Blogging the JP Morgan Chase Open: Serena!

Serena, showing her best assets	Serena prepares to hit ball right at me!

Thursday night I attended the now-controversial Serena Williams-Daniela Hantuchova match at the JP Morgan Chase Open at the Home Depot Center on the campus of Cal State Dominguez Hills in Carson, CA and took some of the pictures above with my new Panasonic Lumix DMC-TZ1 10x zoom digital camera. I'm still getting used to using it to take pictures. Thankfully, I had some of the best seats in the house: Second Row, Section 2 -- about 16 feet behind the baseline. It was a very exciting match. Serena initially started well, Hantuchova started with a double fault and was down 0-40 in her first service game. But three unforced errors and harder serving by Hantuchova got her to the crucial hold of the first game. Serena looked like she was doing fine in her first service game, although her service percentage did seem low. She ended up losing that game, thanks to the first of what turned out to be four net cords favorable to Hantuchova in the match. It was all downhill from there, and it got scary when at 0-5, 15-0 Serena stumbled and fell to the court stretching to return a ball which had skipped off the edge of the sideline. The chair umpire was ut of her seat and over to Serena by the time she got up. She got up quickly afterwards but it was clear that she was testing her left foot and not running for shots. It may have actually helped her to focus on putting a bit more on her serve because she won her first service game with an ace and two service winners. Hantuchova who was serving well, with a high percentage in, easily served out the set 6-1.

Serena called for the trainer and got her ankle taped during the set changeover. She then opened up the second set by getting her serve broken. However, she broke back immediately to level the second set 1-1. Serena quickly jumped to a 4-1 lead and held on to even the match by winning the second set 6-3.

The third set was pretty even, though Hantuchova's first serve percentage plummeted and Sereena's second serve was rock solid. She was able to get a crucial break of serve in the seventh game, leading to a 4-3 advantage. Then, despite whiffing two easy game points in her service game and facing a break point (which she served a service winner on) Serena was able to hold serve to maintain her one-break advantage at 5-3 at which point Hantuchova's serve really got shaky and Serena won the match on her second match point. Final score: 1-6, 6-3 6-3.

It was very exciting being that close to the action at a women's professional tournament match. We were close enough so that we were having direct interaction with Serena, which is why she hit the ball right at us (unfortunately neither of us caught it). The Home Depot Center is a fabulous venue for tennis, there really are no BAD seats in the arena, but definitely some seats are better than others.

UPDATE: Since I started writing this post, Serena played her quarterfinal match against Meghan Shaunessey, which was another 3-set thriller, this time, almost 2 hours, 40 minutes long (the Hantuchova match was a mere 108 minutes long) in the blazing Southern California heat, eventually winning 6-7(4), 6-1, 6-4. Serena played extremely well, ending up with 15 more winners than errors(!) and 12 aces to 1 double fault! Shaunessey played well also, though struggled mightily with her second serve, double faulting on both set points that she lost, the last of which was also match point. Serena plays Jelena Jankovic tomorrow and is now considering playing one more tournament (either Montreal or Pilot Pen) before the US Open starts on the 27th of the month (with me attendance during the first weekend!)

Introducing... LEENAH!

I have withstood the temptation long enough. But, now, I, too must succumb and post pictures of my pet on my blog! So, here it goes. Introducing, Leenah:

She was named after singer Lena Horne, actress Lena Olin and tennis player Li Na.

REVIEW: Ciudad

tortilla soup	empanadas

For the sixth anniversary of my Vermont civil union on 08/08/00 I took my civilly united spouse out to dinner at Ciudad (445 S. Figueroa Blvd). We had eaten lunch at the Border Grill in Santa Monica a few weeks ago and enjoyed it a lot. Ciudad is the "high end" restaurant of Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger. We almost cancelled our reservation after seeing the bad reviews at City Search. However, we wanted to try something new, and there were lots of positive reviews also. We consulted the menu on the restaurant's website to make preliminary selections but the menu we were presented with was different. "Oh, our menu changes weekly," our server informed us brightly. Ohhh-kayyyy, but why does the website claim "Dinner entrees [cost between] $16 - $29" when the cheapest entree was $23 on our menu and almost all were either $27 or $28?

