Dateline: IcelandAir flight from Keflavik Airport to Boston Logan, 24 February 2005

It really is something when you fly west for long stretches, because it just ends up being a day that never seems to end. If youíre in good shape, and especially if youíre in business with a nice Mac, you can get a lot of work done, assuming the movie doesnít capture your attention too much (easy for me this time around, because IcelandAir doesnít have good movies and worse, it doesnít rotate them very quickly).

And Iím feeling good despite all the late-night drinking from yesterday. Fear Iíve come down with a bit of a cold, but it seems mild. Being able to hydrate and keep my legs stretched (row 1 the whole way back) has been great, and Iím always careful to wear my special flight support stockings that Vonne had made for us for our trip to China, and that helps a lot (no swelling from the long flight and a much reduced chance of deep-vein thrombosis).

I will definitely skip the wine on the last leg here.

Man, in reading the Financial Times, I have to say that it obsesses over China and India even more than the WSJ does, which I did not think possible, and yet there it is.

Mac question of the day: How do I delete text to the right of my cursor on a Mac? The ìdeleteî key only eats to the left. Is there no way to eat to the right?

Here's today's catch:

■ America is not in charge of how the rest of the Old Core integrates with China

■ Europe on Iran, China on North Korea, US on the sidelines

■ India and China: there is no point in choosing

■ Feeling for the Gap, wanting a better system for Core action

■ Americaís 51st stateóshhhhhhh!

■ Our shell-game ìWar on Drugsî in the Gap

■ Muslims finding their cinematic voice in Europe