I know that for most of the summer you all indulged my blogs about getting ready to send my oldest child to college. Thank you, your indulgence was much appreciated. I have purposely refrained from giving you all a play by play description of the college transition process every week thinking that might be pushing it a little too far. But we’ve j …
As the holiday season begins, I have tried to think of some creative gifts for my children. My daughter will be graduating with her Masters in Social Work in May, which requires a special gift. I approached her with the idea of purchasing an expensive watch as a combined gift for both Hannukah and her graduate school graduation. Her response, “That …
This was a weekend of old family traditions, snowed out traditions, and new ones. We spent it in the Berkshires. There were about twenty of us, young and old. It has been a number of years since the extended group (almost) all assembled in Lenox. One of our traditions is touch football on the golfcourse just a few yards from the house. This y …
About Thanksgiving..celery and olives were considered standard appetizers for over 100 years. There are actually 12 claims to where the “first” Thanksgiving took place: two in Texas, two in Florida, one in Maine, two in Virginia, and five in Massachusetts. President Jefferson called a federal Thanksgiving proclamation “the most ridiculous idea ever …
As an alternative to this Season's usual profusion of expressions of Thanks I would like to publish a "No Thanks Given", if not worse, list of inappropriate everyday conduct and things which I hate. "Hate" is a very strong word and has a highly negative connotation so maybe I should say "greatly dislike", but you get my drift. Here we go:1) The Cr …
I'm a traditionalist and one of the things I like most about Thanksgiving are the traditions. One of our traditions is a football game before dinner. Given the rain and wet field conditions, this tradition may be in jeopardy this year. And there are the food traditions. Except for the tradition of family, Thanksgiving is mostly about the food t …
The verdict is out and the protests and rioting have begun. Any objective opinion understands that not only is it right not to charge Darren Wllson with a crime, but that he actually acted appropriately under the circumstances. It's easy to dislike Michael Brown, clearly a violent criminal. However, I truly feel bad for many of the protesters …
Sometimes I think our blogs are a selfish exercise. How lucky we are to have your attention every week where we can write about anything, anything at all. My selfish exercise this week is to tell the story of my Saturday evening. My 14 year old son loves to sing. This year he auditioned for and was selected to perform with the Nassau Symphonic C …
You cannot turn on the television, radio, or computer without being bombarded with this story; whether retailers should open on Thanksgiving Day. Many retailers such as Macy’s J. C. Penny’s, and Toys R Us have been open on Thanksgiving Day for several years. KMart has announced that, this year, they will open at 6:00 a.m. on Thanksgiving Day and r …
This is my last blog. I am continually frustrated when I write something and go to post and it is not there or gets deleted. Oddly, it happens to the blogs that I think are the best and is infinitely frustrating. My attemped post for today, in which I was paying homage to my parents on my 60th birthday, magically disappeared two times. This ha …
I've observed that getting old in our society is not handled very well. Not that there aren't galliant efforts by businessess to serve a population that lives longer. Assisted care facilities, rehab, extended stay, senior housing all designed to improve the quality of life. The decisions on what to do and where to go are relatively simple. Howeve …
Our firm has had Season tickets to the Knicks (not always a good investment) since the '80s. As such, I have taken my 2 sons to many games over the years. Last Sunday the tradition continued as I took my son David and my 2 grandsons to a 1:00 matinee. See above photo. I have taken Jackson, the older grandson to a number of games in recent years, b …
Early in my career I heard the phrase, "A cluttered desk is a cluttered mind." It resonated with me as I've always messy - not unsanitary, just disorganized with all the paper in my life. Luckily, the paper in my life has basically decreased to zero (except for my own seminar handouts). This remaining paper isn't necessarily strewn everywhere. But …
I have spent the past week with my mother as she reacovers from open heart surgery for a quadruple bypass. After some early difficulties, she is now recovering nicely. I can't speak highly enough about the amazing people at the St. Francis Cardiac Center at Good Samaritan Hospital. I have unfortunately experienced more than my share of engage …
Wait, wrong artist. Continuing his promise to play in New York until the fans stop coming, Billy Joel just announced four new shows at Madison Square Garden into 2015 and they were all sold out in hours. That was on top of 12 sold out shows, one each month, for the entirety of 2014. Let’s do the math. Roughly 20,000 people at each concert this year …
