Happy Father’s Day!   I already enjoyed a stellar card from Marisa – she always finds a card with the right sentiments and message --earlier this past week and mom’s on Friday.   Sometimes we barbecue; mostlyhere, albeit as detailed in this space last year I caught a break and our nephew hosted.   No BBQ this year.   Unfortunately an institution announced plans to close and Shelly suggested we get there with her dad.   It’s my fave deli.   Heck when a friend and former cli...

In the good weather I like to set up my office outside. I discussed its re-opening a few weeks ago but, until Friday, an important component remained missing. I needed to replace the fan. I ordered one and it was expected for this coming Thursday. Alas, it arrived and I set it up on Friday. It gets covered when not in use. The next day I enjoyed its use after getting back from ball (game-winning shot in the “rubber game”) and some errands afterwards. Certainly, this device ma...

Like a good friend, I can enjoy a good swim. Unlike that friend, my swim facility only recently became “available” to me. My second time I visited it with Shelly. She makes other use of it (and maintained her affiliation for several years before I recently selected it) but I still swam, and evidently we already plan two more successive visits. In past years, I enjoyed the several month extended summer season at a pool club; through that membership I met friends who invited...

One of the nice thing with more temperate weather involves hanging outside. I enjoy an outdoor office in these times including as a place to compose this blog. Of course setting up the office requires more than just a RE-opening: no comparison (exists) to returning to a summer (or winter) vacation home. Making it ready requires power washing a desk, getting out the umbrella, uncovering and cleaning the top the table that functions as a desk. What remained at ready: my fir...

If my recollections remain correct I’ve called ten places home, three almost a sort of hiatus between more longer term stays. I thought about that as my son looks forward to his latest home. Two shared with his parents. My son experienced three of the City’s five boroughs as a home. I’ve remained in Queens with a brief early stay across its eastern border. Some experience many homes. Some not so many. My daughter has only known two homes; her mom four.   Even my latest...

Our Friday blogger “complains” – perhaps mentors – that I use social media not enough. He often cajoles me to post – comment – more, especially on things that matter.  My wife sometimes counters I post too often.  On Facebook some friends (small f intended) may share divergent opinions.   Where facts support another view, I feel compelled to emphasize accuracy (In my practice what we often call "pushback" almost remains a requirement.).   Recently, some friends with whom I s...

Yesterday involved a new milestone very important to me. I certainly welcomed it and gladly survived it. I write not about some annual date which always merits celebration reaching a level generally considered symbolic. Yesterday marked a return to court (and not the legal variety that a friend advised I strongly consider). A leg ailment and a summer primary combined to keep me from playing my regular twice a week basketball. Shelly “instructed” me to play only one ga...

Gatherings serve many purposes. Discussed one last week. There were two this weekend. One tested me a bit since the bat in the rear of my car failed to see the light of day in slightly more than a year. The other represented a test of connection and how things endure despite distance in time and place. Technology prevailed in both cases; it facilitated both events; yet neither in theory required tech to occur. Just a few weeks out, I expressed real doubt Gotham could pull...

This morning into afternoon members of the Bearak, Stone and Stark clans gather to celebrate a special milestone: Mom’s 80th.  If not for my involvement a primary election involving my good friend and client, the party (and this blog) would have occurred the weekend before. Anyway, mom got a nice present when she got to visit and view the new apartment grandson Doug (my eldest nephew) just occupied after a great deal of effort to secure just the right place at the right pric...

My household changes in the summer.   When one works in a school for the NYC Department of Education aka NYC Public Schools, one generally enjoys most of the season without any work responsibilities; so it goes for “Mrs. B.”   Of course some exceptions exist to that rule but not here in Grand Junction, the name my daughter gave our home in a social media application (and I adopted since my fave band’s first LP includes a great instrumental by that name (It also appears a...