My husband annoys me frequently. After so many years of marriage, one would think that one could just “roll with the punches.” Not so. Not only does he still have the same irritating habits, but he has developed new ones.

For instance: How aggravating are those people who drum their fingers on the table? Very aggravating? I understand. My spouse “clicks.” He has somehow figured out how to make the “drumming on the table” noise without the table! I would commend him for his…

My closet is a mess. I hate to even stick my head in past the first rod. I live in an old house. A hundred years ago, the architect of my house apparently thought that narrow, deep closets with (get this) built-in cupboards WAY AT THE VERY BACK of the farther end of the closet were desirable. All I can figure out is that nobody had hanging clothes back then. They simply used pegs on the edges of the closet walls that the wearer hug her chastity belts and peplums on, leaving the chests at the…

It hit me suddenly, as I was admiring some particularly brilliant tweets. What are so many of us doing, writing columns, stories, novels, and memoirs? When all a writer really needs to do is to come up with one good aphorism? Just think of the time saved. No word counts, not a whole lot of editing, that’s for certain. And talk about memorable. Who remembers the brilliant fourth paragraph on page 326 of “War and Peace?” But ask the average Joe on the street for that thing about sewing, and…

I have been warned by my daughters since they entered their teens. I mustn’t embarrass them. There is nothing worse than a mother who says things like “far out” or “gnarly.” Additionally, it is nearly a mortal sin to wear clothing that indicates the generation of the wearer, especially if this means the wearer is over the age of fifty.

I am guilty as charged, and it is getting harder and harder for me to get dressed every day. I mustn’t wear a cardigan. Fred Rogers ruined…

DATELINE: Yoga mats everywhere: It seems as if the real world has finally caught up with what my joints have been telling me for years. An article in the January 8, 2012 edition of the New York Times reveals that yoga, for years thought to be healthy, spiritual, and something that every schlub in America ought to be doing, is actually not good for you!

It seems that yoga teachers all over America have a dirty little secret: years of awkward positions and impossible stretches have…

We’ve all lived through another holiday. Almost. But I never really consider New Year’s Eve a real holiday. Nobody gets gifts. But Christmas (which is what we celebrate in our family—but everyone, no matter what religion, has the same issues, so I’ll stick with what I know) is fraught. Once again, family, alcohol, budgets, gift exchanges and table manners somehow get jumbled together, and what comes out is just plain ugly at times. So here is one more advice column. I speak to all of you…

I always hated that letter about Santa Claus. Even when I was still at an impressionable age, the entire thing seemed way too condescending. Or maybe it was the guy with the maple syrup voice who read the letter over and over again on television. You are probably way too young to remember. A small girl of eight (more likely her mother) wrote a letter to the editor (yes, I know. My girls, when in third grade, spent an inordinate amount of time writing letters to the editor—it must be a…

The curtain opens on a typical American living room. A fire is burning. There are two sofas parallel to the fireplace. Sitting on one, creatively writing on her lap top, is a lovely, middle aged woman, whom most people would guess is around 40 (this is me). Sitting across from her on the other sofa is a bald, much older man, sometimes known to play the accordion badly (this is my mate). He also types on his lap top, but what he does is most certainly not that creative, and God really…

I feel fat. My pants still fit, true, but after all the gratuitous calories I consumed on Thanksgiving, I feel fat. Plus, there is much danger to my waistline ahead: Christmas parties (ok, we aren’t that popular, but still), Christmas cookies (actually, I am not known as a baker, but these delicious things somehow find their way over to my house), gravy (nectar of the Gods, in my opinion), and lots of sitting in front of the television, watching holiday movies. None of this…

There is a revolution in the literary world. Publishing companies are very nervous, indeed. With the advent of e-readers like the Kindle, self publishing has become all the rage. Every Tom, Dick and Harry has a story to tell, it seems, and now there are absolutely no barriers to keep them from spilling their guts. I know, because I have a Kindle.

