“If white America were judged by the quality of its people,” Muhammad Ali might have said, “the USA might not finish too high on any list.” Ali was like that, never pulling his punches, unbowed, cowed neither by Joe Frazier’s aggression nor George Foreman’s power nor the might of Uncle …
Read More »Media Monitor: Darryl’s PS, Camille’s BS, Rowley’s stress and the PNM’s right royal DS mess
Jereem Richards’ 200m Commonwealth Games gold medal was all the rage yesterday. So I want to salute the 24-year-old sprinter on his achievement and give him all the respect he deserves for it before I turn my attention to another medallist. Richard Thompson has thrice medalled at the Olympics. And …
Read More »Media Monitor: Boldon’s broadside, Ahye’s comeback and other notable sporting quotes
Sporting history is replete with examples of if not famous last words, at least famous statements, good, bad and ugly, by famous sportsmen, for the most part good. Of recent vintage are two by former Olympian Ato Boldon which provoked a third from newly minted Commonwealth Games 100m gold medallist, …
Read More »Monitoring Me 2: Sport as nirvana; Football’s Lord, Cricket’s Prince and the Calypso King of the World
Happiness, for this West Indian cricket lover, is an 80″television set. Or larger. With Lara, Brian Charles Lara—no longer “live” but in living colour—in full flow. Nirvana? In the terms of Edward Fitzgerald’s “Omar Khayyam:” A stack of Tapia/Review, complete somehow; More, Sparrow, More; Beyond a Boundary and thou before …
Read More »Ewart Marcelle cards 90; a role model when we were young and free-spirited and used to wear flannels…
It is in Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar that we learn that the evil that men do lives after them but the good is oft interred with their bones. Far be it from me to gainsay the bard but I note without surprise that an “oft” is carefully inserted in his statement …
Read More »Media Monitor: Oh mih Guardian! The Grandma of St Vincent St under an editorial spell?
As the Guardian last week marched into April, something seemed to have been taking place behind the scenes. My suspicion is that, with Shelly Dass now officially fired, someone from the CCN group who knows English has crossed the floor and taken up new responsibilities in the print section of …
Read More »Monitoring me: A rare view in the rearview mirror; stone-cold sober 2018 reflections
“Which woman,” my decent, upstanding, well-behaved friend CJ enquired with a chuckle, “doesn’t want to start her day every day with a prick?” Kees was on the radio, the melodic strains of his “Sweet type of Love” filling the room. Coincidence? Perhaps… “Wanna piece?” she had asked, giggling and proffering …
Read More »Media Monitor: The more thieves change in Australia cricket, the more they reverse the swing
“One seta friggin tief!” Amen, brother! More than 15 years ago in July 2001, Valentino Singh, former QRC cricket captain and later Guardian sports editor, headlined his regular Thinking Things Out column, “Best ‘cheats’ will continue to rule.” The “cheats” referred to were the Australian Test cricketers who, according to …
Read More »Media Monitor: 4.5 percent disrespectful, i95.5 percent e-literate and 100 percent wrong about Pro League story!
“I know English. Goodbye.” Click. That was how an exchange between i95.5’s Andre E. Baptiste’s exchange with a caller on his Saturday Sports programme ended yesterday evening. Trying to get back on, the caller was immediately cut off. My slave name—thank you, Dr Fergus—is a superlative and I am a …
Read More »A QRC lament: Of emails, elite athletes, prestige schools, prizes and unpleasant surprises
Some of the Best people I know went, like me, to Queen’s Royal College: one brother, two sons and four nephews. And a throng of people the media-conscious public knows best also went to QRC. Here is a non-exhaustive list of QRC people who tend to be in the media …
Read More »Time to scrap Dimanche Gras! Best suggests Culture Minister take page from Machel and Kees
An Open Letter to Culture Minister Nyan Gadsby-Dolly Dear Madam, It’s over, madam. Dimanche Gras is dead. Like the numerous, onerous pretty costumes the Pegasus Fancy Sailor and Tan Tan and Saga Boy relegated into irrelevance, the show is arguably now exposed as a creaking, antediluvian anachronism, not merely moribund …
Read More »Farewell to the Four-letter Word Man; a saddened survivor’s sad song to say so long to a sibling
The following is an edited version of the eulogy delivered by Wired868 Editor Earl Best at the funeral of his brother, Clyde, who passed away on October 20 at the age of 80 and was buried on October 27. Triskaidekaphobia is a big word which means “fear of the number …
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