LINGERIE

My pal Deb has just one criteria when it comes to shopping for clothing.

“Do I have to wear a bra to make this work?” she’ll ask. “If I do, I’m not buying it.”

She’s had to walk away from some great outfits over the years but has no regrets.

“I like the way it feels,” she says about going braless. “And I like the way it looks.”

I’m with her 100 percent. I, like Deb, am a 1970s-era feminist. Although we’ve modified some of the more radical beliefs we held back then, a lot of us jettisoned our bras…

WRITING

I’m a writing coach. I often tell the Medium writers I work with to publish — and get paid for — their work outside of Medium before they post it on the platform. And if they aren’t familiar with markets outside of Medium? I recommend checking out Chicken Soup for the Soul. This popular anthology series publishes essays on a variety of topics for their themed books — and pays $200 a story, plus 10 free copies.

Whenever the Chicken Soup website announces that they’re looking for work on a new topic? Regard it as a writing prompt. …

BOOMERS

We Boomers were the first generation to be raised on TV, and we’re forever bonded over the fact that all of us watched Leave It to Beaver, Bewitched and Bonanza at the same time in living rooms throughout the country.

Another thing we Boomers had in common? All the crazy rules our parents had about watching the “idiot box.” At my house, for instance, Peyton Place was strictly off-limits — but it was okay to watch along when our nanny tuned into her favorite soaps. Whereas my friend Deb could watch anything she wanted — but she was forbidden to…

MUSIC

Terry Gross used to help me clean my bathroom.

I’d download new episodes of “Fresh Air,” but wouldn’t listen to them unless I was doing housework. Terry was a fantastic motivator. I didn’t want to do the dishes or make the bed. But I did want to hear Terry’s interview with Marc Maron.

Then I read in Consumer Reports that “light activity such as walking, yard work and even dancing offers significant health benefits. The weight, blood pressure and blood sugar levels of light exercisers were comparable with those of more intense exercisers.”

Housecleaning. It wasn’t just a chore —…

WRITING

I recently wrote a story about being seated next to a racist on a plane.

It was read by 2000 people and received 74 comments. Including this one:

Did this story really happen? Or did you just invent it?

My story was about the fact that my seatmate, a man whom I’d just met, made a racist remark. My reader obviously found this hard to believe, and asked:

The guy next to you really said “He could be a terrorist!”, to a total stranger he had just met? Are you sure this actually happened?

The short response? Yes, it happened…

MEDIUM

The only thing that everyone knows about the Medium algorithm is that nobody knows anything about the Medium algorithm.

Why do some posts take off, reach thousands of readers, and make money? Why do others languish, forever unread, in the Medium Phantom Zone?

And is it true that there’s an inverse relationship between the number of articles a writer posts about making money on Medium and how much money they’ve actually made on Medium?

How much money are writers actually making here?

If you are a writer who assumes that everyone on the platform is making more than you are…

RACISM

I’d just boarded my plane from Philadelphia to California. When you travel alone, sitting on a plane always is a lottery. Would the person sitting next to me be pleasant and friendly? An obnoxious drunk? A motormouth? A jerk who’d assault the first flight attendant who insisted they wear a mask?

This was going to be a six-hour flight and I was hoping for somebody pleasant and low-key. No demands and no drama.

I was in luck. When I got to row 20, I saw that the fellow in the middle seat was a friendly smiling man in his fifties…

WRITING

I’d been happily writing on Medium for 19 months when I was invited to start writing for News Break. As on Medium, I could post (and get paid for) both previously published and original content. Both platforms would (or would fail to) drive traffic to my work on the basis of mysterious algorithms, and would deposit money into my bank account each month.

Having nothing whatsoever to lose, I signed on, and was soon re-posting my Medium content on News Break. I quickly learned that publishing on News Break paid more than publishing on Medium.

A lot more.

Although both…