This open letter to Michael Bloomberg appeared in part in New York Woman. But even if you don’t live anywhere near Manhattan, you probably are being driven nuts by noise pollution, too. Dear Mayor Mike: First of all, I want you to know that I voted for you, and will again, and think that you’re doing a great job in this impossible city, which I happen to love. There...

I wanted to call this “The Case of The Really Stupid Slippers,” but I am haunted by the ghost of my nitpicking editor who would have told me that the slippers themselves couldn’t be stupid, but me for choosing them, so the title would be inaccurate, misleading, and inappropriate. But I’ve worked on a lot of mysteries (I’ll tell you about Nancy Drew some day),...

Although baby, it’s still cold out there, this is the first day of Spring, and that’s as good a time as any to talk about the subjects of l-l-l-love and m-m-m-marriage. Which two things, I can now sincerely say — without bitterness (or stuttering) — are not always mutually exclusive. It was not always thus. My romantic escapades often played out like the...

If I were on a diet, I’d really resent hearing about those “new” plans on the market that I’d already tried. I mean, how many spins can you put on low calorie, low fat, or low carbs? Apparently, like the universe, it’s endless. Since I don’t do diets, yet need something to rail against (I am, after all, a professional whiner), what I do allow to bug me are all the...

They’re mad at Obama. “They,” of course, are always mad at Obama. This time, it’s because he made a joke while discussing the current financial mess when he appeared on Sixty Minutes. Now, as any idiot could tell you, he wasn’t laughing AT the financial situation, but ABOUT it. Why? Because as bad as things are, a person with a sense of humor can find something...

Ah, Rome, the Eternal City. Forget about San Francisco: you can leave your heart here faster than you can say Ciao, Baby! I, however, held on to my heart, but left my underwear. As you may know, I  am capable of losing anything. Gloves, of course, and pens and pencils, cell phones, keys, wallets, and address books, not to mention money, checks, and laundry...

They wuz robbed! Just before April Fool’s Day last year, thousands of people in Brooklyn thought they had won The Daily News lottery— which would have paid them $100,000 each— only to find out that the numbers were wrong because of a printing error. Ouch! The lawyer representing some of these non- winners (it would be cruel to call them losers, no?) sez it ain’t...

I have a cleaning person (we don’t call them ladies any more, ladies ) named Eva, who is lovely and cleans up a storm. She hardly breaks anything, and if I left cash lying around, I would find it on my desk, the bills ironed, the coins polished and stacked in neat piles. She’s also reliable, shows up on time, and doesn’t drink the liquor. So what could possibly be...