There are worse things to be than being a ghost in Oklahoma.

I just discovered, quite by accident, a little town in Wagoner County, Oklahoma, called Okay. Okay, OK, has 597 people and a population density of 737.3 people per square mile. By my calculation, that makes 597 humans and 140.3 ghosts in this posited square mile.

Let’s begin by stating the Obvious.

A banker’s first and best duty is, of course, to extract all the money from your pocket, mattress, closet, or left shoe and lock it up securely in its vaults.

Never mind all of the advertising you have seen to the contrary telling us about FREE CASH, NO INTEREST, SWISS FRANCS, and Gosh-my-bank-wants-to-buy-me-a-new-house! In the end, your dinars must wind up on the other side of the teller’s counter, ostensibly waiting for you to collect them later, otherwise we would have a lot fewer bankers clogging the arteries of Belgrade with Mercedes, BMWs, and Jaguars.

(If I were a banker, I think I would be the guy in the Astin Martin.)

Announcer: We are now arriving at Paris Gare de Lyon. Please make sure you have forgotten NOTHING on the train....
Passenger: Wait!

Why do I bother to fight?

I feel the need, the urge, to say something, but I know full well that my words will drift in the breeze like so much background noise - not even remotely disturbing to the people who should hear them, people who should be deeply disturbed by them.

The saddest part about trying to explain the deplorable, stressful, and completely unacceptable experience

One phone call was all that was needed to introduce violence into our home.

We needed movers. We called a few. We agreed a deal with one. He came, he forgot the deal, and he began threatening to "beat" us when we insisted. He said that he had beaten his mother that very morning. He held the thing we had to move hostage. He added, just for information, that he was a "woman-hater."

LONDON, ROME, BELGRADE.  World Cup football (may God have mercy on our souls) has a self-contradictory role. On the one hand, here we have supreme nationalism wherein the world lines up in a sanctioned and authorized collective and protracted riot of Us against Them.

On the other Reusch-gloved hand, however, nothing unites us with our seemingly disinterested neighbors, distracted fellow Underground riders, and dyspeptic shopkeepers than being au fait on the latest World Cup babble.

When it gets really HOT, we turn on the fans and air-conditioners and complain about the heat, and then we book holidays at places on the seaside where it is even hotter. What we do not do, as I have just begun to appreciate, is to stay in Belgrade.

There is a mixed blessing about staying behind in the White City during August. The streets are empty if you wish to drive your car, but often there is no one waiting for you at your destination. There are fewer people in lines in the supermarket, but much of what you need to buy will not be stocked until September.

Too late.

I got a message on Viber 27 seconds ago. When do I respond? Immediately? What is the etiquette? Is there any etiquette?

People who have an active and useful memory of the 20th Century (like me for example) used to send letters to each other, a process by which weeks and months could pass in between missives. When we got email and could send a letter instantly without relying on the post office, we started to think about "response times". One company I worked for mandated a maximum 48-hour response time for emails. This was soon sliced in two and 24 hours became the etiquette. After that, you were being lazy. Or rude. Or both.

"And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be taxed." (Luke 2:1)

This is generally regarded as the beginning of the Christmas story in Western Christianity. Caesar Augustus, needing to revamp the Roman budget to maintain his supply of bread and circuses, sent out this emergency decree. I think he used Facebook, but this is an unconfirmed rumor.