Howdy. I'm back, after a wlld and unpredictable week, highlighted by a six-inch snowfall on Thanksgiving Day (by Monday afternoon, though, it was all gone!). I have failed miserably to provide for my family in the great hunter-gatherer tradition; we had the worst imaginable conditions for Opening Day of deer season in Pennsylvania that I can remember.
I don't really mind, though. Deer are magnificent animals and I take the bulk of my pleasure out of simply studying and watching them in their natural environment. As the Spanish philosopher Ortega y Gasset once explained, when asked why he hunts: "I hunt to have hunted."
Asked a similar question abou tennis, Andre Agassi might reply: "It's all about the process." Same idea, although I like OG's turn of phrase better—it sounds less like a catch-phrase.
It's Luke's birthday today (he's 3) and he was all fired up about taking a tray of homemade cupcakes to school for his class. But he came down with a high fever and I had to run out of the office to take him home. Poor little guy. At least they all got their cupcakes!
This is supposed to be the off-season in tennis, but a great deal has been happening. Blogging may be sporadic the rest of this week and next, as I have to write a Robert Lansdorp story for TENNIS and edit a few other articles, but I'm looking forward to posting on various subjects that I've either been saving for the end of the year (Jelena Dokic, anyone?), or that are relevant at the end of the year (including my proposal for some sort of shot clock, à la the NBA, in clay-court tennis). I'll be doing that through the New Year, until I travel to Melbourne to blog live from the Australian Open again.
The next few weeks will give us a good chance to look back on the events, happenings and people of the past year, and if you have a particularly compelling question or issue in mind, shoot me an e-mail or add a comment on it below.
Meanwhile, I enjoyed Justin Gimelstob's last column for SI.com.
OK, Justin got off to a rough start with his thoughts on the women's game a few months back, but you could see that coming from a mile away. The bottom line is that Gimelstob is a bright guy who's not afraid to express his opinion, and he brings a player's perspective to his writing.
Before the Internet matured and gave birth to blogs, Justin would not have had nearly as broad a platform—he would have been too inexperienced for the professional information managers of the mainstream media, with its pretensions to "objectivity." Now he has a voice. Information has been liberated!
Anyway, hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!