Mozemen's Blues

9th of Av

2008-08-10T20:47:00.001+03:00

Given our situation, reading the verse "We have become orphans, fatherless; our mothers are like widows" (Eichah 5:3) is every bit as devastating as you'd imagine.

Would you murder and also inherit?

2008-07-20T20:33:00.005+03:00

This being a widow, I see now, means exposure to one injustice after another. (For example, if he had died 64 days later, after being granted disability payments, I would have gotten 17,000 NIS for burial expenses. Because Benjy was so sick that he only lived 27 days after diagnosis, and so saved the government the disability benefits, I get nothing.) Today's, though, really makes me burn.

Today's mail brought a bill for 632 NIS from Magen David Adom, for "transportation and treatment of Benjamin Cohen." Logical enough, had they done any transportation or treatment. However, due to MDA's own screw-ups, they did neither, but still want their pound of flesh.

Within a few minutes of Benjy's unofficial death, one of our neighbors took a break from the resuscitation efforts to call for a Critical Care Unit. Five minutes later we are told that the CCU at the bottom of our hill is out of commission with a flat tire. A few minutes after that MDA called for a regular ambulance from a town 25 minutes away.

In the meantime, since there was no CCU available, the army sent one of its Critical Care Ambulances, fully loaded and staffed by a doctor. The MDA regular ambulance finally arrived 25 minutes after being called (37 minutes after Benjy had died) -- the same travel time it takes a car not going over speed limit. 18 minutes after the MDA ambulance got here, the army doctor declared the death. The MDA volunteer printed out a report (which stated that resuscitation had been done by a different medical team, and that the death had been declared by a non-MDA physician) and left, with Benjy stretched out on my living room floor.

I tried speaking to someone at MDA when the mail came in, trying to understand: if there was no transportation and no treatment, what am I being charged for? The man on the other end of the phone said it was for the declaration of death. So I found the phone number of the doctor who declared the death and he confirmed that he came with the army ambulance.

Riddle me this: MDA came too late to help. If there had been any chance of saving Benjy, it would have required the critical care unit, which was sidelined -- how stupid a reason is this to die? -- because of a flat tire. Since they didn't do a blessed thing because of their own incompetence (Hi. You're an ambulance service. Maybe you should periodically check your vehicles before they're needed?) do they really deserve to make some money off Benjy's death?

30 for Benjamin Cohen Z"L

2008-07-09T17:20:00.003+03:00

The first 30 days of mourning for Benjy are almost over. If anyone reading would like to attend the evening in his memory, here are the details:

Wednesday July 16 2008, 13 Tammuz 5768, Har Bracha

18:45 unveiling in the Har Bracha cemetery

The rest of the schedule will take place in the Har Bracha synagogue:

19:15 Mincha
19:30 Father/son study
20:15 Maariv
20:30 siyum mishnayot, divrei Torah, light refreshment

I am not ready for this, but...

2008-07-02T11:18:00.005+03:00

I haven't posted for a long time. I was so involved in the year of mourning for my mother that I could spare no mental energy for much of anything else. Then I was traveling with The Spouse, and then it was time to get ready for Pessach. And then --

The Spouse had been in America, working like the devil, from Sukkot until just before Pessach. Two weeks before he came home he went to a convention and caught a cold, which developed into a nagging cough. Chol HaMoed Pessach he went to a doctor, who thought the cough was a side effect of his high blood pressure medication and switched his pills. No joy. Then off to an ENT, who thought it was allergies, and prescribed pills and potions and inhalations. Still no help. Off to the lung doctor, who calls for X-rays.

The X-rays show lots of fluid in the lungs, so back to the lung doctor. He says it's pneumonia, and since we live so far out of town, The Spouse should go into the hospital for a week. We head to the hospital, where they draw blood and check his oxygen saturation level -- about 85. They slap oxygen up his nose ("Up your nose with a rubber hose, hon") and we wait for service.

Later that night they aspirate about a liter of fluid from his right lung and send him for chest X-rays and a CT. We spend the night waiting in a corridor, he on a gurney and I on a chair, while he's being pumped full of antibiotics. The next day we spend in the corridor. Toward midnight of the second night they finally put him into a curtained off area with three other people, an area in which I can at least stretch out on the floor to sleep. We spend another day and a half there, and they released him on Friday with major doses of oral antibiotics.

Sunday May 18 he had trouble breathing, and the local paramedic sent us back to the hospital. This time we get a curtained-off triple room in the ER from the start, and since new X-rays show more fluid in the lungs, they inserted a drainage tube first thing in the morning on Monday. On Tuesday the doctor told us we're moving up to a ward -- oncology. The fluid they had aspirated that first night was sent, as a routine matter, for testing, and came back positive for "growth cells."

While we were waiting for a room on the ward, The Spouse had convulsions and passed out. When he came to, the doctor ordered a head CT. The next day the oncologist comes to see us -- they still can't see the growth in his lungs, but the head CT shows two growths in his brain, and they can also see a growth on his adrenal gland. On Thursday they give him a full torso CT and find the growth -- the size of a man's fist -- in his right lung, and small growths on his mediastinum. Final diagnosis:

Stage IV metastasic non-small cell carcinoma of the lungs
malignant pleural effusion
brain and adrenal metastases

His condition, the doctor said, was inoperable and incurable. His projected life expectancy was 4 months; if all the treatments worked well, he might have up to 14 months.

The next day, Friday, The Spouse was given his first chemo treatment (55 mg cisplatin, 55 mg navelbine) and on Sunday we were moved to Hadassah Ein Karem for whole brain radiation. (Shaarei Tzedek doesn't have the equipment to do radiation.) While there he got another dose of chemo.

After 10 days of radiation, on June 5, we returned to Shaarei Tzedek. That Sunday we came home for the holiday of Shavuot, with an appointment to go back on June 15 for his weekly chemo treatment, and on July 1 we were to go for a new head CT. Other than that, we were free to be at home.

On June 17, at 1:20 pm, he had another set of convulsions and died in my arms, in our home. Up until the end he was optimistic and working, telling his clients he would be back in the States after Sukkot. It was only about an hour and a half before he died that he first said "I'm afraid."

(taken at 11:35 am on June 17, 2008; hard at work e-mailing clients)

Rabbi Benjamin Cohen
22 Nissan 5716-14 Sivan 5768
April 3 1956-June 17 2008

Yehi zichro baruch

In honor of Shabbat Irgun

2007-11-10T20:17:00.000+02:00

Snif Givat Zayit -- Kavod!

Coasting in to Paris

2007-07-30T11:30:00.000+03:00

Just in time, I finished the cotton sweater. It's not perfect, but it's meant to be a knock-about sweater, so it's perfect enough. The Middle Teen, who's modeling this shot, wants me to make another, same body size but smaller sleeves, for her, which really means it must be close enough to perfect.

Whew. Now I'll take a rest day and then go back to MS3 (moving into the slow bee lane, because I need to add length to both the black and the white versions) and Vog On.

Dad's here, the last gasp of gardening before shmita is being done, one kid is starting summer vacation and the other is ending it--never a dull moment.

Knitter down!

2007-07-27T18:10:00.000+03:00

Can you spot the mistake in the last of my TdF knitalong WiPs?

If you noticed that one shoulder slope was much wider than the other, you're more observant than I.

The sweater is going for dope testing. If it tests clean, I'll knit up the missing piece and graft it on. If not--off the team with it.

Vog On has been cast on. I never did expect to finish these by the end of TdF, so I'm happy enough to have just spun the yarn and started it.

Tour de France: Elimination rounds

2007-07-18T14:19:00.000+03:00

Before this post, two members of the team which started TdF had been eliminated: the Clapotis Cap and the Mock Croc socks, neither of which had the staying power to remain on the needles throughout the Tour.

Today another member of the team was eliminated: the stained glass toddler sweater.

I'm not entirely thrilled with this sweater. The pattern writer was trying so hard to make the pattern simple to read, but with a little more details, things like the arm holes would have been much easier. Oh, well, it's for the gift stash, so I'll just let it stew in its own juices for a while.

Still in the ride is the cotton sweater which needs sleeves and 'Vog On, whose yarn I'm almost through plying (which will mean the rainbow batt will be eliminated from the Tour de Fleece team, making room for the brown Romney to take the lead.)

MS3 Black is still riding in the team car. Clue 3 done, but since the final clue won't be out when TdF is over, there's no way it's crossing the finish line.

MS3 white is in the car, too, but in the back seat, with Clue 1 a few lines away from being finished.

Something else is getting done around here. Though the Yarn Harlot may complain about teens who want to veg all day, my teens are an industrious lot.

My garden, she is a mess. Shmitta is coming up. Dad is coming for 3 months. Teens to the rescue.

They moved a tree-let that had been languishing in the shade cast by our big willow and built it a terrace

and they hauled scavenged stones and paving bricks to create this nice little herb garden and path under my office window.

Of course there is still tons of work to do, but they're making a good start. And the TV hasn't been turned on in months!

Kntting into the Mystery (week 2)

2007-07-13T13:51:00.000+03:00

Clue #2 is done on I am Mysterious (Black).

Unblocked lace. So pretty. Not.
I am Mysterious (White) is up to Row 80 on Chart B (Clue 1). I'll probably not catch up with that one until the Harry Potter break week.

Skein #1 for the Rainbow 'Vog On socks is done, so I'm halfway through what I wanted to accomplish on the Tour de Fleece and will definitely have the yarn to finish all my Tour de France KAL team projects.

As soon as I finished the two remaining WiPs in the hopper , I can cast on; by then I should be finished plying the second skein.

TdF stage 2: roving to socks

2007-07-11T21:18:00.000+03:00

The polka dot jersey crowd keeps climbing hills in the Tour de France KAL, and from the top of hill #2 I report FO #2 -- Mock Croc socks for The Spouse.

Statistics:

Mock Croc Socks

Pattern from Knit Picks

Yarn: Lang Jawool Color Superwash color 82.0202

Purchased: March, 2006, in Athens, Greece

And in preparation for the hardest TdF hill (and pedaling away on Tour de Fleece), yarn for 'Vog On is nearly done. Singles have been spun, and plying has commenced.

And in non-KAL knitting, proof that I am a total masochist. I decided my Mystery Stole 3 in black was too delicate for everyday wear, so I also cast on in a sturdier white yarn, with white beads (sturdy and subtle--hey, that's what people say about me!). Here's Clue A done.

