Passover Is A-Comin'

With Shabbos just around the corner and Pesach not too far behind, I wanted to take a moment to wish my Jewish readers a good Shabbos, as well as a chag kasher v'sameach.

May you enjoy your family and friends at your table or the company at others' tables.

And as my dear father has always said, "May we be able to wish each other a Happy Pesach next year again."

Amen.

A Fish Tale

I just found this article from a few years ago.

Some people have crying Madonnas; other people have talking fish!


Word is made flesh as God reveals himself... as a fish
Edward Helmore New York

The Observer,

Sunday March 16 2003


This article appeared in the Observer on Sunday March 16 2003 . It was last updated at 02:22 on March 16 2003.

An obscure Jewish sect in New York has been gripped in awe by what it believes to be a mystical visitation by a 20lb carp that was heard shouting in Hebrew, in what many Jews worldwide are hailing as a modern miracle.

Many of the 7,000-member Skver sect of Hasidim in New Square, 30 miles north of Manhattan, believe God has revealed himself in fish form.

According to two fish-cutters at the New Square Fish Market, the carp was about to be slaughtered and made into gefilte fish for Sabbath dinner when it suddenly began shouting apocalyptic warnings in Hebrew.

Many believe the carp was channelling the troubled soul of a revered community elder who recently died; others say it was God. The only witnesses to the mystical show were Zalmen Rosen, a 57-year-old Hasid with 11 children, and his co-worker, Luis Nivelo. They say that on 28 January at 4pm they were about to club the carp on the head when it began yelling.

Nivelo, a Gentile who does not understand Hebrew, was so shocked at the sight of a fish talking in any language that he fell over. He ran into the front of the store screaming: 'It's the Devil! The Devil is here!' Then the shop owner heard it shouting warnings and commands too.

'It said "Tzaruch shemirah" and "Hasof bah",' he told the New York Times, 'which essentially means that everyone needs to account for themselves because the end is near.'

The animated carp commanded Rosen to pray and study the Torah. Rosen tried to kill the fish but injured himself. It was finally butchered by Nivelo and sold.

However, word spread far and wide and Nivelo complains he has been plagued by phone calls from as far away as London and Israel. The story has since been amplified by repetition and some now believe the fish's outburst was a warning about the dangers of the impending war in Iraq.

Some say they fear the born-again President Bush believes he is preparing the world for the Second Coming of Christ, and war in Iraq is just the opening salvo in the battle of Armageddon.
Local resident Abraham Spitz said: 'Two men do not dream the same dream. It is very rare that God reminds people he exists in this modern world. But when he does, you cannot ignore it.'
Others in New Square discount the apocalyptic reading altogether and suggest the notion of a talking fish is as fictional as Tony Soprano's talking-fish dream in an episode of The Sopranos .
Stand-up comedians have already incorporated the carp into their comedy routines at weddings. One gefilte company has considered changing its slogan to: 'Our fish speaks for itself.'

Still, the shouting carp corresponds with the belief of some Hasidic sects that righteous people can be reincarnated as fish. They say that Nivelo may have been selected because he is not Jewish, but a weary Nivelo told the New York Times : 'I wish I never said anything about it. I'm getting so many calls every day, I've stopped answering. Israel, London, Miami, Brooklyn. They all want to hear about the talking fish.'

A devout Christian, he still thinks the carp was the Devil. 'I don't believe any of this Jewish stuff. But I heard that fish talk.'

He's grown tired of the whole thing. 'It's just a big headache for me,' he added. 'I pull my phone out of the wall at night. I don't sleep and I've lost weight.'

Richard Lewis Confirmed You As a Friend on Facebook...

Yup, it's true.

THE Richard Lewis and I are THIS CLOSE.

Okay, so what if I'm one of his 266 Facebook friends...we're still friends. He confirmed it -- just as in the title of this post. Just as in the subject line of the email I received.

And would you believe that out of all those friends he's got, we only have one Facebook friend in common?! A former classmate of mine in Jewish day school and high school is also a friend of Richard's -- talk about coincidences.

So how does one become Richard's friend? Well, in checking out my classmate's Facebook friends, I noticed Richard was on that list.

Richard? The Richard Lewis? The Richard Lewis of "Anything but Love" Marty Gold fame? The Richard Lewis who has attained new viewing audiences with his "Curb Your Enthusiasm" appearances? The Richard Lewis who has made black shirts, black sports jackets and black pants all the rage? The Richard Lewis with those big, baby-doe-caught-in-headlights eyes? The Richard Lewis who made "Jewish neurotic comedian" a familiar term? The Richard Lewis who, in every stage appearance, runs his fingers through his hair countless times to do what no mousse or hair gel could ever do?

