Here’s a link to her article, which was just published on the Huffington Post:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/emilia-barrosse/brazil-favelas-olympics-world-cup_b_3254502.html

Emilia is a Journalism major at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. She’ll graduate in June. Tuition money well spent.

Bravo, Emilia!

The film “42” is in theatres, celebrating the transformational story of how Jackie Robinson broke the color line in Major League Baseball with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.

Today, 66 years later, professional basketball player Jason Collins overcame another taboo in pro sports by announcing to the world that he is a gay man – becoming the first openly gay man active in a major American professional sport.

A first round pick in the 2001 NBA draft, Jason Collins is a 12-year NBA veteran. An All-American center at Stanford, Jason and his twin brother Jarron both enjoyed decade-long careers in the National Basketball Association. Jason’s dozen years in the NBA are further proof – as if needed – that it’s not if there are gay men in pro sports – but how many pro athletes are gay? And why should we even care?

The New Jersey fans that cheered for Jason Collins during seven seasons with the Nets – and the ticket buyers who rooted for him in his NBA stops since leaving New Jersey – weren’t cheering for a heterosexual man or gay man. They were cheering for a talented and durable big man who fought for rebounds and scored consistently in the paint. Team player Jason has also always been considered a good guy in the locker room.

Trivia note: The Dodgers played in Brooklyn NY when Jackie Robinson made history in 1947. The Nets, the NBA team that drafted Jason Collins in 2001, is now playing its first season in Brooklyn. (Significant? Probably not. But us sports fans love us some trivia.)

Jason’s revelation regarding his sexuality reminds me of the silly debate over gays in the military. There have always been gay men in the military – and there have always been gay men in sports. From the first moment men clashed in battle – whether in war or on the playing field – a percentage of those men have been gay. That’s only natural. Completely natural.

So, congratulations, Jason Collins!

I’m honored that Jason attended the same San Fernando Valley grade school that my daughters attended. Sierra Canyon School should be prouder than ever of Jason.

His college and NBA basketball achievements have been laudable.

His honesty and courage today make him an American hero for the ages.

Reblogged from Getting Free:

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Once again, if you take anything with you from this blog, it should be this: When traveling in a place you've never been before, ALWAYS. HANG. WITH. LOCALS. Seeing a city with alongside a person who understands it and has lived in it opens the city for you in a way it never would if you'd stayed behind the plexiglass barrier that is being only a tourist.

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Reblogged from Getting Free:

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Because we were in Brazil for the express purpose of reporting, that is what we did. Without giving ourselves more than a moment to adjust, we grabbed our cameras and tripod and met up with our translator, Thiago.

Thiago is awesome. It is because of him Roshan and my trip was one of the best weeks of our lives. It is because of him I now understand more than ever that being in a new place with a local is a 

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One of the glories of life in Southern California is the ability to quickly escape to the wilderness – whether it’s the ocean, the desert, or the mountains.

From our home at the southwestern end of the San Fernando Valley, we can reach the beach in less than a half hour, the high desert in a little more than that. And in about fifteen minutes, my family and I can be exploring the Santa Monica Mountains at Malibu Creek State Park.

We’ve been coming to Malibu Creek since we moved to Woodland Hills twenty years ago. We go several times a year, and we’ve enjoyed it in all seasons. Each season has its own beauty — but of all the seasons, Malibu Creek shows itself best in the spring.

Located just south of the junction of Las Virgenes Road and Mulholland Highway, the place is a nearby paradise. After you paid the $12 vehicle fee and parked the car — within minutes you can hike to vistas where it’s impossible to tell whether you’re anywhere near civilization. You can almost imagine what the Chumash saw when they settled among these live oaks and sycamores 5,000 to 10,000 years ago.

When we first brought our daughters to Malibu Creek State Park, the length of our family hikes were largely determined by our little girls’ enthusiasm for the expedition. We had to carry them along the trail sometimes, but eventually they became just as excited as their parents about spending some quality time at Malibu Creek.

The chaparral-covered mountains that dominate the park are green in the spring and golden by fall – and have been coveted by Hollywood for decades: 4,000 acres of beautiful scenery within an hour of downtown Los Angeles.

They’ve been shooting movies at Malibu Creek since the silent film era — and in 1946, 20th Century Fox bought 2,000 acres of what’s now the park to shoot movies like How Green Was My Valley, Love Me Tender, Viva Zapata, and Planet of the Apes.

But the production for which the park is most famous was shot for the small screen. And that is why, the Barrosse family sets off along the trail to the M*A*S*H site: where from 1972 to 1983, the Santa Monica Mountains stood in for Korea on the classic sitcom, starring Alan Alda. When the girls were young, a couple of rusting Army vehicles were all that indicated you’d reached your destination.

