I’m an artist and I’m not poor. Does that mean that I relied on my art to bring in money? No. I realized pretty early that I would have to get a job to support my creative sides. And, I did. And, after 45 years of teaching college and working at a well-known cultural institution as a technologist, I’m retiring in 5…

When we were deciding whether to have a second child, my wife said, “How difficult could it be? You make breakfast for one, you just make more for two!” Well, she didn’t take into account that #2 liked completely different food and had to problem throwing it all over the place (our first, was so easy, it blindsided…

When our children were younger, my wife took the blueprints to our 1959 ranch house and decided to invite them to help make a gingerbread house of our place. We had the gingerbread of course, but we used matzoh for our roof (we are an interfaith family). As the photographer in the house, I took photos of the final…

Now, if you’ll just tell us parents who’ve successfully navigated our children’s teens how to navigate our kids’ early 20s, you know when they are legally adults but emotional and experientially teens. 

Let me know when you’re ready to discuss how to survive your 20-something “adult” (technically) children. ;-)

The first time I make a recipe, I follow it exactly. Then I will know the next time how to change it to make it perfect. 

It looks like you’re raising an exceptional child, Meghan. One of the issues that’s often hard to explain is the difference between empathy and sympathy. Basically, sympathy allows you to “see” what another person might be experiencing. Empathy is to actually “feel” what that other person may be feeling.

In Olympic Park, the Birds Nest stadium, designed in part by Chinese artist Ai Weiwei, is nice from a distance. But, it doesn’t scale well. If you get real close, the outside is just a bunch of concrete pillars going in all sorts of directions. Here’s a photo I took of the inside:

If you want to really get a sense of the city, go on a quest for something you forgot to bring with you. Silly me, I thought my new MacBook Air had a SD card slot. It didn’t. I was staying a few blocks from the flagship Apple store in Beijing and decided to buy one there. I took my 16 year old daughter, who was born…

The only caveat to buying a gift when you see it, no matter what the season, is remembering where you hid it! I *just* found a gift I bought years ago (while looking for something else I’d lost). ;-)

For Xmas, give him my gift-giving guide wrapped up in a nice box and bow! ;-)

Here is my seven-step guide to being a good gift-giver. Of course, coming up with just the right gift for a person is a year-long quest. 

I, too, get “irate” (that’s such a nice way of putting it) when people are listening to loud music on the subway. I often will ask them to please use their earphones. When they say, “I don’t have any earphones,” I know I’m in hell, because they seem to be in a totally different universe where earphones haven’t been…

Actually, I’m not. Of course the main issue is how companies protect our data! But, when you don’t have any power, you have to leverage power. Waiting from a company to fix breach is way too late. And, as a user, I can’t tell them to fix their systems. But, I can protect myself as much as possible by using two-step…

There was no school bus. Where we live, just because your school isn’t in walking distance doesn’t mean you get to ride the school bus. 

What a great experience. Thanks for telling us. 

My wife and I had no problem with NOT getting our younger daughter a cell phone in middle school, that is, until my wife forgot to pick her up one day. 

How long does it take to change your password? Just do it. Even if you didn’t get an email. Simple. 

No amount of stubble will make Jr. any more manly. Or human.

Worse, every time I go into CVS with coupons on my card, the items I want to buy are either BOGO or buy one get one at half price. EVERY TIME. And, coupons don’t work if they’re on sale.