We ordered the tortilla soup (with manchego cheese and guacamole, $7) and Argentine empanadas (wild mushroom with warm chipotle sauce and swiss chard with tomatillo sauce, $8.50). The soup was incredibly smooth, delightfully piquant with an exciting blend of flavours (the cheese, guacamole and broth with succulent chicken chunks). The two medium-sized empanadas were interestingly presented, with one side of the plate filled with a yellow cheese-based sauce and the other side was a bright green tomatillo sauce. I ordered the pomegranate lemonade ($3.50) and was glad I did. It was refreshing with just enough pomegranate to deliver a soothing reddish tinge to the beverage along with the much needed anti-oxidants, but without overwhelming the basic sweet-n-sour lemonade flavor.

After about a twenty minute gap our entrees arrived. I had the boneless baby-back ribs (slow roasted in chile, spices, and glazed with mistela, a homemade honey liqueur served with Mexican dipped corn cob and mashed yams, $27) and the better half had the argentine gaucho steak (caramelized jalapeño and roasted garlic stuffed beef rib eyeserved with an herb and garlic chimichurri sauce, bacon mashed potatoes, and a warm black bean, corn, and spinach salad, $28). The parenthetical description of the entrees are from the website but, again, the actual food on the plate that arrived was somewhat different. The food was good, but I think the gaucho steak was better than the baby back ribs. The portions were not huge, but were definitely filling.

At this point we didn't feel like dessert but we did order two scoops of ice cream (dulce de leche and yerba mate flavors). I thought the yerba mate was disgusting but he liked it, the dulce de leche was fantastic--not overly sweet and incredibly smooth and creamy. And even though we only paid for two scoops ($5) they gave us an extra scoop (of dulce de leche) for free.

Overall, it was an enjoyable dining experience and some of the food (the tortilla soup, the hummus with the spicy papadoms, the gaucho steak) was excellent. However, for it's price category, Ciudad is not really exceptional, although it's definitely worth going. Once.

GRADE: B+

Senaator Kuehl Amends LGBT Curriculum Bill To Appease Governor

As Rod pointed out yesterday, openly lesbian State Senator Sheila Kuehl has amended SB 1437, her bill to outlaw discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation in public education curricula, to appease The Governator's expressed desire to veto the legislation. The version of the bill as introduced would have mandated the teaching of the historical contributions of openly LGBT individuals such as poet Langston Hughes, athlete Billie Jean King and congressman Barney Frank, among others.

The California Assembly passed the amended version 56-2 on Monday.

The Dog Who Moos.

Meet Norman, isn't he cute? Norman is a dog who moos. He can't help it, he was just "born different." He is the central image and meme for the $900, 000 "Born Different" public education campaign in the state of Colorado financed by the Gill Foundation and developed by the multiple Emmy-award winning Public Interest Productions.

I think it's brilliant. Take the quiz yourself now.

Indian Prince Discusses Disowning Openly Gay Son

Argh! Blogger ate my first post on this topic! I'm going to look into Moveable Type or some other more stable blogging platform. I don't understand if Google owns Blogger and Gmail why Gmail can have very timely auto-saving while Blogger repeatedly eats draft blog posts. Come on, Blogger, don't be evil!

I missed the original reports of this story in June while I was in Cuba doing research. Apparently, Prince Manvendra Singh Gohil of Rajpipla (in the state of Gujarat) was disowned by his father Raghubir Singh Gohil after becoming the chief patron of Lakshya Trust, the largest HIV/AIDS organization in the region, as well as one of the most well-known faces of homosexuality in India. The family is widely ackowledged as one of the richest and most powerful royal families in India.

Now, the father is speaking out. In an interview with the Times of India, Prince Raghubir says:

I was in an awkward situation and didn't know how do deal with it. Relatives from all over the country called me up. Rajpipla is a conservative place. Women still cover their heads with a pallu; sex is a taboo topic. I was in the line of fire.

[...]

But it was all the more difficult considering we come from a royal family. I understand some people are different, I accept it. I had never interfered in his life, but we are still a conservative society.

Hopefully the Prince had independent sources of income separate from his wealthy and influential royal family. One has to admire his courage at coming out and being an activist knowing that his family could disown him.

I Ain't Shy. Vote For Me!

The Black Weblog Award nominations are open until August 15. I'm not telling y'all what to do, but I do think that the categories of Best Personal Blog, Best LGBT Blog, Best Writing in a Blog and perhaps Blog to Watch might be where the URL http://buckmire.blogspot.com (or http://madprofessah.com ) might fit!

