The Naked Emperor As a young kid I’m sure when The Emperor’s New Clothes was read to me I was delighted by a boy much wiser than the grownups,  and unafraid to laugh at the foolish and naked ruler. And later when I was older and read the tale myself I surely appreciated the clever satire,  the… Read More

Sofa-Bed Our first living room couch was really a sofa-bed –  we bought it thinking when it wasn’t being a living room couch it could double as a guest bed – and it did,  legions of our friends have slept on it over the years with no complaints. And as I remember it was originally… Read More

The Amazing Technicolor Club Chair and Ottoman I’m not a fashionista,  nor a whiz in the kitchen,  nor good with make-up like some gals  –  I’m a wannabe interior decorator and I love thinking about color schemes,  and window treatments and wallpaper,  and rugs and lamps.  And I actually collect pitchers and bowls.  (See Pitcher… Read More

The Great Knaidel Disaster As you may know a bowl of chicken soup without knaidelach is like a day without sunshine. For the uninitiated let me explain that knaidelach is the German-derived Yiddish word for matzo balls,  and knaidel the singular.   And as I’ve said,  without knaidelach chicken soup is just, well,  soup.  (See The Matzo Ball Spelling Bee)… Read More

Rock Concert When our son was 12 we took him to New Jersey’s Meadowlands Arena to his first rock concert – a stop on Bon Jovi’s  Slippery When Wet Tour. Later he told us Bon Jovi wasn’t really a cool band,  and going to a rock concert with your folks wasn’t cool at all.  … Read More

Nude on Blue Rug  1970 Our Pearlstein Nude One weekend many years ago Danny and I visited friends in Pittsburgh and they took us to a local art gallery. We had no intention of buying anything but one lithograph  – Nude on Blue Rug – caught our eye,  perhaps partly because we had a very similar… Read More

Elliptical Intentions Surely the priciest purchases we’ve made were our city coop and our house in the country,  and we’ve been enjoying both for years with no buyer’s remorse. But those aside,  one big expenditure we made that I do regret is the large elliptical exercise machine that’s been taking up space in our apartment.… Read More

Frances Henne I’ve been inspired by many fine teachers over the years but the one who influenced me most was Frances Henne, my professor at Columbia’s graduate library school. Not a household name and surely not recognizable outside her field,   Dr Henne was a mover and a shaker in the children’s and young adult… Read More

Educator of the Year – Remembering Milton I wasn’t on the faculty at Jane Addams High School for long before I realized there was something special about Milton. Milt’s job description was Stockman and his office was in the school’s basement and lined with shelves holding reams of paper, school stationery, notebooks, folders,  boxes of… Read More

Save the Date Procrastinate,  who me?  On the contrary,  I’m compulsive and sometimes I act TOO soon,  which I’ve learned can be just as problematic. There was the time I got a save-the-date for the out-of-town,  black-tie wedding of a friend’s son to be held on a date six months hence. Save-the-dates don’t have reply… Read More