About55

The definition of addict (from dictionary.com): ad·dict noun

~ A person who is addicted to an activity, habit, or substance: a drug addict. Okay, that seems simple enough. I’m addicted to many things, […]

Before you start getting upset at me, the title of this column is about much more than those kids we often see tethered to parent by a leash! Walking in a park the other day, my 14-year-old son pointed out a […]

Every summer means excitement for kids and a degree of dismay for parents: at least the honest parents.  It means the kids get to play, sleep in, bother dad and mom, and otherwise have a ball.  Dad and mom may […]

It’s hard for me to believe, but after writing more than one hundred “A Dad’s Point-of-View” columns, I’ve yet to tackle one of the biggest issues in families. It is one of the issues that causes more dissension […]

My teen son got a job! Amazing! It took over a year of searching by foot and on the Internet, applying countless times, and uncharacteristic persistence and follow through. It was not easy. He experienced some […]

I was amazed at the debate that followed Bin Laden’s death about whether it was all right to celebrate his death. Excuse me? A mass-murdering psychopath bent on the destruction of all Western society and the […]

I put off enabling my son to drive for as long as I could, but he passed the driver’s test on his third try and succeeded in getting his grades up to our agreed-upon level. I couldn’t delay it any longer. He […]

When I grew up, there were wonderful dads that were the staple of television.  These TV dads were an ideal that we all realized was a bit too perfect, but these dads (and moms, for that matter), made us feel […]

I had one of those days we’ve all had at one time or another to! Do I sound like a 5-year-old or what?

It began while my wife and our younger son and I were visiting her parents in Vancouver, Canada. My […]

I play tennis with an old friend who has a cell-phone that probably came out around the time the first iPod came out. Heck, he doesn’t even know what an iPod is. Or how to text, use Twitter, or how to “like” a […]

My birthday and Dad’s birthday happened at the same time this past month. Dad is my Andy Kaufman alter ego, though I will never admit that Dad has any resemblance to me! We each celebrated our birthdays in […]

I have the joy of living across the street from a beautiful man-made lake. There is always roving fowl and other wildlife in and around the lake and it’s an ideal location for an early morning walk. Often, I […]

Some of my best thinking is when I walk around the lake near our home. Often, I will listen to music. My taste is decidedly eclectic and recently I listened to the overture from The King and I and realized how […]

When I began my writing career, and then my radio show, I promised myself I’d avoid politics. I’m breaking that promise via this first column of 2012, though it is not exclusively political. I’m old enough to […]

There is a reason that money is on that short list of things that couples argue about most. What are the other things? Sex, and the kids, of course. With the state of our worldwide economy being in such flux, […]

For the past few years, I’ve written a New Year’s resolutions column. One year it was pretty straightforward while another year I scored the previous year’s resolutions using baseball terms and statistics. […]