Israel Here I Come

So I decided that I would like to visit Stretch, who is currently hanging (wearing?) his hat in the Holyland. Tickets are not cheap now, unless you fly via the Third World, so I decided to look for an alternative. 

Now a few years ago i got  a HAS card which is supposed to be good for Israel , and easy bonus  trips.  I figured they must be serious because they use a picture of the Kotel on their cards. 

However, recently I got a letter Fron them stating  that I am starting to lose points. So I decided that it is time to see if I can get a free ticket to Israel, before all my efforts are wasted.  

Stay tuned, dear reader to see how this saga develops. I have a feeling it is going to be a too good to be true type of situation. 

Be Careful What You Wish For

Today is election day in New York City ( other places too, but they are not relevant to this post). I have real mixed feelings about it.

on the one hand, I have never been very complimentary to our current hizzoner, as he is affectionately referred to here as Mayor Moron due to his nannyish policies and interesting ways of making money for the city ( raise the fees and fines on everything and everyone!).

However, at least there was an outside shot during his tenure that businesses would be able to survive and function somewhat in the City. he was, after all, a businessman first with a clear love for this City. Wow, I feel a bit nostalgic and miss him a little bit already. mostly because of the disaster that is coming down the pike if the polls are even close to correct.

We are going from a businessman with a Napoleon complex who wants to tell you what to do to a flat out communist professional politician. Someone who talks about income inequality in New York City. ( Huh? I thought that was why people came to New York in the first place, to MAKE MONEY and better themselves, unlimited opportunity, etc. etc.) he will send us back to the days of Dinkins, when lawlessness ruled and anarchy prevailed. Not to mention what will happen to the incomes of the middle class. Some have said that he will move back to the middle once elected, so he either is a liar or committed to destroying this City. Not really very good choices either way.

Be afraid,

Be very afraid

Finally!

The title says it all.  The question is, all about what. It could be that I am FINALLY posting something again. However, dear reader, although that seems to make sense, it is not completely true. The real reason for the "finally" of the title is that after YEARS of trying, we FINALLY, in the good doctor's  test kitchens, have found the BEST fat free

WAFFLE RECIPE!!!!!!!!!

Yes indeed, dear patient follower, I decided that blueberry yogurt would be the key, I searched online, liked a recipe I saw, tried it and gave it to the official taster, who truly wanted to have nothing to do with it.  However , I prevailed in convincing her to taste it and she agreed with me. Light, airy, sweet, crunchy. Wonderful. 

However, in keeping with Boo's style, she did add 

After three years, it's about time! 

WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER

I'm sure that most of you are familiar with "Moshiach's Hat" a poem by Anonymous ben Klonymous .

While light in flavor, it details in comedic form a grave problem facing our generation in its anticipation of Moshiach. Indeed, it is inconceivable, given the state of the factious nature of current Orthodox Jewish society, that anyone, regardless of how charismatic, could build a following of all the diverse elements among us.

Could you imagine a member of Monsey's Community Synagogue blindly following a leader from the community of New Square? Or even more bizarrely, a Brisk kollel member willingly receiving religious instruction from a YU ordained rabbi.

And yet, it will all have to happen somehow in a manner of which  we cannot at this point conceive.

I think the miracle of Moshiach's coming will play out as follows: Every member of Klal Yisroel, from the non-believer to the most extreme religious fanatic will see G-d's annointed one as being exactly like himself. He or she will then willingly and naturally accept direction from the Moshiach and proclaim him as his own leader. Although Moshiach will appear as many different people, will seem to wear many different hats, he will speak with one voice.

If we cannot be united then Hashem will provide the unity for us.

SLUG WARS

Earlier this year, during the spring, I noticed holes all over the leaves of my newly planted coleus plants. The problem got worse and pretty soon many of the leaves were only stems, the fleshy part having been eaten away. Some had been attacked from the edges and all were a sorry lot. The container in which this problem was manifest also contained a sweet potato vine which also had chewed up leaves but it wasn't as bad and as the vine got longer the problem lessened.

