Bruce Littlefield's Life 101 » Travel

Holiday 101 – My Survival Guide

Bruce Littlefield — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 17:35:25 +0000

Vital Juice asked me some great questions about how to survive the season a little jollier… Consider it your Holiday First Aid Kit.
Between the parties, the presents and the nosy relatives, ’tis the most stressful season of the year. So we asked lifestyle guru Bruce Littlefield (pictured), co-author of the new book The Truth Advantage, how to handle every sticky holiday situation. His answers:
The guilt trip: You ate too much.
Undo the damage: Try this.
The guilt trip: You drank too much–and have the raging hangover to prove it.
Undo the damage: Try this.
The guilt trip: You don’t have time for regular workouts.
Undo the damage: Try this.
The guilt trip: A relative asks when you’re getting married or having a baby.
Undo the damage: Try this.
The guilt trip: Someone hands you a gift, but you don’t have a present for her.
Undo the damage: Try this.
You’ve got this one wrapped up.
Got a stressed pal? Send this news!

Holidays – Gifting 101

Bruce Littlefield — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 16:35:08 +0000

I stopped by WGN-TV in Chicago to help host Steve Sanders with his holiday list. Check it out here.
Three gifting DON’Ts: #1 DON’T give a fruitcake unless its a gag gift. #2. DON’T give anything that poops or pees. #3 DON’T just throw it in a gift bag.
Three gifting DO’s: #1. DO shop at a discount retailers like TJ Maxx & Home Goods. #2. DO think comfort (luxurious sheets, towels, robe.) #3. DO know that the real way to someone’s heart is if you get their pet a gift.
I also was in Philadelphia with the gorgeous and fun Michelle Grossman on NBC’s 10! Check it out here. Ho ho ho, here we go!

Life 101 – Halloween candy

Bruce Littlefield — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 21:05:12 +0000

Halloween is a dentist’s favorite holiday. Why? Would you believe that over $2 billion is spent each year on Halloween candy?! That’s a whole lot of scary cavities. But since you’re going to run out and buy some (and be judged by the kiddies), let me tell you that chocolate candy bars are rated the #1 Trick or Treaters delight (and Snickers is the absolute fave.) And, in case you’re wondering, there is more than 35 million pounds of candy corn made each year, equaling something like 9 billion kernels. But, hey, at only 3.6 calories, it might be the dieter’s choice. There’s less sugar in a candy corn than in a raisin! Or forgo the calories all together and give yourself a candy corn manicure.

Life 101 – Swimming Back

Bruce Littlefield — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 20:32:23 +0000

Am back from a fun vacation–an amazing journey with Capt. Geoffrey on Dolphin Expeditions–in which I went swimming with dolphin and ended up swimming with sharks! Had several realizations while underwater: 1) Life is sometimes happily unpredictable. 2) Our planet is a truly incredible place. 3) Blackberry’s and computers don’t work in the ocean! What a joy to be underwater for a week, rather than trying to keep my head above water! Hoping your week was fun and reminding you to every now and then plan for some time away from the electronic buzz. It really does clear your head.

Life 101 – Gone Fishin’

Bruce Littlefield — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 02:58:17 +0000

I’ve just finished my new book… and am off to swim with wild dolphin! Yes, I’m taking a vacation! Yee haw. Be back in a week. So, to keep yourself busy, why don’t you read a book. How about Shark Tales? ABC Shark Tank star Barbara Corcoran tells how she turned $1000 into a billion dollar business. Got a dog? How about The Bedtime Book for Dogs, the first book to read to your dog. Studies have shown kids that read to dogs improve their reading skills 30%. Don’t have a dog or want to make a billion? How about finding treasure? Garage Sale America is my hunt for everything America loves to buy, sell & collect… and, yep, Santa is counting the days. Sneak a peek behind the scenes of America’s Clark Griswold’s in Merry Christmas America. Oh, enough already! Enjoy your week. I’ll see you on Columbus Day… and I’ll be tan when I return.