No walking tour this week. Instead we went to Jerusalem to take advantage of a credit card offer for 50% off glasses in exchange for points. Still ended up spending 760 shekel on glasses for the Middle Teen, but they are nice kallah maidel glasses. Not that I want guys to make passes at her, despite the best bets amongst her friends being that she'll be engaged this time next year, to a boy she has yet to meet...

F'ing the O on the TdF

2007-07-08T21:42:00.000+03:00

First mountain climbed on the Tour de France KAL. The Clapotis Cap is done. The Middle Teen doesn't love it -- says it looks too much like a hat a married woman would wear -- but she'll take it. Oh, well, they can't all be the stunning successes Skully was.

Tour de Fleece progress: another color of the rainbow spun. 2 more to go.

Shvil Yisrael, around Elad

2007-07-06T12:24:00.000+03:00

Some sections of the Israel National Trail are beautiful, like Apollonia. Some are decidedly less beautiful, like this week's walk. We took up where we left in February (which I have yet to blog about, since we did the walk just before my mother's final illness. Must. Remember. To. Backpost.), at the town of Elad.

Elad is a religious community which has won awards for its beauty and landscaping. And just outside its fence--yuck. We parked at the outer edge of the town, just near the entrance, since our starting point was about a quarter kilometer out of town.

We started at what's a not-uncommon sight in Israel: a memorial to a mother and daughter killed in a road accident.

(One of the problems with the trail is maintenance. If the weeds in front of this rock hadn't been tramped down, we never would have found the path.)

After a short distance you get to the one pretty thing on this walk: Mazor Mausoleum National Park. (Yes, it's a National Park. Yes, it's about the size of some people's driveways. As they say, Velcome to Izreal.)

We were unsure of the mausoleum's status vis a vis a cohen and ritual impurity, so I went in, but The Spouse stayed outside.

(Remember the window in this picture. It will be important later. There will be a quiz on this.)

The inside is two rooms. In the first there are the remains of two sarcophaguses and a mahrab (Muslim prayer niche), which is part of the reason it's still standing.

The other room is difficult to get into without assistance or a stepladder. It's a columbarium. I loved the built-in stone staircase. The windows in the earlier picture belong to this room.

One of the cisterns outside the mausoleum. Wouldn't want to have to drink from this...

Here's where we leave anything pretty behind. Can you see the Trail marking on teh stone?

You spend a short while walking on the old road.

Carefully look to your left as you walk, because the turn off is not marked. See the marking on that first tree? That's as much warning as you get. You should be OK as long as you remember that this section skirts the outside fence of Elad. When the fence turns, you turn, too.

(Note: Wear closed shoes on this portion of the trail. These green things are very sharp. A certain idjit [yes, that would be me] wore sandals and regretted it immensely.

Another reason for closed shoes: there's a wadi just outside Elad. Easier to navigate the rocky bottom in something other than sandals.)

At the end of the wadi you turn, seemingly away from Elad (we'll rejoin the fence line soon). The turn is marked, but not too well--it's on one of the big rocks in the background.

Obstacle course!

When you get to the dirt road, turn left (sign is on the fence). If you make the wrong turn you'll end up back at the main road and can return to Elad.

When you get to a fork in the road, take it. Another piece of bad signage, on a tree; take the left fork, rejoining the fence line of Elad.

It's very nice of KKL to provide garbage bags when people use the woods for gatherings and cookouts. Too bad KKL never sends anyone around to collect the bags...

Here's where we ended our walk for the week. We were getting hot and cranky. Taking a summer walk in a beautiful setting is one thing; this is quite another.

Knitting: Mystery Stole 3 has the second clue out, and tomorrow night I start the Tour de Fleece and Tour de France KAL. Whole lot of needle shaking gonna happen after Shabbat.

Setting the baseline

2007-07-05T11:50:00.000+03:00

Two big, active -alongs coming up this weekend: Tour de Fleece and the Tour de France KAL.

For the KAL, I've entered in the polka dot jersey section. I'm going to try and finish up all my WIPs aside from Mystery Stole 3, which I obviously can't until the last clue is issued.

Clockwise, from top left: Grafton Fibers rainbow bat to be spun for Tour de Fleece and then knitted into 'Vog Ons for The Youngest Teen, a Clapotis Cap for the Middle Teen to match her revamped Clapotis, mock-croc socks for The Spouse, a cotton sweater that was supposed to be for me but now will probably be shared by the female Teens, and a Toddler Stained Glass sweater for the gift stash.

Knitting into the Mystery--clue 1 complete. (Bear in mind that, as innernetz wisdom has it, unblocked lace looks like boiled Avraham Shmuel Schnidman. And yes, that's a real person's name, though I may have misspelled the surname. My nephew went to TA in Baltimore with the boy, and yes, they did make fun of the initial.) Mystery Stole, mystery yarn pulled out of a dumpster when a neighbor decided he had a whole stock of yarn unsuitable for commercial hat making, sz 4 needles from a collection given to me in Florida by a woman who collected all the needles people in her senior community had stopped using due to eyesight deterioration or due to death. Recycling at its finest:

And in the garden, my birthday gift. Yes, this year of mourning I'm not supposed to get gifts, but given what it is, I guess this is OK. (In any case, I bought it and paid for it myself, from my own salary, so it's not really a gift.)

No, it's not a Dalek in the making, though Blue Peter does have instruction for making it into one. (But really, Uncle Rusty, could that finale have been any more lame? Doctor Tweedy Bird? Doctor Jeebus?) My very own composter! Ever since I read about composting during shmitta, I've been lusting after my own solution to next year's let 'em rot problem. And it's right outside my neighbor's teen-age boys hang-out, where the delinquents of the yishuv start gathering about 11 pm every blessed night, so it may kill two birds with one plastic box.

Israel National Trail: When the going gets hot

2007-06-24T17:09:00.000+03:00

Just because the temps are up doesn't mean Shvil Yisrael for the Old and Enfeebled can;t continue. But since it was in the 90s last Thursday, we haven't done any serious walking aside from going to Chomesh, and Ikea was having a summer solstice sale/fair, we decided to take our walk in Netanya, where we could find shade and cool drinks.

This part of the walk starts off at Kikar HaAtzmaut, at the intersection of the Midrachov/tourist area and the boardwalk.

You then turn towards the boardwalk, passing this plaza.

(Isn't it a great space? If it could be cordoned off effectively, it would be wonderful for a wedding.)
The first sign you're on the right trail:

A little bit of history to start your walk off right. Netanya was the primary port for the illegal immigration ships of 1937-1940.

Netanya also brings teh pr3tty:

After a few minutes' stroll the boardwalk ends. Follow the path the only way you can, leading you through an alley:

and out into Netanya, onto Rechov Gad Machnes. You'll continue down that street until Rechov Dankner, where you turn right.

Follow Dankner all the way along (because of construction you won't actually, at this point, be walking the Trail; you'll be across the street, but can see markings past the construction site)

until it intersects with and becomes Baruch Ram.

(Three apartments for sale on the same side of the same building. Kind of sad...)

We stopped at the end of Baruch Ram because we were getting too hot. Nice art installation?

Just rocks on the end of metal poles. Some things look beter from a distance or from a passing car.

Tonight it's Dr Who time. David Tennant. John Barrowman. John Simm. Squee!

If I disappear

2007-06-18T11:54:00.000+03:00

it's because I got my Ravelry invite. Oooh, it's all kinds of teh shiney! I'm going to try to be a good girl and not get sucked in: no more than 5 pictures of stash yarn added per day. (OK, at least that's what I'm aiming for.)

And speaking of teh shiney--Dr Who. Was that not just the most... Makes you kind of regret those John Barrowman genes aren't going to go on to another generation. The Middle Teen hates me now for letting her watch a "to be continued" episode; she despises having to wait a week for the next part.

But there has also been dull. Not dull knitting, but a dull black color for my Mystery Stole 3 swatch. This yarn was pulled out of a dumpster years ago, and the needles were given to me by a woman who collected knitting supplies from senior citizens who could no longer see well enough to knit. Recycling at its finest--maybe it is teh shiney after all.

Not the Israel National Trail, still not for the old and enfeebled

2007-06-14T14:23:00.000+03:00

Or
What I did on my 42nd birthday

While some people boycotted the march to Chomesh this Tuesday, I went. Why?

(a) Yes, it was organized by Moetzet Resha. Anyone who doesn't know that this means you go, you walk around, you take pictures and you get out of there when told (and come back on your own later, without the snitches) almost deserves to get caught. Come on--our teens know who's unreliable. Still, it was a chance to go to Chomesh.

(b) My daughters were going. Their friends were going. It was my birthday. I'm going to stay home because I don't like the organizers? Screw 'em--I'll go where I want, when I want.

(c) Something very odd was going on during the march. Several times army vehicles pulled up alongside us and shouted encouragement: "Way to go--you're the heroes! Keep going--you're halfway there." "Settlers are great! Settlers are heroes! Welcome back to Chomesh!" It's almost like they went out of their way to send unzerer soldiers. And the shortcuts they allowed us to take on the march were not the same ones which were taken on the last march. One of the kids I climbed the hill with said "It's almost like the army is teaching us new paths up there."

(d) Planning for July, G-d willing, if my father isn't in then and needing my care. 'Nuff said.

While I'm resting my aching legs (it took us over 3 hours to walk up from the junction of Shavei Shomron to Chomesh -- we have got to get back into shape), some pictures:

The start of the march (look--there's still a trail here!)

A scarecrow--if you're following Dr Who in recent weeks, you'll know why that could scare more than crows.

By this time we'd lost The Spouse, who couldn't keep up with the kids (while I was trying valiantly). We waited for him at Sebastia for a while, then gave up when he was till lagging behind.

We continued on, this time thankfully mainly on paved road (though certainly not hobo grade).

Finally The Spouse caught up to us by taking a few short cuts we didn't take (and having some teen boys almost literally drag him along) and calling us to wait for him. Man, was I happy I had thought to bring my spindle along to keep me diverted -- well, that and discussing Peres vs. Rivlin with all the press photographers who staked out the turn-off from the road to the no-trail shortcut.

(See that road in the center of the picture? That's where we'd come from. See the trail we took? No, we didn't either. We just kept going "up" until we found another paved road.)

At last we got to Chomesh (see how nicely the plants are surviving?)

where The Youngest Teen was waiting. She and her friends had come in bus chartered by her school, because they had classes until 1 pm. We said mincha and had my birthday cake, baked by Youngest Teen and somewhat worse for having survived the trip up strapped to The Spouse's back.

The media was out in force up here, too. Well, of course. Didn't Bentzi Lieberman and his crowd need cameras to play to?