Go Vote!

PRODUCT: Panasonic KX-TG5439 5.8Ghz Phones

Following in the footsteps of Kevin Drum endorsing fabulous products, I want to blog about my home phones, the Panasonic KX-TG5439 5.8GHz. If you are one of the diminshing few who actually have a home phone line, these phones are incredibly useful. There are all sorts of really cool phones and "phone systens" made by Panasonic, actually. However some of those are full of features you may not need and can get sorta pricey, i.e. over $200.

However, the model pictured to the left is pretty cheap ($89.99 at overstock.com) and has lots of useful (and often used) features. Both handsets have extremely clear and loud speakerphone abilities, plus they come with caller-id, directories of calls made and a very cool intercom mode. This is the feature that I use the most; you can basically use the phones as walkie-talkies to talk to "the other person in the house" instead of having to walk all the way to find your spouse in order to ask them something, you can just talk to them via the intercom. There are actually a bunch of other features the phones have that I haven't used (there is some voice enhancement feature that I don't even know what it does). I suppose these phones won't be as useful to people in small apartments or if you don't have a home phone line, but otherwise I think these gadgets are indispensable.

Interesting Poll Results on the Kulturkampf

There's an interesting Reuters article about the overhyped nature of the cultural divide in this country on social issues as reflected in the latest Pew poll results. For example, majorities oppose gay marriage, amending the United States constitution to ban it and approve of civil unions: As usual, Pam over at The Blend has the jump on analyzing these interesting results first. The numbers have implications for what the strategy of LGBT activists should be moving forward on gay marriage. Some people have argued recently that too much energy, effort and resources are being spent on achieving marriage equality. MadProfessah disagrees with this position. There's no reason why the LGBT community can not be arguing both for marriage and for increased AIDS funding and for adoption/foster care rights and for non-discrimination policies, et cetera. It's a false choice to say that we can only fight for marriage equality instead of these other also much needed policies.

Three Hollywood Democrats Defect To Schwarzenegger

The Los Angeles Times has a disturbing article on the front page detailing the surprising endorsement of Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger by major Democratic donors Steven Spielberg, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Haim Saban. The report emphasizes that the reason why the trio is supporting the Republican incumbent over his Democratic challenger Phil Angelides is primarily "a matter of friendship" rather than partisanship.

This is a pretty shocking turn of events. Three prominent members of the Jewish community (some would say the most prominent) in the state's largest County are declining to support a Jewish candidate for Governor of California! And the announcement was made on the Sabbath, no less.

The Times article recounts the bona fides of Spielberg, Katzenberg and Saban as 6-figure donors to traditionally Democratic causes. Amusingly, the paper also tries to confirm Hollywood's Democratic/liberal reputation by providing a list (helpfully supplied by the Angelides campaign) of bold-faced names who are supporting the Angelides ticket: Will Ferrell, Ed Begley, Jr., Larry David,Matt Dillon, Dana Delany and Olympia Dukakis. Which group would YOU rather have on your side?

Why I Love New York

Frank León Roberts' blog at http://brooklynboyblues.blogspot.com/ is a very interesting mix of gossip, commentary and analysis of "ball" culture and other urban black gay expression and representation. But what really caught my eye was his photography. Namely, this photograph:

Don't You Want To Touch His Snake?

Definitely looking forward to being in The City (Sorry, Frisco!) again in September 2-7 for the U.S. Open!

Official Statement from Fidel Castro on His Health

Here's the (clearly translated-into-English) statement by Fidel Castro which I couldn't find anywhere online yesterday:

MESSAGE SENT BY THE COMMANDER IN CHIEF TO THE PEOPLE OF CUBA AND FRIENDS FROM ALL OVER THE WORLD.

I can not make up good news, because that would be unethical; and if there were bad news, these will only be of benefit to the enemy. Given the specific situation facing Cuba and the plans designed by the empire, the information about my health condition becomes a state secret that can not be continuously disseminated; and my compatriots should understand that. I can not let myself be trapped by the vicious circle of the health parameters that are constantly changing during the day.

I can say that my condition is stable, but only with time could I speak about the true evolution of my health status.

The best I could say is that my condition will remain stable for many days to come before I could give a verdict.

