And so we packed and left the tiny apartment  in Trastevere and joined up with (what we have found to be) the typically not-quite-honest Rome cabbie, who delivered us to Termini for not quite 18 euros. Seeing as how the meter had read 13-something, when we got out, how it ended near 18 is a […]

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  Sure, it’s a little odd. When on vacation we sometimes go to the movies. In Paris. In Rome. It would not be unreasonable to expect that, on only the seventh day in Rome, something historical or important remained unseen or unexplored. But, sometimes, you just don’t feel like making the effort. Instead, we went […]

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It is easy to forget that the touristy part of Rome is quite compact. A person can walk across it, or from top to bottom, in perhaps a half hour, if hills are avoided and tourists don’t choke the sidewalks too much. It was another wonderful day, temps in the 70s, mostly sun (an intense […]

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As mentioned previously, I have not spent any time inside the city of Rome since 1990. Two weeks then, and 10 days in 1987, while covering sports events … and I saw more than a few sights. But I never saw a Rome as overrun by tourists as I did today.

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Dubai International Airport has moved up to No. 2 in the world for international departures. Thus, if you travel enough, even from the United States, the likelihood is increasing that you will land in Dubai. This is not hard to figure out. Asia’s east and its subcontinent have been the sites of much of the […]

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Speaking of hare-brained travel schemes, as we did in the entry yesterday, the two NFL games today brought back more memories of bad ideas that somehow usually worked out. More or less. After great angst. And one that turned into a fairly spectacular (and perhaps life-threatening) disaster. San Francisco home to the Packers, Denver at […]

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I have always liked the notion of a 24-hour race. Le Mans, of course. And here in the UAE, we have the 24 Hours of Dubai. The annual UAE event began today and finishes tomorrow, and we talked in the office about when the toughest part to drive for 24 hours might be … and […]

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It is rare to see a woman at a soccer match, here in the UAE. Rarer still, by far, is to see an Emirati woman. A citizen, that is. So the notion that as many as 25 Emirati women took advantage of a chance to fly over to Bahrain (at Football Association expense) for the […]

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The Galaxy won the Major League Soccer championship today, and the way this will play around 98 percent of the soccer world is this: David Beckham leaves MLS with another championship. That is how it will be looked at here in the UAE, certainly. I have two thoughts here. The first is something I’ve already […]

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Our fifth consecutive Thanksgiving out of the U.S.  A tricky holiday, when you are overseas. As great as turkey is (low fat, lots of meat at a low price) and as great as the holiday is (a meal with family/friends with football) … it just doesn’t translate well anywhere that isn’t Canada. How have we […]

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