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The Chief appears to have taken a personal day, to which he is certainly entitled. He fought for his country while the rest of us (i.e. me) were back in the States drinking large amounts of Jameson. I'm sure he's fine, and I'm also sure his version of this story from the Subcontinent would be much funnier:

India have scrapped a training camp for this month's Thomas and Uber Cup qualifiers because of a lack of shuttlecocks, badminton officials said on Thursday. The federation sent home over 30 players due to start training on Thursday, blaming the state-run Sports Authority of India (SAI) for not supplying the stock or allowing them to import . . . "It is a very lackadaisical attitude," Badminton Association of India (BAI) president V.K.Verma told Reuters on Thursday. "They're supposed to provide shuttles, but are doing the game a great disfavor. "We can't have our 30 best shuttlers, juniors and seniors, twiddling their thumbs with only five tournaments left to qualify for the Olympics." 

Perhaps if they referred to them as 'cocks' instead of 'shuttles', they wouldn't be in this predicament. But I wouldn't help them and travel to India no matter what kind of cock shortage they're having there. You know it's the only country that still has the Plague. I mean the Plague, please! -KD