Yup...that Richard Lewis.

So silly me just dropped him a message, reminding him of a show he'd played in Toronto close to 20 years ago, which I attended and where I'd managed to get his autograph in a comedy book of mine, with the help of an usher. And after the show I ran into him at a Toronto popular cafe and approached him then to say hello.

Must've hit a nostalgic soft spot 'cause the very next day I got confirmation that I'm his friend.

Okay, friend, I'm making a bar mitzvah in June for my son. Would you like to MC the luncheon? Or, okay, friend, would you like to be a special guest speaker in my other son's grade 2 class on Career Day? Or, okay, friend, I have another friend -- a blogging friend -- I want you to connect with. He's funny, he's neurotic like you, he's apparently a chick magnet, and he writes well. Maybe you can introduce him to your other friend, Larry David.

Here's to a long and -- if your monologues prove anything -- a long-winded (Facebook) friendship!

This Has Yiddisher Ta'am...

http://www.davidseastsidedeli.com/1.html

Play the music button when you open this link.

Anyone Can Make A Difference

http://shmais.com/news.cfm?ID=44538

A Beautiful Song...

I just discovered this song/singer on http://www.jewishtvnetwork.com/ -- it is such a beautiful and simple piece of music, and no doubt will leave you teary-eyed.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cac5iXNREJg

This Kid's Always Thinking...

I was preparing school lunches this morning and asked my youngest son if he wanted baby carrots or a cucumber for snack. He preferred the cucumber and I asked if he wanted a mini cucumber. He said yes but asked me to peel the skin first.

As I was washing and peeling the skin, he asked with a smile, "Do you have any dill to put on that?"

I said no, and he replied, "That way, I could have had a pickle!"

PPS*...

*Pre-Passover Syndrome...

Oy, this is something I'm already suffering from.

Symptoms:

-- clenched stomach muscles

-- new stray gray hairs

--an aversion to brown shelf paper

--continually consulting a calendar

--mental listing

--bingeing on nosh food

--anxiety... I want to eat all the food in the freezer

Like in most cities, Pesach is in the air. It's not even Purim yet, but I sure got a whiff of Pesach last week already when the supermarkets' Kosher aisles were half empty, the dry goods temporarily shelved elsewhere in the stores, and brown paper was lining the shelves.

It used to be the moment Purim was over that Pesach took over, but now Pesach seems to want to have even more of a head start!

And you know how it is with those Mishloach Manot packages -- before we buy goodies to package for others, we hit our own stocks of cookies and cakes and candies and other nosherai and think , "Good, if I give this to ______, it'll be a few less items in my cupboards that I have to get rid of before Pesach."

I had to smile the other night when I was shopping. The kosher aisles in this particular store had mainly been emptied with some shelves already housing paper goods and candy and cookies kosher l'Pesach. A very frum husband and wife were slowly walking down the aisle, presumably looking for where the Purim items were hiding. The husband aimlessly ran his hand along the brown paper lining an empty shelf, and his wife exclaimed in Yiddish: "What? You're touching the Pesachdik paper with 'treife' hands!!?"

I spoke today to a cashier in one of the predominantly Kosher supermarkets nearby and she told me that some years ago, the shelves would only get stocked two weeks before Pesach, so there'd be a mad flurry of purchases. These days, four and five weeks in advance is when the "matzah" ball starts rolling...

I'm sure I'm not the only Jewish female suffering from PPS. Maybe together with others like me, we should form a support group for this time of year. But then, come to think of it, who'd be available? The others will be busy assessing their cupboards and pantries, their cleaning supplies, their paper goods supply...and will then go on to recipes.

I'll still be eating my way through my Mishloach Manot packages...and then tackling the contents of my freezers!

We have some time to worry about Pesach.

In the meantime, I wish you a Freiliche Purim. And to those who celebrate Easter, Happy Easter.

Bye-Bye, Guy

One of today's headlines is Madonna and husband Guy, after 8 years of marriage, are preparing to go their separate ways...in Fall '09.

What?! Their fans need some 18 months to mentally prepare themselves for this celeb couple's split? Or perhaps this couple came to this offbeat decision by checking their Blackberries...

"No, Guy. Next month isn't good -- the kids are off with me to visit my dad. I don't want to upset them."

