A thin line separates a prudent shopper from a miserly consumer. I fear that I sometimes straddle this line. Over the past few weeks, a number of events made me re-examine my shopping habits. My favorite clothing store, Coldwater Creek, announced that it is closing. Considering that my closet is packed with clothing purchased via...
If you know what your car engine sounds like when running normally, you will instantly pick up early signs of mechanical problems. If you know the sound your baby makes when he’s hungry, you will immediately recognize a cry of pain. Departure from pattern is a warning sign. In forensic accounting, false expense submissions are often...
My father was a respected physician and family man. He died when I was 19. All my life I have tried, with varying success, to follow his example. But what if I couldn’t remember him? I would have no role model to emulate. I wouldn’t know where I came from. Even worse, what if someone...
Is it a coincidence that countries with healthy Jewish populations tend to enjoy far greater economic success than those without? King Edward I expelled the Jews from England in 1290. For about two hundred years prior, England’s economy had been growing dramatically with Jews playing a significant role in the development of silver mining, currency...
Would you consider a resume sent as part of a job application to be business correspondence? So would I. Yet when my husband asked a young woman who responded to an ad for assistance why she did not capitalize (the word) “I,” she replied that she would know to capitalize it on work documents. He...
Place your hands together, palm to palm, in a praying gesture. No problem, right? Now rapidly rub them backwards and forwards pressing them against each other as you rub. Feel the heat? What if you tightly clasp a rope and quickly pull it through your hand? You’ll quickly raise a heat blister. Friction, which produces...
I have been searching in vain for a support group catering to the geographically challenged. Moving to a new city a few weeks ago means that I often have no idea where I am. His voice filling with desperation my husband beseeches, “Don’t you know that P___ Street is east of us?” I don’t even...
You may be one of those people to whom interesting things keep happening. I hope you’re always saying things like, “You won’t believe what happened to me today!” or “Guess who I ran into yesterday.” Friends sometimes ask you, “How did you get that interview?” Or, they exclaim, “I can’t believe that you found one...
