The Dance

Now class, everyone line up. Today, you will learn the steps that hold the key to your future success.

First step - Lean far to the right, open your mouth and prevaricate
Second step - Repeat step one, but add a spin and be sure not only to prevaricate but to obfuscate
Third step - Saunter, strut and pontificate
Fourth step - Begin to yell and stamp your feet, and always exaggerate
Fifth step - Continue to gesticulate, while now running like a raging bull, pinning those on the left directly against the wall
Sixth step - With fire in your eyes, agitate, as those on the left do the squirm
Seventh step - Turn yourself around and reinvigorate, if your prevarication, obfuscation, pontification, exaggeration, gesticulation and agitation lose their momentum
Eighth step - Run circles around those on the left, slowly causing them to disintegrate
Ninth step - Rest, and self congratulate as those on the left trip over their feet, trying to get out of their own way

Repeat over and over until the dance becomes one continuous flow- Perpetuate, be obdurate and never vacillate

You are a natural at the dance of the right, by the right and for the right.

Where Is That Ringing Coming From?

In the 21st century, we have stores devoted entirely to choosing cellphones and proper 'plans'. It is now a fundamental need of many in our society to carry little computers in their pockets. Significant sums of money are devoted to the purchase, utilization and worship of the latest, and for what appears to be the briefest of moments, the greatest in technological achievement.

To put this in context, my phone is a relic. It has no 'data' plan and does little more than permit me to speak with others without a telephone cord. I don't do text messaging. I still have not quite mastered the art of searching for my phone contacts. I did not program these contacts, and would be without any alphabetical list were it not for the assistance of my family.

I am proud to report that I have taken many pictures with my phone. However, almost every one is of the inside of my pocket. Those few that have been taken intentionally, remain locked inside my own world as I have no idea how to send the images to the rest of society. I am always told that most applications are intuitive. What the hell does that mean?

Over the past several weeks, we have had numerous family discussions about upgrading our phones and our plans. It seems that every time a new phone is acquired, one must pledge allegiance to a particular carrier for a period of years. Like LeBron, Dwyane and Chris, my entire family has now played out our contracts. We are free agents on the phone market.

Jo and I enter the Verizon store. There is much energy and enthusiasm among the gathered throng. I listen to animated conversations about the size of this piece, the narrowness of that one. I hear mention as to the clarity of the picture. There is talk of Droids and similar other worldly sounding pieces. I know that all of this has significance, but for the life of me, I can't find the on-off button on the phone at which I am staring.

I watch as Jo picks up a demo model and navigates through its portal into another universe. I try, in my head, to mimic her every move.

Jo shows me how she got onto the Internet. NYTimes.com appears and she is soon turning images sideways, making them bigger and then smaller. She continues to do magic tricks for a few more minutes. She has now convinced herself, I think, that she is up whatever challenges she may encounter.

I soon step up to bat. I try to make myself almost invisible, so that those in the room won't notice that there is an imposter in their midst. I make it appear that I am totally conversant in the rudimentary functions of this lump I hold in my hand.

After a few moments, images actually appear on the screen. I quickly get the hang of moving my fingers closer together or further apart. I find the icon to be advised as to the weather in every town on the globe. I can do some things. Not a lot, but some things.

I don't want to press my luck. While it takes a little effort, I am eventually able to back out, and produce a blank screen for the next visitor. I don't think anyone has noticed me. Given my limited abilities, I consider this to be an unqualified success.

Jo and I slowly work our way out of the store and into the night air. We speak of options for each family member. We decide that I will wait a little before making a decision. I will try out what Jo buys, slowly, and see whether frustration or excitement is the prevailing sentiment. Let me dip my toe into the water, before diving in. One small step for man...

The Restraining Order Has Been Lifted

THE NY TIMES HAS FINALLY COME TO ITS SENSES - AN EDITED VERSION OF THE PIECE BELOW APPEARS IN TODAY'S LETTERS TO THE EDITOR SECTION ('THE DREAM JOB, OUT OF REACH').