We escaped the crowded entrance and went for a quiet walk around the yishuv, just the two of us and 5 teenagers in tow.
Looks pretty much like any other yishuv, doesn't it? Aside from the lack of buildings and electrical wires overhead. It would be so easy to rebuild Chomesh...

The water tower is still up, even, painted in honor of the crowd.

Hurrah for the kids who came ready to clean and plant!

A year of davening slowly

2007-06-11T23:02:00.000+03:00

Jewish philosophizing to follow. If you're looking for craft content, skip to the end.

Jewish law has many ways to help people cope with death. Most of them don't apply to me. No new clothes? I buy, on average, one shirt every two years. No music? I have a great memory for music, and mainly "play" it in my head after hearing a recording once or twice. No TV? Haven't watched since our color tube went, leaving us with a 17 year old black-and-pink set. No movies? Last movie I saw in a theater was Shrek 2. Before that--Shrek. No weddings? We live here in Israel, our families in the US, so that's an easy one.

So what's left? I could learn some gemara or read some Tehillim. But I already do that, anyway.

Then there's the biggie: Kaddish. Not exactly the world's least controversial topic given that, last I checked, I'm not my brother. I read up some, checked some sources, spoke to the local rabbi, and have been at minyan three times a day, saying Kaddish, for the past 13 weeks.

Some people say women only want to recite the Kaddish to "be feminists." That we're looking to take over men's roles instead of doing our own. I'd like those people (largely men) to try saying Kaddish as a woman must for a month or two and then let them talk.

Saying Kaddish, at least in the Orthodox minyans in which I have said it and particularly in my home shul, is an exercise in humility and humiliation. I'm not allowed to say the Kaddish alone--I have to arrange for a man to say it with me. Twice my husband was too sick to go with me to shul; I said Kaddish and none of the men answered. (Since then, my husband has arranged back-up kaddish-zuggers, who usually remember they're on. If they forget, I'm not allowed to prompt them--see next point.) I'm not aloud to say Kaddish above a whisper, because some men complained to the rabbi that the sound of my voice saying Kaddish made them think inappropriate thoughts. On the other hand, at least once each day some man walks in to the women's section to get a book, put down his books, put sunflower seeds out for the evening study session, or just to disguise how late he is getting to shul--usually when I'm bowing during Shemoneh Esreh, rear halfway in the air and unable to turn around. (Interesting--my voice behind a curtain is irresistible, my posterior is not. Not so great for the vanity, is that?)

Yes, I've read the responsa on women saying Kaddish, pro and con, and in this case they're irrelevant--the local rabbi's had his say (though his changed his psak in midstream because of community pressure, telling me to whisper the Kaddish, and saying wistfully "If it were 100 years from now..."). What gets me is how little the (male) community thinks of the women's section, with how little sanctity they perceive it compared to the men's section. The men's section is tidied after every prayer. In the morning, after the men have had a study session in the women's section, there are dirty tissues and sunflower seed shells on the floor, candy wrappers, books flung all over chairs, the table, and the floor, chairs tossed about as though they'd been wrestling with each other instead of the text. The curtain between the men's and women's section is consistently flung open all the way across. (I don't close it, aside from the little area in front of where I sit. It's not for my purposes, the curtain; I'm allowed to see the men. They can reach the curtain at least as easily as I can. Let them close it.)

I'm all out of ideas. I've talked to individual men. I've talked to the men officially in charge of the shul. How does one stop men from being pigs in the women's section?

I try to get to shul early and learn some gemara. Today I was learning Megillah 14b, which includes this gem: "While women talk, they use the spindle." In honor of that saying, here's what I've been spinning.

Sock yarn (still in single form) from a rainbow colored batt by Grafton Fibers. (As soon as I bought this, I found out Linda's no longer going to sell retail. Note to self: don't fall in love with this stuff.)
And there's been knitting. Clapotis v.3, out of horrible wool and mohair that my sister-in-law "inherited" from her mother, who is now in a Home, suffering from Alzheimer's. (Don't blame me--it's for my sister, and she spied the yarn in SIL's stash.)

And socks. Sockotta, no pattern, plain simple knit until you throw up. Started in the hospice while Mom was dying, finished here at home. Explain to me why from one side they look like they have nothing in common

and from the other they're a perfect match?

So, who's going to Chomesh tomorrow?

Blame the lack of posting on Lolly

2007-06-05T18:27:00.000+03:00

Lolly posted about Ancestry.com and I fell into the gaping maws of the time suck. I'll never get as nice a family tree as she has, because my family arrived only in 1898, 1912, and 1947, but I still have found census information on my in-laws, grandparents, and great-grandparents. I've even tried their "find famous ancestors." Um, no. No way am I related to all those famous goyim. Nice try, though.

But at least it's taught me not to complain. Sure, I have 3 teens to feed, but my poor great-grandmother had 19 mouths to feed every single day (see lines 43 to the end below; click to enbiggen). And no tanorexics, either--family and farmhands (yes, a farm in the middle of Queens, NY, bordered by Woodhaven Blvd. and Union Turnpike).

Back with a vengance--or rather, with a meme

2007-05-30T21:58:00.000+03:00

The past 12 weeks have been a roller coaster, up one day, down the next, sharp slides and long hard climbs. I miss Mom like crazy, and have to fight the urge to dial her phone number, expecting to hear her voice, half a dozen times a day.

How to go from all this emo back to the mundane of blogging knitting and teen life?

Heatherly was nice enough to ask me some questions for the Interview Meme. I love this one, because no matter how many times you do it, the questions are never the same. If you want to join in, drop me a comment.

So, here are the Yenta's Qs and my As:

oh i have missed your blogging! must be hard with all the traveling! not to mention crazy people trying to blow you up! or do you used to that? this is not an official question.:-)

The traveling is pretty easy to recuperate from. People trying to blow me up--well, that's really not an issue; I live in a pretty safe area of the world, all things considered, and of the country, for that matter. (It's not like this is Sederot.)

my son dreams of being in the IDF, how do mothers in israel prepare their children and themselves for enlisting and the inevitable conflicts that arise?

I was lucky. My son is slightly disabled (completely deaf in one ear) so I knew from early on that he would never be a combat soldier. We spent his entire childhood teaching him, contrary to Israeli popular mythology, that combat units weren't the best thing since sliced bread. We regaled him with stories of his paternal grandfather, who was a machinist on the Manhattan Project, and had him think about who did more damage to the enemy -- his grandfather or a foot soldier. That doesn't mean that he didn't develop rifle envy, what with a lot of his friends going into combat units; he solved that by getting a part-time job doing guard duty and armed escort work, so he has a rifle of his own. The one big conflict is what would happen if Israel stages another land giveaway as they did in the summer of 2005, giving away Gaza in exchanged for thousands of Kassam rockets, to be delivered daily over the course of years. What will he do, and how will we help him through that? No clue. We'll burn that bridge when we get to it.

BTW, there's a whole program for foreigners. In fact, when we took The Oldest Teen in on Induction Day, we were speaking English as we approached the fenced-off area where recruits were standing. A group of English speaking boys called him over and told him, "You have to go inside and surrender your passport." We all started panicking a minute: he was supposed to bring his passport? No one told us that! He said he didn't have a passport with him, he had his national ID card. "Oh, you're not an American?" the boys asked. "I am, but also Israeli," said Teen. "Oh, then forget what we said; we thought you were here to volunteer in the overseas program."

i know you can grow your own cotton but where do you buy yarn in israel?

Well, this year I won't be growing cotton because the time period when I usually started was eaten up taking care of my mom and then taking care of her estate. And next year I won't grow anything because of shmitta, so it's a good thing there are now decent yarn stores in Israel. It used to be, back when I moved here 17 years ago, you could buy all the yarn you wanted -- as long as what you wanted was fuschia acrylic. Now there are two yarn stores I frequent (when I'm not on a yarn diet): Badei Shani in Jerusalem (Martef HaIr, next to HaMashbir, across from the midrachov) and Gourmet Yarn in Raanana.

is there a yarn or product you can't get in Israel but are dying to try?

I haven't been to Gourmet Yarn in a while, between being busy and being on a yarn diet. Pretty much everything I'd want to try she's got, or is willing to get. One thing I'd like to try, though, and which I didn't find when I was in NY last month, is Tofutsies sock yarn (and all the other cool new sock yarns that aren't 75/25).

what is your favourite thing(s) about living in israel?

Oooh, tough question. I love the pace of life here, I love the freedom my kids have to go where they want, when they want. I love that here I never have to explain why I'm taking time for a religious life. (Go explain to the average American employer that you're taking off half an hour for afternoon prayers.)

we are just about to enter life with teenagers, any advice?

Fasten your seatbelts. No, seriously--if you've raised them right until now, they'll be fine, with a minor bump or scrape here or there. There's a Yiddish saying--from seven to seventy, a person's essential character remains unchanged.
When my kids were little, we had a reputation for being very strict. Now that the youngest is 15, we have a reputation for being very lenient. I rarely tel my kids no, but not because I'm indulgent--because they already know what they can do and what they can't, and very rarely ask to do something I wouldn't allow.

DIRECTIONS FOR THE INTERVIEW MEME
1. Leave a comment saying, "Interview me."
2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. Please make sure I have your email address.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and offer to interview someone else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.

Now that I've broken the ice, maybe I can finish up that post about knitting in the hospice, or knitting since, or saying kaddish...

Baruch Dayan HaEmet

2007-03-12T14:54:00.000+02:00

Excuse my prolonged silence--my mother A"H passed away on Purim morning in Florida. I was with her the last week and a half, day and night, was with her when she died until the funeral home took her away, identified the body before the funeral, and helped bury her. We got up from shiva yesterday morning and I am flying back to Florida with my father today to deal with all the financial paperwork, then to Toronto for the weekend and back home on Monday night.

My knitting ate my weekly walk

2007-02-11T15:14:00.000+02:00

Last week we didn't get to do any of the Israel National Trail. Blame it on Monkey business.

What is it with me lately, underestimating the amount of sock yarn I'll need? Luckily Tzvi at Badei Shani had one more skein of this yarn in this dyelot. I might even have enough for fingerless mitts, since the third skein is only making toes.