I very much appreciate all the messages sent by our compatriots and by many people in the world.

I feel sorry for having caused so much concern and bother to our friends in the world.

I feel in a very good spirit.

The important thing is that everything in our country is going on and will continue to go on very smoothly.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces and the people are ready to defend the country.

Our compatriots will have a complete information in due time, as was the case when I fell down in Villa Clara.

We must struggle and work.



August 1st, 2006, 5:30 p.m.

The View Outside My Bedroom Window

Friday Spider Blogging! This little beauty was outside my bedroom window. It's about 2 inches long. My partner says it is called a "garden spider." He is correct! It's called Argiope aurantia.

Black Tennis Report UPDATE: Blake Signs Evian Endorsement Deal

Top(?) American player James Blake has signed a multi-million dollar non-tennis endorsement deal with Evian water. (hat tip to London Calling Luv for the great pic!)

As I mentioned earlier in the July Black Tennis Report, James became the world's fifth-ranked player on Sunday by defeating former US and World #1 Andy Roddick in a very thrilling final at the RCA Championships in Indianapolis, IN. This was Blake's sixth career title, but his fourth in the last eleven months! Go James!

U.S. OPEN Site To Be Named In Honor of Lesbian Phenom

The New York Times reported today that the United States Tennis Association has decided to rename the USTA National Tennis Center, the site of the U.S. Open, in Flushing Meadows, NY after open lesbian Billie Jean King. (What, you were expecting the Martina Navratilova National Tennis Center? Pshaw!) According to the Times, the USTA is foregoing almost 5 million dollars in annual revenue from corporate naming rights by bestowing the honor upon the most important American female athlete of all-time. According to the USTA, the soon-to-be-named "USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center" is the world's largest public tennis complex with 45 courts being used by 65,000 people annually on 46.5 acres. The USTA National Tennis Center contains the world's largest tennis stadium, Arthur Ashe Stadium (inaugurated 1997). The naming ceremony will coincide with the opening night of the U.S. Open on August 28th.

Billie Jean King is generally regarded as the founding force of the modern international women's tennis tour. She is also an International Tennis Hall of Fame champion, with 12 Grand Slam titles (1966-68, 1972-73, 1975 Wimbledon, 1967, 1971-72 and 1974 U.S. Open, 1972 French, 1968 Australian Open) and 67 singles titles and 101 doubles titles.

Prince Getting Divorced. Again. Let's Remember The Music

One of my favorite singers, Prince, is getting divorced. Again. Amusingly, to some people news of this divorce is the first official confirmation that The Purple One was actually married to Manuela Testolini. It was common knowlwedge that he had divorced his first wife Mayte Garcia shortly after the couple's baby son died from Pfieffer's syndrome, a rare skull disease, in 1998. Prince later had that marriage annulled.

I actually hadn't thought about Prince much recently so news of the divorce made me fondly remember the "good old days" when I used to be a Prince freak and run to the music store the very day a new Prince album dropped. I even wangled a way to get a bootleg version of "The Black Album" when Warner Records balked at releasing a record where the lead singer uniformly has his voice digitally altered to sound like he's singing in a helium atmosphere.

So, what I did was think about my Top 10 Prince songs. What are yours? (Here's a link to a helpful Prince discography.)

1. "Adore" from Sign O' The Times
2. "Kiss" and "Venus de Milo" from Parade: Music from the motion picture"Under The Cherry Moon"
3. "When Doves Cry" and "Purple Rain" from Purple Rain
4. "Joy in Repetition" from Graffiti Bridge
5. "Condition of the Heart" from Around the World in a Day
6. "Little Red Corvette" from 1999
7. "Gett Off" from Diamonds and Pearls
8. "A Love Bizarre" from Sheila E.'s Romance 1600
9. "Do Me Baby" from Controversy
10. "When 2 R In Love" from The Black Album and Lovesexy

Phew! I had first started this as a Top 5 Favorite Prince singles and couldn't stop at 5. It takes discipline to restrict oneself to ten. (You may notice I technically have 12--but hey! "Venus de Milo" is a swooningly beautiful instrumental which was my outgoing phone message for years in the early 1990s so it doesn't really count. Almost every track on the Purple Rain soundtrack is a classic, but clearly "When Doves Cry," "Let's Go Crazy" and "Purple Rain" are first among equals.) It should be noted that I stopped buying Prince albums after 1992's Love Symbol so his earlier work may be oversampled in my Top 10 list. I have also generally tried to restrict myself to one track per album.

