Great day … I am back in sports journalism.
I have transferred from the news desk at The National, here in Abu Dhabi, to the sports department. And so far it’s been rather like going home again.
Even if “home” now includes quite a lot of cricket and rugby for what is, at heart, a British sports […]

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After traveling all day down the mountain-spackled length of Italy — and no, you can’t find a dozen places flat enough to plow 40 acres anywhere south of Rome — finally some time to do my tiny bit on UCLA basketball coach John Wooden, the most important sports figure in Southern California over the last […]

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At the office the other day. A weekend day. Things are slow. Room is quiet.
And then, those mechanical sound. The sort of ambulance siren … with scratchy needle-on-LP thing … and yes … someone is playing Pacman on the google.com home page.
Someone turned around and gave the co-worker — a person with a title, actually […]

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This is Part 1 of this topic. With Part 2 to come … eventually. Once I get around to compiling a list. And I think about it every day. Really, I do.
Today, we address the following phenomenon: In a newsroom where everyone speaks English … why are about half of all declarative sentences answered by […]

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It was the sort of event that left me thinking, “Wow.”
Did that really happen? In 2010 print journalism?
An everyone-is-invited, Friday-night newsroom party at a posh new hotel at the nearby (new) world-class race track.
Wait. It gets better.
Major buffet spread. Lasagna, mini-burgers and fries, fish, samosas, chicken and noodles, hummus, baba ghanoush, dinner rolls, Arab bread, […]

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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 observing what […]

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This story is almost beyond comprehension, for those of us of a certain age.  Anyone, that is, old enough to remember the Evil Empire that was the Soviet Union.
Now, not even 20 years after the Soviet Union fell, to the delight of the free world, a former agent of one of its more feared and […]

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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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My friend and former colleague Steve Dilbeck now blogs about the Dodgers for the Los Angeles Times.
I would like to read Steve’s blog. I would also like to read a blog about the Dodgers.
The trouble?
None of the latimes.com blogs will load. Zero. Sports, politics, news. None can be called up.
The people who run the website […]

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Another rough year for the economy. The world economy, the national, the state …
People losing jobs. Unemployment of, what, 12.5 percent in California? Something like 10 percent in the nation? Even higher, when you include people who have stopped looking for work and the scads of people not fully employed.
U.S. print journalism is still in […]

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