Downsizing January

2007-02-01T21:31:00.000+02:00

I don't know whether it's an early midlife crisis, a fit of FLYing, or the Israeli settler's version of the American middle-class woman's fear of ending up a bag lady (i.e., ending up in a charavilla), but I've been trying to downsize. Get rid of things I don't love and won't use, books that don't interest me, VHS tapes I have on DVD or electronic files, turning stash into knitting. January was a productive month. I'm down 22 VHS tapes, 40 books (yes, I do read fast), and 13 skeins of yarn (after the one skein which was bought to finish these):

The four skeins of yarn it took to knit these knee socks aren't amongst the 13 in the count; until I knit the final stitch possible out of a yarn, it doesn't count as done, and I have about 40 grams left. Anyone have any ideas on what to do with such a small but substantial amount? If it were food I'd feed it to the cat, but I doubt she likes Strumpfwolle 6 fach.

Shvil Yisrael -- Rabin Park

2007-01-31T11:29:00.000+02:00

Is it just me, or is everything in this country named "Rabin"? I'm surprised we haven't yet become the "State of Rabin."

We had agreed to take The Oldest Teen to his base on Sunday morning. Despite the prohibition on soldiers hitchhiking, every time we go out we load up our car with soldiers, so why not do it once for our own boy? Everything was planned, I had a nice walk planned out near Nitzanim, and then he comes home--he's been assigned, for the week, to the big army base at Tzrifin. Great. Who wants to walk in Rishon LeZion?

The day was beautiful when we left the house, horribly foggy by the time we got to the base. But since we were out, anyway, we decided to continue toward Beit Meir and see if the weather picked up. By the time we got to where we'd left off last the sun had come out, and we set off in the direction we'd meant to go last time, if only The Spouse didn't have a lousy sense of direction.

Israel National Trail markings are few and far between on this route. If you don't have a book with turn-by-turn instructions with you, just remember that you have to pass mishlat (fortified height) 16 and 21 to stay on the Trail.

The views here are very different from those on the beach walks. Hard to believe we're less than an hour away from there. The more I walk this country, the more I realize how much is compressed into this little slice of land.

Most of this walk is along the path used to gain the hills around Jerusalem. The historical aspect (the Palmach's fight to gain control of the fortified high ground, in Operation Maccabi, May 1948) is well-signed. The trail--less well signed.

Here's why a guidebook is so important. See any National Trail markings here? (Those would be blue, white, and orange.)

Overlook to the right, 4x4 path to the left. The overlook is probably on the trail, right? Wrong. When you get to this sign, you'll start to follow the green and white 4x4 trail. Occasionally there will be National Trail markings, but not often. As long as you're on track towards 16 & 21, you're in the right place, not that anyone will tell you.
After a nice little nature hike you'll reach mishlat 16, where you'll find a nice example of our national product--a memorial to the fallen, in this case, Palmach fighters.

It felt odd, a year and a half after the expulsions from Gush Katif, to see a marker memorializing (among others) 10 Palmach fighters who died trying to defend Kfar Darom in the fight for independence, and it made me think how different history would have been had they managed to hold on to the village back then.
We thought this was the difficult part of the trail--there were some somewhat steep uphills. The Spouse and I joke that we're doing "National Trail for the old and enfeebled," but this section is not for that demographic; we certainly couldn't see bringing his 86 year old mother here, for example.

Continue up the path, following the green and white markings, until mishlat 21.

Here the trail gets more complicated, because instead of following the signs to more historical markers, you have to go behind the memorial area, behind the firing stand (for some reason, exceptionally well marked)

and down between some rocks on what barely looks like a path. How a 4x4 is supposed to manage this part is beyond me.
For the next hour or so I only took pictures looking uphill after we'd scrambled down. If I'd had to look all the way down from where we were at the top of the mountain, I'd have been too chicken to go on.

Do you really think a 4x4 could do this path?
Finally an Israel National Trail marking, telling you to continue on the green path. We were getting hot and tired, so we decided to cut across the blue path, back to the red, which would circle around to where our car was parked.

No one, not even the guidebook, bothered to inform us that if green and white meant "barely passable for a 4x4," blue and white meant "barely passable by a mountain goat."

(See that vaguely light brown dirt path? That's the path to take. It's very well marked, which is good, because the trail itself is very poor, and tends to become slippery rock at the least provocation.)
The red trail! A Jeep trail! Probably passable! Yay!

The specs: From the Beit Meir hen houses to mishlat 21
Parking: Free parking at KKL's Rabin Park (space for 4-5 cars or 3 buses)
Return: Foot, baby. Bring a walking stick.
Difficulty Level: The trail itself is a bit steep in places, but manageable. The shortcut to make the walk circular is not recommended for anyone with a fear of heights or problems with balance. Wear good walking shoes.
Potential hazards: Steep rocky paths, poor signage, loose rocks.

Shvil Yisrael -- Tel Aviv to Arena Mall

2007-01-29T12:42:00.000+02:00

So, it looks like all I do is walk, knit, and work? Um--yeah, and your point is?

Last Thursday we finished off the Tel Aviv section of the trail. We had started it, as a family, back in April of 2005, but since the kids are all over the place now (the Oldest Teen in the army, the Middle Teen in Hadera, the Youngest Teen sometimes agreeing to come home), we decided to finish it off by ourselves.

Warning: This is going to be picture heavy, because the trail signage sucks, and not in a good way, in Tel Aviv.

We took up where we left off last, in the Yarkon Park in Tel Aviv.

Based on the marking, you'd think you should go over the bridge, right? Well, the bridge was pretty, with all its cut out shapes, so it was a nice detour.

But if you're doing the trail, take the path *under* the bridge to continue. Go along the path until you get to the memorial for fallen Tel Aviv residents (this country specializes in memorials).

Here's another example of bad signage. The path, you'll notice, runs on the extreme left of the picture. The sign to turn is on the right.

Usually signs, especially ones so important, are just on the side of the trail, not hidden. Again--if you're doing the trail, the turn onto the streets of Tel Aviv is just past the tennis courts, *before* the boating and rowing center. *Before,* I said--not after. But having missed the turn, we did get to see some pretty sights:

Once we realized we were lost and found our way back to the trail, we exited onto Rokach Blvd. On the other side of the memorial are two computer kiosks, one to Tel Aviv residents killed in terrorist actions, back to before the establishment of the state:

The kiosk on the other side of the park is for Tel Aviv residents who fell in battle. Despite the fact that The Spouse used to collect obits of people with the same name as his, he wouldn't let me take a picture of the screen devoted to the soldier with his name who was killed in Khan Yunis on June 5, 1967.

When you get to the corner of Rokach and Ibn Gavirol, you won't find another missing marking, but make a left turn onto Ibn Gavirol. Just across Rokach you'll see a marking telling you to continue up Ibn Gavirol, so you know you're on the Trail.

Continue up Ibn Gavirol to Agnon. Here there is a marking telling you to turn right, but since it's on a traffic isle, you might not notice it.

You'll pass a municipal "protected animal area" -- I'm not sure what it is, but from the sounds coming past the fence, there are a lot of dogs there. Isolation? Municipal kennels? Bueller?
Then you'll walk past a lot of fancy apartment buildings. Why does the Israeli "good life" involve living near so many other people, in so little space, with nature being something you look out your window at?
Make a left turn off Agnon onto Levi Eskol. The marking is on the bottom of the electrical box to your left. For once, it's close enough to be easily seen.

You pass the Sde Dov airport. (You could fly to the other end of the trail in a little less than an hour, if you were in a hurry).

Another reason for poor signage.

Did the municipality take down this pole, or was it someone looking to make mischief? Or maybe metal thieves, preparing for a night-time pick-up? In any case, where do we go from here? Good thing we brought along the book, because the maps are useless when the turns are so sharp.
On the corner of Levi Eshkol and Tzvi Propes, make a left.

Here's a hint: If you think you should have seen a marking and didn't, try looking in the opposite direction. There was no marking for the left turn, but once we made it, there was a marking on Propes instructing us to make a right onto Eshkol, so we knew we had made the correct turn, considering we were going in the opposite direction. (Did that make any sense?)
Continue past some construction and you'll get to the Tel Baruch parking lot.

In the summer it's full of cars. In the winter, it's full of evidence that Tel Aviv prostitutes practice safe sex. Wear closed shoes.
You're finally off the streets (as are the women who work in the parking lot...).

A few meters on we met a fisherman. He had a net and would stand on the rocks, peering out at the waves, and when he saw what he wanted, throw out his net, gather it up, and bring a catch of fish back to the sand. He'd dump out his catch, throw back the small ones, and his partner would gather the rest into a plastic basket, washing them off in the sea.

Then they moved down the beach a little to start again.

WARNING: The section of beach from Tel Baruch to Cliff Beach is, I gather, an unofficial nude beach. Luckily, we only passed two men taking advantage of the freedom, and The Spouse warned in time about each. Isn't the sea lovely? Shmirat Einayim, enforcing modesty by being careful what you look at: it's a great alternative to forcing your own values on others.

At Cliff Beach we met more fishermen, this time using a more conventional method.

Good-bye, Tel Aviv. Good-bye Herzeliya.

Next stop, Jerusalem!

The specs: Park HaYarkon (Tel Aviv) to Arena Mall (Herzeliya), approximately 10 km
Parking: Free street parking on Ibn Gavirol off Rokach
Return: Dan 90 bus from outside Arena to Alozoroff, just past Ibn Gavirol. Then take the Dan 26 outside Ibn Gavirol 120 to the corner of Ibn Gavirol and Rokach.
Difficulty Level: Very easy. Only potential problem is walking along the beach, for those who have trouble walking on sand.
Potential hazards: Prostitution at Tel Baruch parking lot, nude beach between Tel Baruch and Cliff Beach, jellyfish along the water's edge.

Sometimes I even knit

2007-01-27T22:27:00.000+02:00

Skully sweater #2 is done and on the model:

Of course Skully #1 had to launch a fight with Skully #2. Who said the army takes a boy and turns him into a man?

The specs:
Skully by Samantha Bliss
From Stitch 'n Bitch (page 190)
Knit in Knitpicks Sierra (70% wool. 30% superfine alpaca), 9 balls Coal, less than 1 ball Natural
Modification: Attached the sleeves via single crochet and I am knitting each teen a set of plain black sleeves in case they ever grow out of skulls.

Shvil Yisrael -- Arena Mall to Tel Baruch

2007-01-21T12:36:00.000+02:00

It's raining and nasty out today, but last Thursday we did another 2 kilometers of the Israel National Trail. Yeah, at 2 kilometers a stretch we'll be doing this for the rest of our lives, but at least it's something.

