Survival of the Fittest

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              “This is how we

do it,” sang Montell Jordan in 1995, and I took those words in stride as I had another Jongleurs gig that had all the earmarks of disaster, but the emcee, showcase act, and…



John Lennon a Right-Winger? Imagine That!!

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                  A week ago, Fred Seaman, a former personal assistant to John Lennon, divulged that the late ex-Beatle had turned Conservative in his final years, professing an admiration of Rona…



Suddenly A Smoke-Free Year Has Passed

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                Yesterday I was walking on Broad Street in Dagenham passing by a newsagent when three kids approached me. I didn’t have to guess what they wanted, but my god, if you’re going to smoke, …



Why Holidays Often Suck, and Why This One Didn’t

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             Until my last marriage, I could only remember taking one, possibly two, holidays with a loved one. One of those was taking a train up from LA to Portland, Oregon at Christmastime, 1998, for a reunio…



An Easier £1.2 Million May Have Never Been Made

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                I love/hate readi

ng “Platell’s People,” a weekly Saturday Daily Mail column/bitchfest by the right-wing, unfunny, and sometimes totally rude Amanda Platell. Most of it is unfo…



Worst Show on TV … and I Watch it Every Week

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                   It was by accident that about a month ago, while killing time in a hotel room in Cardiff, that I turned on ITV just after 7PM and did not know there could be a show so utterly d…



Next week, I’m driving!

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                 “Trains and Boats and Planes” was a Burt Bacharach song recorded by Dionne Warwick and Billy J. Kramer, among others. “Planes, Trains, & Automobiles” was a Steve Martin/John Candy …



Jesus Came Back To Tell The Bunny Where To Hide The Eggs

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                  “On the third day he rose from the dead,” so it says in The Apostles’ Creed, and every year since that well-documented event which may or may not have happened, we have celebrate…



Just GOING To Las Vegas Is a Big Enough Gamble

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                   It’s been almost exactly four years since the last time I was in Las Vegas, Nevada, and what I saw then was distressing, but with a credit crunch having taken over, and the city…



Not this year (but a one in 30 chance I’m wrong)

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            I felt the chances of a

repeat championship for San Francisco in 2011 were slim several weeks ago, and their stumbling performance in their first two games against their bitter rival LA Dodgers p…