Surviving the Crazy Twins

The longer I live, the more apparent it is to me that my memory is a very queer thing. In fact, curiouser and curiouser. Ask me what I did yesterday, and you're likely to get a blank stare. Or, perhaps, "Uh, lemme think . . . " And, yes, I'll probably come up with...

The first thing that crossed my mind this fall when I'd forgotten both my wife's birthday and our anniversary? After, that is, I'd identified the nearest hidey-hole in which to duck and cover ? Obvious: come up with an excuse. And if there's a silver lining in the...

Merry Christmas to you and your family, Christmas, 2020 It’s tough to know what to say about a year like 2020. Conjure up Dickens? “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times”? Maybe. But it’s not easy to look back on 2020 and summon up anything like “best of...

Do you remember what it felt like to wobble and weave down the sidewalk in a drunken stupor? I hope not. But what if, in addition to that boozy feeling, your mind, without warning and even when you're stone cold sober, occasionally goes on a tear that that leaves you...

My Scandinavian mother was a great cook. She pulled out all the stops for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. For these holidays, she believed there were two basic food groups: cream and butter. Beyond that, everything else was a side dish. But boy, could she work...

You up for a little history lesson? No? Too bad. It's my party and I'll cry if I want to . . . Not long after the United States became the U.S., we got involved in an obscure and nearly forgotten naval conflict with France over money we owed to the French for their...