The Israel National Trail detours from the coast for a kilometer or so to scoot around the Herzliya marina and the Arena Mall. Following the sidewalk, you pass a memorial to a parachutist, Yossi Cooper, who crashed and was killed. Roadside memorials are not uncommon in Israel, but they can vary from a pile of rocks with a makeshift sign, such as you'll see at the bus stop outside Ariel, to elaborate constructions calling for metal thieves to plunder them. In other countries I've visited, such as Greece, they are much more uniform and institutionalized.

It feels odd to be doing a "nature hike" at the edge of a city, though the edge is not very busy.

After about a kilometer you go back onto the beach. Very soon thereafter you're walking the separate-sex beach. I'm not sure what Trail walkers are supposed to do during the summer--is there an alternate route, or are they expected to only use the Trail during non-daylight hours (or winter, as we did)?

Just because The Spouse wants me to post this:

The separate beach has bathing and bathroom facilities. No, they are not open in the winter. note teh man and the car on the top of the bluff to the left of the picture. I wonder if he could also get so close during the summer, and if so, what's the point of the separate beach?

The end of the walk. You can see the buildings of Tel Aviv in the background.

And once you turn around, you can see teh Herzeliya marina in teh background. Like I said, short walk.

Obviously, after last week's 1970s style lifeguard stand, you can see that there are no standards when it comes to the stands.

Did someone forget to bring in the last of the laundry at the end of last season?

Sunset over the Herzliya marina.

Winter delights

2007-01-14T08:42:00.000+02:00

Crembo

chocolatey

sweet white fluff

A cookie, and done.

Shvil Yisrael -- Beit Meir

2007-01-11T16:30:00.000+02:00

Instead of continuing our walk from last week, we hit the Jerusalem area, because early in the morning we had to hand our precious Oldest Teen over to the tender mercies of the Israeli Army. (They then loaded him on a bus and took him to the Tel Aviv area, which we could have taken him to more easily than to Jerusalem, but that's the army for you...)

We took the main highway to the Beit Meir turn-off, and parked at a KKL sign at the entrance to the Burma road.

My National Trail guidebook said that there was a 2 hour circular section headed down the Burma road, so of course The Spouse chose to head out in the opposite direction. [sigh]

The scenery is beautiful, especially all greened up for winter. The almond tree is blooming already, though it's about a month early.

The only blemish on this bucolic scene is the odor; this section of the Trail passes right alongside the Beit Meir chicken coops. At least you know, on the return trip, when you're almost done, with the perfume wafting int the air around you.

This section of the trail is much better marked than is the section on the Herzeliya beach. It's no less crowded, but here's it's bicyclists you share the trail with, thanks to KKL. (I never thought I'd say those words about the Jewish National Waste of Funds.)

Most of this section is a forest walk, with pines and oaks obscuring anything else--you can't see the forest for the tress or, as my brother put it when he was about 7, "I can't see the view. All these trees are in the way."

Along the way, enjoying the sunshine and the relative warmth, you do find reminders that it is still winter.

Rain puddles, two days after the last rain. Well, something had to get everything so green, didn't it?
At one point there's a break in the trees and you suddenly see what, in some circles, passes for civilization: the city of Beit Shemesh. Between you and the city there are kilometers of trees. All those blue-box pennies actually were used, so when are you coming to water your tree?

After about 40 minutes of strolling we got to a downhill which in real-life looked a little trickier than it does in a photograph and we decided to leave it for another day, when the Old Spouse's heel spurs are further along the road to recovery.

(If you look carefully, you can see trail markings on the big stone down at the bottom.)

And because this is still a knitting blog, proof that all this walking hasn't completely stalled knitting, though it seems to have affected my sense of color:

The first Monthly Dishcloth KAL. It was supposed to be white, but I need to start making some milchig dishcloths for Pesach... Besides, isn't snow a bluish kind of white? (Now let's all quote the Teens: "Mama, you're weird!")

Paying an old debt

2007-01-08T18:41:00.000+02:00

Back in the Stone Age (2006), the Safranit tagged me with a meme. Now, I am smart enough to know one never says no to a librarian (even if one does risk a late-fee):

Four jobs I've had:
*Stripper. No, not that kind. Rubylith in a print shop type stripper.
*Shooting instructor at the National Olympic Range. I specialized in teaching women, politicians, and senior citizens.
*Youth group leader. Surprising considering how little I like teenagers in large groups.
*Off-Off Broadway actress with the Black Spectrum Theater and with Miriam Kressyn's Yiddish Theatre Troupe.

Four movies I can watch over and over:
To Be or Not To Be (Mel Brooks version)
Stevie (starring Glenda Jackson as Stevie Smith)
HaLahaka (especially the really bad English subtitles)
Bride and Prejudice (I love Bollywood)

Four places I have lived:
Queens, NY
Brooklyn, NY
Neve Tzuf, Israel
Har Bracha, Israel

Pretty sad that--that's *all* the places I've ever lived. If I'd had to stretch it to five I could have broken Queens down into Laurelton (birth-5) and

Kew Garden Hills (5-20), but after that, I'd have to count vacations as living.

Four television shows I love to watch:
Torchwood (OK, the plots so far stink. Fiction me some science, guys. Though the last few eps didn't stink quite so ripely. But still--John

Barrowman eye candy? Who can resist that?)
Dr Who (although I worry about the new companion's pineapple hair)
Eight is Enough (now if I could only figure out how to save off AOL TV)
Histeria (ditto)

Four places I have been on vacation:
I don't do vacations, so 4 places I've been this year on work trips, with sight-seeing attached:
Mexico City
Paris
Athens
Toronto

Four of my favorite dishes:
seitan "pork" from Buddha Bodai in Manhattan (5 Mott St.)
extra-hot tacos from Barbacoa in Maxico City (Jules Verne Ave.)
fresh criossants with butter for breakfast in Paris
warm chocolate bomb from Umami (Eglinton Ave., Toronto)

Four websites I visit daily:
Rotter.net
Bloglines
Gmail
Mininova torrents

Four places I would rather be right now:
Anywhere, any time in New York City (either you're born a New Yorker, no matter where the birth physically took place, or you're not. I was, both mentally and physically)
Walking the Israel National Trail (well, that's planned for Wednesday)
Driving between Binghampton and Buffalo in the early morning fog
Mexico City

Shvil Yisrael--Herzliya, heading south

2007-01-04T10:54:00.000+02:00

We started off in the same location as last week

But this time, instead of heading towards Netanya, we turned toward the Sinda Ali complex.

On the northbound side, this part of the trail is beautiful little nooks, marble-rocky beaches, wandering through ruins. On the southbound side, it's crowded urban sprawl.

We walked until the Herzeliya Marina, where the trail leave the beach for about a kilometer; it's an easy point to remember when we next pick up our hike.

Instead of going off the beach to get to the Marina and its adjacent mall, we kept going until we found a brook of sewage which we had to cross. Obviously, others had crossed it before us, leaving help behind.

Northbound we had seen tiny little fishies. At the Marina, they looked ready to take on a small boat.

The Marina, with the Arena Mall in the background:

Arena is supposed to be a fancy-shmancy mall. OK, so it has Nine West and Kenneth Cole, but it also has Kravitz and Fox. That's fancy how?
On the way back to the car we did actually follow the trail, street portion and all. (Better than the sewage.) The one problem with the Trail is finding the markings, especially in urban areas. See the marking in the picture?

(It's on the rock, just to the right of all the greenery.)
Some people complain that Israel is getting secular, but it's everyday signs, warning of doom and destruction if one swims without supervision, still quote the Scriptures.

Some more pretty-pretties:
Lifeguard station of obviously 70s vintage:

Our starting/stopping point, 3:15 pm:

Knit from your stash 2007

2007-01-02T10:45:00.000+02:00

Like just about everyone in the blogosphere, I'm doing the KFYS07, but this time, I'm going to play it my way.

Everything counts.
I'm certainly not saying sock yarn doesn't count, because more than half my purchases in 2006 were sock yarn.
No allowances for things I'm asked to knit, since that was the other half of my purchases.
However:
I am allowing myself to buy whatever I feel like buying.
So how is this "knit from your stash"?

I may buy whatever I feel like buying, but I must use up at least an equal amount, plus more. Since February 2006 (when I started to keep track) I bought or was gifted 3.6 kilo of yarn. I used or gifted 7.2 kilo, so I had a net stash depletion of 3.6 kilo of yarn. In 2007, since I'm starting to keep track from January 1, I hope to up that net depletion to at least 4 kilo. I've already made a start. Despite a last minute 2006 acquisition (which went on the 1006 balance sheet), I have used 100 grams of stash so far this year.

Final purchase of 2006 (Dec. 31, 3 pm) and first FO of 2007 (January 1, 12:20 am):

Snow kidding

2006-12-28T16:32:00.000+02:00

The country was on high weather alert yesterday. Big storm coming--batten down the hatches. Snow! For a country that gets snow maybe once a year, it was big news. Well, there were flakes here and there, and it started snowing again when I went to sleep, so I grabbed the camera first thing in the morning, opened the front door, and found this:

Who says Israel can't make a real big something out of nothing?

Shvil Yisrael--Herzliya, heading north

2006-12-26T11:42:00.000+02:00

Amy, I owe you an apology. I begged off getting together at Gourmet Yarns to catch up on work, but at about 10 o'clock The Spouse came into my office and made me an offer I couldn't refuse: "It's beautiful out. It's supposed to be disgusting tomorrow and Wednesday. Want to go for a walk along Shvil Yisrael?"

As a family we've walked sections of the Israel National Trail before, and would have liked to walk it all with them, but as the kids get older and have busier lives, we're seeing that it's just not possible. So we sat down with the maps we own (2 of the dozen or so) and a book about the trail to find a short segment which was accessible by car and/or bus.

We decided to walk north from Apollonia and turn around when The Spouse's heel spurs were hurting too much. (He started complaining after 19 minutes of walking, but I got him to keep on going until we'd walked 48 minutes in one direction.) To get down to the trail you pass the top of the Shell House

You go down the stairway and look for the Shvil Yisrael signage (the orange, blue and white marking on the staircase which tells you whether to go straight or, as in this case, bear to a different direction).

You pass alongside the Shell House (I wonder if this guy owns his lot or is a squatter?)

The walk itself is on the beach under the Apollonia Nature Preserve. There are signs, here and there, warning about landslides, and they're not kidding. It's obvious that at one point the wall which is currently on the rocks of the beach was attached to the remnant up the cliff.

Where this granite column fell from is anyone's guess, but the beach for at least a half kilometer north is littered with marble.