I fought back with Sevin which usually kills flying parasites and caterpillars after only one substantial application especially if the infestation is caught early and the parasites are small. It didn't help at all even after several applications and I realized I was fighting a pest I hadn't encountered before.

It is difficult fighting an enemy you can't see or even know. So I turned to that repository of all commonly accepted human knowledge and discovered that what was eating my coleus was probably slugs. This knowledge came with some suggestions on how to eliminate them, such as using poison or copper strips or wire or by enticing them with beer. Finding the latter to be the most practical and using the most available ingredients, I set up Soupy's Slug Bar and waited for customers.

That evening, one of my assistants confirmed the presence of slugs in the coleus pot by photographing some as they approached the bar for a late night drink.

I also set up a tavern at a different location where we had observed potential customers, assumed to be pretty heavy drinkers based on their size and one evening discovered a customer on his way in. Not wishing to lose his custom, I helped him along with the use of a small stick and he landed inside. I thought that would do it, but wouldn't you know, about 5 minutes later I saw him leaving. I wasn't going to let him go, so I prodded him back in again, but again he climbed out. It had rained earlier and a member of my team observed that the reason my customers were leaving was because I watered the beer.

Subsequently I caught four rather large critters along with some beetles, all in my western branch. While my initial quest was to eliminate the things that were eating my coleus, where I had opened the original bar, so far I hadn't caught anything there. In frustration, I bought a jar of snail bait and applied it. So far I haven't seen any results but today I also noticed a whole colony of inchworms in the soil under the coleus and think that maybe they are eating the leaves. I destroyed them (by stepping on them) and will report back in a few days when I see if the the holes in the leaves have remained status quo or  have increased.

Stay tuned.

BACKGROUND MUSIC

When we were young and giving parties every few weeks, we would have friends over for snacks and drinks and good conversation. Likewise, our friends would invite us to their homes and usually, a good time was had by all.

One of the features of most of the parties, in fact almost de rigueur, was the stereo (remember this was at the birth of the component boom) tuned to some station or playing records or tapes with what some people considered suitable mood music for the occasion.

I never saw (or heard)  it that way since it was difficult to hold a conversation among a group of people while the music was either a distraction or interference. Many times, when a  conversation got a bit boisterous, the host would increase the music volume in order to hear the music over the buzz which only served to make the conversation even louder as the participants in an animated discussion tried to drown out the program which led to another increase in volume. You can figure out the rest. With other hosts, the volume would be kept to a minimum at first and when only a few people had arrived it could be quite pleasant (depending upon your individual tastes) but as the crowd increased there would be an inevitable call for an increase in volume so that the music could be heard.

At that time, some engineers and psychologists came up with the idea that if every salient note would be taken out of music it could serve as a universal palliative which would calm people in public venues so that something would soothe them but not engage them. The invention was called Muzak. Some famous playwright would have one of his characters refer to it as "elevator music."

Elevators were actually a perfect location for this new kind of music because usually, (except for Alfred Hitchcock) people are silent there, shuffling about, staring at the floor indicator, clearing their throats and looking everywhere up and down except at other passengers.

Supermarkets and the lobbies of public buildings also became places who subscribed to Muzak although its purpose there is less undestandable.

Another type of background music was "mood" music, supposed to evince a scene of low light, candles burning, table set for two with fresh flowers and a woman lounging on a couch dressed in a long silky gown in front of floor to ceiling windows showing the dusk skyline of a large US city. Remarkable  about this music was its dullness and lack of excitement. Maybe that is what it was meant to convey.


A disturbing use of "background music" is its implementation as an accompaniment to the spoken words in videos, typically those created for institutions for display at their fund raisers. Someone is depicted in an interview or making a speech  with a dubbed bass accompaniment. The designers and producers of these oeuvres insist that the music is necessary in order to avoid boring the audience. I can't understand this kind of thinking. Just imagine the President of the United States making a speech  
 le an orchestra alongside him plays music long on beats and short on melody.

Although these days everyone carries around his own personal entertainment and communication center and wears earbuds from wakeup to bedtime (and even during sleep) most public places still have enough background music to impact on the general noise level that modern man is subject to.

