Proceed at Your Own Expense

With filing season and the next congressional fight – this one over the debt ceiling – just a few short weeks away, it’s usually this “tween” time of the year that I read about some of the more outrageous abuses on company expense reports.

The final week in December traditionally sees a flurry of companies attempting to reconcile before year end and thus some of the more, shall we say, “creative” entries usually come to light.

Being Resolute

When we said our goodbyes to 2012, I put forth my unsolicited predictions for 2013.

Now, just four days into the New Year, I will piggyback on those prognostications with my unsolicited resolutions for the next 360 days or so.

My track record for these annual pledges more closely resembles my tests scores in high school physics than determination to improve my quality of life, yet like the person who swears to drop 10 pounds by the summer and instead manages only to prop up the share price of McDonald’s, I continue to be resolute on at least making an attempt to reach these goals.

So here goes:

• I will no longer let people who talk on cellphones while using the exercise equipment at my gym bother me. Traditionally, I needed at least two antacid tablets to calm my stomach down when I found myself next to someone on the treadmill who appeared to be conducting a conference call or counseling an unhappy marriage. So yak away!
  
• I will learn to keep better electronic records of my business dealings instead of amassing a scribbled stockpile of yellow legal pads that the entire partnership at Skadden Arps would have trouble filling.
  
• I will wash my car at least once a month. There are only so many times I can ignore someone finger-writing “clean me” in the grime of the winter salt and accumulated road particles.
  
• I will not be surprised or angry when, yet again, several of my relatives predictably claim they do not have the money to repay me for loans I tendered back in 2002.
  
• I will remain silent and most of all calm when my long-time tennis partner – an avowed Democrat – crows about Barack Obama’s impressive list of accomplishments since taking office. Seriously.
  
• I will resist using some of the more annoying buzzwords and phrases frequently heard in 2012, such as “bucket list,” “kicking the can down the road,” and the always fingernails -on-the-proverbial blackboard  “whatever.”
  
• I will limit the episodes of “Real Housewives of New York, /New Jersey /Miami/Beverly Hills/Atlanta/Orange County…)” and/or “Keeping up with the Kardashians” that my daughters will be allowed to watch.
  
• I will take down the holiday decorations before Valentine’s Day.

I may be optimistic, but that one I actually have a shot at keeping!

Nobody Asked Me But…

Traditionally, this is the time of year when all assorted types of pundits and columnists weigh in with their annual predictions for the coming year.

And for the past two decades or so, yours truly has been no different.

Third Place is You're Fired!

Normally I view the holiday season much in the same light as a root canal with far too little Novocain.

The other 51 weeks of the year, my usual sunny persona (I can hear you laughing already) traditionally morphs into the screenplay for “Grumpy Old Men.”

Notes from the Front Lines

Now that my conference and CPE teaching schedule for 2012 has officially come to a close, I’m in the process of filtering through the notes I’ve compiled at each itinerant stop in an effort to  gauge just what were the most frequently debated topics and questions I’ve  fielded since my journeys began in earnest back in April.

Tossing aside some lighthearted Zen koans such as “why is college football’s annual Bowl Week actually 16 days long,” or “how come Hawaii has  interstate highways,” obviously the majority of inquiries centered in the timing of succession and transition such as when, where, why, and how.

For Execs at Fannie and Freddie, it’s Always Christmas

I, for one, was not saddened when I read over the weekend that some Wall Street bonuses in year-end 2012 would lag behind those of previous campaigns. I don’t know about you, but when someone receives a year-end largesse of $10 million as opposed to $15 million, somehow I find it hard to elicit even a morsel of sympathy.

Especially when my I opened my holiday credit card statements.

GRA Should Be Declared DOA

It’s often said that the nine most frightening words in the English language are “I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

World-renowned  economist Milton Friedman once joked that you could take any three letters from the alphabet, scramble them in any order, and you'll end up with an acronym for a federal agency we could absolutely do without.