At one point you have to walk through the fallen ruins to continue. In the summer, I suppose you could just wade in the ocean instead, but yesterday was a little too cool, and The Spouse was wearing his super-duper orthopedic shoes and I cloth sneakers, so we didn't chance it.

The trail is listed as easy walking, and it is for the most part, but there are some tricky areas where you have to negotiate the ruins.

Once you get through the rock-falls it's just a nice

easy

stunning walk.

The week in review

2006-12-21T13:57:00.000+02:00

Confessions of a middle-aged housewife: The Other Man

2006-11-30T11:08:00.000+02:00

I'm in love, and with someone other than my husband.

Yes, that's right. Go back and read it again if you were too shocked the first time to absorb it.

Who's the object of my affections? This handsome man.

Judge Steve Adler, who ordered the striking government employees back to work, at least for a week. Enough time for The Spouse to come home from his North American Tour of six weeks. Love you, Judge Adler! We'll make a toast to you around our full-family Shabbat table this week. Mwah!

Now, can anyone explain to me why anyone still works for regional councils? Every few years there's a strike because the council workers haven't been paid. You'd think these people would know that their employer has a lousy track record when it comes to handing over salaries. Why don't they just look for jobs with more reliable employers? There must be something in it for them, so why they have to make my life miserable every other year is beyond me.

A suggestion for the Histadrut: your strikes are so overwhelming that the judiciary has to intervene. Why not lower the intensity and make it much more disruptive? Don't strike 24 hours a day. Pick hours--say, from 10-11 am all government offices shut down and all people inside are kicked out. When they're allowed back in at 11, refuse to accept any previous numbers, and make people line up again. Then go on strike after lunch, and again make people line up from scratch. People can't complain that they aren't getting services--they'll just have to wait anywhere from 5 minutes to 5 days, depending on how often you play the 'empty out and start again' game. Roll the dice each morning and only deliver mail when it comes up even. Have the air traffic controller strike for 20 minutes on the hour, and the baggage handlers for 15 minutes on the half hour. You'll drive everyone insane, but since citizens can still, with enough time and patience, get on with our lives, we'll be more likely to pressure the government on your behalf.

Or here's a really novel idea: Don't strike against the public sector, strike against the Knesset and the government complex! Block the entrances. Don't prepare or serve food in the cafeteria. Shut off the power and phones to the building. Don't pick up or deliver mail (including bribes). It's easy to push against those who have no power to push back, but we're also the ones who have no power to help you, knuckle-heads. But speaking truth to power might get your little union knees cut out from under you, mightn't it? And so, since government employees are withholding the salaries of government employees, non-government employees suffer.

Love you, Judge Adler. Have I said that already?

In the spirit of love, yarn p0rn. Stephanie sent a huge, terrific package to make up for The Middle Teen taking all her sock yarn and Cotton Ease with her to Hadera. This blows to hell and back my "use up 5 kilo more yarn than I get in this year" plan, but it is worth it.

I count a pair of knee socks, a pair of socks for the Middle Teen (it's not as warm in Hadera as first she thought) and a hoodie for the Youngest Teen in there.And maybe something for the Oldest Teen, as well, but that will have to wait until he's back from basic training.

State of the art update (aka WIP p0rn, aka too much going on, wouldn't you say?):

Slowly I turn, step by step

2006-11-17T08:44:00.000+02:00

On Nov. 2, the 20th anniversary of the founding of the Moze-Spouse house, we took the totally corny step of accompanying our Socktoberfest socks to Niagara Falls.

(Mine are the Mystery Socks from the Yahoo SAM group. The Spouse's are the long awaited Trek with Me socks. You can't see much of the sock-y goodness with Mr. "Almost ready for Century Village" rockin' the orthopedic arch supports in heavy support shoes)

Yes, Niagara Falls is a hokey choice for an anniversary. Yes, it is also as awesome as everyone here told me it would be. I wasn't prepared for the constant roar which could be heard all the way to our hotel room, not was I prepared for how immense the Horseshoe Falls are. The only way to get most of that fall into one picture is from across the street.

The American Falls are much, much smaller.

Doing the Falls in winter is much quieter and less crowded, but many of the attractions (like the Maid of the Mist) aren't open. No matter, we like walking. Next time we go, though (and we will be back), we want to do Goat Island and walk right up close to the American Falls.

Doesn't the Spouse make a great Cyberman? OK, maybe not so much a Doctor Who Cyberman (his antenna are upside down), but maybe another Torchwood era Cyberman? (OK, OK, so he doesn't have the Madonna framework and the high heels. Better this way, no?)

Coming back over the border was a pain. The US government can really be paranoid, can't they? So what if I have 3 suitcases for 1 week--yarn alone took up nearly a whole suitcase. Sheesh.

As soon as we crossed into the US, the snow began.

So we had fall and winter, and when I went to West Palm Beach, summer. (No pictures, though--short emotional visit. Mom's down to 2% kidney function, still won't consider dialysis. Wants me to come for a week next month, but I think the kiddos need their mommy home for Channukah. Damned if I do, damned if I don't.)

Then it was back to NY for a quick trip to a Yom Limud in Westchester featuring The Spouse, Philadelphia for a repair job, and then back home to work and laundry and waiting for the Spouse. And a fabbo box from Stephanie, about which more later, because now that I'm home, you think anyone else will do the Shabbat cooking?

Random notes from the road

2006-11-16T20:28:00.000+02:00

I'm home, jet lagged and not even fighting it, trying to catch up on work and housework. I think The Oldest Teen did one load of laundry while I was gone. I know I found 10 days worth of his clothing in the wash, and I was only gone 16.

So...

The drive up to Toronto? Beautiful.

We conked out at Binghamton (of course I did--I'd just flown in that morning and for me it was about 1 am) and then continued the next morning through mists and light rain. The border crossing was easier than we thought it would be (Hand over our driver's licenses, "That luggage all yours?" "yes." "OK, have a good time.") and two hours later were checking into our youth hostel room in Kensington Market.

(The view from our room)

The drawbacks to staying in a youth hostel is no private bathroom/toilet, but it's cheap, centrally located, and has a full kitchen. (Yes, you can live a whole week cooking food double wrapped in a microwave.)

Shabbat we davened and ate at the Minsker shul. From the outside the building doesn't look like much, but inside it's gorgeous -- stained glass, wall murals, woodwork. It was torched in 2002 and some areas haven't been repaired yet (including a big window in the women's section--brrr); when they have enough money to finish the job, it'll be spectacular. The community there is warm and hospitable, even though you may end up helping cook on Friday afternoon.

Some random Kensington Market photos:

(OK, that last one wasn't random, but finding the place was. I didn't have the address, just the street, and the first thing I see, at 66 1/2, is a Lettuce Knit store sign and an empty shop. No indication that they've moved a few doors down to 70. Good thing I decided to walk down the rest of the block.)

Aside from set-up and break-down days, we walked to our convention in Bloor-Yorkville, just opposite the ROM. I love me a construction site.

At night we'd pick up fruits and veggies at a Vietnamese green-grocer on Spadina and then wander around the neighborhood. Youth hostels will definitely feature in our future travel plans.

Our last day in town we went to the Bata Show Museum, where the Spouse completely freaked me by spotting a conservator working on a boot in a glassed-in office and holding a large note asking about acid deterioration up to the glass. She thought it was cute and came out to talk, but she was only an intern and the head honcho was unavailable. I swear, The Spouse never stops working...

Random thoughts about Toronto:

Lovely city, especially the downtown areas.

Why did the Jewish community move from Kensington Market to the north? Where they are now looks like middle-class projects. [shudder]

I was surprised to see a city so well built for bicycles and public transit, but with so few people doing shoe-leather commuting. It wasn't even that cold the days we were there, and as environmentally sound as street cars are, isn't walking even sounder?

Toronto residents seem very concerned about soldiers in Afghanistan, locals in Iraq, and the HIV+ in Africa. And a lot less concerned about the homeless in Toronto.

You lot really get into Halloween, don't you?

Being young and hip in Toronto seems so much work. Walk around Kensington Market on a Saturday morning and everyone's shopping for the same jacket, same hair dye, same tattoos as everyone else there has. Back in my day (when men were men and cattle was dinner and we had to walk 10 miles uphill through the snow each way to school, and "vintage" was just used clothes) off-beat wasn't a uniform to which one had to conform; it seemed so much freer and less fraught.

A perfect prelude to an anniversary at Niagara Falls.
(to be continued when I can keep my eyes open)

In praise of younger men

2006-10-26T08:47:00.000+02:00

While the Spouse has been working on the East Coast (of the US; if he was working on the East Coast of Israel, he'd be home), The Oldest Teen has been filling in, for good and bad.

Good: He went to the city and got the Youngest Teen's cell phone fixed.
Bad: He leaves his coffee cup on the table, just like dear old Dad.

Good: He went to the city to get the rice mixes my parents asked me to bring.
Bad: Since Dad's been away he's taken to wearing his tzitziyot like Dad -- one set of strings hanging straight down the center outside his waistband.

Good: He drove me to the airport.
Bad: He nearly gave me a heart attack doing it.

Good: He made me dinner every night.
Bad: It was either pasta with no sauce or frozen chicken schnitzel.

But all in all, it's been a joy having him home. No scrambling for who'll watch The Youngest Teen while I'm away. No having to run in to town to take care of errands. Almost like having The Spouse at home, but when I tell this man to clean his room, he sometimes (somewhat) listens.

I'm taking a newer, smaller hand luggage this trip. I'm such a yekke that I always worry they'll enforce the weight and item limits. Usually I take two pairs of socks to knit on the plane, but to free up weight, I quickly finished my pair. The Spouse's can wait; he's getting gifted them for our anniversary, a week away.

(Quick, bad picture, because the airport authorities don't like you taking pictures inside the terminal.)
Mystery socks from the Yahoo SAM group.

ETA: Free on-board innernets rulz!

What a heel

2006-10-22T08:30:00.000+02:00

(And I'm not talking Yair Lapid, either)

The week before Fall Travel Season is always busy, especially if The Spouse has gone on ahead and I'm left with all the last minute details. This year I'm lucky; the Oldest Teen is home, waiting for basic training to start, and he's out running errands for me. (Picking up my travel insurance, taking in the Youngest Teen's cellphone for repair--again, etc.) Every traveller should have a teen with time on his hands to help out.

The Spouse left with two suitcases which were together within a kilo of his total buggage allowance. What have I got?

One suitcase is packed inside the other, because I always have more coming back than going--yarn, goodies for the kids, stuff The Spouse doesn't need again until he comes home. That's three weeks worth of clothing, a coat, and, of course, knitting projects.

