77% Weekly

Why we don’t fly, a Passover story   Cohen and I chat about once a week, usually on my evening walk with the dogs around my beautifully maintained 1940s NE Portland neighborhood. We chat about life, how we miss our deceased parents, his dating life, my parenting life. We tell and critique jokes. We chat […]

Fresh Fish Sold Here Today I remember a magician in the 1980’s unfurling and holding up a paper banner with the words “Fresh fish sold here today” printed on it. The magician would say, “I find this phrase a touch redundant. Fresh? Of course it’s fresh fish. The sign doesn’t need the word fresh at

Laughing at as many incongruities as possible It’s a Tuesday night. We just had tacos. We do Taco Tuesdays probably more than two weeks a month, if we kept track of it. But it could be any night other than Tuesdays. Because we aren’t that uptight about stuff. The kids argue about whose turn it

Dad and I went on our third father-son road trip in 2002. This one was in a rented RV. We leave LA, drive east, pass Palm Springs, and go south to Niland, by the shore of the Salton Sea—a huge unswimmable lake of salt, rotting fish corpses, and runoff fertilizer. From 1910 through the 1950s,

My friend Michelle sits four feet feet away from the stainless-steel fire pit in my backyard. I’m on the other side, also four feet away. We are having a small, Covid-safe inauguration celebration. We are drinking G & Ts with Hendricks, a fancy tonic, and slices of cucumber. Two drinks in, I’m good and buzzed.

Opt in While it’s not the rousing fun of a kids’ game of hide-and-seek or even a word search, I enjoy the game of looking for the unsubscribe button at the bottom of automated emails. I decided that I don’t need to know about all of the sales from my local craft store, the inside

*A Few Chess Lessons* The dogs and I are on our evening walk. It’s a longer than usual as my friend Carmel and I are chatting via my wireless headset about the chess lessons we took in New York City in the early 1980s. It’s raining hard, but I’ve lived in Portland long enough to

My classroom. North Portland. September 2016. This week, I will meet five new sets of students. It’s my seventh year as a full-time high school math teacher. Today is our second day and the second day that I’m not doing any mathematics in the classroom. I’m hoping to beat last year’s record of six days

Yesterday I was moved by the wise words from CNN commentator and former Obama advisor Van Jones: Some things you have to see believe – like what we saw today at the Capitol. But there are also things you gotta BELIEVE in order to SEE. I believe breakdowns can lead to breakthroughs if you use them right.

Two Lessons for 2021 ### The 77% Weekly. ### Rabbi Brian. ROTB.org ### 40/52 weeks a year in your in-box 1. Good enough is good enough   The second section of this article, the next part, has been upcycled from a 2019 issue.   By upcycling, I mean I’m reusing, elevating some of my previous