It's time we concentrate on the foreground.

Not Guilty

I have been silent throughout the Zimmerman trial because I was thoroughly disgusted by the way this case even came to trial.

The cops who did the initial interviews, who were first to see what happened and to get the immediate impressions had chosen NOT to prosecute. Pressure from the press and that idiot in the White House forced the state to proceed on a weak case.

I think it is a tragedy that a young man is dead. However, that does not allow public and political pressure to put another man through the hell of a trial, a police chief to lose his job for doing it correctly, and a state to spend thousands and thousand of dollars on a losing case.

I also think it is a tragedy that every case involving a white person and a black person, where the black person comes out on the losing end of the confrontation,  is immediately labeled as racism, and the press will then get involved to put pressure on everyone involved, make all kinds of pronouncements, and then turn strangely silent when the truth comes out.

There are no winners in this case, just losers.

Fight! but Who?

I just read that there was a Chareidei soldier attacked in Meah Shearim for allegedly talking to people to try to convince then to go to the army. It turns out he was talking to his brother in law. However, this did not stop him from being attacked.

My question is, if these people who attacked him are so ready and willing to fight, and have all this energy and aggression, why AREN'T they in the Army, fighting our enemies instead of their fellow Jews???

Just asking.

Hippy Bread

My sisters have been after me for some time to change my diet further than I have already done. bad enough that I have given up cookies, cakes, eggs, meat, gefilte fish, egg challah, liver, etc etc, now they want to take away sugar and bread as well.

So I have been resisting, while tweaking the diet (using whole wheat, splenda, and natural sugars and olive oil spray) but that doesn't seem to be enough to satisfy these food vigilantes. So today I broke down completely in Trader Joe's.

Yes, I have succumbed to purchase what is known in my family ( or referring to the Detroit branch of vigilantes) as "Hippy Bread."

Not only does it make me feel like I am in the 60's, with sprouted bread ( I can't even believe I just WROTE that), but the  Ezekiel 4:9?, on the packaging?, as the name of the bread?????? This is beyond  belief.


I give up.

Doesn't taste bad, though......

Whose Army Are They In?

I just saw the video of the protest in Israel against the new policy of Yeshiva Bochurim being drafted into the army. It was very enlightening. It was also the best proof as to why some of these kids SHOULD be in the army. throwing rocks at other Yidden doing their job, pushing garbage containers at police on horses and lighting other garbage containers on fire is NOT the way a yeshiva Bochur acts.

The video was chopped up, but it looked as if the police were showing tremendous restraint for most of the video. These boys clearly have too much energy and they are not channeling it into learning.

let them fight a common enemy instead of their brothers.

Management Featherbedding

Pretty typically, our bureaucrats have reacted to the sequester by punishing those who threaten their featherbed. All in an effort to shift the pain somewhere else and at the same time continue their cushy work situations.

Our local school board was famous for forcing ever increased school budgets in the face of declining enrollment and a shrinking physical plant, on our hapless landowning taxpayers. The ruse was simple. By state law, any proposed budget that didn't pass the electorate would immediately have to be replaced by an "austerity" budget (not very much less than the proposed one) which was drawn up as a backup in case the real budget didn't pass. The kicker was that if the school board's budget didn't pass the austerity budget was so designed as to inflict the greatest pain on the electorate. This was done by eliminating busing for anyone closer than 1 mile from his or her school. If you had five children going to five different schools, the threat of your having to carpool or drive your kids to and from each school was enough to reduce the electorate to a catatonic state and of course the proposed budget, or one very similar to it, would pass on the second try. The irony of all this is that 90% of the cost of busing was paid for by the state and so the local school board didn't have much skin in the game anyway. This worked until the state law was changed to make things more even handed,

I though of this when the predicted delays at airports took place, supposedly because of the sequester. The sequester didn't tell the bureaucrats to lay off the air traffic controllers (who do the actual work) but, of course, if the middle and top managers would have to take on 15% more work, the public wouldn't notice it and the managers would have a less cushy and privileged life.

