Over the years, in many houses that I’ve owned, I furnished and decorated them in almost as many different ways as one could. 50 years ago my first house, purchased when I was only 23 years old, was decorated with discount furniture, American style. That was by necessity since the purchase of that home tapped out all of my savings and all of my borrowing power on my credit cards. By the time I purchased…
Back in 1990 when I was moving to Toronto by myself, I went out and bought some furniture for this wonderful two-bedroom, two-bath apartment I had rented to live in during my tenure as CEO of BT Bank of Canada. Given that my tour in Toronto had been likened in the industry as my being sent to a Russian Gulag, it was not so Gulag-like on the ground, but actually rather nice surroundings. The one…
For almost the first time in a year, Kim and I watched MSNBC last night. It was strange to see all the familiar faces that have been absent from our consciousness for the past year. Yesterday was a watershed day on this hilltop. At about 2:30pm, Kim’s brother, Jeff, lost his hard-fought battle and succumbed to the ages of eternity. His twelve-day hospital rollercoaster ride going from ER to ICU to Stroke Ward and back…
My daughter Carolyn ran her 10th NYC Marathon yesterday. She started before she had her two daughters and other than the obvious hiatuses while pregnant, she has been doing this annually for fifteen years. She started during college and hasn’t stopped since. In fact, her goal, she tells me, is to complete 15 NYC Marathons so that she can join that elite New York Roadrunners group who get automatic annual entrance exemptions without either having…
Tomorrow is the first Sunday of November and we are due to “Fall Back” an hour on the clocks. For some, this release from daylight savings time means an hour more of sleep on a crisp Sunday morning. When I was in college, my friend Robbie, who was desperate to do well enough in his grades to get into medical school, was so focused on time management that he would “bank” his hour and “use”…
We’ve been going through a lot lately, as people often do from time to time. Into every life, as they say, some rain must fall. No one can fully anticipate the rain and we all live with unpredictable weather in life, but the progression of life keeps marching forward with both sunny and rainy days. I feel that the trick is to treat every day with wonder and surprise and yet not be surprised by…
Inspector Gadget was a bumbling, cyborg detective and the main character of the animated TV series “Inspector Gadget” that premiered in 1983. He was a clumsy, well-meaning but incompetent detective with a body full of gadgets (hence the name). He worked for a law enforcement agency that constantly battled the evil organization M.A.D. (Mean And Dirty). He was completely oblivious to danger (in the Maxwell Smart tradition), and he accidentally and regularly solved crimes while…
Everybody’s talkin’ at me…Can’t hear a word they’re sayin’…Only the echoes of my mind. It was 1969 when Midnight Cowboy hit the big screen and boy did it score big. It won Best Picture, Best Director (John Schlesinger), and Best Writing (Waldo Salt). Both stars, Jon Voight (Joe Buck) and Dustin Hoffman (Ratso Rizzo) were nominated for Best Actor, but lost to the long-time favorite of Americana, John Wayne for his portrayal of Rooster Cogburn…
There are reasons why I read what I read and just this morning I am reminded about why I read the New York Times. Mostly I think I read it because it is, in my opinion, the single best voice of the America I believe in and enjoy. I chose my words carefully in stating that because there is a case to be made that perhaps something like Fox News is more representative of the…
Since I was young, I have always been against capital punishment. This is one of those beliefs that I can genuinely say was not adopted from others, but was, rather, something I very specifically and very memorably pondered while I was taking my high school courses in ethics. I learned all about situational ethics and still I concluded that man simply does not have the right to inflict a punishment with such finality and profound…