A significant percentage of the movies I have watched in the past two months has been while flying. In part, it’s because so few films I am interested in seeing have come out during that time. But a big part of it is the array of movies-on-demand available for viewing on the big and modern […]

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Andy Murray won the “gentlemen’s” singles championship at Wimbledon today, the first Briton to do so since Fred Perry in 1936. Yes. Seventy-seven years ago. And there went another great losing streak. I am on record expressing support for the continuation of all prominent losing streaks. They give context and shape to teams, people and […]

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And you thought a crossword puzzle was a lawless place? An unseeable place — like the inside of your brain — where you make up your own rules? Ha. The game has rules. You know it. We know it. They just are not written down anywhere. So I am going to do that now. To […]

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For Lent, I gave up Snickers candy bars. That may not seem like a very significant, nor a serious, Lenten sacrifice … and it is not, cosmically. But it is, for me. I consider Snickers the best candy bar ever invented. Whatever is second is a distant second. Maybe the Baby Ruth. As a candy, […]

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The Abu Dhabi Triathlon went off today, and it was the usual brutally long swim/bike/run. Well, not quite “the usual”, because the “big kids” version of the event includes a 200km bike ride — which is 20km more than the usual “Ironman” distance. In addition to the 3km swim and 20km run. The winner trotted […]

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Let’s count down from 10, Letterman style. 10. The roses? You wouldn’t believe how cheap they were.

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You would think I would have written this post three years ago. And parts of it I could have, and probably did. Other concepts dawn on a person slowly. Especially the absence of something. Here is a short list with items, I have mentioned before, and at least one I have not.

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So, you live in Abu Dhabi and want to see the Super Bowl? Have to be prepared to go all night long. With a couple of Americans new to town living just one floor away, at the new digs, we invited them over and watched the game (or I did, anyway) — which ran from […]

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A person leaves town … switches states .. crosses an ocean … and eventually his sports preferences morph. It’s one of those things that you don’t realize until you do a sort of internal check. “Which teams’ results do I follow? Which have I stopped tracking? Which teams can make me feel a little better […]

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It’s vaguely disconcerting to think you might be boarding an airline that will be out of existence in the near future. Because if the company is in financial peril, doesn’t it begin cutting corners on maintenance? This thought came to me in the shower the other day: How many airlines have I flown that no […]

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