My friend once referred to it as the lost generation, as she watched uncomfortably while her daughter, a law school graduate, found herself unemployed and, for a short period, back home. It is a distressing time for our generation, as we watch dreams of our young being deferred and hope they are not permanently destroyed.

I am a parent of 2, both of whom are in their 20's. I have witnessed a number of their friends stress over whether to remain in jobs that were a bad fit. The fear of the alternative, has caused some unhappy alliances to continue. Others, have decided that the anguish of being in the wrong workplace is ultimately just not worth it. They now are either in their childhood bedrooms, like Scott Nicholson, looking for something that makes sense, or seeking the shelter of a further degree, hoping they find a different economic environment down the road.

Next year, my daughter completes her graduate education. I hope that all her hard work will have immediate positive results, in a job that is both satisfying and pays the bills. It is not too much to wish for, but with an "elusive American dream" I recognize that it is something that she, like so many others, could find just out of reach.

A Letter of Apology from Dan Gilbert to LeBron James

My Dear LeBron,

I wanted to take this opportunity to apologize to you for my outburst the other day. It was uncalled for, and was not in keeping with the relationship we shared over the past 7 years. I will never forget all that you have done for me and for this city.

When you arrived, we were but a struggling franchise, never able to reach the NBA's promised land. Thanks to you, as you leave, we are now a struggling franchise, never able to reach the NBA's promised land.

I thought we would be together forever, like Brad and Jennifer; A- Rod and Kate; Ben and Jen (#1).

I must have done something wrong. Was it not naming the arena after you? Did I forget to give you a Rolls Royce for your birthday? Were you really serious about being governor of Ohio in the off season?

I wish things had worked out differently, but I guess the stars just didn't align. Or maybe they did, but there is no such thing as collusion among players.

I will always think of you like a son, a son who stole my money, my heart and then ran away.

I had a dream last night. In this dream, you were an angel. I am sorry, I truly didn't mean to push you down those stairs.

So, from me, and all of us who remain in Cleveland, we wish you nothing but the best. Let me rephrase that. We wish you nothing, and hope you and your new friends are never the best.

With deep regrets for my earlier open letter, and my love always,

Dan Gilbert, Majority Owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers and your former BFF

Lebron

As we watch and wonder, as we await the television special devoted to the man and his decision, we are in the vortex of LEBRON. Our lexicon demands tributes to this phenomenon. Following, are some possibilities:

'Lebronite' - a fawning, synchophantic follower; a worshiper; an idolizer; one consumed by the greatness of another.

'Lebronned' - to be overwhelmed by the possibility of gaining financial benefits on the back of another - see the video by the mayors of Cleveland and New York as examples of this ridiculous hyperbolic attempt to capture the economic capital known as LEBRON

'Lebron , the billionaire' - a board game in which the protagonist moves around the country seeking to fulfill a lifelong dream to be richer than the entire community in which he settles- if the protagonist can do this in New York City he automatically wins the game

'Lebronzed' - to be immortalized during your time

'Lebronican' - a political movement to name an athlete governor of your state upon signing of his contract

'Lebron time' - whatever time Lebron says it is

'Lebron, Florida; Lebron, Ohio; Lebron, Illinois; Lebron, New York' - 1 right and 3 wrong

This is worse than the buildup to awarding a city the rights to host the Super Bowl or the Olympics. When the decision is rendered, it will appear that the fate of the winner and the losers will be forever sealed. Elation or depression. To be a lover or a hater of everything Lebron. All in the blink of Lebron's eyes.

'Lebronatronics' - The world according to Lebron (stay tuned)

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things to remember

when attending a James Taylor, Carole King concert at Tanglewood on a July 4th weekend.