Dinner Party Talk- Summer Soup

Bruce Littlefield — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 14:36:13 +0000

Here’s my back to school book report: “What I Did This Summer.”
After my bestselling book Shark Tales, with ABC Shark Tank star Barbara Corcoran, was published in Asia, Barbara became an international sensation there. The blonde real estate lady from New York who turned $1000 into a billion dollar business was invited to speak in Taiwan for a business convention of entrepreneurs. Who better to tag along than her co-author and co-seeker of anything adventurous?
During the 18-hour flight, Barbara and I thumbed through the pages of National Geographic’s Guide to Taiwan I had picked up at Barnes and Noble. When she asked what had stuck in my mind, I said, “The home stay with the Aborigines family in the jungle.” And with that and a handshake, we vowed we would do that “off-the-beaten-path-excursion” as described on page 225.
After checking in to our luxurious suite at the Grand Hyatt Taipei, we had the concierge make the calls and set up our travels to the Alishan Township in the middle of the jungle. The celebrity handler assigned to monitor Barbara was horrified. “Why?” she asked. “It’ll be memorable,” we said. Barbara smartly prepared for our excursion into “real Taiwan” by having the concierge write out in Chinese everything we could possibly need: “Where’s the bathroom?” “How do we get back to the Grand Hyatt?” “Hospital! Emergency!”
The following morning we left our suitcases, our cloud like beds, and our room service in our already paid for suite and headed to the train station, Taiwan’s equivalent of Metro North, for a three hour ride south, through “real Taiwan.” “Um,” Barbara said more than once, while pointing out the window, “Rice paddy.” We had promised our doctors when we were getting our vaccinations for the Asian adventure that we were going nowhere near rice paddies, farmland, or live stock, also known as hotbeds of malaria. We had skipped those shots.
We arrived in a town not unlike the Taiwanese Hoboken. Instead of hopping into one of the many waiting cabs, we decided we’d “immerse ourselves in a real Chinese town.” (Barbara’s words exactly, even though we were in a real Taiwanese town. China was the country on the other side of the Taiwan Strait.) But they do speak Chinese, I think. In addition to our written instructions, the only phrase I knew was thank you. Or “shay-shay.” I had that written on my hand.
We were the only two blonds in town. In fact, we may have been the only two blonds in all of Taiwan. We definitely attracted attention, so we decided we should get off the street and stepped into a little café. Barbara quickly pointed to a bowl of passing soup and indicated to the waiter that she’d have that. Whatever that was. I’m a bit more, shall we say, picky in my eating habits. I tend to like vegetables and try to steer away from cat, dog, and bird nest. (As an aside, I was offered bird nest soup repeatedly. “It good for libido,” one waitress had promised. I told her to bring me scrambled eggs, and I’d pop a Viagra and call it a day.) When the waiter looked at me for my order, I said two international words in as Chinese an accent as possible: “French fries.” I was thrilled when he nodded his head.
I “shay shay”ed and added two more words to my Chinese vocabulary. I delighted in my French fries with real ketchup, while Barbara stared into a bowl of soup as big as a half of watermelon. One by one, she’d pick something out of the bowl with her chopsticks, put said mystery thing in her mouth, chew once, make a puke face, and remove unidentifiable item from her mouth. After collecting two napkins full of nameless, but not faceless items, she found she liked what was left, so much so that she drank every drop of the rest of the bowl. It had to be at least a gallon of juice.
We walked back to the cabstand, happy that we had immersed ourselves in real culture, and pulled out our “how to get to the jungle” directions from our bag. We handed them to a group of cabbies. There was a lot of discussion. One guy escorted us to his cab, put us in the backseat, and said, “I get wife.” As we waited, Barbara optimistically said, “They must live near the jungle.”
Let me get right to the point: It was a fifty dollar, hour and a half cab ride from hell: Mario Andretti behind the wheel, his yakking wife at his side, and the curviest mountain climb I have ever experienced. World’s Scariest Drives and Real Housewives of Taiwan had nothing on this. Avalanches had created single lane roads that our driver didn’t slow down for. Barbara whispered, “Don’t worry. He wouldn’t kill his wife.” I whispered back, “If she doesn’t shut up, I’m going to.”
At one point, a curve was so crooked and our speed was so great, I fell over into Barb’s lap. What I heard was a gigantic slosh. That soup wasn’t sitting well. “I’m not feeling great,” she confessed. I quickly pulled out the map. “We’re almost there,” I said, encouragingly, with undertones of please-don’t-throw-up. Sure enough, the concierge had marked the top of the mountain, but, when we began our descent, we realized he marked the wrong mountain! We had to go down that mountain and back up the next one!
When we finally arrived, we were immediately surrounded by a swarm of kids, chickens, and a pig, and we could hear the screech of monkeys in the near distance. We asked the cabbie for his number. Thinking we wanted to use his phone, his wife told us $3. Barbara drew a diagram of the two of us phoning him and fleeing. He gave us his card, and we got out of the car.
What we soon discovered was that the Tsou village had been destroyed by a typhoon, their Hurricane Katrina, in 2009. “What year was that National Geographic book published?” Barbara asked. I looked at the copyright page. “Um, 2008.” The beautiful pictures on page 225 had been washed away. But I will say we had a magnificently memorable one-night stay in our room next to the rice paddy.
Since I’m here to write this book report on my summer vacation, you know we survived the cab ride back to the train and am currently testing negative for malaria.
Moral of our story: Never take a summer vacation with a three-year-old travel book and enjoy your soup!

