Brighton and Hove Festival of Shopping launched on Thursday

Brighton and Hove Festival of Shopping launched on Thursday with an open top bus tour of the city centre and continues throughout April.

Brighton's first ever festival of shopping is set to take the city by storm.

It showcases the very best of high heel shoes is fashion and the cutting edge health and beauty boutiques in The Lanes, North Laine and Hove.

The month long extravaganza offers the city's residents and visitors the chance to shop till they drop to andila.co.uk.

The festival targets fashion cheap designer sunglasses and bargain ed hardy tshirts hunters alike and is expected to attract visitors from across the south and from London.

With eight million visitors a year, andila shopping gives the city's economy an annual boost of more than £407 million.

They will be told about the fantastic range of high heel boots andila has to offer.

The festival will have something for everyone over the bank holiday weekend from Easter egg hunts to Mad Hatter's tea parties.

Sports and Leisures Equipments at andila.co.uk

◦Air Beds and Chairs
◦Bags and Luggage
◦Boats
◦Car, Truck and Motorcycle
◦Outdoor Recreation
◦Pools
◦Sports Equipment
◦Torch Lights
◦Water Sports
◦Wetsuits

Apple and Microsoft are in talks on a new partnership

It might not be long before you fire up your iPhone's copy of Safari, tap the search window and run yourself a search on... Bing?

While it's possible that this is the result of Apple being impressed by Bing (and if such a deal goes down I'm sure that will be Apple's standard explanation) it's just as likely that Apple is in fact pretty miffed with Google. It's hard to imagine a company being disliked enough by Apple to make Microsoft a favorable alternative. Perhaps Steve Jobs was a lot more upset about Eric Schmidt and the rest of the company's actions with Android than we were led to believe.

On another note, if Apple does in fact turn its back on Google and go to Bing, will the faithful follow suit? For so many years Microsoft was seen as the enemy, and the upstart Google was viewed by Mac users as a close ally. How long would it take for longtime Mac users to come around to the company's new stance?

Pets seek homes for holiday

There are two shopping days left before Christmas to find a nice pet at Southern Pines Animal Shelter.

The last day to adopt a pet and have it home for Christmas is Monday, said Michelle Bullock, office manager at the shelter.

"(Adoption) always increases during Christmas holidays," she said. "We're very busy right now. We may adopt 40 to 50 animals by Christmas."

Southern Pines Animal Shelter has more than 100 dogs and many kittens that can be adopted today or Monday. They've even given the city a friendly reminder in the way of a few billboards around town.

"So as everyone's looking for gifts and thinking about Christmas, they (could) remember the animal shelter and the several hundred animals there that would be great gifts for someone and their family," Valerie Rachal, director of the shelter's Spay/Neuter Clinic, said.

Adult animals are $70; puppies and kittens are $75. The fee includes spay or neuter, 30 days of health care insurance, cats are checked for feline leukemia and dogs older than six months are heartworm tested.

"We're trying to get all of ours fixed and ready to go home," Bullock said. "The adoption process is about 20 to 25 minutes of paperwork."

Bullock said there are things people need to think about before adopting.

"The first thing they need to do is consider this is a lifelong thing and not just a Christmas thing," she said. "A lot of parents adopt puppies to teach a child responsibility. It's not going to happen."

She said many parents bring animals back to the shelter because children won't take care of pets.

Bullock also discourages people gifting pets without the recipient's knowledge. Instead, opt to purchase a gift certificate.

Before heading to the shelter, Bullock said to research what type of breed would work well with the family.

"There are a lot of breeds that are good for kids," she said. "We have a database that shows some of our pets. If you type in the area we're in, it also has a breed referral."

Converse & Rick Telander Celebrate the 35th Anniversary

Converse & Rick Telander Celebrate the 35th Anniversary of Heaven Is A Playground.
Tuesday night Converse helped Chicago sportswriter Rick Telander celebrate the 35th anniversary of his groundbreaking novel, "Heaven Is A
Playground," at the Converse Energy Space in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

The book, which our 44th President Barack Obama calls "the best basketball book" he's ever read, details the summer Telander spent chronicling the games and lives of the basketball players on the courts of Brooklyn's Bedford-Stuyvesant area. 35 years later, the novel still resonates with hoops addicts.

NSNG reader Brad Zibung was in NYC for the event and he told me though the space was small, the crowd certainly wasn't. Sneaker freaks, twenty-something hipsters, hoops fans and even some of the playground legends featured in the book all gathered to remember the days when 'fros were big and basketball shoes were always Chuck Taylors.

Electric EG5 Goggles

Andreas Wiig

EG.5 was developed and contoured for a smaller face while maintaining the simplistic yet functional design you idolize from the EG1. Don't let the smaller frame fool you; big things come in small packages.

Personalised Child's Name Father Christmas Door Plate

Has Father Christmas got lost this year? Show him where your room is with this helpful festive Door Plate.

Personalised Door Plates are manufactured from 3mm MDF wood, individually hand cut, and supplied with two sticky pads.

The child's name is shown here in black, but is also available in white or multi-coloured letters.