There's still at least ten other Prince tracks which I love which are not on this list: "Let's Go Crazy," "7," "D.M.S.R.," "Starfish and Coffee," "Batdance," "Anotherloverholenyohead," "The Beautiful Ones," "Pop Life," "Cream," "I Wanna Be Your Lover" and "If I Was Your Girlfriend."

Hmm, perhaps coming soon: favourite Prince covers? Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U" would be my #1 fave for sure. For now, I'd love to hear what others have as their favorite Prince songs.

Fidel Castro Delegates Control To Brother Raul in Cuba

Hmmm! One of the main stories of the last twenty-four hours has been the news that for the first time since January 1, 1959 Fidel Castro Ruz is no longer in charge of Cuba. His brother Raúl is. Here is the English-language version provided by Radio Havana (and reproduced by the BBC) of the text read to the Cuban people for the first time at 9:15 p.m., Monday, July 31, 2006 and repeatedly after that.

Proclamation of the Commander in Chief to the People of Cuba

Due to the enormous efforts made to visit the Argentinean city of
Cordoba, participate in the MERCOSUR meeting, in the closing of the
People's Summit at the historic University of Cordoba and the visit to
Altagracia, the city where Che lived during his childhood, and together
with that my participation in the commemoration of the 53rd anniversary
of the assault on the Moncada and Carlos Manuel de Céspedes barracks on
July 26, 1953, in the provinces of Granma and Holguin, days and nights
of continuous work with practically no sleep, my health, which has
resisted all tests, was subjected to extreme stress and broke down.

This provoked a severe intestinal crisis with sustained bleeding which
obliged me to undergo complicated surgery. All the details of this
health accident are found in the x-rays, endoscopes and filmed
materials. The operation obliged me to rest for several weeks, away
from my responsibilities and tasks.

Since our country is threatened in such circumstances by the government
of the United States, I have made the following decisions:

1. I temporarily delegate my responsibilities as First Secretary of the
Central Committee of the Cuban Communist Party to Second Secretary
Compañero Raúl Castro Ruz.

2. I temporarily delegate my responsibilities as Commander in Chief of
the heroic Revolutionary Armed Forces to the aforementioned Compañero,
Army General Raúl Castro Ruz.

3. I temporarily delegate my responsibilities as President of the
Council of State and the Government of the Republic of Cuba, to the
First Vice President, Compañero Raúl Castro Ruz.

4. I temporarily delegate my functions as principal promoter of the
National and International Public Health Program to Political Bureau
Member and Public Health Minister, Compañero José Ramón Balaguer
Cabrera.

5. I temporarily delegate my responsibilities as the principal promoter
of the National and International Program of Education to Companero
José Ramón Machado Ventura and Esteban Lazo Hernández, members of the
Political Bureau.

6. I temporarily delegate my responsibilities as the main promoter of
the National Program of the Energy Revolution in Cuba and collaboration
with other countries in this area to Companero Carlos Lage Dávila,
Member of the Political Bureau and Secretary of the Executive Committee
of the Council of Ministers.

The funds related to these three programs -- Health, Education and
Energy -- should continue being carried out and prioritized, as I have
personally been doing, by Companeros Carlos Lage Dávila, Secretary of
the Executive Committee of the Council of Ministers, and Felipe Perez
Roque, Minister of Foreign Relations, who have accompanied me in these
endeavors and should form a commission to continue the work.

Our glorious Communist Party, supported by the mass organizations and
all the people, has the mission of assuming the task set forward in
this Proclamation.

The Summit of the Movement of Non-Aligned Nations, which will take
place between September 11th and 16th, should receive the highest
attention of the State and the Cuban nation, and to celebrated with the
highest splendor on the dates scheduled.

The 80th anniversary of my birthday, for which thousands of
personalities have agreed to celebrate on August 13th, should be
postponed until the 2nd of December this year -- the 50th anniversary
of the Landing of the Granma.

I call on the Central Committee of the Party and the National Assembly
of People's Power to give their strongest support to this Proclamation.

