Cold beer on a parched throat    Plopping down at day’s end   A shaded beach nap   A cooling dip in water   A clever rejoinder   A thank you   The scent of a flower   A welcoming smile   Words of encouragement   A loving relationship   A creative moment   An unmasked breath of sweet fresh air!...

It had been almost a year since we were inside a museum, so the notice from the Brooklyn Museum grabbed our attention. It was an invitation to a member’s preview of the new Kaws exhibit. At the museum. Not virtual. Limited admission. After six in the evening. We could schedule it exactly two weeks after our second vaccine. We considered. What was most striking to me as I walked into the museum was the sense that I had just been there. It didn’t seem like more than a year h...

Someone once told me that the best way to become good at relationships, is to be in them! Simple advice, but oh, so true. Recently, I’ve had the opportunity to go on a new adventure with a family that sought out guidance on inheritance. Most people feel an overwhelming urge to do something different, upon inheriting a great sum. The best advice I give is to practice “business as usual” with no major decisions in the first 12-18 months. Relationships are at the center of how ...

  Has anyone else noticed the increasing appointment frenzy? And has anyone else noticed how important it is to understand how the system works? The current instructions are to ignore “No Appointments Available” on the NYS “Am I Eligible “ website. Just keep hitting refresh in as quick and furious a motion as you can muster – and then quickly grab whatever appointment comes up. Of course, you have to be lucky enough to grab a time along with that date, otherwise appointmen...

In view of recent allegations against the New York governor (which this blog is not about) a long time female friend and I recently discussed the issue. We then began talking about different situations we have found ourselves in over the years wherein inappropriate things were said to us, all in professional settings. We discussed our outrage and individual responses to each situation.     During our discussion, a mutual friend’s name came up and certain comments he has made...

I did not expect to follow last week’s blog welcoming the return of Mets baseball tomorrow. A Newsday article yesterday, a discussion at the Gotham Brad Scherer Happy Hour Friday eve and an email exchange with Mr. Title is Vital attorney and fellow tribal member Roy Fenichel induced today’s commentary; Roy even took the exchange to twitter after I shared my preferred Mets lineup. This column blossomed after I shared to Gotham Sportstalk listserve a nice article (to which Roy ...

Ever notice how everyone else has the answer for your issue?   No matter what it is; realtionship, business, love, angst, etc.  You explain your issue and in that conversation there'll be at some point a declaritive statement from that person saying "this is what you should do!"   I think Gian-Carlo Rota, the famous MIT mathmetician, said it best..."the advice we give others is always the advice we need to follow most."...

How often do people talk to us in code? They have an intention, but they try to cloud or cover it in rhetoric. A perfect example is the obnoxiously directing request “why don’t you?”   In superficial code this means “I want you to do the following, right now!” Well, I’m fed up. I’m no longer going to play along.  I’m either going to respond with an uncoded No, procrastinate, or just not do it. I’m just fed up! What do you think?...

Do you remember The Tiger King? It’s significance to me was that it was much talked about as we settled into the Covid lockdown almost one year ago. Inevitably a conversation — even a business conversation- would digress into “what are you watching?” and The Tiger King was on most people’s lists. Here’s my incomplete list of what we’ve watched: Watchman, Ozark, His Dark Materials, Schitt’s Creek, Bridgerton, The Queen’s Gambit. As I look back over the last year in front of a ...

The author of 8 spirited children and 31 grand-spirited-children. She was 97 years young when she left this earth, but her legacy lives on. She was a quiet, kind, sly woman from the town of Reading, Pennsylvania. Fondly known as Pennsylvania Dutch. “S” cookies, Pecan Balls, Buckeyes, Pecan Pie, Lemon Bars, Cherry Bars and tasty dishes filled her kitchen and our bellies. A shark of a card player, a writer, poet, and a hell of a scrabble player. She could stitch, sew, hem, and...

  I was having a conversation the other day with a colleague about our respective remote work spaces. For me, I have reclaimed my son’s room. He has the best desk in the house and a door I can close. With that space, it feels like work when I walk in and sit down. I think it is good for my focus to be actually going to work in a space that is dedicated to work. When I leave the “office” at the end of the day (of course, let’s talk another day about when that is), there ...

This blog was inspired by a comment I wrote on Corey’s blog from last week.   I find it interesting how music can influence our memories. The early years after my divorce were, in my memory, a particularly dark and challenging time in my life. My youngest daughter was not even a year old when her father and I divorced. Yet I was thrust into the position of being a single parent and going back into the working world at the same time. Finances were a daily ongoing concern at t...

Last year at this time I blogged with great optimism how things looked up for my baseball team.  The season that followed failed to meet my expectations, especially on the pitching side.  Lost Thor before the season started and Stroman opted out.  Pitching depth never overcame such a deep loss; it reverberated on the bullpen as usually happens.  Nonetheless despite no signings of the top free agents at fielding positions 1, 2 and 8, the experts find gear merit in the first ro...

It almost happened...My sister and I were scheduled to see our Mom face to face this weekend. However, since all of the workers at the assisted living facility did not got vaccinated (which is the subject of a different kind of blog) two of them were diagnosed with COVID-19 and they had to cancel all the visitors...again. So disappointing.   We continue to use Facetime and Zoom to see her but she is obviously disengaged and rely on the one of the wonderful health care workers...

The definition of mailing it in is to perform a given task, duty or activity with little or no attention, effort, or interest in actually doing something, ie, doing it in a perfunctory manner.    For example, a key player on the gridiron, the team star running back, “seems to be mailing it in this afternoon.” This is distinguished from a reporter excitedly calling in a news scoop to the Editor.    Don’t go through the motions: Deliver!  ...