Skip to content

I hate the fine print

I taught my students how to properly fold a letter before placing it into an envelope. An important life skill. At the end of the day, I found a properly folded sheet of paper on my desk. I was thrilled about the demonstration of competence, and the message warmed my heart. Until it didn’t.

Read More

8 rules for requesting songs at a wedding

My DJ partner, Bengi, and I worked wedding #383 earlier this month. Our first in more than 18 months. The couple had chosen every single song for their wedding, from cocktail hour through the end of the night, which naturally tied my hands a bit when it came to taking requests. We were also positioned…

Read More

I would like my students to call me “Matt.”

I’m not ready to allow my students to call me by my first name, but only because I’m not sure what administration might think, and I suspect that some of my more traditional colleagues might hate me for it. Mind you: Neither one of these things are non-starters for me. I’m more than willing to…

Read More

My illustrious lip sync career

While listening to Sweet Child O’ Mine in the car yesterday, I found myself reminiscing about a sliver of time in my life when public lip-syncing contests were popular and people – myself included – lip-synced competitively. I was 17 years old when my illustrious career began. I was still in high school, working for…

Read More

Upending greeting card tradition

I was recently told about a new trend in greeting card giving: Signing the cards with a post-it note. When you find a card to which you are particularly fond, you affix a post-it to the inside with your signature and any personal message you wish to extend, so that the recipient can use the…

Read More

Kat Koppett changed my life.

On Monday night I won The Moth’s virtual GrandSLAM championship. My seventh championship so far. My first virtual championship. Credit Kat Koppett, who doesn’t even realize how she has changed my life. We all need a Kat Koppett in our lives. Lots of Kat Koppetts if possible. Back in early April of 2020, as the…

Read More

Lessons from an afternoon at The Hill-Stead

Elysha and I are looking forward to hosting our first live storytelling show since February 2020 at The Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, CT on August 18, 2021. The show will be outdoors, but it’s our first step to returning to normal life once again. We can’t wait. You can purchase tickets here: An Evening of…

Read More

The Black Spot

I’m reading Treasure Island to my students. One of my favorite books of all time. If you’re familiar with the book, you know about the importance of The Black Spot. It consists of a simple piece of paper featuring a blackened circle, signaling to the recipient that he is about to be deposed as pirate…

Read More

Cascatelli: A brand new pasta shape and a moment of creation

Back in March, I listened to a Planet Money podcast about The Sporkful’s Dan Pashman’s journey to create a brand new pasta shape. Being someone who celebrates, reveres, and adores anyone in the business of making stuff, I loved Pashman’s story of inspiration, perspiration, and realization of a longtime dream. The result: Cascatelli, manufactured by…

Read More

Turns out I am telepathic.

Stephen King refers to books as telepathy. An author thinks something, writes it down, and then months or years later, that sentence appears in the mind of the reader. Sometimes a thought. Sometimes an idea. Sometimes an image. He writes: “Look- here’s a table covered with red cloth. On it is a cage the size…

Read More