115.02/ #ShavuaTov everyone & hello to the last day of 5782! I admit that I get a special thrill about skipping "Vayehi Noam" even though doing so implies my upcoming week has many days of isurei melakha. I love yuntif, honest I do, but I am a fan of writing & the internet, too.
115.04/ An experiment for quickly posting the #ChochmatNashim for #RoshHashanah 5783 (2022). Link below is to a PDF in a google drive that has the formatting organization and links to the Divrei Torah. Please let me know if it works. drive.google.com/file/d/1ty7lT_…
115.06/ As self-appointed Sanegor during #Tishrei, I must find a defense for the dangerous Uman nonsense: Ukraine is at war & needs arms/money to defend against a genocidal attack. The Uman trip pours money into their economy, thus helping repel tyranny! jta.org/2022/09/21/glo…
115.10/ Every time I turn around the Biden-Harris administration is doing something (1) unabashedly good & (2) kinda dumbfounding that it hasn't been done before.
115.13/ Was listening to "Oh Death" from the "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" soundtrack and realized the thematic similarity with U-Netaneh Tokef ("oh death, won't you spare me over for another year") and thus had the urge to watch that scene again. Enjoy!
115.14/ The Lizzo Flute Freakout - while similar to meltdowns over hobbits & mermaids - is as seismic to the bigots as Obama's election because it's about how they cannot accept Black people as part of American history despite the country being literally built by Black Americans.
115.17/ My son just told me that the #Mets have a minor leaguer named Zebulon Vermillion @Zebatron3000 and I wish him success for our team, of course, but I also support his candidacy for greatest name in the current sporting world. #LGM
115.19/ Escobar being the hero in the last game, especially after the really rough time earlier in the season, is one of the great #Mets storylines of 2022. He deserves praise for his grit and #LGM!
115.20/ Good advice for academia, for all interviews, and I dare say all of life. In everyday interactions, one of the best gifts you can give to anyone is to just listen.
115.21/ The song #September is so good, I play it every day of the month at breakfast, just to start the family off right. I was asked to play it on other days and not save it for this month, so for now I'm adding every 21st. Maybe more, because c'mon now.
115.22/ Candle Lighting is 13 minutes earlier than last week. I know that's a natural process but still, yipe. Please stay safe everyone and #ShabbatShalom!
176.02/ #MotzeiShabbatMovieNight continues. This week "Denial (2016)" about Holocaust denial, because it's great and because we're facing a new assault on truth, this time about October 7th. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Denial_(2…
176.03/ I'm not writing more about the freeing of some of the hostages because of mental self-preservation. If I think too much about kidnapped children and what they went through I descend into a deep despair. Thank God they are being freed, what a literal nightmare.
175.02/ #MotzeiShabbatMovieNight continues. This week the incredible technological and artistic masterpiece "Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio." The highest level of art. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillermo…
174.02/ The newest season of #MotzeiShabbatMovieNight began tonight with "Flash Gordon." It's a camp classic and stars Topol a'h, the wonderful Israeli actor. One of the extras on my disk has Alex Ross saying it's his favorite film!
173.02/ After a number of discussions with many in the world Jewish community I think most of us are at the 5th stage of grief with our former friends: acceptance. We oscillate, sure. Some are still denying, a number of the "pick-me"s are still bargaining. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_stag…
173.03/ #ChochmatNashim for #ChayeiSarah 2022 5783 (Last year). @ChochmatNashim
Downloadable PDF with working links to Divrei Torah from Orthodox women scholars.
172.03/ Just came back from a lecture and Q&A with @jeremybob1 and while what he said about the current situation is grim, I'm glad to have learned so much. Also, I'm definitely going to buy his book. a.co/d/5YNKnDI
171.02/ I highly recommend this article by @havivrettiggur. It's a very astute analysis of the situation in Israel, the fallacy of the anti-Israel paradigm & why the Israeli Left collapsed after 2000 & where they are now. timesofisrael.com/hamas-does-not…
171.03/ One thing I've read, from Rettig-Gur & many others, is that Hamas had a real strategy. It's the Algeria playbook: to make life in Israel so intolerable that the "colonialist tourists" would pick up and go back to where they came from. That's why I call it a paradigm error