The World Vision Report aired my interview with model/designer/saint/UN Ambassador Bibi Russell. They mixed the interview with some Bangladeshi music and I think it turned out quite good. Especially, since it’s my first ever recorded piece to air.
Listen to it now.
Bibi plays an important part in my book. Here’s how the chapter she’s featured in starts out:
“Now is a good time,” Bibi said. “The electricity is out.”
I have never interviewed a supermodel before or even talked to one, for that matter. I never expected that she would be there – up three flights of stairs off the chaotic streets of Dhaka sitting in the dark.
When she stood I almost said, “Boy, you sure are tall and…
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Ricky Reilly might be gone, but the back page of Sports Illustrated is still pumping out some worthwhile pieces. S.L. Price wrote one about the Olympic committee granting China this year’s summer Olympics with the hopes that China would work on its human rights. But they haven’t. The Olympics are here and the international community and the Olympic committee are turning a blind-eye.
Here’s an excerpt:
China? In the seven years since being awarded the Games it has emerged as an economic superpower — potent enough to welcome the Olympics even as it freely flouts the Olympic spirit. Why should China keep its vow on human rights? No country will boycott the Games, and no sponsor will pull out of them, if it means…
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Hemingway, Thoreau, Emerson, Twain, and Melville are just a few of the writers who have NOT influenced me. I would never insult them like that.
I’m not sure whether it sounds more conceited to say writers like these have influenced you or that no one has influenced you – as if you are doing things with words that no one has ever done before (you trailblazer, you). If someone asked me who my influences were – and no one ever has because I’m not that successful – I would list the following, for better or worse, as my influences:
1) Some dude that wrote about paddling a canoe down the river that runs through his backyard with his son for National Geographic Adventure. The story taught me that…
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Forget melting ice caps, rising sea levels, displaced people, spread of disease, and other bad stuff. What irks me the most about climate change and, in general, our crappy stewardship of our planet is the disappearance of quality dive sites around the world.
Yeah, that’s selfish…oh, well.
Here’s a NY Times piece with more evidence that our dive sites are fading fast.
Save the reef!…
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That’s how many I wrote about the world’s largest dam today. If you look close at the bottom of the pic you can see fishermen catching the world’s smallest fish (note: you can’t see the fish).
…
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…and the chapter on China is winning. I’m on day two of pounding my head into my desk.
My mantra: Keep it simple stupid.
But that darn country is so complex!
Wish me luck….
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I was scrolling through photos the other day, searching out details, and I came across the photo below. It seems like a nice photo of me and some Bangladeshi garment workers, doesn’t it? Well, you don’t know the whole story. I had forgotten all about it. Such memories are repressed.
See that dude to the right of me? I don’t want to go into details, but as this pic was taken, he was trying to molest me. If you look close, you can see my innocence drifting away. Following this photo, he received a quick elbow to the ribs and then he disappeared, back to whatever creepy lair he crawled out of….
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The cat, Oreo, that let’s me occupy her house has now decided the chair – which was the only thing in the entire home which was solely mine – is pretty cozy. We’re sharing for now. But I foresee a future where I will write on the floor and she will supervise from above.
Oreo already dictates when I can and cannot work. Although, she did send me a Valentine this year, which makes her less of an evil dictator. It read:
(Outside) Today I though about clawing you to pieces and feasting on the remains. But I didn’t.
(Inside) If that’s not love, what is?
I’ve made a static page here that will feature cat’s and their writers….
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In front of the flip flop factory, the flip flop fabricators wear flip flops.
How fun is that? I’m having an awesome day writing and that sentence just made it twice as awesome….
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