When I was growing up, I had a great Uncle named Sam. He was both my great Uncle and also great as an uncle, who was 100% supportive of me and let me know it in many ways with his encouragement. If I did something that he thought was an especially good accomplishment, right afterwards […]
A friend of mine has a magnifying glass with a beautiful carved gemstone handle on it. She told me it belonged to her aunt who she loved very much, and to remind her of her Aunt, she keeps it on her desk. She told me that she uses it every day. I’m reminded of an […]
There is something interesting in the world of statistics called ‘The Birthday Paradox’. It is so named because if you ask the average person what size group you would have to have to find two people with the same birthday, meaning the same month and day, people often guess a very large number, like several […]
birthday, birthday paradox, statistic
I was out to dinner the other night at a restaurant with a large group, and three people who were sitting right next to one another noticed that they were each left-handed. And this led to this sort of instant bond, and they began talking about the trials and tribulations of being a left-handed person, […]
left, left handed, lefties
There is an old toy car that’s been in my family for decades and the way that it works is you put it on a flat surface and pull it backwards; that creates tension in a spring inside the car and that propels it forward. I think in life there are often situations where we […]
car, go forward, moving forward, toy car
This morning while I was making coffee, I was looking down at the box the coffee came in and it said on there “bold yet refined, strong yet smooth” relating to this brand of coffee. I thought that’s a pretty awesome way to be in life, to be bold, yet refined, that sounds pretty good, […]
coffee, message, messaging
When the final scene of the iconic series The Sopranos ended, viewers were left with a dark screen, the sound of a ringing bell over a diner door, and not much else. And that gap of information which was of course intentional by the creators, caused all kinds of frustration, but also fun while viewers […]
frustration, information, sopranos
In Malcolm Gladwell’s excellent 2005 book “Blink”, he interviews two food tasters who have just excellent and perceptive pallets. During the interview, it’s sort of a minor piece of the interview, but they talk about something called “rework”, which is when prior ingredients or ingredients from another product are included in the making of a […]
blink, cookie, malcolm gladwell, reworked cookie
I read a news article the other day about a lawsuit involving the definition of just one word in a contract. Despite the length and complexity of the contract, the lawsuit hinged on that one word. It made me think about all the things in life that are big decisions or commitments that we make, […]
lawsuites, newspaper, short, short words
