| THERE’S AN APP FOR THAT World of Wine Events, creator of the San Diego Wine & Food Festival, has created a guide for the iPhone that lets users find about 3,200 wine-tasting rooms nationwide, with clickable phone numbers, maps, and directions. TastingRoom Finder includes a reference guide to grape varieties and viticultural areas and allows users to track their ratings and create a favorites list. |
 |
| TRIO TIP-OFF Before opening in September, Trio restaurant in Palm Springs partnered with Colin Fisher of Colin Fisher Studios in Cathedral City to hang artwork on the bar and dining room walls. Ten percent of sales are donated to the Palm Springs High School Arts Institute and AIDS Assistance Program. The restaurant showcases works of art by different artists each month. |
|
| ON THE WATERFRONT A few years before his death in 2004, Marlon Brando began plans for an ecological utopia on Tetiaroa, a private atoll in French Polynesia. Now his trust is fulfilling his dream, constructing The Brando, a luxury eco-resort with 47 deluxe bungalow villas. The project, built entirely of natural, native materials and using renewable energy technology, includes a scientific research station and possibly a marine sanctuary. Completion of The Brando is expected in late 2011. Purchased by Brando in 1965, Tetiaroa is a 13-island chain circled by coral reef 35 miles from Tahiti. |
 |
| WORD ASSOCIATION | |
| Robert Julian of Palm Springs has released But the Show Went On (Lulu Press), on sale at Just Fabulous in Palm Springs. The book recounts the gay scene in San Francisco in 1987-1988. Each chapter covers a different event or individual and includes interviews or firsthand encounters with celebrities such as Donovan, Liza Minnelli, Carol Channing, Peggy Lee, Wayland Flowers, and the Chippendale Dancers. |  |
| Peter Moruzzi’s Palm Springs Holiday: A Vintage Tour From Palm Springs to the Salton Sea (Gibbs Smith) offers a pictorial history of the Coachella Valley through experiences of tourists who vacationed here from the 1920s through the 1960s. Moruzzi — an architectural historian, expert on midcentury modern architecture, and founding president of the Palm Springs Modern Committee — resides in Palm Springs and Los Angeles. |  |
| Lori Weiner of Rancho Mirage has written a book in which talking dogs interact with humans. The title character of Dino Vicelli: Private Eye in a World of Evils (Dorrance Publishing Co.) is an Italian greyhound/private investigator who takes on a missing person case and finds himself embroiled in kidnapping, murder, and scientific experiments aimed at controlling the world. |  |
| Tod Goldberg, a La Quinta resident and administrative director of the MFA creative writing program at UCR’s Palm Desert campus, has compiled 10 short stories into a book titled Other Resort Cities (Other Voices Books). With settings that include the Salton Sea and Palm Springs, the stories center around ruthless, vulnerable people who inhabit resort cities. |  |