"Madonna, summer isn't a good time. You know that. I play a lot of rugby and do horse wrangling -- I don't have time to make appts. with legal counsel."

"Guy, this fall isn't good. I'm hanging in Hollywood with my Kabbalah pals for the High Holidays. If we try to tackle divorce then, my soul won't be pure for the New Year."

"Madonna, I'm shooting a film from December '08 through June '09 on Malta. I'll be unavailable for legal consults."

"Guy, I think we're both clear for Fall 2009. That should give our fans enough time to mentally prepare themselves for our split..."

___

And on a similar note...

I was on the Yeshiva World website, which I find interesting. I'm not up on all the Yeshivish lingo that can be found in the comments, but I'm learning.

Once in a while they feature letters from the YW mailbag -- and these make for countless comments.

I've read open forum letters about THE SHIDDUCH CRISIS.

Last night there was an open forum letter about THE DIVORCE CRISIS.

What?! First there are not enough guys to match up with girls and girls to match up with guys because of all the predetermined wants/needs/have-to-haves. And now there are too many has-beens floating out there?

The theories readers offer as to why there is a divorce crisis in the yeshivish world is interesting. The theories readers offer as to why there is a shidduch crisis in the yeshivish world is interesting.

Mazel. Mazel. Mazel. Hard work. Hard work. Hard work.

That's what it takes to find a partner...hopefully a life partner.

Guess Guy and Madonna will be adding to the "crisis."

Gettin' in the Spirit of Purim

For the month of Adar, my children's school celebrates even before Purim officially arrives. The halls are bedecked with magnificent thematic decorations, put together by our wonderful b'not sherut girls who come from Israel for the year to help out in the school.

Last week, the students from nursery through grade 8, were invited to dress up like their favorite teacher or administration staff member. My youngest son and at least 3 of his friends chose to dress like the same person, so seeing their interpretations of that person was interesting.

Today was "crazy hair day"... and my three children had me spray their hair this a.m. with silver, blue, and sparkles.

Wednesday is their Purim carnival.

Thursday, my oldest son has a half day because of the fast, and G-d willing, at night, we will go downtown to one of the remaining Orthodox shuls, and hear megillah there.

And G-d willing, my father is being released tomorrow from hospital and able to go home.

(I realized when I went to drop off and pick up my kids from school today that it wasn't a "crazy hair day" for me; it was a BAD HAIR DAY!!!)

Cleaning Up One's Act

I said to my husband yesterday that if I were a playwright, I'd write a one-act play -- a black humor piece -- about the following... How people need to settle things by cleaning: they clean and tidy up for the cleaning lady -- G-d forbid she should be faced with such a clutter; and they clean and tidy up in anticipation of having to soon hold a shiva in their home -- G-d forbid that those who come to comfort the mourners should see the clutter and whirlwind state of a family's belongings.

It hasn't been a good week: my father was rushed to hospital after midnight on Tuesday. He developed a sudden flu and fever, and with his already delicate medical history, it threw things off balance so that he was so weak and unable to walk, and suffered from a couple of seizures, confusion. He has finally been moved to a room from Emergency where he was in isolation -- Influenza A was the diagnosis -- until yesterday. I had to gown up, mask up and glove up in order to see him each time.

Thank G-d he's much better than he was and we hope he will continue to improve so that after a few days he can return home...usually a better place to recover.

My husband's mom isn't well and is deteriorating quickly. A vibrant and vital woman suddenly felled by an ugly disease...

It isn't easy to watch her nor see my husband in his worry and pain.

I said to him the other day: "I've never been so close to death before."

May we only share simchas and welcome Purim later this week with freiliche spirits.

Excuses, Excuses

I have found as an adult that people make a LOT of excuses. You think that stops with children and teens, but nuh-uh...excuses come out in a different way with adults.

"We [a family of six] are going to Israel...BUT it's for a family simcha...AND it's all on points."

"We're going to Florida over the school break, BUT it's ONLY for a week."

"...I'm going to Mexico JUST for a week." (I often tell people when they've given me their vacation travels and have thrown JUST FOR into the same sentence that they should never say JUST...simply because some people NEVER travel.)

I once had a conversation with someone who'd moved from a reasonable-sized, modest home into a large, well-to-do home on a posh street. When I mentioned she had a nice house, she said, "I'm glad the house looks small from the outside and not so ostentatious, so people won't talk."

Honey, you think people don't talk?! Of course they talk when you move from the equivalent of a 3-star roadside motel into a penthouse suite at Trump Tower. Your excuses don't change anything.