We need the sequester and it's time the public asked the bureaucrats, how much of the sequester is being applied to non-direct labor.

Possibly Pink

So I've been griped at for not writing for a while. All justly deserved. I appreciate that you all are still checking, though.

I will recount a story for your reading pleasure.

I was having a discussion with  Boo about how you say different colors in Hebrew. She said that pink had a particular definition, and I was unsure, so we decided to ask Bug, who had spent over a year in Israel as a student, and had many opportunities to speak Hebrew ( but, I believe, he eschewed most of them).

So we asked this veteran of the Israeli streets, who managed to navigate through the stores and restaurants of a foreign country, how one says pink in Hebrew.

He sat in thought and deep contemplation for a moment, looked at Boo and said, with great authority.


How should I know? I never ordered a pink felafel!

Not Only Public Transportation

I'm beginning to think that it is lower Manhattan and not just public transportation. Let me explain


I went to court today. I parked my car in a secondary lot that I use, as my usual lot was full and I couldn't get in. I told the attendant I would be a half hour or all day, depending on whether I had to run into Brooklyn. In the end, I spent the whole day waiting on one case and didn't get out of court until 4 PM.


Now I drive a black car of the Honda family, so when I got to the lot, I gave the guy my ticket. He looked at the ticket and said "Hyundai". I was a bit distracted looking over the near empty lot for my car, and not seeing it. But then it registered what he said, and I corrected him. He said it again, I corrected him again, getting a little nervous that I couldn't see my car.

Then he gets in a WHITE car, and says "this one's yours". I told him AGAIN no, I drive a BLACK car.

And then it hit me.

I took my mother in law's WHITE Hyundai to work today.

Maybe I SHOULD take the bus.

Public Transportation 2

Interesting things happen to me whenever I go downtown for CLEs. Last year it was the bus, this year its the train. Here is the story.

I took the train to go to a CLE class in Manhattan (remember this, its important) this morning. I got on a very crowded Q train at 42nd Street. At the next stop, 34th Street, the strangest thing happened. Almost the entire train of people going to work got off. Then the train filled up with people who did not look like the type of workers who worked in midtown offices. There were coffee cups and some casual business attire, but a different group.  Then at the next stop, 14th Street, almost the entire car emptied out again!

This time the car did not fill up, but the people that did get on looked even scruffier and less inclined to be going to work than the previous bunch. I sat there thinking about this until Canal Street, where I switched to the N to go to Whitehall Street.

As I got on the N, with dreams of a blog forming in my head, I realized three things, not all right away. The first was that the days of Giuliani and clean subway cars were gone, as the car was basically empty at the side I got on, except for a couple of homeless people, Secondly, the second homeless guy, the one not all bundled up and sleeping, was reading a couple of newspapers like some big business tycoon, and the third thing I realized, after I sat down and the doors closed and I looked up at the schedule of stops, was that

The N train goes from Canal Street to Brooklyn. Express

So here I am, no longer on time, going into the bowels of Brooklyn on a ten minute stop, with no recourse. Sure enough, I turned around, went back on the R to Whitehall, and showed up half an hour later than I  should have, and like last year, running down Water Street to not be late for something. Which might not have happened if  I would have actually been paying attention to things instead of looking for material to entertain all of you.

The sacrifices I make for all of you and my craft.

Reap as you Sow

I finally heard some good news on the radio today. there were two pieces. The first was that the Times did not think that its layoffs that they have to make are going to be as severe as they thought (OK, so the news was not ALL good), and the second was that Time was going to have to have layoffs as well.

Now I feel bad for the fact that people are going to lose their jobs, but as far as the corporations that are in question here, it couldn't happen to more deserving companies, whose very own policies and positions helped to put them in the condition they find themselves.

Now if only there had been a mention about the struggles of Newsweek my day would have been made.

Out of the Mouth of ( no longer ) Babes

My kids are both too perceptive and slightly brutal, but they do tend to put things in perspective.

