By the time the guys were 3 they’d learned that sooner or later their pretty balloons would pop if I gave in to their pleas to blow it bigger. It took a few bouts of …

If you hold your breath every time a letter arrives from your bank and pray it’s not telling you your credit-card interest rate is about to skyrocket, don’t exhale just because Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd’s …

The headline – Feeling stressed? You can combat the worry line – was enticing enough that I clicked.
It included some interesting anecdotal nuggets about how the economy has taken its toll on our health – …

Coming to a town near you: The arrest of a teen on child pornography charges for taking pictures of herself.
It happened again this week in New Jersey, when a 14-year-old was arrested after posting nude …

Maybe Boots is not just on a mission to explode my head and make Big Guy late for school every morning when he wails “I can’t remember my shoes.”
Turns out he’s not just being whiny …

Six months into this work at home gig, I have to confess a renewed appreciation for my sweats.
Not that I haven’t always been infatuated, but before it was a love affair consummated only on weekends. …

Lewis Smith, you flick your Bic for all of us fed up with basketball hoops on sidewalks and weed whackers blaring at 7 on a Saturday morning.
You’re carrying the torch for millions annoyed by gas-powered …

Sometimes it’s hard to decide who to root for in a hissing match between giants such as the one that’s been going on since December between Warner Music Group and YouTube/Google.
Unable to reach a new …

Note to self: Set parental controls to block access to all articles mentioning “Obama” and “garden.”
Nah. Too vague. That also would filter anything happening in the Rose Garden. OK, then let’s try “Michelle Obama” and …

Go ahead, tell us we just don’t understand.
Patiently explain why the $165 million in bonuses American International Group is paying 400 people are necessary to keep “some of these brainiacs in their seats.” Tell us …

Next to “bop brother over the head” and baseball, “pretend I’m not allergic” is Big Guy’s favorite game.
Boots will sit with their toy cash register as his brother orders at McDonald’s. “I’ll have chicken nuggets, …

Food and Drug Administration left hand, meet the Food and Drug Administration right hand. You two need to talk.
Right hand says we’ll look at banning children’s cold medicine because some parents misuse it. The reason: …

She takes care of Boots, fights off Swiper, loves her abuela and can fend for herself quite nicely, thank you very much.
Ay, but just as dragons live forever but not so little boys, it seems …

When a well-connected party-goer mentions that she’s wearing a 10-year-old dress to a charity gala, it’s easy to dismiss everything else that comes out of her mouth as “oops, I did it again.”
And in fairness …

I am notorious for glossing over legal-looking documents that land in my mail box.
I’m not “oh, crap, I didn’t know the adjustable rate mortgage was going to adjust that high” negligent, but I’ve been known …

I am officially sick of coffee.
I bought a pound of my favorite this week – Peet’s Major Dickason’s Blend, the formula so stout mere mortals spew it – and it hasn’t fazed me. I had …

Confession: I love Barbie.
When I was a kid, my friends and I would play for hours, creating elaborate houses and villages. Set-up time actually took longer than play.
I have two dozen or so pristine in-the-box …

Tired of ranting at teens to straighten out? Burned out from complaining but never seeing any change result?
If you can’t beat ‘em, then drive them out with old fogey music.
That’s the approach a New Zealand …

My God, this is like watching an old lover stricken with cirrhosis and emphysema hobble around with a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other.
Your heart aches for him. You want to …

So you know those “music-focused developmental tools to stimulate babies’ brains”? Or the other DVD series that helps teach “problem solving, listening, classifying and concept awareness” to kids who can’t even crawl?
Turns out, those claims …

You really have to wonder what George W. Bush was thinking (pausing for uproarious laughter to end in 3 … 2 … 1 …) when he enacted the Provider Refusal Rule during his final hours …

The good news from this month’s New England Journal of Medicine: Regardless of whether you go Atkins or South Beach,if you cut calories you will lose weight.
The bad news: You’ll likely regain eventually.
That’s according to …

My congressman is against “partisan, pet projects.” He told me so in a screed last month about the stimulus bill that didn’t answer what I’d written him about.
My congressman is so worried about the government …

Funny how a company can’t even offer something for free without critics landing on it with both feet.
Such was the case Sunday when Microsoft rolled out “Elevate America,” a three-year program that will offer technical …

Aren’t Republicans the ones who believe in less business regulation? Who are convinced America would be a much more prosperous place if those nanny-state liberals would get off Mom and Pop’s back?
Ay, but all bets …

Rule of thumb for the guys: You won’t get in nearly as much trouble for what you do as you will for lying about it.
That’s what a 14-year-old Wisconsin girl found out last week when …

You’re a conscientious objector to flash cards and Brainy Baby videos, but a tiny portion of your brain fears you’ve doomed you kid to life in a dunce cap.
You titter to yourself when parents complain …

There’s a two-story house with a big back yard on a cul de sac about a block from where we live that’s just a picket-fence shy of perfect .
We have close friends on the street, …