Peter Myers' Blog

Fathers Day 2008

There's pressure on working fathers like never before.  You have seen it - carpooling, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning and giving those kids time - the ramifications of having 75% of mothers of school-age children out in the workforce, slogging it out full time.  And while there is a general public sympathy towards working mothers, almost nothing is said, discussed, or considered about the husbands of these women.  How are we affected?

(Im)possible Prayers

I got an email from my little sister a while back, who has gone through her own version of hell in the last several years - I'll spare her a description here, but she is so often coming up with stuff I blog about there has to be some deeper connection.

The email is one of those "chain letter" emails that you feel like you have to respond or forward so as not to break the chain and put some bad mojo on everyone else's wishes and prayers.  (You should be thankful I didn't forward it here).  So, I read through it, thought about my wish (prayer, wish, whatever, I think it was a prayer because there were various references to saints and God in the poem that you read after you make your "wish" - but the email called it a 'wish').

Diamonds in the Rough: The Google Adwords Campaign

Fellow Blogosphere Readers:  I admit it, I succumbed to the hype and launched a Google Adwords campaign.  What is it?  Its the "pay per click" that happens when you punch in, for example "San Francisco Estate Planner" and a bunch of names come up on the right-hand side of the page.   These spots are auctioned off to bidders who pay each time someone clicks on their ad.

Initially, it worked well in bringing traffic to the site.  But here's the problem:  there is no pre-existing relationship with anyone affiliated or associated with our firm, so it is a completely anonymous view of us.  It commoditizes the particular service advertised, and when your service becomes a commodity, the only remaining determinant between your ounce of gold and someone else's ounce of gold (or whatever commodity) is . . . what?

Stop Growing Up, Mom & Dad!

Our parents are getting older and every one of their body parts is getting closer to the ground.  This is the reality we see and experience every time we set foot in the old house, or greet them at the airport, or see them for the first time after a hiatus.  Its like some old person came and inhabited our [formerly young] parent's body.

More than 25% of American families are involved in elder or parent care. So if you are facing this situation in your own family, you have company. This happens to be my career and my life.  Listen or not.  Your choice.  My thoughts.  Here goes.

10 Tips to Being a Better Husband

My sister sent me a note recently about being a better husband.  Apparently she thought my comments about being scolded for leaving an unwashed coffee cup on the counter were over the top.  So she gave me an article by Hugh O'Neill, self-proclaimed "perfect husband," which is entitled "10 Tips to Being a Better Husband: Simple Secrets to Keeping Her Happy."  It turns out O'Neill's rule #8 involves just that: an unwashed coffee cup!  His was in the sink; mine on the counter.

This is me in my perfect-husband costume.  I wear it on Halloween to scare the other husbands in the neighborhood.

I tried to find O'Neill's article on the internet - no luck.  So I posted it below, and I link here to O'Neill's other gems, A Man Called Daddy or Daddy Cool, his books.  If you like O'Neill as I do, buy the books.  Enough Myers, let's hear from O'Neill:

Marital Honesty

This post comes from Global Consultants and Services Limited, a group of international tax planners with whom we share some mutual clients.  The story concerns Bill and Kathie Monroe, a City Council candidate and his wife. 

Cars and Shrinks: Matters of the Heart

When car-service technicians service your car, are they servicing the car itself or its owner?  I ask this because I took my car in yesterday and, during a 15-minute wait at the counter, I noticed a stack of 'customer evaluations' of the auto technicians that the HR manager must have temporarily placed on the counter.  OK, I'm a bit sleuth-like, so I glanced out of the corner of my eye to read, among things, the criteria by which auto mechanics are evaluated. 

The form was far more interesting than any of the comments that customers had supplied.  You want to know what it asked? 

Myers Holiday Party Debrief

This is the debrief from the Holiday Party.  There's lots of good news: (1) no telephone calls from revelers in compromising situations two hours after the party was over; (2) no loud arguments between staff and their boyfriends/girlfirends, at least during the party (to my knowledge); (3) lots of old friends showing up prepared to relax and kick it around with us; and (4) we didn't run out of anything except time.

The bad news: (1) we missed some of you old-timers - I know, we picked a tough night; (2) I had to drive home, so I stayed sober (not really bad news there); (3) Eileen had a Judicial Evaluation Committee Meeting, so we all missed her; and (4) I didn't get to talk to everyone who came by.

Grieving Kids

Lately I have been reflecting on grief.  Specifically, I have been reflecting on memories of the grief of loss.  The reason I think this is important and relevant is because the ways that we are treated during our childhood, specifically the ways we are shown to experience grief and loss, have effects on our psychological well-being over our entire lifetime.

So, for my probate and trust administration clients, or for anyone else out there who has recently experienced the sudden loss of a loved one, I am going to share my personal experience of losing my mother when I was a child.  Perhaps there is something in what I say or how I express my feelings that will help some parent or aunt or uncle out there who is in a position to comfort a child who has experienced the sudden loss of a parent or other close family member.

Lions and Tigers

Life insurance professionals working with lawyers.  There is interest in this subject.  I should have written about it earlier.  Here's some more Q&A from the life insurance agent world:

Question:  I am a life insurance marketing manager with an agent who has a business-owner client in the Napa, Ca. area who is seeking an estate planning attorney to draft an ILIT for a life insurance policy. This, of course, could expand to other estate and business planning issues. Having saved the Worth magazine edition listing the top 100 attorneys in America, I found your name and vistied your website and blog. was wondering if you could give him an idea of the cost of drafting a simple ILIT. He says he always has clients who ask but never knows what to tell them.

Q & A: How Do I Know if the Trustee Absconded With Assets?

I recently received this question from a reader of my blog:

I believe that my trustee absconded with trust assets.  I am aware of accounts that were titled in the name of the trust that never appeared in the trustee’s accounting.  It is possible that these accounts were re-titled or closed prior to the grantor’s death, but I suspect that the trustee simply took them for herself.

The only way to prove how these accounts were titled is to demand documentation, but I expect that the trustee will refuse to provide documentation, claiming that these accounts were non-trust assets.  Is there any procedure, short of a probate court petition, whereby beneficiary can demand production of documentation of estate assets that were (supposedly) not trust assets on the date of death?