“What do you think of this ad from Air New Zealand?”

The question, and a YouTube link, came from my friend Bebhinn Kelly, Chief Fashionista at www.hellwafashion.com, and a regular supplier of juicy, thought-provoking and sometimes controversial material for AWR.

I clicked. I watched. I pondered. I considered blogging. I demurred.

That was earlier this week. This morning, I got my daily

The Burj Khalifa (formerly known as The Burj Dubai), the world's tallest building, officially opened today, January 4, 2010.

For the past 12 months, I've lived in its shadow, about a kilometer away from where it towers. Each time I left my not-so-temporary home-away-from-home in Jumeirah 2, one of Dubai's more established areas, I cast my eyes on "The Burj," in all its dubious

"But Susan," Fatma chided, "I couldn't find anything about YOU on your website."

I couldn't help but laugh at Fatma's reproach. Because almost everything on AWR is about me in some way.  

I choose, write and/or edit all the content (more than 1,000 individual articles to date!). Most of it is, in one way or another, a reflection of me, my views, my quirky sense of humour, my feelings, my

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My friends Elaine and Gray kindly agreed to host me at their place for two weeks while my villa mate Tricia welcomes family and friends at “ours” (it’s her villa really, I just have a room there, but that’s another story).

Elaine, Gray, and Elaine’s son Phil are in Oman for the Eid holiday, so I’m in charge of their two dogs Poppy and Gypsy. They’re good dogs. Most of the time.

Today, as

As you can see from the photo, I don't need an excuse to go pink, but in case you do, here are 10 reasons to wear pink every day (nine of the them are kinda' goofy, and the last is a very good one):

1) So you won’t be mistaken for a Ninja turtle

Everyone knows that Ninja turtles dress almost exclusively in green and brown except for their individually coloured eye masks, none of which is

Being a vagabond and a nomad, (a cowgirl on the road as it were), has its up and downs.

On the one hand, travel is all about adventure, experiencing new stuff, and often being outside of your comfort zone – love those bits. Living out of a suitcase, on the other, can quickly become quite tedious – hate that part.

After being "on the road," for almost two months now (in UK, Croatia and

There’s nothing special about Louise Adamson (pictured at right) and Pascale de Jong.

Except for the fact that they seem to constantly come up with new ways to 1) challenge themselves 2) create a sense of community, and 3) contribute to charity – usually all at the same time.

In 2007, they were one of only 16 two-women teams who took part in the grueling eight-day, 800-km Absa Cape Epic

Reports today say the completion of the Burj Dubai, the world's tallest building, will be delayed by about three months. It's now slated to open in December 2009 instead of September as planned.

The EXACT final height of the building is apparently still under dispute; some say 818 metres, others say more. One thing for sure the Burj will be in interesting company as I explored in a

A fellow Canadian reminded me this morning that today, July 1, is Canada Day.

Living here in Dubai, where it’s 45 Celsius and God-knows-how-humid at the moment, I guess I could be forgiven for forgetting my country’s 142nd birthday.

Truth be told, I often don’t keep track of what day of the week it is, let alone what DATE. I probably should have remembered yesterday as I blogged about