According to hotelbusiness.com, the Half Moon Resort in Rose Hall, Jamaica, has already begun prepping for the arrival of Dennis, which has been upgraded to hurricane status and is bearing down on Jamaica and Cuba.

Half Moon has waived all cancellation fees for reservations scheduled for July 6-10, and guests will be able to reschedule their visit at the original rate booked up to December 15, and between May- October 2006.

During the passage of Hurricane Ivan last September, Half Moon relocated guests to the resort’s 17,600 square-foot conference facilities in the Half Moon Shopping Village. The facility was designed to double as a shelter in the event of an emergency.

Stay safe, everyone, and best wishes for safe flights to the MPI meeting next week in Miami–hopefully, the worst will be over by then.

Can you relate?

peanut-butter spread: The act of taking meager resources (budget, staff, etc.) and
spreading them as thin as possible to cover the most projects. “We’re gonna have to do a
peanut-butter spread in Marketing come September.”

Courtesy of Buzzwhack.com.

This has to be the coolest thing I’ve heard in a long time: University of Las Vegas to build INNovation Village. From the Las Vegas Sun:

UNLV’s Harrah College of Hotel Administration is pursuing partnerships with private companies to build a $200 million-plus mini-campus that would include a hotel and conference center, giving hotel operators a “living laboratory” to test new technology…

Every innovation that may possibly apply to or benefit the hospitality industry could be tested in the village’s inn, conference center and restaurant, particularly new technology that controls everything from security to the environment to the key card door locks.

The village would encourage cross-disciplinary involvement from all of UNLV’s academic programs in testing the products, Mann said, including science, engineering and fine arts. INNovation Village would pursue a partnership between UNLV and Desert Research Institute, which is across the street from the site, to pursue new energy-efficient methods of heating, cooling or lighting a hotel, [college Dean Stuart Mann] said.

I can just see UNLV hospitality professor and frequent MIMlist poster Patti Shock doing a dance of joy! Congratulations to UNLV for having one of the best ideas in recent history, and good luck getting partners who will help you make it happen.

My friend’s oldest daughter, a very thoughtful and generous soul, was talking with a six-year-old today about the terrorist attacks on London. In an e-mail to her mom, she said, “She asked me what a terrorist attack was. I told her a random act of violence against human beings. Also told her we are going to combat the senseless acts of violence with random acts of kindness.”

Her plan is that every Thursday, she will do something nice anonymously, like send $10 to a name picked randomly from a phone book, along with a card like the one found here (along with some more great anonymous good deeds. It may not bring world peace, but then again, it just may bring us one step closer.

I cannot stand this. Can. Not. According to the latest on MSNBC, at least 40 are confirmed dead and more than 300 injured in today’s rush hour terrorist attack on London’s public transportation system.

Being the good little meetings industry journalist that I try to be, I should be wondering what’s happening with meetings going on there now, and disruptions to hotel services when people can’t get to work because the Tube is shut down, etc. But all I can do is cry. Just the other day I saw a guy in town with a “Mind the Gap” t-shirt on, and it reminded me of how pretty much every American I’ve met who’s been on London’s underground cracks up at the very British way of warning people to be careful getting on the train. It’s no longer even remotely funny, now that so many families will have gaping holes where once a loved one was, just because they went to work this morning.

The gap I mind most is the one in the hearts of terrorists that enable them to attack innocent people like this. I have no more words, other than those of sorrow for the people of England. We’re grieving with you on this horrible day.