I know people who are bankrupt and owe tons of people tons of money yet they take mini vacations with their family. "We're under a lot of stress. We NEED a vacation."

People are continually apologizing for what they have or belittling what they have. It surprises me simply because I think that they're trying to protect themselves and what they have in some way. That's how it appears.

Money seems to set the tone for many conversations in this community in which I live; even if not overtly, dollars and cents seem to hover silently overhead.

I wish that people would simply enjoy what they have, make no excuses about it and at the same time not brag.

After all, cents don't often give a person SENSE.

8 Years Old

As I was told eight years ago:

"To No-am is to love 'im."

So true.

Happy 8th Birthday. Yom Huledet Sameach.

Help Sam

Winnipeg, Canada - An 84-year-old Orthodox Jewish man is in danger of being euthanized by Grace Hospital in Winnipeg, despite protests from his family that the hospital’s decision violates their religion (as was reported on YWN).
Samuel Golubchuk, whose family has been waging a court battle to keep him alive since late last November, was hospitalized for pneumonia in October of 2007. Doctors have attempted to hasten his death by starvation and dehydration, tactics that have been barred by a temporary court order keeping Samuel alive.
Golubchuk’s family claims that he is recovering due to medical treatment, and although Golubchuk is awake and responsive, doctors refuse to acknowledge the fact to the courts. Goluchuk suffered some brain damage in a fall in 2003, but is still responsive and capable of communication.

Please go to http://www.samuelgolubchuk.com/ and sign the petition.

With your help, this man might have a continued chance to live by his own means.

(my husband knows this man and his family from his years of growing up in Winnipeg; when it becomes national news, and with this petition, international news, it truly is a sad situation, and we must help)

Not Open To Discussion

Over the years -- especially the blogging years -- I've made an observation. I don't know if it's merely coincidence or something personal and directed to me, but...

As some -- or many of you know, or have come to realize -- I like to talk. I am very detail-oriented, so that "colors" my conversations or my writings.

I also like to break down barriers.

I can be formal, if the situation calls for it, but more often than not, I'm very casual. When I'm referred to as Mrs. Saban, I say, "That's my mother-in-law. Call me Pearl."

I like to get beyond "Hi, how are ya" and often get to the guts of things.

Lately, I'm of the belief that most people aren't in to that.

While I'm busy writing from the heart and just "letting loose", some other people seem to put up an invisible wall. Am I overstepping boundaries in any way? Am I touching a personal nerve of any kind?

I've corresponded with several bloggers over the years and sometimes the emails are about my blog or theirs; other times it's about our lives.

But I've found that once the lines of communication are opened, they get shut down rather quickly. I write a note, the person writes back; or a person initiates it and I write back, thinking the lines are open, but the person doesn't respond...or is so very brief that it's clear my message wasn't read entirely.

It's like the concept of a "one hit wonder", but in this case it's a "one message, no more" phenomenon.

I guess it's simply the little girl in this grown woman's body who feels rejected. When it's not silence that I'm seeking from others, but it's silence that I receive, it hurts.

Of course, everyone has time limitations, so a back and forth rapport is perhaps not always possible, but if it's the other person who's started the ball rolling, and then doesn't catch it again,
it simply makes me wonder...

That's it. There ain't no more to say. Just as the title says, "Not open to discussion."

All in the Family

Last night we went to see my brother-in-law's new 10-week-old Labradoodle puppy, "Couscous".

When we got home, my youngest ran to greet Max, and in an exuberant voice said to the pooch, "YOU HAVE A NEW COUSIN. We met your new cousin!"

That's My Boy!

My little guy made a couple of sweet comments in the last couple of days, and I wanted to share them. Of course they might not have the same impact on you as they did on me...simply because he's not YOUR little guy.

1. Noam was trying to describe a snack his friend had brought to school.
"It has chocolate and -- you know cigars? yeah, this was like cigars. (he proceeded to demonstrate how you smoke an imaginary cigar) Yeah, they're called SMOKERS, and they're like cigars but smaller."

Me: "You mean cigarettes?"

Noam: "Yeah, i didn't know the name for them. I thought they're called smokers."

[I love that name; I think it's great that he knew the word cigars but not cigarettes!]

2. We have a fairly large kitchen with a freezer-fridge and a stand-up freezer that are side by side. Now one of my weaknesses is that I put everything on these unit doors with magnets. Usually there's no longer white space on the appliances and the papers that are posted began to fall down in spite of the magnets.
Yesterday, Noam posted a birthday party invitation on the freezer door. This morning he couldn't remember where he'd put it on the door and tried to spot it among the posted papers and invitations.