It all seemed to catch fire when an unknown young woman who worked in an assisted living facility self published a series of young adult…

When I think about things that I have failed at, cooking is always high up on the list. My children grew up nutritiously, and I have been known to put together what my husband has called “a helluvasupper,” but certain things have always eluded me. I have written about these things. But I have a new confession: I would probably be executed for my macaroni attempts.

Macaroni. Or as most others call it, “Macaroni and cheese.” My family always felt the “and cheese” part was…

I believe that days of yore were better than the days of now. Yore had gypsies, itinerant peddlers that came to one’s door with all manner of interesting stolen goods; there were hobos who had special symbols that they painted on one’s gateposts and stiles.

Today, nothing doing. We have just one gypsy. Granted, it’s Johnny Depp, and he’s the hottest man ever invented, but he’s about it. The door to door peddlers are long gone, the last one selling Fuller brushes—no stolen…

I admire busy people. They have full lives. They need things like little pocket calendars or scheduling apps on their electronics. They have things like appointments. They bustle around all day and come home exhausted. I used to be one of those people. I had a career. I had two little girls. I made lunches and family dinners, and I even went on business trips.

Now I don’t have those things. Well, my girls didn’t die or anything; they just grew up and left. I don’t have…

In this era of joblessness, recession, predatory lending, sky high gasoline prices, and a volatile stock market, I have issues. I want to support our economy and be a good consumer. But this tipping business has got me all in a swivet. 

I used to think that tipping was an indicator of good service. If you did a good job for me, your customer, then you would get a reward. That reward would be entirely up to my generosity, socio-economic bracket, and my mood that day. I never…

At my age, the odds that I am going to win anything big are looking slim. No matter how hard I try to make people laugh, my name is unlikely to be known in households around the country. But in case something I say in an offhand manner somehow goes viral, and I end up with a popular TV sitcom based on my blog, starring William Shatner as the Accordion Player and Diane Keaton as me, I thought it would be a great idea to have my acceptance speech ready. I am sharing it now. As I said, things…

Reality television is full of awful truths. People hoard things. Some folks just can’t stop eating. Bachelors and bachelorettes compete for roses or something. Survivors eat bugs and look for idols in the jungle. But there doesn’t seem to be a show about perfect spouses. I would like to see one like that. I daydream often about the kind of men who would be contestants on a program like that.

For instance, I would be in heaven married to a man who would…

A DAY LATE AND A DOLLAR SHORT

I was minding my own business, trying to increase my circles on Google+, when my husband walked into the room with a shocked expression on his face. It was obvious that something was bothering him. I normally don’t care about the kinds of things that bother my husband, because he plays the accordion, and thus we are living in two different worlds. But the expression on his face was very alarming, and so I was forced…

I used to get letters in the mail. Some were from my parents. My sister wrote funny letters from the places in the world where she was living. My favorite letters were from my friends. I admired their cute stationery (well, in my Mom’s case, her grocery list paper), their different cursive styles, and the different commemorative stamps. I felt special!  I also received quite a few love letters from a man who was destined to marry me and play the accordion, unfortunately not in that…

My television service is abominable lately. Recordings freeze. I love things “on demand,” but apparently my demands are unreasonable, because the last two movies I have rented won’t play. “America’s Got Talent” went black right at the most crucial moment, and I wasn’t able to see if that guy survived the fifty foot fall into the baby pool. My computer is no longer wireless. The phones are a bit wonky. We have limped along with all of this, but when we lost the signal right in…

When people talk about stuff that they “can NOT believe,” I believe that they are actually thinking about pretty normal stuff. For instance, I have overheard people say things like “I cannot believe that the (insert your sports team of preference here) lost that game!” Conversations often veer in the direction of the imagination, as in “I can’t imagine how those two got together.”

But we can imagine how those two got together. It’s easy. She probably has big boobs, and…