一举两得

前几天朋友发来一张“照片”，据说是热情的洛杉矶人民为Beckham夫妇特意竖起来的巨大迎宾牌：



肥彭在他的书里 说，随着英国对世界的影响越来越小，恐怕有朝一日英国给世界的贡献只有两样东西能存活下来：一个是足球(association football)这项游戏，一个是"fuck off"这个短语。倘若Mr. and Mrs. Beckham的美国之行不但带去了足球－－用SkySports的话说：to succeed where Pele, Beckenbauer and the World Cup failed，而且把英国的另一个伟大遗产也发扬光大，他在英国人民心里的形象肯定比做英格兰队长高大得多，实在是功莫大焉。从这张“照片”看来不管他的 第一个使命是否完成，美国人民已经张开双臂来拥抱英国的第二大遗产了。

环绕地球14天

听说地球是圆的，所以只要认准一个方向走，最后都可以从终点又回到起点。于是十四天前我出发一路向西：北京--Helsinki--New York--Princeton--Miami--Washington DC--New York--北京。虽然“游”的地方不多，但是在完成“环”的速度上我是既胜了Phileas Fogg也打败了Michael Palin.

十四天以前飞机降落在赫尔辛基机场的时候地上没有一丝雪的痕迹，我甚至有些怀疑自己是否真的到了冬天的芬兰；今天下午飞机在一片雾气沼沼中落地，取行李的时候被别人的箱子撞到却没有听到一声“Sorry”，于是我确切地知道自己是回到北京了。

给编辑找点茬

很少读Time Magazine，一是因为身边没有人订，更主要的是文章写得不够有趣，否则也可以上网看的。

前几天在Princeton朋友的家里闲来无事，顺手抄起最新的一期《Time》翻了翻，吸引我的除了中国专题的封面文章以外，就是那篇iPhone的报道。先看这两天炒，哦，吵翻天的iPhone，结果放下杂志，一边笑一边上网写了这么一封Letter to the Editor：

The Rule of Thumb

Sir,

If some points you attempted to make in your piece on the recently unveiled iPhone ("The Apple of Your Ear", Friday, Jan. 12, 2007) are, at best, debatable, you definitely got one thing terribly wrong. You would not need to wait till June and spend 499 USD on the iPhone (or 599 USD on the more expensive version) to make sure that "you will never again have to hit the 7 key four times to type the letter s", you have been able to avoid the pains for ages with the mobile phones already available in the market. My Nokia phones, and I believe all the other mainstream mobile phones as well, are equipped with a software called T9, which predicts the words you mean to key in as you thumb the keypad. For example, instead of hitting the 7 key four times to get the letter s, you can simply key in a string of numbers 788743 to get the word "stupid".

Your sincerely,

既然上网就顺便看看他们别的文章，于是看到了报道Beckham去好莱坞，错了，是洛杉矶，高价退休的文章，忍不住再写一封信给编辑：

Booted Like Beckham

Sir,

In addition to the ludicrous self-glorification by likening the Major League Baseball to the Champions League in Europe in your piece on David Beckham's transfer to LA Galaxy ("End It Like Beckham", Thursday, Jan. 11, 2007), your judgement on Mr. Beckham's fitness level is very wrong by claiming that he is"still close to the top of his game". England would have done much better had Mr. Beckham been dropped from the squads for Euro 2004 and World Cup 2006. The very reason that he was not is the same reason as what the sceptics commented and you rightly quoted for his move to Real Madrid in the first place, as well as, I'm afraid, the same reason he is now signed by LA Galaxy. Meanwhile, your comment on Mr. Bechkham's passing and free-kick skills being rare among English players is far from accurate. Do the names John Barnes, Alan Shearer, Paul Gascoigne, and most recently, Steven Gerard ring a bell?

Best regards,

最搞笑的是两封信发出去很快就收到了回音：

----- The following addresses had permanent fatal errors -----
<mail11146@vpop4.pop.net>

----- Transcript of session follows -----
popdeliver: mailbox is full
554 5.0.0 Service unavailable

哈哈，看来编辑收到的信太多，已经顾不上看了，那就权当跟自己开个玩笑吧。