical Studies offers scores of free maps (most made with Soviet help during the 1980s) that are not scaled, but are still much better than anything commercially available outside the country.
Home & Abroad: This innovative travel site allows you to search and sort attractions, activities, restaurants and more according to your own strange tastes.
Kim Grant: Guidebooks, photos and T'ai Chi Chih from Bindu Press, Countryman Press and many more.
Tom Brosnahan's Turkey Travel Planner: What are you doing for Thanksgiving vacation?
Brazil Max The hip guide to Brazil.
Polo's Bastards: Missives from brave tourists going where they "ain't supposed to go."
Survival Guide to Kabul: What to see and do in the Afghan capital, plus hotel and restaurant reviews for when you just can't take another meal at Red Hot 'N Sizzlin.
Colombian Tourist Board: Until I get my Vacation Colombia website up and running, this is the best first stop for tourists headed to South America's emerald in the rough.
Science
Scientific American: The venerable scientific stalwart now charges for most of its offerings, but cheapskates can still check out the latest science news, two feature articles from the current issue plus all of their great columns - don't miss Michael Shermer's "Skeptic" - for free.
New Scientist: The United Kingdom's best science magazine is also charging for some of its feature articles, but there's still plenty of content available even for tightwad wanna-be scientists.
Virtual Nuclear Tourist: Visit hot spots like Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and the Bikini Atoll without risking irreparable damage to your DNA, or just learn all about how nuclear reactors work!
Complete Works of Charles Darwin Online: You'll go ape for this collection of evolutionary classics, personal correspondence, original drawings and more.
Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster: Heck, even supporters of Intelligent Design admit that a certain bearded Guy sitting on a cloud wasn't necessarily responsible for all this. In fact, many Creationism Lite proponents believe that we were actually created by the Flying Spaghetti Monster, may He touch you (and your children's biology teachers) with His noodly appendage. The Church's climate change experts also note that increases in global temperatures correlate almost exactly with the tragic decline in Caribbean pirates. Touché, Mr. Gore.
Climate Crisis: Speaking of global warming, have you noticed that no country singers (or travel writers) ever announce any embarrassment at hailing from the same state as Al Gore? That's because every claim he makes in An Inconvenient Truth is backed up with scientific documentation right here.
Virgin Galactic: My fellow damsels distressed that they may not have the right stuff to go up in the space shuttle, or be able to pay the US$20 million required to follow the space princess Anousheh Ansari on Russia's Soyuz, fear not! Sir Richard Branson is riding to the rescue, with seven minutes of space flight for a pea-sized US$200,000.
Interactive Periodic Table: Still trying to figure out how the silicon-based monsters of Planet Zog could potentially interbreed with already-augmented supermodels following their vile takeover of Earth? Junior scifi writers can check out every element's atomic structure right here, then click on links to see how it naturally combines with just about anything else.
General
Lowrider magazine: You've never seen a sparkly purple, 4000-pound car hop straight off the ground, or dance around to classic War tunes like a chrome-plated kangaroo on meth? Then you just haven't lived. Click here for photos, or to find the next lowrider car show happening near you.
Kitchen Sink magazine: When you just can't bear another article about the new diet, fashion, product or pill that will finally make your own life as fabulous as a Hollywood celebrity's, click on this wonderful literary magazine, with lots of meaty reading that isn't just about filling space between advertisements.
Free Will Astrology: Rob Brezsny posts his poignant poetry, disguised as weekly horoscopes, every Wednesday, while Jonathan Cainer provides great daily forecasts and Susan Miller calculates your best days of the month to ask for a raise, or a kiss.
Still can't find the future you want? Try Llewellyn's Free Online Tarot, which you can refresh until all your hopes and dreams are in the cards.
Aztlán: Curious about Aztlán, mythical homeland of the Aztecs and current flashpoint for right-wingers like Pat Robertson, who apparently thinks that Mexican-Americans plan to take over the US Southwest and return it to Mexico? For a little insight into the Chicano Movement, check out sites like MEChA (Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán), the United Farm Workers, Voz de Aztlán and the UCLA Chicano Studies Department, all offering possible explanations of why US Latinos are working for equal rights and respect for their culture(s), both goals that could potentially be realized without mounting an armed revolution against the 700 Club.
Mark Morford: This San Francisco Chronicle columnist is my favorite writer working today.
Mark Fiore: And my favorite political cartoonist, from the San Jose Mercury News, sets his left-leaning illustrations to music.
Pop & Politics: Young writers and journalists, most from the MySpace Generation, have their say about issues from global warming and race relations to cross-dressing and the War on Terror.
TahoeT: Amazed at how great my website looks? Me, too, and it was easy and inexpensive to build, thanks to Tim Dineen, whose personal site timandvictor.com includes the fabulous FoodTalk blog and lots of recipes.
Steven Colbert Roasts President Bush: When I'm facing a challenge, say, covering a recently de-mined national park during hurricane season, or actually finishing one of my science fiction short stories, I watch American hero Steven Colbert stare unflinchingly into the face of the abyss, while the abyss smirks uncomfortably and looks at his shoes. It's inspirational.