I admit I'm cheating here, since I have a Knitpick order waiting in New York, so all I've brought is cotton for the November Dishcloth KAL, yarn for kneesocks, and the Knitpicks stuff I have in stash which matches what's waiting for me. With any luck I'll come home with a dishcloth, a Skully sweater for the Youngest Teen, and a pair of knee socks in progress. In my hand luggage I'll take the current sock WIPs.

Now to see how much of the current WIPs can be finished before Wednesday night

Two Mason*Dixon logcabin blanets, a pinwheel blanket, a dishcloth, socks for The Spouse, and socks for me. The priority is The Spouse's socks, since our 20th secular anniversary is Nov. 2. (Today's the Jewish annoversary, but since he's in Boston and I'm in Israel, not a whole lot of celebrating giong on.) The plan is to spend our honeymoon in--ready?--Niagara Falls. Honestly--we're finsihed in Toronto on November 1 and don't have to be in NYC until November 3, and the Falls are right on our way home. I told American neighbors our plan, and they weren't quite sure how to react. Is it ridiculously corny, or so corny it's cool?

That was the week that was

2006-10-19T14:32:00.000+02:00

When last I blogged, I was about to go into knit withdrawal. Been there, done that, gained the extra holiday kilo. But the holiday's been over for nearly a week, so where have I been? Knitting, of course. Like those two or three cups of coffee you drink after Yom Kippur -- you know better intellectually, but you're jonesing and so indulge.

Sukkot was lovely. The Youngest Teen had to do all the decorating herself, since the Oldest Teen and The Spouse put up the contraption and The Middle Teen barely breezed in with enough time to shower before candle lighting. Youngest did a ton and a half of paper chains and used all our ornaments.

Instead of bringing back all sorts of useless garbage from our travels, we bring back useless souveniers as sukkah decorations. Works best when we travel in December, not so well when we're travelling in June.

First day we went to my aunt, who lives about 20 minutes away, not so much to see my aunt and my neohew (learning here fr the year and with my aunt for the holiday) as because The Middle Teen agreed to come home for the holiday only if she could be assured of seeing friends who live in my aunt's town. (Said friends are now in Poland doing the 'Let's give the Poles our tourism shekel as reward for everything they did to--oops, for-- us in WWII' tour. Oh, my, did I get political there?)

Last Monday we went to Jerusalem because the Teens wanted to go to the huge Birkat Cohanim at the Wall and I had a client meeting. Afterwards we all (including my nephew) went to lunch in Talpiot--which cost a fortune, because the only way to get a seat in the restaurant's sukkah was to take waiter service, and then to the second day of the Beit Shemesh Festival.

Middle Teen met more of her Poland-bound friends

and we got to see Shai Gabso for a second Sukkot in a row.

I was more impressed with Adi Ran and the Moshav Band, but was very disappointed with Shlock Rock. I guess when you've been following a band for 25 years (before they even were Schlock Rock) you build up unreasonable expectations.

Time to get back to my knitting--Socktoberfest (and my upcoming anniversary) call.

When Judaism interferes with knitting

2006-10-06T11:19:00.000+02:00

Tonight the holiday of Sukkot starts, and so my knitting ends for a week. I'm still not sure I understand why I have to give up my craft Prozac -- sure, in the days when you *had* to knit/weave/spin/sew to clothe your family it was work, but now? [sigh]

And it comes at the worst time, right at the start of my quick-finish-everything-in-sight-before-I-fly panic.

Speaking of which, can anyone explain why accomodations in Toronto, Canada are so flippin' expensive? The Spouse and I may actually stay in a hostel, because everything else seems to be about the same price as the hotel we stayed in in Paris, without the convenience of a kosher breakfast or being walking distance from the Eiffel Tower. (And what, pray tell, is worth doing in Toronto, particularly after 5 pm, aside from Lettuce Knit?)

Here's a state of the WIPs, before religion forces them into hiding.

An FO--another MD baby kimono. Everything old is new again, only this time in stocking stitch. Gifted to a baby to be named later -- her parents were so sure she'd be a boy they hadn't even thought of any girl names, and then, when she was born, oops!

So now I have no girl baby gifts. A serious problem in a town where babies are the local industry. Lack of gifts + lots of oddballs of acrylic + MD knitting book = log cabin baby blanket! Too bad I started the blanket off thinking I'd have a run on boy baby gifts, but I can compensate: when I'm done I'll embroider a flower in the center square using some girly-girl color yarn. Since the picture was taken I've added two strips and four circular needles, because a blanket all bunched up looks like unblocked lace. What this might say about my tolerance for unblocked lace and the number of #6 circular needles I own will go unsaid.

But it's not all acrylics (me, knitting in acrylics--well, it's for a good cause, namely reducing my acrylic stash). Oh, no, of course it's not, because it's

I've even managed a half FO (does that make it an F or an O?)

Trekking XXL, color 66. This may hold the record for sock longest on the needles, since I cast it on at the beginning of June, while waiting for a flight to Las Vegas. (Here's the sock visiting Red Rock Canyon, back when I thought I could actually finish a sock over the summer with the Trek-Along)

and cast off Tuesday. With any luck sock #2 will go faster, because now that The Spouse has doctor-ordered custom insole and needs to wear old man shoes for the rest of his life, he's decided the only worthy compensation is hand-knit socks. (Are there any good cotton sock yarns with a decent amout of lycra content, too? The Spouse will spring for a whole new sock yarn stash if I can find a brand. If not, I'll probably try a pair or two out of Cascade Fixation.)

And if he gets, socks, I get socks. I hope these come out nicely, but who can tell? It's a mystery pattern from the SAM Yahoo group.

And in the Mason-Dixon spirit of "nothing is too crazy if you want it bad enough," a garterlac placemat. I think it may be a little small; I may buy another ball of this Coats & Clark yarn when I visit my parents in November.

Yeah, I know it's garish and tacky, yet for some reason, every time I look at it it makes me feel insanely happy. Go figure.

Not-so-random facts

2006-09-29T11:37:00.000+03:00

1. The Oldest Teen has finally heard from the army about his placement. He's been accepted into the Atudah program (which is basically ROTC), to study aerospace engineering at the Technion. And to think that this is the child the regional council wanted to force into special ed...

2. Word to the wise: never be the first woman in my town to give birth in a new year. Last year the first birth was quadruplets, this year it was only twins.

3. Only in a small town department: Second day of Rosh Hashanah and I'm awake, but still in bed. The Teens have already gone to synagogue and The Spouse is putting on his shoes and socks, getting ready to leave. Our bedroom door is opened up by someone calling The Spouse's name. "What, this isn't TheNextDoorNeighbors' House?" she asks, a little angrily. "No, it's ours. TheNextDoorNeighbors live next door," The Spouse replies while I sink under the covers, trying to hide from TwoDoorsDownNeighbor's mother, who was supposed to go to NextDoorNeighbor and wake her grandson (who has the same first name as The Spouse) for prayers. Think this will stop my neighbors who are always telling me how far-too-American looking my house is, when their's (they claim) isn't?

4. I'm working my way through the Mason-Dixon book; I've already knitted more from this book than from any other knitting book I own. I've done many, many felted baskets and am now working on a crop of baby kimonos (babies are SmallTown's national product). This is done in garter stitch and only one tie (never did like the look of two) in Hibiscus Yarns hand-dyed:

5. To the person who got here by Googling Jewish men allowed to knit -- whyever not?

6. I'm not sure if I find this deeply cool or deeply disturbing. There's a new mixtape CD DJ Handler presents Y-Love, and one clip is on Y-Love's My Space site. So's a warning against listen to that clip, because some of the samples include female singers. (a)If it's forbidden to listen to them, why put them up on the site? (b)How many Charedi mean who'd obey the warning are actually trawling My Space?

7. G'mar Tov!

5766 FOs and KALs

2006-09-22T13:11:00.000+03:00

Multi-direcional scarf

Bad Juju

Cinxia

Shadow socks

pink tank top

Glad Ragg socks

Holly

Jaywalker socks

Astra one-ball baby sweater

Felted Flamingo

Sixth Sense socks

Broadripple socks

Pomatomus socks

Skully sweater

felted baskets (7)

The habit of silence

2006-09-21T19:26:00.000+03:00

Once you get into the habit of not speaking much, it's hard to start again. You either gush (as at Knit Out Israel) or stay too silent (as on this blog).

You know things are bad when you listen to Sondheim to cheer you up.

Finished Business:

1. Knit Out Israel. Read about it at Amy's blog (her ice cream socks looked yummy enough to eat). Gourmet Yarn Shop would be OK for a US yarn shop; that it's in Israel at all is pretty darn amazing. Orly's got glass knitting needles and will soon have the short Bryspun dpns, and she seems pretty open to carrying just about anything her clientele will buy. Works for me.

I think I shocked the British ladies. They start talking about odd balls who have multiple WIPs, and I pull out the MD felted basket, an MD baby kimono, a garterlac placemat and Amir Peretz -- I spared them all the ER trip and did not pull out the other MD baby kimono, the sock, and the kumihimo braid. And I didn't even bring the shawl in progress, the dishcloth, the linen ties, or the other pair of socks. Nothing succeeds like excess.

2. Got our new car today. It's a case of second verse same as the first; another white Hyundai Getz, but this time a 2005 model instead of 2003.

3. It's a small world. Our Rosh Hashanah guests are bringing a guest of their own, an American whom the Oldest Teen knows from his summer university classes. A professor he may have next semester (if the army sends him to the university he's been in) has a son who used to live next door to our guests (down the block from us). The Middle Teen's housemate turns out to be a cousin of the Middle Teen's 5-6 grade teacher. I think we're getting to the point where we're reaching a critical mass of connections.

Have a sweet new year. Anyone wants some killer honey cake?

Touching history

2006-09-14T23:46:00.000+03:00

Today, for the first time since 1942, rabbis were ordained in Germany. And of all the scribes and calligraphers in the world, who was chosen to write their ordination certificates? The Spouse! I'm so proud of him for having his hand (literally) in a piece of history. Here's a video of some of the ceremony; The Spouse's work is inside the tubes being handed to the new rabbis.

9/11

2006-09-11T14:06:00.000+03:00

Today is not the yahrzeit, but since today is the day the 2996 tributes are going up, here are links to tributes to the two (thank G-d, only two) 9/11 victims we knew personally.

