Campfire tales

Have you heard true-life litigation stories like these? The following were among several shared by Rodney Gould, a travel attorney at Rubin Hay & Gould in Framingham, Mass., at the recent National Travel Law Symposium in Washington.

He flew to Seattle and drove to Vancouver but had not allowed enough time for the border crossing. He missed the cruise and sued the agency on the grounds the agent should have warned of long delays at immigration. (Gould said it was not clear the agent even knew the customer was traveling via Seattle.)

Litigation grew out of a situation involving a woman who was asked for such a document, but she could not provide the paper. In the noisy encounter that followed, she shouted her explanation: Her son was a product of artificial insemination, so there was no known father to ask.

After the event, she sued the airline and her agent -- not over a missed trip but over her son's "pain and suffering" at learning about his parentage.

All of the above cases have been dismissed, except the latter, which was dismissed in the lower court but is now on appeal.

Blown, not store-bought

The Annual International Martini Challenge will be held Friday and Saturday, Feb. 25 and 26, in Seattle and Vancouver, British Columbia, and Paul Ishii, general manager of Seattle's Mayflower Park Hotel, an event cosponsor, announced a new wrinkle this year: the inaugural Martini Glass Blowing Competition. "Every year, we search high and low for creative martini glasses," Ishii said.

"This year, we decided to invite the regional glass blowers into the competition, which pits Seattle's best bars against the best bars in Vancouver."

Prizes in the martini-glass competition will include trophies, hotel room nights and food and beverage vouchers.

The handcrafted glasses will be displayed and judged in the upper lobby of the Mayflower Park prior to the main event: the martini tasting. Good idea.

Oh dotcom on!

If some guy can change his name legally to DotComGuy, as the former Mitch Maddox recently did, why not a town?

Halfway, Ore. (pop. 360), on Jan. 20 legally changed its name to Half.com, Ore., at least for the duration of 2000, proclaiming itself "the first dotcom city in the world."

The idea actually came from a start-up Internet marketing company called www.Half.com, located (if Web companies can be said to be located anywhere) in Conshohocken, Pa. (pop. 8,064).

The incentive for the town in east-central Oregon was the Web company's promise of 20 free computers for the local elementary school, expert Internet training, financial support for civic-improvement endeavors and the possibility of opening a call center there.

Half.com Mayor Dick Crow said there was some wariness, initially, on the part of the citizenry that the change would bring too much attention and, possibly, too much tourism to the town. But in early January, after meeting with representatives of Half.com (the company), folks were apparently won over by their generosity.

For any tourists who plan to visit the world's first dotcom city actually, rather than virtually, we can tell you upcoming events include the Sweetheart Ball on Feb. 12 and the Crab Feed on March 11. Both events will be held at the Lions Hall.