We’re all familiar with cozy Christmas quotations, such as “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus…” and “Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house…” So for a change of pace, here are some Christmas quotes with a bit more zing…

“Our children await Christmas presents like politicians getting in election returns: there’s the Uncle Fred precinct and the Aunt Ruth district still to come in.”—Marcelene Cox

“I never believed in Santa Claus because I knew no white man would be coming into my neighborhood after dark.” — Dick Gregory

“There is a remarkable breakdown of taste and intelligence at Christmastime. Mature, responsible grown men wear neckties made of holly leaves and drink alcoholic beverages with raw egg yolks and cottage cheese in them.”— P.J. O’Rourke

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If you are considering buying a home and wondering how much of a difference there is between the highest and lowest property taxes in the country, here’s the per capita* low-down. Alabama has the lowest property tax in the USA, but if you buy a home in New Jersey, which has the highest property tax, you will be paying $2,165 smackeroos more per year than Alabama. Not exactly a pittance…

Four of the five states with the highest property tax rates are in the northeast:

1. New Jersey: $2,642.
2. Connecticut: $2,393.
3. New Hampshire: $2,320.
4. Wyoming: $2,175.
5. New York: $2,124.

The five lowest property taxes are all south of the Mason-Dixon line:

1. Alabama: $477.
2. Arkansas: $527.
3. New Mexico: $539.
4. Oklahoma: $562.
5. Kentucky: $620.

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During steamy New York City summer nights, I sleep in the nude, cooled by a sweeping fan. This is good for both my electric bill (I never use an air conditioner at night) and for my nightclothes budget, which pretty much hovers in the zero zone.

When fall arrives with crisper breezes and sleeping turns into a more refreshing proposition, I usually slip into an oversize cotton tee shirt. I exchange these short sleeve tees for long sleeve ones when winter storms start rattling my windows. For roomy comfort, I always buy the extra large size tees plucked from the men’s department in thrift shops. They’re dirt cheap and not only save me a bundle, but they’re also pleasanter against the skin then many of today’s synthetic nightgowns. The biggest prizes are fresh new tees or those barely used. I’m forever amazed by the terminally tattered tee shirts donated to thrifts by men under the delusion there is still life in those stretched to hell dead fibers.

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After one of the coldest, snowiest winters we’ve had in years, February is about to pounce. It’s time to break out the comfort foods to get us through that bleak gray month standing between us and Spring.

Remember when you were a kid and February was just part of that wonderful season, winter, with frosty designs on the windows and snowfalls that canceled—yay—school and all the kids in the neighborhood ran outside and licked the air borne swirling snowflakes and made angels and fat, lumpy snowmen. And remember how warm it was afterward in the kitchen drinking hot chocolate. And For lunch, eating grilled cheese or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or tomato or chicken soup. And after a day sledding and defending the fort with snowballs, remember how satisfying your meatloaf and mashed potatoes tasted, or maybe you had pot roast or macaroni and cheese or spaghetti at the dinner table where the whole family gathered and sat in seats that belonged to each member forever…And any bad things that happened to you that day vanished at the table. You were safe there. No big bad wolves could touch you.

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When I first moved to New York City I used to make appointments all over the island without regard to location. Result: I wasted a ton of time sitting (or more usually standing) on buses and subways traveling to and from typical daily appointments. Since claiming a seat on a public conveyance here is pretty much a competitive sport, I was rarely able to use that time productively. Even if I was fortunate enough to grab a subway seat from another not so nimble rider, I still had to deal with endless interruptions. These were not conducive to reading or writing unless one had the ability to remain focused during intervals of screeching pleas for money, break dancers back flipping in sync to pounding boom boxes, painfully off tune vocal renditions or acrobatics performed on the overhead strap bars. And all this while maintaining constant surveillance of any deranged passengers for sudden movements in one’s direction.

But all those wasted hours and fares ended when I changed health insurers. Most of my former doctors were affiliated with a far west side hospital that was a big bug to get to: two buses plus some of the longest cross-town blocks in the world to cover on foot. Every time I had a medical appointment over there, I kissed a whole morning or afternoon goodbye. So the first thing I did was select a new hospital that was within walking distance of my apartment. I found a great one a mile and a half away. Next I selected doctors affiliated with that hospital, so now every time I had a medical appointment, it was a pleasant walk to and from. Which saved me transportation fares with the added benefit of a healthy, and, in New York, always entertaining walk.

