If you've read the The Alchemist and want to be a subject of a virtual art exhibition hosted by the man himself -- Paolo Coelho -- the process couldn't be easier. Send a picture of you reading the book, and voila, you will forever be part of virtual art history!

The exhibition is to celebrate the 20th anniversary of The Alchemist, that has till date sold a 100 million copies. Holy gonzoly. So far, 38 people have sent in some cool photos of them reading the book; the photos will be uploaded for the rest of the year.

Coelho is quite the tech-savvy writer dude. He keeps a regular blog, and has the occasional vlog. Obviously, he understands the importance of connecting with his readers, and enjoys the process too.

So take that picture and send it in to: paulocoelhocovers[at]gmail.com, perhaps you will be displayed in a gallery somewhere someday! If you don't have the Alchemist on hand, any of his books will do. Coelho wants to see your face, so be careful not to cover it with his book, and don't stress about quality.

(In the image, I'm holding his book Eleven Minutes, one I enjoyed way more than The Alchemist. I haven't read any others. Urrr...yup, I'm going to send it in.Cheap thrills.)

Two summers ago we spent a few days in Minneapolis visiting friends, a visit several years after my first trip here. Both times it struck me how lovely the city is. Minneapolis is one of those gorgeous urban spots in the world that pays attention to how public and private space work together to create an environment everyone can enjoy.

The architecture in Minneapolis is a large part of its visual scene. Its buildings often end up winning awards for their design. Here are a sampling of what you'll find of particular note. These are new buildings that were commissioned as a tribute to Minneapolis's dedication to the arts: Children's Theatre Company; Guthrie Theater, Central Library, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, the Walker Art Center and Frederick R. Weisman Art Museum.

All featured on the Meet Minneapolis Web site and are places you might consider putting on your itinerary. Here's a link that leads to the descriptions. The Weisman Art Museum was designed by Frank Gehry thus is my particular favorite.

However, my favorite aspect of visual pleasure was when we spent an evening walking among the sculptures at the Minneapolis Sculpture Garden outside the Walker Arts Center. This is an eclectic mix of styles set in among flower beds, a conservatory, an arbor and wide open spaces.

This year marks 20th year since the garden has been open. Jaunted tipped me off to the two artist designed mini-golf courses that have been added to the space as part of the celebration. It costs to play the courses but you can see them for free. The rest of the garden is free as well.

Here's another opportunity for a public art feast, you can also tour the University of Minnesota's campus where there is an extensive public art program. Tours are available from May and October. Here's the link for that info.

Do you remember the commercials for a fold-out couch that showed a six year-old opening and closing it? Engadget posted today about power-assisted luggage by Live Luggage that I think is the sleeper sofa of suitcases.

It's easy enough to use, even a six year old can handle it.

The luggage has been under construction for several years as the company has worked out the design. The premiere, which I suppose is when you can get out that wallet to buy it, is June 26.

Here are the features:

• The handle can adjust to three heights.
• It weighs 23 pounds (10.6kg ) which leaves you 37 pounds for clothing unless you want to pay for an overweight charge.
• The battery is rechargeable and it is recommended that you charge it each night. I suppose it would be the pits to have the thing die on you before you reach check-in. Fully recharged, the luggage will go 1.5 miles (That's six times around a track.) If it does poop out, you can wheel it on your own with out assistance from the suitcase.
• It's as tough and strong as a car bumper
• The user propels the suitcase by lifting the handle and tilting the suitcase.

The manufacture points out in its press release that this is power-assisted luggage. It won't go on its own.

According to the company, the weight distribution is what makes the luggage manageable for a six year-old. For an older person, I can see where this luggage would be an advantage. You do need to be a rich older person. According to Engadget, the price might be as high as $1,365. That's what's listed. That is some suitcase.

Matt Harding, as in "Where the Hell is Matt," --the guy who dances around the world, has found the answer to world peace. Don't believe me? Just watch his video, Dancing 2008 and you'll be smiling in a few seconds. Halfway through, you'll feel like dancing yourself. The song "Praan" is perfect.

As Matt dances his way around the world through 42 different countries, people join him. Along the way there are laugh-out-loud surprises and joy. (To see the high quality version, click on the video. It will take you to the YouTube site. Click on "watch in high quality" under the video--or go here for the video via Matt's Web site.)

What a great way to travel. Matt, you're brilliant.

The post about the eight abandoned hotels reminded me of the glory days gone by hotel where I worked one summer during college. Wildmere was a wondrous expansive wooden hotel that first opened in 1887.

Perched on the top of the limestone cliffs of Lake Minnewaska in upstate New York near New Paltz, it was a regal testament to monied folk.

When it was in its prime, the hotel gleamed white from fresh paint. When I worked there, it was at the tail end of fading. As with the hotels in the abandoned hotel post at ProTraveller, as the economy shifts, keeping up with beauty is not easy.

Paint flaked. Dripping pipes in the basement created puddles one had to gingerly step through on the way to the laundry room.

Over at ProTraveler, there is a read worth noting about eight abandoned hotels in various parts of the world. They once had glory days, but didn't hold onto it for financial woes or pestilence.

These are the places that chronicle shifts of time. Hot destinations that don't stay hot or where the owners made bad decisions. You've probably come across examples of these types of places in your own travels.

"What was this place?" you might say to your traveling companions. You wonder if anyone important stayed here or what the building looked like when it was brand spanking new.

One example is this picture of the Palace Hotel in Jerusalem. I love this shot. The hotel reminds me of John Everett Millais's painting of Ophelia still clutching flowers, dead, floating face-up in a pond.