Father Mulcahy at the reunion.

But once you arrived at the M*A*S*H site, if of a certain age, you could easily recognize the jagged hills through which the helicopters passed and the plateau where they landed. You could even see the path that Captain Hawkeye Pierce climbed to meet the incoming wounded.

Since former cast and crew celebrated the 25^th anniversary of the series’ last episode in 2008, the M*A*S*H site has gotten a facelift.

There are now signs that explain various features of the site, markers that lay out where the tents and buildings stood – and a freshly painted vintage ambulance offered up to the ravages of nature.

Along the trail to and from the M*A*S*H site, my wife Victoria, daughter Eva and I were delighted to see the wildflowers starting to bloom. And we kept our eyes and ears alert for wildlife.

These geese weren’t that hard to track down. In fact, they just swam right up to Eva as though they were expecting her.

Can you see the well-camouflaged critter in the photo below?

And do you know what this nasty-looking insect is?

It’s a Jerusalem cricket. They’re not really crickets, and they’re not from the Holy Land, but you might find one at Malibu Creek State Park.

Yuck.

Quick. Let’s have another pretty picture.

And another.  Love those wildflowers. (That reminds me: I’ve got make sure to get out to Lancaster to see the poppies this spring.)

Malibu Creek State Park is a large slice of heaven waiting just next door. I’m already looking forward to my next visit.

All photos by Eva and Victoria.

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In November 2013, my roommate Roshan, who is originally from Florida, suggested that for New Year's, all of our college friends meet at her place in Ft. Lauderdale/Miami Beach to bring in 2013 together. This is Roshan:

Because I'd already had plans to fly from LA to Cleveland to celebrate my grandma's 80th birthday, to make both trips, I just exchanged my ticket from LA to Cleveland for 2 cheaper tickets: One from LA to Ft.

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Well, on a night like tonight – March 20, 2013 – it’s easy to see why I’m captivated by the drama playing out on the NBA hardwood.

By the time my Western Conference team, The Clippers, walked off the court after trouncing the Philadelphia 76ers at Staples Center in downtown L.A. by 29 points, 101-72 – my Eastern Conference team had already come back from a ridiculous, impossible-to-overcome deficit to earn its 24^th consecutive victory.

LeBron James and The Heat were playing The King’s former team, The Cleveland Cavaliers (my hometown franchise). LeBron & Company were behind by 27 points with about 7 minutes left in the third quarter – and still managed to pull out the victory to extend the second-longest winning streak in NBA history, surpassing the 2007-08 Houston Rockets.

With a roaring, rabid, sellout Cleveland crowd of 20,562 taunting their former hometown hero at the foul line — with the game on the line — a cold-blooded LeBron, the reigning NBA MVP, drained two free throws to win the game 98-95.

The moment was ridiculously dramatic. The irony was exquisite. That LeBron should cap such a furious, historic comeback cooly at the foul line was one thing — but that he should do it against the team that he left so infamously a few years ago was the final scene of an almost preposterously perfect script, played by the greatest actor currently performing on an NBA court.

Even though I’m a proud Clevelander, I gotta give props where they’re due.

Now, LeBron and The Heat are within nine games of matching The Los Angeles Lakers’ record of 33 consecutive wins during the 1971-72 season – a mark of excellence once thought to be untouchable.

“This was one of the most bizarre, unique days of my life with everything that happened,” said James, referring to the fact that a fan ran onto the floor, wearing a t-shirt encouraging him to re-sign with Cleveland next year. “It also was one of the best comebacks I’ve ever been a part of. The streak wasn’t on my mind, but us getting blown out was.”

LeBron, of course, scored a triple-double — with 25 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists.

Miami’s 27-point comeback was the largest collapse in the Cavaliers’ 43-season history. Miami, down 23 points at intermission, set a franchise record for its largest halftime comeback.

How special was Miami’s comeback?

ESPN just informed me that in the long history of the NBA — in games where a team was behind by 23 points or more at halftime — the team that was losing lost the game more than 2,000 times.

And only a dozen of them hung on to win the game.

What a wild, historic night.

Can’t wait for the playoffs!

Though I’m paying close attention to the Papal Conclave, the Sequester melodrama, Rand Paul’s drone strike filibuster, the Chuck Hagel affair, Paul Ryan’s continuing budgetary impudence — and everything else that Lawrence O’Donnell is covering on MSNBC — the fact is, I don’t have much disposable time.