BEFORE THE CONCERT BEGINS
1. drive over at least 4 days in advance to secure the best parking spot and best spot on 'the lawn'.
2. hire a sherpa with a donkey to carry the chairs, tarps and food supplies you need for the evening
3. bring "War and Peace" so you have some reading material before the concert starts
4. anticipate your little patch of earth becoming a main thoroughfare for 20,000 travelers
5. don't drink any water or other beverage for at least 3 days before the concert so you don't have to use the facilities
6. no one is sitting next to the garbage dumps for a reason
7. don't eat very much for the week before, as you will consume enough calories to hold you through the next week
8. don't make arrangements to meet by the third big tree from the left
9. the crowd's most likely drug of choice is not marijuana but Pepcid AC
10. as much as you consider your voice the equal of either of the performers, no one is there to hear you,


ONCE THE CONCERT STARTS
1. you are in one of the most beautiful venues you will ever find
2. it is a wonderful evening
3. you are sitting with the people who mean the most in the world to you
4. everyone is smiling; everyone is happy
5. there are babies, and young children, older children, young parents, young grandparents here and they are all in your group
6. you love this music
7. you have almost no rhythm, and you don't really care
8. you should be getting to your car before the last encore but you won't be
9. you are more relaxed then you have been in weeks
10.you will be coming back next year if your luck, and James Taylor hold out

Wake up Joe Torre

What was Joe Torre thinking? As I watched the ninth inning meltdown by the L.A. Dodger closer last night, I wondered why he was allowed to self- combust, costing his team a game and hurting his psyche if not his arm.

In an era where everything is tied to pitch counts, how do you let your pitcher throw 48 pitches in ONE INNING, especially the night after throwing 19 pitches. As they say in baseball, he "had nothing left in the tank". And yet Torre remained planted firmly to his seat in the dugout as the disaster unfolded.

We all spent over a decade watching Torre protect the arm of maybe the greatest closer in baseball history. We all managed along side him every day. When had he ever let Mariano twist in the wind like this? I can't recall a time where he mistreated Rivera the way he mishandled his player and the situation yesterday.

Maybe it is being in L.A. that has dulled Torre's managerial senses. Who knows. I just want to thank him, as a long time die hard Yankee fan, for his failure to grasp the obvious. Could you imagine if this happened when he was in New York, in the days when George Steinbrenner ruled over his team with an iron hand? It is almost too painful to contemplate.

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What Would J.I. Do?

It was about 50 minutes into what was an intense, grueling bike ride. Well, at least that's how I viewed it. For Joanne and our friend Margaret, both of whom happen to be in excellent shape, it was almost the conclusion of a flat as a pancake trip of about 10 miles in total. While they chatted and rolled forward effortlessly throughout our journey, I was trying to 'draft' behind them, to lessen the almost Herculean effort that was taking place, at least in my mind. I spoke little and pretended that I was as able as they.

The only hill we would confront, would come at the 50 minute point. To me, it looked like the monster they refer to as Heartbreak Hill, at the 20 mile mark of the Boston Marathon. In reality, if Lance Armstrong cycles up mountains that are rated 10 out of 10 in difficulty, this would have registered no more than a 2. To call this a hill was really an insult to all true hills.

The 'climb' was maybe a quarter of mile or so. There was actually a way to flatten this out by taking a road that branched off from the main street, meandered back and forth, and eventually led, in a circuitous manner, to the top. Jo chose this route, thus turning our 2 into maybe 1 1/2.

Jo and Margaret moved through and up, quickly and without thought. I began my ascent by putting my gear at the easiest setting. With each turn of the pedal, I became a little more fatigued. My companions had already completed the route and here I was, imperceptably moving forward, the goal still in the distance.

Then it hit me. "What would J.I do" I thought to myself. "What would J.I. do?"

John Isner had just finished playing in the most incredible match in the history of tennis, and maybe the most incredible test of human endurance and fortitude since sports was invented. He had played about 5000 games of tennis, or so it seemed, in one match. As the history books will recall it, he ate, drank and slept while playing tennis for 3 days. This was the ultimate in willing oneself up to the top of the mountain.

