I’m going to do the math. I’ve been out of the United States for … hold on … for 128 days now. My longest consecutive stretch, eclipsing the 120 (or thereabouts) I spent in and around Hong Kong in 2008-09. No, not a significant stretch for veteran expats, or career diplomats or military people based […]

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I’m not sure we ever posted a photo of the Teeny Apartment taken from outside. Not much to look at, eh? I was outside the other day, just before dusk, taking photos of three of the “villas” near our place. I’ll do something on those in a few days. About their architectural weirdness. But back […]

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Busy day. Tiger Woods did his thing and we watched in a newsroom from the other side of the world. Probably the only American athlete who could command that kind of interest in such an international workplace. But people got a bigger laugh from the Gloria Allred stuff that came after. Count me among those […]

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Landon Donovan may not be extending his stay with Everton in the English Premier League,  after all. That’s what his Everton coach, David Moyes, is saying. Unless Moyes is engaged in some sort of semantics game here … it looks as if Los Angeles Galaxy fans can expect Donovan back in SoCal before March is […]

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That was the subject line on the e-mail I received yesterday from a friend of mine, David Lassen, and since he was working as a columnist in the print industry, it was hard to imagine “They got me” was going to be anything good. Maybe as the butt of a practical joke. You know, “Boy, […]

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I work at a newspaper that appears to have seven guys named Paul in its newsroom. Seven. And what makes things, uh, interesting … is that at the moment three of those seven Pauls work within three yards of each other. One of them is directly behind me and another faces him on the other […]

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I am devastated. Like a Boston Red Sox fan after losing the ALCS to the Yankees in 2003. Except keener. More intense. Deeper. Because my team has never won nothin’. Even the Red Sox have won the World Series — and did before the 2004 “miracle” edition. We lost last night. We. Being Al Jazira […]

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Well, it’s mortal for them, anyway. I hope it’s not potentially mortal for me. They are gnats, not mosquitos and, besides, the UAE hasn’t had a reported case of malaria since 1997 … Anyway, did I mention on this blog that we had mushrooms growing out of the rotting wood beneath the kitchen sink? I […]

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Opening Ceremonies for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics were last night. And I was not there. The last Olympics I didn’t cover? Calgary 1988. I covered two before, and 11 after — including six Winter Games among the total of 13. And how do I feel about not being in Vancouver?

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I don’t often do this. Just link to someone/somebody and let it go at that. But this story and the nine-minute video that goes with it are worthy of it. (As if none of you aren’t looking at espn.com.) In the three decades I spent covering sports, including the 23 I spent as a sports […]

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