My MD sent me to the ICU for an MRI after he read my EEG. Is this any way to talk? I refuse to use initials for things that I don’t really understand. Just so you might avoid giving CPR to a DOA, I put together this little quiz. Now let’s see if you really…

When you’ve got something new to announce in the business world, you hold a press release event, invite all of the journalists important to your industry, and hope for front page coverage, above the fold, in the Wall Street Journal. I’ve done many of these, but it’s the memory of four such events that still…

Deming Writing Group Assignment Write about something that has disappeared in your life that you miss October 17, 1963 Another spectacular sunset paints the sky in warm pastels as the sun plays peek-a-boo through a stately row of quaking eucalyptus trees. These haunting giants dwarf the groves of orange trees they protect from the winter…

I was fumbling through something or other, and read that The World Values Survey rates Japan as the highest in the world in “Rational-Secular Values”, whatever they are. I really like Japan and have the greatest respect for all things Japanese. Who or what the hell is the World Values Survey, and is it good…

I like food, especially local dishes in far away places, but doesn’t everybody? Having a cheesesteak on a street corner in Philly, ripping apart crabs along the shores of Chesapeake Bay, chomping a corn beef on rye at the Stage Deli, dipping littlenecks in butter on Cape Cod, finding the best Green Chile Stew in…

  A Tribute to The Genius of Oscar Wilde And now, I am dying beyond my means. — Oscar Wilde, while sipping champagne on his deathbed. – Dave Berry retired, Erma Bombeck died far too young, and Will Rogers is doing his rope tricks in some other dimension. Andy Rooney was never much with a…

(The Best Shaggy Dog Stories) I never realized why I liked Shaggy Dog stories so much until I read that, in its original sense, a shaggy dog story is an extremely long-winded tale featuring extensive narration of typically irrelevant incidents, usually resulting in a pointless or absurd punchline. That sounds like the story of my…

Call me Ishmael. I spent the spring of my 71st year reading Moby Dick; or, The Whale by Herman Melville, and why he couldn’t decide on just one name for this epic story is beyond me. Melville used stylized language, symbolism, and metaphors to dig into some heavy themes, like class and social status, good…

Something happened yesterday I can’t explain. Venus passed in front of the sun, and I was content with just seeing the pictures on TV. I didn’t race out looking for filtered glasses, or research how to make them at home; I just sat on my butt and went about my humdrum life like nothing unusual…

Psst – Just to keep you on your toes, there are three past participles of abide—abode, abided, and abidden. Someone far wiser than me observed that a man’s interests change predictably over his lifetime. They go from sports, to women, to career, to golf, and finally to bowel movements. I’m teetering on edge the last…