The photos are haunting, I think. Chairs with no one sitting in them, debris scattered across the floor, and an old sign that once flashed its neon. These are reminders that nothing gold can stay, but if lucky, can be resurrected into a new life.

For example, the Palace Hotel is to be reopened as a Waldorf-Astoria luxury hotel in a few years. The Diplomat Hotel in the Philippines may be turned into a museum. The folks who are going to do the project better hurry while there is still a building worth saving. It's thought to be haunted, so hopefully, the ghosts will be happy with the change.

One of our favorite airline columnists over at MSNBC.com and from Elliott.org published an interesting article today on the separation between coach and first class called "Frequent Criers: Elite Fliers are Ruining Air Travel". In it, he points to the increasingly childlike behavior among top tier passengers that has recently been giving first class passengers a bad name -- and asks whether this is a function of the passengers themselves or the airlines catering to an unbalanced class of service.

As an elite member myself, I have thought about this topic several times and part of it is true -- Elliott points out a variety of instances in which first class passengers have acted unruly and entitled. But I don't think that it's limited exclusively to first class passengers -- in fact, there are idiots in all classes of service and modes of transportation.

It doesn't take much effort to be an obnoxious jerk when you're in cramped quarters and have been traveling all day. In the same way that the taxi cuts you off when you're merging into traffic or the guy on the stairs walks down the left side instead of the right side, some people just don't make common courtesy a high priority. Yeah, it sucks. But it's okay. They're in the minority that think differently, but we'll get over it and we'll continue to do the nice, right thing.

There are good frequent fliers out there. I'm sure Chris Elliott flies all over the world and like myself and many frequent travelers on Gadling is professional and courteous. Don't lose faith, fellow passenger -- first and coach passengers are all stuck in this aluminum tube together. We can't let articles like this tear us apart.

I admit, I took the SkyMall catalog with me when I left the Southwest Airlines plane after my last flight. I had grand plans to find something useful or something unusual to write about by pouring through its pages. I got busy.

Then, today, Grant tossed out this link to "The 5 Most Ridiculous SkyMall Products Money Can Buy" at Cracked.com, and after I finished laughing, I unpacked the catalog from my daypack. I looked through it before, but I became curious once again. Cracked.com found some winners. I could use the Hula Chair myself--maybe.

What has caught my attention with this page turning session is the Motion Sickness Relief Wrist Band found in the left-hand column on page 41. On Tuesday I went to Kings Island with my daughter, eight of her friends, my husband, son and another family. I took one too many roller coaster rides and felt woozy all day yesterday. Could this wrist band have helped?

Oh, my pies. Over at Intelligent Travel, I found out that yesterday was National Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie Day. That's a national day worth celebrating. Instead, there I was at Twist O' the Mist in Niagara Falls eating a butter pecan ice-cream cone, not knowing I that I should have been on a strawberry-rhubarb pie hunt.

The best strawberry-rhubarb pie I know of is at Wallkill View Farm Market right over the bridge out of New Paltz, New York. Oh, I can see it now in the glass case on a shelf among others. Forget the blackberry, cherry or peach. What I'm after is the strawberry-rhubarb as soon as I pull into the parking lot. A whole pie with the hint of the sugary sour of strawberry and rhubarb juices that have bubbled up through the flaky crust. I buy at least one every summer. Sometimes, I buy two--or three. It depends on how many people I am visiting on my summer trips back to New Paltz where I lived through 8th grade and high school.

Wallkill View Farms was a smaller fruit stand back in my high school days. Since then, it has grown into an upscale roadside fruit and vegetable stand that has expanded into baked goods, gourmet offerings and flowers. Every inch of the produce and products are lush and gorgeous.

Another great place to find pies of any kind is at the Green Market at Union Square in Manhattan. Farmers and bakers, many of them from upstate New York and elsewhere, come into the city on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays, turning the park area into a garden of earthly delights with pies and more--much more.

Then there's major pie country in Holmes County, Ohio, where you'll find the largest population of Amish in the United States. Head to towns with names like Charm, Mt. Hope and Berlin and stop at any Amish stand you happen across. The pie version I snap up here are fried pies. These are in between a pie and a turnover. There is strawberry-rhubarb, but the apricot is mighty fine as well. Actually, they're all good.

A few days ago, Grant posted about Derrie-Air, a new airline that is to charge passengers by the pound--not just the baggage weight, but the passenger weight as well. "The more you weigh, the more you pay."

As Grant noted in his post, and Daily Travel & Deal, the L.A. Times travel blog, reported yesterday, the airline isn't real, but was created as an ad campaign study by Philadelphia Media Holdings to see how effective print advertising can be. There was enough of a buzz that it's clear that people, in general, have problems traveling on the same plane with people who are overweight. Feeling squished in an airplane seat next to a person who is taking up more than his or her fair share of space is annoying at best and anger producing at its worst.

When I read about Derrie-Air, before I caught on to the hoax, I flashed to my high school friends who wrestled in the lower weight class. They barely ate for the season and told tales of how they worked on getting their weight down before they stepped on a scale before a meet to see if they qualified. If people did have to pay for their airline ticket according to their weight, I could see there might be some who would do the same thing wrestlers do about a week before their travel date. There they would be in their neighborhoods wearing sweatsuits, walking around the block over and over again, just to loose the water weight.

I also imagined the arguments couples would have at the airport, blaming each other for the extra weight one of them packed as their souvenir money was eaten up by the cost of the seat. "If it wasn't for you we could have that extra day at Disneyland."