Between my day-to-day work in television, writing The New Vic & Paul Show with my hilarious wife, the imminent graduations of my two younger daughters (Eva from Louisville High School in May and Emilia from Northwestern University in June) — and trying to develop some new TV shows to pay for it all, I have scant time for recreation and vicarious emotional release.

That’s where the Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Clippers fill the bill.

Let’s be clear. I am not a front-runner. Never have been.

As a Cleveland native and Cavaliers fan since the days of Austin Carr in the Cleveland Arena during my grade school years, I was nonetheless completely supportive of LeBron James’ move to join Dwayne Wade and Chris Bosh with the Miami Heat.

After seven years of servitude under an owner who surrounded The King with nothing better than Mo Williams and Antawn Jamison, LeBron had a right to pursue a championship in Miami.

So, in the East, I am rooting for LeBron James and The Heat.

In the West, my preferences are just as personal and idiosyncratic.

After spending my post-Northwestern University, early adulthood in Chicago in the 1980’s, I was a Michael Jordan and Bulls fan who had just moved to Los Angeles in 1991 — when Air Jordan and the Bulls defeated The “Showtime” Lakers for the first of six NBA titles. If I had any money at all that June, I could have made a mint betting against all the overconfident Lakers fans I watched those NBA finals with.

Despite living in Los Angeles, I was never really a Lakers fan. I loved former Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson – and I hated Bulls owner Reinsdorf and his General Manager, Jerry “players don’t win championships, organizations do” Krause. But while I celebrated The Zen Master’s success with The Lakers, I could never embrace Kobe Bryant, despite his incandescent talent.

So, like Billy Crystal, I turned my attention to the underdog Los Angeles Clippers. I enjoyed the rise of The Clippers during the Elton Brand/Chris Kaman era – but, in the past two years, my devotion to The Clippers has been repaid with interest.

This year, The Clippers have been the greatest show in the NBA. “Lob City” has been a nonstop showcase of team play, dazzling, high-flying dunks, aggressive, larcenous defense – and the deepest bench in the NBA. Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, Chauncey Billups, Caron Butler, DeAndre Jordan – and super subs Jamal Crawford, Matt Barnes and Eric Bledsoe have raised expectations for what The Clippers can do in the NBA playoffs.

So, whoever gets elected Pope – and whatever those a*#holes in the GOP do to President Barack Obama’s agenda – I’ll be rooting for a Miami Heat versus Los Angeles Clippers NBA Final.

After that, I’ll get back to what really matters.

But, boy oh boy – would I love to see LeBron James go one-on-one with Paul Ryan…

On Saturday, February 28, 1863, 150 years ago today, a now-forgotten Civil War engagement pointed the way toward the future of naval warfare.

On this day, Federal Naval Commander, Captain John L. Worden (former captain of the original Union ironclad USS Monitor) was at the helm of the Union ironclad warship USS Montauk on the Ogeechee River south of Savannah, Georgia — when he saw the CSS Nashville, sold as a privateer and now named Rattlesnake, run aground, lying under the guns of Fort McAllister.

With the U.S. Navy gunboats Wissahickon, Seneca and Dawn providing supporting fire, Captain Worden trained The Montauk’s batteries upon the enemy ship and started firing.

Minutes later, the Montauk’s cannonade hit the CSS Nashville, struck her gunpowder magazine — and the Confederate ship exploded with “terrific violence.”

Alas, after his brief, triumphant engagement with the Confederate privateer, Commander Worden’s own ship hit a submerged mine, and he had to beach the USS Montauk on a mud bar to make repairs.

The Confederacy could hardly afford the loss of the Nashville. The CSA commissioned shipbuilders to build 50 warships — and 22 were built and sent into battle, including CSS Virginia, CSS Arkansas, CSS Tennessee, and CSS Nashville.

The fate of the Nashville on this day in 1863 is not very well known – but what happened one year earlier to the CSS Virginia — the first steam-powered ironclad warship in the Confederate States Navy – became an epochal moment in naval warfare.

Built as a Confederate ironclad from the hull and steam engines of the scuttled Union warship, USS Merrimack — the CSS Virginia was sunk by the Union ironclad USS Monitor in the Battle of Hampton Roads on March 9, 1862: the first battle between ironclad, armored warships.

150 years ago today – on the banks of Georgia’s Ogeechee River — the American Civil war adds another explosive, revolutionary chapter to the history of modern warfare.

Five months from now, in July, we’ll note the 150^th anniversary of The Battle of Gettysburg.

And there won’t be a boat, ironclad or otherwise, anywhere near the battlefield.