I don't have the slightest doubt that our people and our Revolution
will struggle until the last drop of blood to defend these and other
ideas and measures that are necessary to safeguard our historic
process. Imperialism will never smash Cuba. The Battle of Ideas will
continue forward.

Long Live the Homeland!

Long Live the Revolution!

Long Live Socialism!

Ever Onward to Victory!


Fidel Castro Ruz
Commander in Chief

First Secretary of the Party and President of the Councils of State and
Ministers of the Republic of Cuba

July 31, 2006
6:22 p.m.

Having recently spent two weeks in Havana, Cuba I am following this story pretty closely. Twenty-four hours after news of the above first statement caused street parties in the Calle Ocho section of Miami, Fidel released a second statement (full text unavailable) saying that "[he is] in perfectly good spirits. The most I can say is that the situation will remain stable during many days before a verdict can be given."

As the New York Times says, the particular details of Fidel's health are being kept secret, but I don't find this unusual. Particularly since the world's only superpower is less than 90 miles away and has reiterated as recently as yesterday that they want to be involved in Cuba's "transition to democracy" (or as the Cubans would parse that statement "overthrow our givernment").

An Inconvenient Truth: Global Warming Is Real

Al Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth is a very effective, compellingly argued film which educates, entertains and ultimately, energizes the viewer.

I saw it at the stylish Fleur Cinema in Des Moines, Iowa during one of the most extreme heat waves of recent years. Despite self-serving statements to the contrary, there are lots more people all over the country who are now believers in global warming thanks to the recent extreme weather that they personally experienced in recent weeks.

In California, an estimated 139 people have died as a direct result of the heat wave in the state. This is a higher death toll than any other natural disaster to hit California in over a decade. All sorts of temperature records were reached during the two week period which ended Saturday the 29th of July. Exactly one week before, I played two sets of tennis in record 112 degree heat in Burbank between 2-4pm . It felt like a sauna! The sun was brutal and the humidity was surprisingly high.

Now another heat wave is going to be hitting the East Coast this week. New York City will feel like 115 degrees (temperatures over 96 degrees with humidity approaching 90%). Unfortunately, unless policymakers in Washington D.C. lose their air conditioning they will not be able to appreciate the full impact of the weather. Hopefully their constituents can impress upon them the necessity of reducing greenhouse gases.

Lance Bass is Gay. Film at 11.

So, finally, one of the members of the 90's boy-bands that ruled pop music (*NSYNC and their bitter, and better, rivals Backstreet Boys) has come out of the closet!No, it's not Justin "Sexy Back" Timberlake or Kevin "I'm Outta Here" Richardson. It's Lance Bass!

The reaction to the news has been one of bemusement (or downright bewilderment) in the gay community. First off, the boy has been dating Amazing Race Season 4 co-winner Reichen Lehmkuhl for quite a while. The surprise was not that Lance came out, but that he came out now, while *NSYNC is "on hiatus." Of course, People magazine immediately put him on the cover of the magazine. 'Nuff said!

Black Tennis Report for JULY

James Blake won the RCA Championships and cemented his status as the #1 ranked American male player by defeating former World #1 Andy Roddick 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(7-5). It was a very close match, with Roddick having over 5 break points in the final set, but was unable to win any of these crucial points, due to Blake's clutch serving and determination. Roddick also served quite well, approaching the speed and accuracy of his 2003 heyday, when he was the #1 player in the world.

American Shenay Perry scored a stunning upset over #5 seed Daniela Hantuchova at the Bank of the West Classic by defeating the Czech player 6-2, 0-6, 6-3. Unfortunately, Perry lost in a 3rd set tiebreaker the next round to American Jill Craybas 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 (2).

Serena Williams returned to the game in excellent form at the Tier III Western & Southern Financial Group Women’s Open in Cincinatti, losing to the eventual champion Vera Zvonareva in straight sets 6-2, 6-3. Serena and Venus then pulled out of the Tier 1 Acura Classic but are both still entered in their hometown's JP Morgan Chase Open, which MadProfessah will be attending next week in Compton, CA. In order to be eligible for US Open Series bonus prize money in New York, both Williams sisters need to play either the Rogers Cup in Montreal or Pilot Pen in New Haven, CT.

Jamea Jackson and Mashona Washington were members of the United States Federation Cup team that lost in Belgium to the home team anchored by Kim Clijsters.

Next month, a report on the US Open Series and a US Open preview!