Now, it was as if J.I. was pushing me forward. "Don't get off that bike" he yelled in my ear. "Don't you dare get off that bike".

In what must have been a record for the slowest time ever recorded in getting to the top of this little street on a bike, I triumphed. At the apex, I nonchalantly sipped from my water bottle, and then mostly coasted the last few hundred yards to the apartment complex. Jo and Margaret had already put their bikes away as I came to a halt in front of our garage.

"Good ride" I told them. As Margaret hurried off, to get ready for her next activity, a lengthy 'power walk', I stumbled up the steps to the apartment. With J.I. now on my side, who knows where this may lead. I am ready for anything. Except maybe biking straight up that hill.

'Out'surance

Raise your hand if you think you can properly interpret your health insurance policy. I didn't say Simon Says. Put your hand down. You're out.

As I wander helplessly through the bureaucratic maze of explanation of insurance benefits, or more precisely, lack thereof, I feel like I am in the middle of an Abbott and Costello who's on first routine. Let me walk with you as I take you on a journey through the who, what, why and I don't knows.

It all began innocently enough. As a result of back surgery last June, I was in need of some physical therapy. Having done nothing over my lifetime to 'strengthen my core' I would now go through several months of sessions, 2 or 3 times a week, to at least try to build a one or two pack. The goal was to give me the best chance of keeping me upright and out of pain. Logic would dictate that this would help me and ultimately benefit my insurance carrier, who would not be faced with paying for any additional surgery.

My insurance plan permitted me 30 visits per year with a physical therapist. My cost, were I to find an in-network back strengthener person, was $20 per session. The carrier would then absorb the remaining balance, at a rate agreed upon between them and the service provider. Simple enough. And simple enough it was, as I located someone who was willing to accept what seemed like a wholly insufficient payment from my carrier (I think the total compensation was $59 per hour). I got to be pushed, pulled and prodded, and in the end, was without a one pack, but thankfully in little discomfort.

Come early December, my back had decided it was not through causing me pain. A trip to the doctor resulted in a prescription for 12 more sessions with a therapist of my choosing, as long as that person was in network and agreed to accept the payments established by my carrier. But, since I had exhausted my 30 permitted visits for 2009 and would now be paying fully out of my own pocket, at least for the balance of the calendar year, I would wait until the ball dropped before I began dropping and lifting the ball in the therapist's office. I was smart enough to understand my policy terms. I would be patient until I could become a virtually non-paying patient.

And wait I did. In early January, armed with a brand new bag of 30 allowable visits, I searched out a new therapist,as I was concerned that my earlier course of treatment had actually been a little too easy on me. It seems my carrier was known for being particularly stingy, so my chore was not as easy as one would imagine. But, eventually, I found a practice that advised that I, and my carrier, were welcome. I was told I could start with them as soon as they were in contact with my carrier, and had gotten the approval to take care of me.

As it turned out, take care of me they did, but not as I had imagined.

I was informed in the middle of January that all was set and I was now their patient. At the first of my sessions, I checked in at the reception desk, announced myself and my intentions. I was led shortly thereafter into the back room, which looked much like the room where my 2009 treatments had occurred. Things to pull, things to push, things to run on, things to lie down on, alarm clocks, timers, and other people in various states of disrepair.

I was 'assigned' to my leader who gently walked me through my paces, seeing where I was, and where I would eventually go. At the end of our 50 minutes (the shortened version of an hour) I went back to the front desk and advised that I had a $20 co-pay that I would now fork over. I was then told that I would be separately billed and thus I should put my $ back in my pocket. I did.

I ended up going back to this facility on 10 additional occasions. I liked the treatments, well at least I thought they were helpful. Each time in I passed the reception desk. At the conclusion of each session, I went back to that desk and got a token, which permitted me to leave the parking lot without cost to me. It was a seemingly efficient system and it was as pain free as these things can be. Never once was I asked for any money, and never again had I offered. I was waiting for my bill, which by my calculation (not too difficult to do) was to be $20 times 11, or $220.

