Give me another six months, and I’ll come up with 10 more. 10. Indian food. India has 1.1 billion people. It has all sorts of cuisine. I do believe we have ’em all here, somewhere in town. Indian has replaced Mexican, in my universe. 9. Trash removal. Garbage. Rubbish, as the Brits would say. Every […]

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I could feel the vibe around me today, here in the Hadbat al Zafranah neighborhood. The guys building the villa next door … pretty subdued. I’m not even sure they started hammering nails much before 8 a.m. The old guy behind the counter at the mini-mart next to the mosque … his smile had vanished. […]

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Really. Why is this? Hertz has Avis. Coke has Pepsi. Adidas has Nike. Ford has GM … and Honda and Toyota and Hyundai, Renault, Volvo, BMW, Fiat, Mercedes … Every great brand name in the world has a rival. Or 50. Why doesn’t Bill Simmons? How is it that one man has been able to […]

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What’s hot in sports, right now, on the shores of the Arabian Gulf? I knew you were dying to know. And that is where this list comes in. This is a purely subjective list … based on following media coverage here in the United Arab Emirates, and on conversations with local residents (as well as […]

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Yes. Let’s buy the Dodgers. You, me … and a few million other fans. What, you don’t have a credit line of several hundred million dollars? Don’t worry. Just hear me out. This absolutely is not the stupidest idea I’ve ever had. Promise.

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I was a Dodgers fan for nearly half a century. One of my earliest memories is lying on the floor in the living room of the family home in Long Beach and listening to Vin Scully call a game, through those enormous speakers my father rigged up. I was, maybe, 7. I have been a […]

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Arabic,  like Hebrew, is written right to left. I don’t get this. Never have. What it means for right-handers, who are most of the human race, is the risk of dragging your hand over wet ink as you move it left, left, left — over an area you’ve just written on. The other day I […]

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Got to get this in before tipoff, which is about a half-hour away. Can we get a shout-out for the Butler Bulldogs? Doesn’t every right-thinking American have to be pulling for Butler? A mid-major in the NCAA basketball Final Four? OK, right-thinking Americans who live in East Lansing, Durham and Morgantown are exempt. But everyone […]

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This was cheesy. A sellout wrapped in a semi-clever package. But still a sellout. Yesterday, April 1 … the espn.com home page seemed to have a new feature. Streaming across the upper half of the home page was a ticker sort of concept. Moving news, right to left. Like the cable news stations use across […]

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Maundy Thursday. I had forgotten from where the word “Maundy” came. According to the minister at the local Anglican church, it comes from the Latin for “command” — mandatum. Which got anglicized into “maundy”… which should come as no surprise to those who know what the English have done with other foreign words they encountered. […]

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