You can dismiss Father’s Day as a minor holiday conceived as a marketing tool, but if you’re a dad you can’t help but be aware of it. You kind of hope the kids call because of what it implies if they don’t. But you kind of dread the dutiful nature of those calls, too. I don’t know if there’s a father anywhere who doesn’t feel at least […]
Every call is a wakeup call
I do think mobile phones are changing how people relate to each other. But maybe it’s not such a bad thing. Tonight a young couple parked in front of my house, no doubt intending some quality time at the wine bar across the street. They were both good-looking, both in their mid-20s, both smiling when they got out. Then the woman groped for her purse. She pulled […]
Forever on the hips
According to this story in the New York Times, two-thirds of adults in the Bronx are overweight. I know, right? But then it’s the Bronx, poorest of the five boroughs. Waddaya gonna do? However, it gets worse: “According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, about 68 percent of adults in the United States were either overweight or obese in 2008.” So as a nation, we’re […]
It’s a depressing tradition
Back in March, a guy was shot to death a couple of blocks from here. A week or so later, this makeshift shrine went up at the scene. It’s still there; I walk or ride a bike past it nearly every day. It’s beginning to get on my nerves. The cops said the shooting — several rounds from an AK-47 in broad daylight — was drug-related. Around […]
Her majesty’s a pretty nice girl
There’s a lot to be said for longevity. Elizabeth II has been queen of England for about as long as I’ve been alive. When she took the throne, Harry Truman was president and Joe Stalin was running things in the Soviet Union and people still had to worry about polio. There’s a lot to be said for symbolism too. Here’s an 86-year-old woman floating down the Thames […]
Some dopamine of one’s own
If you were to make a list of things that might really make a difference in your life, quitting Facebook would be way down there. Probably about the same level as quitting American Idol or vowing to clip your toenails more regularly. Which is to say, it can’t hurt. But neither can it make much difference in the fullness of time. But I quit anyway. Again. It […]
Maybe that “dislike” button is a good idea
Regarding Facebook, I’m starting to feel like Kramer in that Seinfeld episode, “The Stock Tip.” I put FB on my Yahoo listings and smile each time I look at it. Something about watching stock you don’t own plummet in value — it just makes all the world a sunny day. I guess they call that Schadenfreude. As Jerry would say: “Why does it please you?” I don’t […]