So, you can imagine my surprise (that it the "g" rated version) when a month or 2 later I opened up my insurance carrier's explanation of benefits to discover that I was being told that MY cost for these 11 sessions was somewhere north of $2700. The first question I had to ask myself was how the carrier decided that my therapy, when they were paying it, was worth less than $60 per hour, but when I was reaching into my pocket, the retail value had escalated to over $300 for each 60 minutes (including the portion that they pay). Bad enough. What was unfathomable was the next leap into the world of the illogical.

The therapy practice had 2 offices, one located somewhere out in the general community. The second, where I found myself due to its proximity to my office, was housed in a wing of a local medical center. This, I was now being advised, made me a patient at a hospital. It apparently mattered not that I walked into each session from the street, and 50 minutes later walked out through the same door I had earlier entered. My 30 treatments, with my $20 co-pay, no longer applied. Now, my $2500 deductible for hospital visits controlled.

My son is both very bright and very much engaged in the practice of dealing with insurance carriers and hospitals. He has had the misfortune of being the go to guy to address our family's insurance questions, whether pertaining to himself, to his sister, his parents, his grandparents, and on occasions, various other members of society. I turned to him, sure this would be a slam dunk. Not so fast.

He started using words like interpretation and phrases like 'exploiting a loophole'. He spoke of working its way through the system. How could this be?

We have since had conversations with the carrier and the therapy center. We have written and explained. We have received assurance from the therapist that they had spoken with the carrier on the day of the first treatment and confirmed the $20 copay. We are still being billed for the full amount by the therapist. We are still being told by the carrier that this is all my responsibility. We are nowhere close to resolution. I do not know whether this will ever lead to a rational conclusion.

I don't want to pay this bill. I am not obligated to pay this bill. I pay an exorbitant amount of money every month for insurance protection. I have insurance but little or no protection. I don't want to be dunned. I don't want my credit impaired. I don't know why what seems to be so clear is not. I want to get out of this Abbott and Costello routine but I am afraid I can't find the exit. All I know for sure is that I don't know much about my health insurance. Except that it went up 34% this year.

Filling out my foursome

As I struggle mightily to find even a whisper of a golf game, I was buoyed slightly by yesterday's events. If the saying is true that misery loves company, then I was able to find plenty of that merely by turning on my television set and watching the implosions at Pebble Beach.

Who were those guys masquerading as the best golfers in the world? Whatever happened to all those 63's and 64's? How did a hole less than a 100 yards long become a challenge? And what in the world was a table top doing where the green should have been on the 14th hole?

There were more grimaces, head shakes and question marks then I had ever seen from the cream of the crop. Dustin Johnson went from the leader of the entire world to a guy who you felt sorry for, in about as long as it took you to read this sentence.

As those who we have long seen with the widest of smiles and trophies held aloft slinked and sulked, the last man standing wobbled home. We watched as he fell from 4 under to 3, then 2, next 1, and finally to even par. Even that descent did not seriously impact his lead. 3 foot putts were no longer 'gimmes' for anyone, short shots sailed into the rough and the sand traps, and longer strokes headed to parts unknown.

For those of us who live in a golf world filled with disappointment, in which greatness never appears, and good rarely does, this was like watching my Saturday morning foursome on the screen. Here was a course that brought even the strongest to their knees. This was a technical knockout, as we watched the victim struck over and over, meandering aimlessly without a clue of where he was or how to defend himself.

So, as I get set to play my next round, I thank Pebble Beach for making Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Ernie Els look nothing if not mortal. Hey guys, I have time at Centennial this weekend. If you 3 are not doing anything else, why don't you join me? We can play even-up, with 2 off the first tee and a floating mulligan. It's Pebble or me. See you at 9:32.

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