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Ever come across skinflint employers in job interviews? The next few posts describe my run-ins with a few of these year round Scrooges.

Located between Fifth and Madison, the address housing numerous galleries is a fancy-schmancy brownstone. Upstairs I have an appointment with the owner of a photography gallery who is interviewing for a gallery manager. Have I ever managed a photography gallery? No. Have I ever worked in a photography gallery? No. But I love photography and art. Not to mention cash is a tad low at the moment. So up I go.

While waiting for the owner to appear, I check out the quality of the photographs. They’re high end. Nothing too surreal or garbage canny. First hurtle cleared. The second hurtle – the atmosphere – is another matter. I feel a sense of unease, a whiff of negativity in the air.

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Why have some retail establishments not only escaped the hungry jaws of the worst recession since the depression, but also flourished in it? What are they selling? And why are people buying?

This past year, after small businesses began disappearing on every block in my Upper East Side neighborhood, I found myself peering through store windows to see how the survivors were coping. In many stores the unoccupied staff had nothing better to do than peer back at me. Lounging in empty customer seats in hair salons, stylists flipped listlessly through magazines or played games on their cells. At the nearby travel agency, first three, than four of the seven desks went empty. Stationed at their front doors, store proprietors contemplated the passing scene, longing perhaps for stage hooks to drag in some trade.

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One minute after the stock market opened, I knew there was a problem. The stock (let’s call it ZXA) didn’t jump out of the gate, raring to go, as it usually did. But when two more of my Bulletin Board stocks also didn’t show any trades in the first few minutes, I thought it might be due to a simple computer glitch. Before calling my broker, I brought up the active ZXA message board on Investors Hub. If anything was going on with this stock, these guys, many of whom had owned this stock for years, would know. And yes, something was going on all right…Trading in ZXA stock had been suspended.

For I don’t remember how long, I stared at my computer screen while a thousand thoughts zoomed and banged into each other in my head. Had trading been halted for good or bad major news? I immediately suspected bad. For weeks, indeed months, the stock price had been falling from a high of $2.24 in October to an opening of $.88 that morning. A conference call that was supposed to outline the company’s progress had suddenly been cancelled only hours before the event. Add that to a new financial officer who had flown the coop a few months after his appointment, blaming his departure on the company’s failure to obtain insurance formerly agreed to in his contract.

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The first time I stumbled on the Gift Clearance Shop at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I was delighted to uncover a series of spacious rooms packed with alluring goodies. When I returned for a second visit – poof – the shop had vanished. When I discovered its new location (again accidentally) down a flight of stairs in the Egyptian Collection, the Clearance Shop had shrunk to a shadow of its former self. And then boom – the shop suddenly expanded and gained a more commodious partner two floors above it. So at the moment there are two Clearance Shops in the museum, the bigger one at the rear of the second floor Gift Shop, and the second diminutive one in the basement.

In contrast to all this roving, The museum’s flagship Gift Shop is solidly planted, front and center in the main entrance hall on Fifth Avenue, the better to check out gift possibilities when entering and to purchase those gifts for full price when leaving.

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When I used to take photographs in long past St. Patrick’s Day parades, I rarely saw grossly overweight high school band marchers. Then last month after a thirty-year hiatus I decided to try out my new digital camera and shoot the parade again. Right off the bat I had problems in the bright sunlight seeing the marchers in my viewfinder. As they approached closer and closer, they kept merging into large clumps of black shapes making it impossible to precisely identify anything I was shooting till I replayed the images. At which point I saw a disturbingly large percent of obese teenage band members filling many of the frames. Which probably shouldn’t have surprised me, since over 67% of US adults are overweight or obese.

But to see so many teenagers in the parade carrying all that extra poundage when they should have been nearing their physical prime was troubling. And many of them definitely appeared to be struggling to keep up with their more svelte classmates. The parade route covers well over two and a half miles, a long distance for out of shape couch potatoes. The pained expression on the scarlet, sweaty face of one boy who was maybe twelve or thirteen suggested he was having an epic struggle with his obese body to keep it moving forward — to not throw in the towel no matter how badly he was hurting.

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