Life 101 – Back in the U.S.A.

Bruce Littlefield — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 17:07:12 +0000

Since we last spoke, I’ve been to Asia and back. There’s some gossip about it in NY Daily News’ Gatecrasher today. While abroad, I can report that I didn’t hear a word of debt ceiling talk, but I’m happy to be back in the U.S.A. eating in restaurants that don’t feature shark fin, snake, and bird’s nest. The latter, a delicacy the Taiwanese tried to serve me on several occasions, is a gelatinous goop made from the saliva of cave swifts. It’s supposed to be good for the libido. I’ll take diner eggs and a Viagra, thanks.

What I’m Doing – Gone Fishin’

Bruce Littlefield — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:29:45 +0000

Have spent a great week in Hollywood with my pal Barbara Corcoran as she filmed the next season of ABC’s Shark Tank. (Catch it all summer long on ABC.) We’re headed to Taiwan, where Barbara is speaking on our book Shark Tales: How I Turned $1000 into a Billion Dollar Business. So, for those of you following the fun daily, I’m Gone Fishin’ from this page until Friday, August 6th. In the meantime put your paws on a copy of The Bedtime Book for Dogs for a furry friend and join me as I try to Tweet from Taiwan.

Gossip! – Barb back to the Tank

Bruce Littlefield — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 21:48:48 +0000

Good luck to my friend Barbara Corcoran as she heads back to Hollywood for next season’s taping of Shark Tank! (In this self-portrait, we’re in a pedicab in Central Park headed to lunch… But for the record, she’s the only person I know who regularly has business meetings in the back of a pedi-cab.) If you haven’t read our best-selling book Shark Tales: How I Turned $1000 into a Billion Dollar Business, you should. Her story is both hilarious and inspiring, and her advice is genius no matter what career you’re in. The second season of Shark Tank is airing all summer long on ABC.

What I’m Doing – Palisades Center Mall

Bruce Littlefield — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 20:19:48 +0000

Westminster, illustrator Paul Heath & I will be center court at the Palisades Center mall atop a Sleep Number Bed this Saturday, June 18, 1 – 4 pm, honoring canine search-and-rescue teams who worked at the 9/11 sites. In addition to a reading of The Bedtime Book for Dogs, we’ll play my new doggie game show JePAWdy.™ and introduce the crowd to real SAR dogs and their handlers from the Ramapo Rescue Dog Association. Barnes & Noble will be on hand to sell books and if you bring a photo of your dog Paul will draw a sketch for a $30 donation benefiting the 9/11 canine search and rescue teams.