A Social Security Windfall Changes My Entire Life
Just before the tattered, charred and crumpled curtain of 2020 was drawn, I was notified I’d be receiving a windfall from the United States government “on or about January 20, 2021.”
I was so exhilarated I felt I just had to share the news with someone, even though my family always maintained a tradition of never telling anyone what we earned. This included not telling the people living with us, even if we shared a surname.
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Young Women Get Business Fashion Help from Two of Their Own
Two juniors at Vanderbilt University are on a mission from Mod. They mean to make it possible for women their own age—as well as those a bit younger and some a bit older—to garb themselves for success with their self-designed (and cleverly named) age-appropriate fashion line, Ready Dress Go.
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Gerry and the Pacemakers Founder Passes—but Memories Linger
I was sorry to hear that Gerry Marsden, who headed the rock band Gerry and the Pacemakers, died early this month. It felt as though an entire era—the so-called “British invasion” of the early-to-mid 1960s— had been permanently withdrawn from our memory banks.
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For Nearly Three Decades, EditPros Have Helped Others Tell Their Stories
For 28 years, Jeff March and Marti Childs have been doing the write thing for their clients.
The co-founders and co-owners of EditPros create, edit and/or proofread everything from newsletters and websites to books and résumés. They also assist with correspondence, brochures and other marketing materials, based on the very solid presumption that being able to write isn’t a universal skill—and certainly not in the corporate world nor academia.
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Bob Dylan Opens a New Bank Account
Shortly before the close of 2020, legendary songwriter and Nobel Prize winner for Literature Bob Dylan sold the entire catalogue of his songs to Universal Music Group for a sum said to be close to a billion dollars.
Actually, I’m the only one who said “close to a billion dollars.” If I’m off by a few million bucks, I’ll apologize in the way that a politician would: “Was a mistake made? Possibly. Do we regret it? If anyone was offended. It was certainly not our intent.”…
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Not-as-Crappy New Year!
I wish you and yours a Not-as-Crappy New Year! Yes, 2020 is gone! Like the embarrassing acne of youth, Gallagher performances and the devastating flatulence of Rudolph William Louis Giuliani, some effects will linger but the worst may be over.
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My Nine Fizzleutions for 2021
I’ve never kept nor even made a New Year’s resolution. I tend to call them Fizzleutions because before I get the chance to even float them, opportunities abound to sink them.
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The Game of the Rose, or Umberto Hears an Eco
In the 18 years I lived in Southern California, the Rose Bowl game in Pasadena (now relocated) and the parade that preceded it (canceled this year) loomed large every New Year’s Day. For me, each became a rite of passage.
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Native Californians Really Rocked Their Art
Reefer madness ran riot in California centuries before the 1936 movie of that name—which was intended to be a cautionary tale but became a must-see stoner film in the 1960s and ‘70s, much like Ed Wood’s ”Plan Nine From Outer Space.”
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A Christmas Story, Though Christmas Only Makes a Cameo Appearance
As a kid, I had enough Jewish classmates at Public School 106 in the Bronx to make celebrating Hanukkah every December seem like nothing out of the ordinary. At that age, the glue that bound Christian and Jewish kids wasn’t world understanding: it was comparing holiday gift hauls.
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Christmas, Kwanza and Hanukkah for Non-Carnivores
Having read incessantly about faux-meat products like yam chops and incogmeato (I love that name), I decided to combine my branding and R&D teams here at The Goldman State HQ and come up with 15 new food items and appropriate names for non-carnivorous holiday feasters.
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Winterizing Tips for the Hearty and Imbecilic
Since autumn officially ends Sunday night, I’m going to start “winterizing” everything within my purview over the weekend. I’ll pour anti-freeze into my car’s radiator, leave at least one faucet in my home slightly dripping each night to help ensure against frozen pipes, wrap my outdoor plants in festive pashminas and encase my garden water spigot in old pajama bottoms.
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