"There's the party invitation! I see it. And I saw a spider on the fridge this morning."

Me: "A spider?"

Noam: "Yeah, a common house one."

[to me a spider is a spider and I don't differentiate between them...unless it's a tarantula! the fact that Noam elaborated -- correctly and knowingly -- on the type of spider made me grin]

The Marvels of Monopoly

(I received this message in an email from...Jerusalem)


If you think Jerusalem should be one of the cities on the proposed new Monopoly board, read on …

The makers of Monopoly are inviting fans worldwide to vote in an on-line contest that will determine which 22 cities will be etched in the collective memory for a new global edition of the 75-year-old board game.

The contest, which got under way this week and will continue through February 28, will allow Monopoly fans the world over to cast their ballots for the 10 best cities out of a pre-selected list of 68, including Jerusalem. The 20 cities with the highest number of votes will make it onto the new global Monopoly board.



Please ONLY vote for Jerusalem - by voting for other cities as well you bump up their numbers and make it harder for Jerusalem to get into the top 20. Jerusalem is at #27 and could easily be put in the list but only if we send this out to everyone we know and note that you can vote EVERY DAY up to Feb. 28.



VOTE NOW - It's Easy!
http://www.hasbro.com/games/kid-games/monopoly/

Waste Not, Want Not

My parents used to always tell me when I became a mother that I shouldn't eat off my kids' plate if they didn't finish a meal. Did I listen? Nah...!

It kills me to throw food out and I've always been that way. I can't even say it's survivor mentality because I didn't go through a war of any kind, thank G-d. My parents never instilled a real guilt in me if I didn't finish my food; I was just a slow and somewhat picky eater when I was young and my mother would keep reminding me of that.

I think I just "knew", as a daughter of a survivor, just how precious food was and still is.

But it occurred to me last night, after I'd eaten a FEW pieces (small, or not) of homemade pizza, that I'd finished the last two pieces on the tray because "I didn't want them to go to waste."

So the pieces might not have gone "to waste" but they certainly go "TO WAIST" -- MINE!!

Lice Ain't Nice

They're in the lice-removing business
BY RACHEL MONAHAN
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Tuesday, January 29th 2008, 4:00 AM

They're the lice ladies of Brooklyn.

A network of a dozen Orthodox Jewish businesswomen has developed a specialty in nitpicking — a profession rooted in Jewish tradition, the women say.

"They say Jewish men make good husbands," laughed Abigail Rosenfeld, who charges about $100 a head and works solo out of her Kensington home. "Jewish women are known to be nitpickers."

These days, the best technique involves less picking and more of a combination of combing and the use of various potions.

The women — who live in Borough Park, Kensington, Flatbush and Marine Park — have known each other for years and have worked together on lice outbreaks across the borough.

Lice are tiny parasitic insects — adults are about the size of a sesame seed — that live among hairs, most commonly on the head, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nits are their eggs.

"Everybody here has a lot of kids, so [the louse infestation] spreads faster," said Susan Sherman of Borough Park, who's been nitpicking for years and is Rosenfeld's best friend from high school.
Sherman recently started LiceBGoners, employing 16 people and charging $75 an hour for a treatment that lasts an hour or two.

Rosenfeld also offered a more serious explanation of her community's specialty. The women have experience checking food for bugs, which aren't kosher.

"Do you know how many bugs you can find in dates and figs, lettuce, celery?" she said.

Because lice are not particular to the Jewish community, the lice ladies' fame has spread far and wide. Sherman tended recently to a family in Connecticut who hailed her as a lifesaver.

Adie Horowitz, of Marine Park, who runs Manhattan-based Licenders, recalled another reason Orthodox women got into the delousing profession about 10 years ago. "There was a tough strain coming in from Israel," said Horowitz. "Now all the lice are resistant to the poisons."
The Lady Bug, a good friend of Rosenfeld's, credited her as a master nitpicking teacher.
"Abby was the first one to develop the method," she said. "She should have patented it, but she didn't."

Rosenfeld's method, developed about 10 years ago, involves repeated combings, first with hair coated in conditioner and then with baking soda. The lice ladies use various versions of a stainless-steel comb with closely spaced teeth to do their work.

"We're social workers and psychologists for panicked mothers," said Dalya Harel, of Lice Busters NYC, who's been nitpicking for more than 20 years and employs eight people.