Arrival

Girl on the BART train to Milbrae There was a cut-off and she just made it (suitcase in hand); it was pink beyond flamingo and bubble gum, she wore an aqua marine fleece and turquoise socks, all the pastels of...

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The Slippery Slope

My descent upon it continues from California. Stay tuned....

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From the lobby of the JCC Houston

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Couch by Couchwest: Tentative Line-up

I am soon embarking on Couch by Couchwest, a summer tour of America....and the couches of my friends. Should you wish to reserve a cushion to be blessed by my fulsome derrière, please hit the "Contact the Trust Fund Reporter"...

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Central Park Again

I go to Central Park three times a week now that school is out and I'm also slightly unemployed. Pardon the dust, we are renovating here. My friend Mike calls and asks where I am. It had been raining off-and-on...

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Kerouacing Off

Episode I, The Super Duper Weenie It all began with a powder blue Prius. I had planned to take the Amtrak to Boston, to sit morosely with my schoolwork and take in the countryside as only it can be...

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Cairo with Osama

Author's Note: This piece is the product of an assignment to write a complete piece strictly within a fifty-minute increment without an outline or any editing or anything more than a prompt for a topic. The prompt was to write...

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Happy New Year from Israel

Well technically, I am not there yet, but by the time most of you read this, I will be (I've got a sixth sense about these things just like when I picked Barack Obama and Mike Huckabee to be the...

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Los Angeles I'm Yours: Part One

But oh, the smell of burnt cocaine The dolor and decay It only makes me cranky Oh great calamity, Ditch of iniquity and tears How I abhor this place Its sweet and bitter taste Has left me wretched, retching on...

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Racist Warlocks and Sunflowers

Spoiler Alert: The end of this post contains the first two sentences of my forthcoming book about racist warlocks. Should you be a warlock purist, I strongly urge you not to read the last section of this post. I...

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Toulouse, Cat'Art, Ste Columbe

I may or may not have almost been thrown out of here for screaming "BIJOU!" I knew that I had successfully left Paris when strangers started to speak to me on the trains and buses. I met a very...

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Cimetiere Montparnasse

After being surrounded by billions of people at the museum, this was easily the highlight of my day and my last night in Paris. After dinner in Montparnasse, I walked down Rue Emile Richard which divides the cemetary in...

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The Montmartre Arcade Fire

Artistic/symbolic blurriness or low battery? You decide. I napped and "worked" until 10:30 on Saturday night, showered and made it to Montmartre at midnight. For those unfamiliar, Montmartre is on the far northern end of Paris (I think), on...

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A Mime, A Beret, and the Champs-Élysées

Trying to look as French as possible here. Champs Elysees: Part One One day when I'm traveling dishonestly, I will wake up early (or stay out all night) so that I can walk the Champs Elysees when it's empty...

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Croque Madame and Eiffel Power

Only the French (and Tony Parker) would place this backdrop for a basketball court. Inspired by the stories of French apostasy at the Jewish Museum of Art and History, I decided that I would break all the Shabbas laws...

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The First Twenty-Four (Hours)

I woke in a panic as I had missed free breakfast at the hotel and had overslept to counterbalance the difference between my intended and actual bedtimes. I was due uptown (which is a totally inaccurate but wholly-of-habit term) in...

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Foggy Londontown Sans Fog

Author's note: I got progressively drunker as this post was written and though I planned to edit it, I thought I would be robbing you of my precious integrity if I were to change any of the wacky, Freudian things...

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Chocolate City In White Beignet Powder

After 1200 miles and 11 states, you have no idea what a beignet can actually mean. Crossing Lake Ponchartrain was a highlight of the trek. Something inherently redemptive about a first sojourn to New Orleans since the deluge. But...

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Tocqueville in Birmingham

Baseball in America is alive and well in Alabama. Or maybe America in baseball is alive and well in Alabama, where outside of Birmingham, our national pastime still thrills, if only as sideshow to a more salient national pastime,...

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Regions Park, Alabama

Official press credentials. A view from the press box. Barons locker room where the non-human-growth-hormone magic happens. This is NOT what a baseball dugout should look like. Midnight moon and dugout lights from the pitchers mound....

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Panegyric L'Waffle House

Waffle House is, at the exact same time, an unabashed and guilty pleasure of mine. It's a difficult paradox to explain, but I will try my best (especially for Northeast and West Coast readers). Three hours past Washington, D.C.,...

