“Merry Christmas" These 2 words are always a reminder to me of the magic and wonder in the world: whether it’s the magic of Santa arriving while you sleep and leaving lots of toys or the wonder of an innocent baby arriving in the world in humble surroundings as a gift to us. This season is

It's been a rough year for a lot of people in a lot of ways.  As it draws to a close, may we all look forward to a better year. I wish everyone a happy, hopeful and mostly a peaceful 2015.

This is the gift giving time of year. It makes me reflect on the gifts that have been my favorite over the course of time. In no particular order:

Over the years from time to time I have worked on my family tree.  With familyecho.com, I have now mapped it out, and with a total of forty seven entries have taken it to the level of my great great great grandparents on my father's mother's father's parents' side, if you can follow that.  My great great greats were Sarah Stein and Solomon Potak, and Cecil Cohen and Samuel Orloff, who were born who knows where in the early 1800s.   I thought that was going pretty far back, until

As Hanukah is upon us, I wanted to let you know about my spin on a holiday tradition.   I never connected to the religious prayers when lighting candles and wanted to do something that was more meanignful. So i started a new tradition when my children were young. Each night when we lit a candle, we dedicated it to an important person in our lives that had passed. We talked about them, told stories, laughed and cried.   I told some friends and they have adopted this new tradition. Have you done something different over the years during the holidays?

I don't know how long it has been going on (I suspect many used spears were passed around by forward thinking Neanderthals), but I think reGifting is a great practice and venerable tradition. Everyone drives a "Previously owned" car and lauds recycling as a "Save The World" necessity, but for some incomprehensible reason their first cousin is frowned upon.Well, it is time for this down-low practice to come out of the cold and into the light. No more shame and sneaking.

Tuesday morning, I posted to Gotham politics a blurb and link from Crains that “Theater cancels premiere of controversial film” with a comments aimed a Gotham bloggers that I see a great blog here. Anyone familiar with that Gotham mantra, you say it you own it?