Joanne and I are not world travelers, nevertheless, in an adventurous moment we decided we wanted to travel to Italy with our friends Ennid and David Berger and we planned a year ahead and decided upon Sorrento, Italy. Laney Sachs and her company Ortensia Blu Italian Adventures helped us find a beautiful cliff side hotel in Sorrento, over looking …
When I was young there were only 48 states, “Under God” was not in the Pledge of Allegiance, we got under our school desk in nuclear attack drills, TV was aborning in black and white with few channels, there was a smoking car on the rail road, pay phones were few and far between, Alan Freed was spawning Rock n’ Roll, I read The Daily Mirror tabloid …
I admit that I go on Facebook, Twitter, and the Gotham Politics listserve in an effort to stir things up and engender intelligent discourse on topics of the day. However, in my opinion, I have failed as more and more, as the days go by, some of the responses are too much, characterized by extreme self serving smug certitude. Some have told me they …
I eat a different variety Chobani yogurt every morning. Last Sunday I mentioned that I was enjoying my favorite and Joanne asked “Which one is it?”. I looked at the label and responded S’mores. The name was unusual and new to me, so I asked Joanne it’s meaning and she said “haven’t you ever had a s’more?”. When I told her no, she explained that …
I just said something exuberant to my wife Joanne and her response was “Sure, dream on, Fred”. My response to her was “That’s a subject for a blog.”And here we go: “Dream on” is the perfect subject for a blog, less than one week after the fourth annual Gotham Picnic softball game which was covered last Sunday by Sunday blogger and my first basema …
I know a lot of people who are addicted to the weather channel and constantly check weather forecasts. Except for softball season when I fear rain outs and tomorrow when the Gotham picnic is scheduled, I ignore the weather forecast. Early in the week rain was forecast and some panicked, but I adopted a wait and see attitude. In my limited experienc …
Are you superstitious? I know I am!Superstition is defined as a belief or notion, not based on reason or knowledge, in or of the ominous significance of a peculiar thing, occurrence, proceeding or the like – irrational fear of what is unknown or mysterious. Another definition is a widely held unjustified belief in supernatural causation leading to …
I live on Long Island and commute to work in Manhattan by car. I drive to the East River on the Long Island City side where I park and take the subway 2 stops into the city. The distance is 19 miles and when I was young and training for the marathon, Ben Geizhals and I (see photo) would run the 19 miles into the city once a week. It was quite a t …
Do you know what I mean? Did it ever happen to you? Did something suddenly come out of nowhere unexpectedly and happen so fast? It happened to me last week. I was driving along the Grand Central Parkway, in lane and observing the speed limit, when two cars came upon me weaving through the traffic as if in a careless contest or race. You’ve seen …
One of my favorite pastimes or hobbies is to take pictures/record images and my new IPhone 10 has the best camera ever available to me. For instance, the other day I looked out the back door and observed vivid butterflies flitting through the flowers. I quickly grabbed my phone, ran out and clicked away. The best of those clicks is above. To me, a …
When I was young I suffered from severe youthful irresponsibility which was best exemplified by being habitually late. It’s a fact that I was an hour late to my PSAT test. As a consequence, I really hated myself for this characteristic which forced me to flip into a person who hates to be late. One of our biggest disagreements in our long and bount …
One of the best things about Summer is seeing the Lightning Bugs/Fire Flies dancing around in the air at dusk. It is one of Nature’s greatest light shows. Apparently these marvels are winged beetles which use bioluminescence (when oxygen combines with calcium adenosine triphosphate and the chemical luciferin in the presence of luciferase a biolumi …
Last week I blogged about being beleagured by a (Hack) Hoax and once that was resolved I immediately proceeded to lose my phone. The second was surely worse than the first. The only explanation is that my pocket was picked. Believe me, I looked everywhere!I hope it never happens to you. What a horribly helpless empty frustrating feeling. Everyt …
Last Saturday we were the subject of a (hack) hoax. It started with Netflix denying access and reporting that too many others were using it. Joanne went to our computer to reach Netflix, but found an **Apple Warning Alert** Malicious Pornographic Spyware/Riskware Detected (pictured) on the computer screen. As per the alert, she called for support …
I live on Long Island and drive to work in Manhattan. Actually, I drive 19 miles from my home to the Queens side of the East River and take the subway two stops to my office in Manhattan.I take various driving routes without using Waze and bide my time by making Bluetooth telephone calls and listening to books on CDs. Once school is out traffic lig …
Fridays With Fred
A perfect way to send you into your weekend