Family

My advice is simple: Do not request a teddy bear made out of your deceased loved one's shirt.

A Zen monastery isn’t the kind of destination you’d typically think of taking the family on vacation, but that’s what we did this summer. I got up very early one morning in late June, shoveled the 18 year old and the 12 year old into the car, along with some basic camping gear, and drove […]

So the 9 year old, who loves to wear soccer jerseys with the names and numbers of his heroes (Ronaldo, Neymar) said this morning he wanted a Team USA Olympics swim cap that said Phelps on it. “Or better yet, Ledecky!” he added. Definitely Ledecky, he said later, because she wins by larger amounts. D

“In the pots warmed the bigos; mere words cannot tell Of its wondrous taste, colour and marvellous smell. One can hear the words buzz, and the rhymes ebb and flow, But its content no city digestion can know. To appreciate the Lithuanian folksong and folk food, You need health, [to] live on land, and

I was briefly walking behind a mother and daughter in downtown San Francisco last week about midday. They were both very nicely turned out: The mother in her thirties, the daughter probably 8 or 9, in matching brown coats and matching mid-length haircuts. A pretty picture. The daughter was talking t

One of the things about having a younger brother, if you are a scientifically-minded child, is that you have a guinea pig for many of your experiments. And Chris was a willing or unwilling guinea pig many times. Let me tell you about one of those times. One day, we were down in the basement […]

Ten years ago today, I was in the middle of trying to get a content syndication startup off the ground. I’d just left InfoWorld, where I had a cushy gig as a columnist and content development editor. In six months, the startup would be dead and I’d be back to journalism, this time as a […]

My daughter and I will be on TV this week, 8pm local time Wednesday night (Nov. 14) on most PBS stations. That’s when our “GeekDad” segment will air, sometime during that night’s Wired Science program. Wired Science is a collaboration between Wired (my employer) and KCET (a PBS station in LA). I’m n

Thanks to repeated viewings of Jimmy Neutron, Clifford the Big Red Dog, and Scooby Doo, Clara is now obsessed with the idea of building a super-duper clubhouse that contains, among other things, trap doors, secret pools, a waterfall, and levers that make things happen (like pop people into the air).

Last night Clara was working on her homework, part of which involved math problems — simple addition. (Math homework! In kindergarten! But that’s another post.) 2+2, 2+3, 6+0, etc. Karen set her up with a handful of clementines on the table and her homework folder. For 2+3, Clara put two clementines

At the start of JFK Drive in Golden Gate Park, near the McLaren Lodge at Fell and Stanyan, the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition holds a monthly “Freedom from Training Wheels” event to help kids learn to ride their bikes without training wheels. On Sundays the drive is closed to car traffic, except fo