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Random Roadtrip Tableaux

It all began with the end of my stint in Corporate America. That's right (censored corporate publishing house name), I will dance in a bear suit for you NO MORE! And yes, I actually did wear a bear suit,...

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Roadtrip: By the Numbers

Total Hours: 74 Total Miles: 1668 Total States and Federal Districts Entered: 12 Total Waffle Houses Patronized: 2 Total Moving Violations Accrued: 0 (bitch!) Total Crosses Seen: 3.147579232345 Beignets Eaten: 2 Total Amount of Time Which An Oppressive Middle Eastern...

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Andy Rooney, Inflatable Rats, SiCKO: A New York Week

Part II of last week's series: A New York Week After Wednesday's brush with Edward Albee, I left work early on Thursday to go to a press screening of the new Michael Moore "documentary" SiCKO. On the way to...

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Don't Write Your Second Book: A New York Week

It all started with Edward Albee... Well, it actually started with a walk home from work. Or it started with the 76 degree June day that prompted the urge to walk. It was a straight shot down 5th Avenue (of...

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Throwback to Adolescent Angst

I realize how unfair, disastrously unkarmic (or completely meaningless for some) it is for me to brag about the Arcade Fire concert I went to last week at Radio City Music Hall, but I can't help but find meaning...

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A Long December

While away in the nation's capital over the weekend, be on the look for some quality updates coming early next week. And how. Here's some homework in the meantime. Gilad Shalit, Udi Goldwasser, and Eldad Regev. Anybody remember them?...

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Ramallah Redux

While West Jerusalem is on Shabbat lockdown, I accompany Hassan on his first trip to Ramallah. By this point, I am old hat at Ramallah, I know all the best places to go for baklawa and Arafat keychains. Here's...

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Bethlehem

Church of the Nativity Low entrance...presumably to keep horses and ogres out St. Jerome, Mary, and the Cross Birthplace of Jesus Hassan and I paid tribute...and not just in case we turn out to be wrong in the end....

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Petra Postcards

This is the pet that eventually rose up against the smurfs. The quest for the grail is not archeology, it's a race against evil... This grammatically-incorrect sign is the only reason why I even bothered to come. Hassan figured...

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Life and Near-Death in the Hashemite Kingdom

Alright, maybe that's hyperbole. Hassan gives up my cover at about 11:15 P.M. after we've exchanged all bilingual pleasantries with the fine residents of the ancient town of Karak and the conversation now shifts to Islam. We've been invited in...

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The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan: Day One

...I arrive in Jordan proper after they detain me at the Jordanian side of the border crossing and make me watch an hour-long Arabic soap opera with the Arab equivalent of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern and then release me without asking me any questions.

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On Ramallah (part ii)

...As I witnessed with Hassan in East Jerusalem, people were simply curious; they wanted to know why we'd ever come to Ramallah, where we were from (ahem..Canada), and whatever other information we could relent in our limited speech. A small conversation would turn into a circle of eight or ten people around us (which was moderately disconcerting at times), but we were invited into the shops and given keepsakes of the capital of the West Bank.

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Greetings from Ramallah

Downtown Ramallah My camera can't even believe it... But I've arrived. The circle where everyone is isually angry and shouting when covered on CNN, Central Ramallah Arafat and Nasrallah portraits for sale... Jihad posters! There's No Place Like Home......

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Faisal Hostel

Hassan and I arrive at the Faisal Hostel in East Jerusalem after the place I've stayed in previous visits turned out to be full of drunk yeshiva kids. Walking across the Green Line to the Damascus Gate entrance to...

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Updates.

I've been without consistent internet access as of the last few days, so be sure to follow me on the trust fund itinerary and travel log. It's like knowing where I am without having to hear about it at nauseating...

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Pension Grillparzer

An interesting turn of events at the Old Jaffa Hostel; I met my political doppelgänger from the opposite side of the spectrum. I emerged from debate/conversation some three-and-a-half hours later both floored and renewed. Hassan is Iraqi and grew up...

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Sculptures

I couldn't take pictures inside of the museum, so I took whatever pictures I could from the sculptures in the front and in the outside garden. You know, I was exceptionally moved by this piece and had to comment on...

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Wandering

After the sirens stop, I give a vendor at the station my last unexchanged $20 and tell him to take his cart to the soldiers and pass out ice cream. He doesn't argue with me. I leave the station to...

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