I used to keep utensils in the car for times that I would eat a snack pak or oatmeal. I recently switched cars, as my lease was up on my old one. I decided to downgrade a bit and go smaller, so I could save a little on the gas.

As I was looking over the car and features I noticed that there was no longer a little eyeglasses holder in the headliner between the sun visors. as I was bemoaning the general lack of storage space in the new car, i mentioned to Bug that there was no glasses holder. His response?

Oh no, where will you keep your spoons?!!?

Dream? I Think Not

I heard the speech of Martin Luther Ling Jr. on Imus this week. He plays the speech in its entirety every year, and has done so for many years. (The hypocrisy of the people that attacked him is unbelievable, but that is for a different post).

I try to catch the speech every year. It is truly an amazing speech. I was especially struck how Dr. King could not have known nor probably even imagined that 49 years later this country would be inaugurating a black man for a second term.

I am also always struck by the message of the speech. That he is displeased with the status of race, but optimistic that it can improve, and improve through peaceful means.

Obviously, his trust has been borne out. However, I find it sad that the couple who has been a major beneficiary of his vision and the advantages of this country are the least deserving, most ungrateful, and most bent on destroying all that has made this country great.

The dream has turned into a national nightmare.

Why do they Yell?

I have always tried to figure out why Israelis get so upset when trying to communicate with Americans who don't speak a very good Hebrew. over the years I have developed a few theories which I would like to share with you now, as illustrated by the following story.

I was on the bus to Kever Rochel (Tomb of Rachel). As we were approaching, there was some announcement over the loudspeaker, but I was on the phone and not paying attention ( which I really need to do if I am to translate and understand an announcement). The way this particular bus line works is that the bus arrives around a quarter to the hour, and leaves the following half hour.  I, of course, did not know this. So as I got off, I asked the driver when he was leaving.

This immediately created a firestorm of hand waving, teeth gnashing, yelling, and general all around foul moodiness on the part of the driver. (The good thing about the Israelis is that when agitated, which is most of the time, they speak expressively with their hands, so I KNEW that he was annoyed that I had not followed the announcement, since he was gesticulating at the mic quite vehemently.)  So i told him, in English, of course, ": I know you made the announcement, but I didn't hear it, so when are you leaving?"

He begrudging, in Hebrew informed me that he was leaving at 11:30. I, of course, still being half asleep from the flight over, did not compute this fast enough or correctly, and asked him if that was 11:15.

I cannot begin to describe the ensuing eye rolling, general shouting and overall annoyance of this gentleman, who could have saved a lot of time and grief if he would have just said the time in English ( which I truly believe every can or should speak, just like on Mutiny on the Bounty).  Completely exasperated, he TYPED the time into the little change computer on the bus, and made me read it.

I politely thanked him, and made sure to be on the bus at 11:28, so as not to cause any more problems.

And got off two stops too early so as not to have to engage him again on the return trip.


So why do they yell?

Either

1)  because they like to, and it is the preferred form of communication in the Middle East ( this theory has some merit shared by others as well)

2) they are frustrated that Americans can't speak their language and feel that everyone should.

3) they are frustrated that they do not speak English and have to try to communicate with foreigners, which is not necessarily in their job description as bus driver.  Therefore they feel inadequate, which causes them to default to yelling ( see number (1) above) .

4) They are just grumpy people who don't feel like being helpful ( a trait shared by bus drivers here as well, at least for the Jewish bus companies, so it might be part of an international union thing)., and that is why they are bus drivers.

instead of working for the DMV.



.

ICE capades

So I arrived this morning on the 6 am flight from Jerusalem. Flight landed right on time. I figured "great, I can be at mt desk in four hours". Right?

Well that was before I came up against the governments first line of defense to harass the heck out of its citizens, I mean protect this country from marauding Americans, Immigration.

The lazy geniuses that run this department not only don't bother to be open when flights start to arrive, but then they don't even bother to properly staff the hall to reduce the line to under 2 hours.

I am still on line. It's 8 am.

I can solve illegal immigration in this country. Make them go through immigration once we catch them. They will go home on their own.