Shimmy Biegeleisen
During high school, The Spouse worked in (or rather bartered in--he took most of his wages in books) the Biegeleisen family seforim store. When we're back in New York, we still stop by the new location in Boro Park, and it's still our go-to store for hard to find Judaica, be it old books or books which one needs a personal reference to be allowed to buy. (Yes, true story.) With one thing and the other, and living in the neighborhood, you get to know nearly everyone, like The Spouse got to know Shimmy.

Shimmy, HY"D, had the zechus of letting his family know where he was, so when the initial psak came out, declaring every unaccounted-for person who was known to be in the Towers at the time of the crash halachically dead, hsi family could begin the process of mourning.

Eliyahu Furman
The Furman family, though, did got get that privilege and had to wait long months until Chavie (my sister-in-law's adopted sister) was declared a widow and not an agunah. I remember seeing her and the kids at our mutual neice's wedding that December, how heartbreaking it was to see those nearly-perfect little angels and realize I was seeing part of their lives that Eliyahu never would.

May G-d avenge their blood.

As a family we were lucky. One of The Spouse's nephews worked in the Towers and was just about to get on an elevator when the first plane hit. He freaked out so badly, just from the sound, that he ran from the building, past the first bridge to Brooklyn and caught himself only at the second. If it had hit one minute later... ut it's hard, thinking abuot hashgacha pratit, because if it was what saved Ari, wasn't it also what doomed Shimmy and Eliyahu?

When knitting gets political pt 2

2006-09-06T12:41:00.000+03:00

How I became a statistic

2006-08-28T06:48:00.000+03:00

Most of our plans for this summer involved being up north, plans which were cancelled by the Hezbollah and our own government. To make up for it, Friday we went out as a family to the Middle Teen's new obsession--bowling.

Here's the Oldest Teen (Happy Birthday, Boy!--19 years old today) trying to steer the ball with his body

On the way home the Oldest Teen was driving (gotta let him get all the practice he can) when a woman coming out of the local Arab town lost control of her car coming into what we locals call Death Curve. Oldest Teen did an amazing job of driving, but we still came away with a lovely souvenir

but you should see the other guy

She got taken to the hospital; we only had bumps and bruises.

What was odd (#1) is that the secod car she hit belongs to another car in our town, so local gossip had it that we'd gotten into an accident with our neighbors. All Shabbat both families were doing damage control to squash those stories.
What was odd (#2) was the reactions. The neighbor's car was being driven by their 20 year old, and when she got out of the car she stretched out on the road, in shock. The Oldest Teen got out of our car, looked around, and decalred, "Did you see that? It was just like Fast & Furious 3! Woohoo!" Boys...

Random Ramblings fromRecent Royalty

2006-08-21T17:01:00.000+03:00

Diane's alliteration deserves some -- well, something in return. Thanks to Anne for leading me to the game. In truth, it was the "not Russia at the time of his birth" that led me to identify G.I. Gurdjieff as the Dead Guy.

Speaking of man and mustaches, I ought to write something about the Lebanese mud we're getting pulled into like something out of a Brer Rabbit story. The politicians will never be able to get their hands clean. But really, what could I say about Amir Peretz that I didn't knit before the elections?

There's a protest boycott being organized by e-mail for tomorrow night. Organizers are (in Hebrew) asking people not to watch tomorrow night's news in protest over the way loose lipped reporters, out chasing scoops, helped Hizballah pinpoint where their missles fell. FYI--I'm not participating because I haven't actually watched any of the news programs since early 2001. There's only so much I can take being called all sorts of names, and with three teens in the house, I don't need Yonit and Chaim taking their turns, too.

Instead, I'll knit. Amazingly, I actually finished something. Typically, it's from a book everyone else discovered months ago (which is dog years in internet time).

The Mason-Dixon felt basket in its natural state:

Drying:

And in use:

(I think I'm going to have a William Carlos Williams moment...)

Eye Candy Friday

2006-08-18T17:21:00.000+03:00

I always seem to forget to post somethin, which is why the button isn't up on my sidebar.

This is a photo of the artwork for The Spouse's Rosh HaShanah card.

Commuter Family

2006-08-17T22:28:00.000+03:00

So, it's time to shape up my fall travel plans. And just in time, I find out that the clinical trial I've been cat-wrangling is almost certainly a go, so I'm going to be spending a lot of time in Greece.

Fall travel? More like living away from home most of this year. Problem is, so will The Spouse -- but not The Youngest Teen. Time to start cobbling together people she can stay with. Thank G-d Greece is close enough that I'll be able to come home weekends.

Time to start learning Greek.

I can't tell if I'm excited or terrified. Oh, well, at least I know where the LYS in Athens is (and they speak English -- and have sock yarn).

National Knitting Service

2006-08-15T16:56:00.000+03:00

Proof positive The Middle Teen is moving out prior to what's basically the first of three years of national service:

She's cleaning her room. (As opposed to the Oldest Teen, who basically moved out 5 years ago, she's pretty much renouncing this as her home. "You'll have a guest room!" she chirped as she threw out yet another bag of trash. I refrained from reminding her that the fact that she's finally cleaning her room, after 17 years, doesn't mean I've seen the last of her.) She's dismantling her stash and handed me a pile of dishcloth cotton.

The little stinker is keeping her Trekking, Cotton Ease, and handspun.

No politics inside. No real knitting, either.

2006-08-09T20:22:00.000+03:00

No politics, because I think Shoshi Greenfield said everything that needs to be said. We don't have enough sons to send them off to die in a war the government doesn't want to win.

Instead, a work rant.

I don't think I've ever talked about my work, even though I work over 40 hours a week. Suffice it to say that I love my work conditions, my work less so, because several of the topics I have to deal with are -- well, imagine Hassan Nasrallah working for Jewish National Fund.

But my work conditions--ah, what a joy. Even though I'm on call every day which isn't Sabbath or a holiday, from 6 am to 10:30 pm, weekends and legal holidays included. Even though I get no vacation. What other job in the world would allow me to go travelling with the Spouse for 3-4 months a year? At what other job would I be facing my current dillema--to go to Toronto with the Spouse in late October or go to Greece alone? (In truth, I'm giong to try to swing it so I can do both.)

But right now I'm doing trial management, and trying to get a protocol together. Two camps are involved, and I have to get one camp to approve the protocol, then go to the other, get a new version of the protocol approved, go back to the first group -- over and over.

Things that got settled on Monday were once again questioned on Tuesday. I answered everyone's objections, patiently, calmly, and got everyone to agree with me. Then on Wednesday the questions and objections came up again. I answered everyone's objections, patiently, calmly, and got everyone to agree with me. Who wants to place bets on what'll be in my inbox come Thursday morning?

I want my boss to change my job title to Mommy. This way I can set up an autoresponder reading

No.

Why not?

Because I'm the Mommy, and I said no.

I'm going to ask my boss to change my jo

The Lion sleeps tonight

2006-08-08T17:55:00.000+03:00

Follow up to yesterday's post.

First off, mitpachat tip to Jerusalem Knitting and Craft, who had the link on her blog yesterday.

Yes, I understand why people would use acrylic when sending gifts/charity to others, to people who may not have the time/desire/know-how to care for natural fibers properly. When I gift, even I do it in acrylic 99% of the time because of future care. But still, somehow the thought of (as I said) Arab petrochemical byproducts to victims of Arab terror just rubs me wrong.

And as for Lion Brand, I realized that even I have a sleeping Lion in my stash.

Oddly enough, through no planning on my part, it's in a box full of sock yarn I don't like wearing--the rest is Sockotta. Like gravitates to like.

Does this mean I have to start liking Lion Brand?

2006-08-07T19:24:00.000+03:00

Hello, people coming in from Overheard in New York. Unfortunately, Overheard in Israel is a lot less entertaining...

Madison, NJ women knit for victims of terror. Can I be catty? Oh, sure I can--this is my blog. I am *so* happy to see that they started this a year ago, for terror victims. I feel as bad for the people of Haifa and Tzefat as anyone, but where was all the national unity when people in Yesha were getting shot at, gunned down in their own homes, kidnapped, or bombed? Where was the national unity when Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, and Hadera were having Arabs blow themselves up downtown? Where was the national unity when Shederot was/is getting bombed? I'm glad to see that, though this group is getting publicity now, they've been active before it was quite so fashionable. It's awfully nice of Lion Brand to donate the yarn, and I know many, many Israelis are happy with acrylic (gioven what's in the yarn stores here, most of them simply don't know better) but I hope a lot of the yarn being knitted for distribution here is the good stuff. Because really, sending petrochemicals made from Arab oil byproducts to victims of Arab terror--no.

Saturday night I was listening the rad. A man from Haifa had taken shelter in Hadera, which itself was attacked on Friday. Mr. Haifa tells the reporter: "Well, now the people in Hadera know how we feel." And all I could think of was The Middle Teen's next-year principal, telling the parents "We haven't had a terror attack in forever--the last one was in the middle of Sukkot" (10 months ago). And some guy from Haifa thinks he can teach the Haderans something? Teach his grandmother to suck eggs, more like.

When knitting gets political

2006-08-04T10:32:00.000+03:00

One-Year Anniversary of Expulsion of 9,000 Jews

(Pattern courtesy of Monthly Dishcloth KAL.)

The last honest Israeli politician

2006-08-03T12:15:00.000+03:00

The JBlogosphere is buzzing over Prime Minister Olmert's statement that we must win the war in the North so that we can acomplish the much more important goal of giving the Arabs Judea and Samaria.

Jameel (eee, it always seems like I'm picking on him. I'm not, really, it's just that he expresses things better than your avereage blogger, so he's very quotable) wrote:

And you know what? Olmert is entitled to his political opinion as Prime Minister, and he is even entitled to try and push his plan forward.

However, to do so now, during wartime, intentionally targeting the settlers who are showing incredible loyalty to a State which turned it's back on them last year, who are fighting as one in a war of survival for the Jewish State -- shows incredible cynicism, small mindedness, and I'm sad to say...evil.

Interviews with Knesset members from NRP/NU echoed the sentiments -- Olmert can keep on planning, but he should shut up until the war's over.

My question is--why?

So that we (the settlers/the national religious camp which supports us) can go up and die to defend the country? Olmert is being remarkably honest, especially for a politician. Launch the announcement and damn the consequences.

When will the national religious camp stop closing its eyes and pretending everything's all right until someone shows up on the doorstep with an eviction notice? If you're going up north to serve, if you're going to throw yourself on a grenade to save others, you should at least know that you're doing it to throw your own wife and kids out of your home, not for some idealistic hope of making Israel safe.

Does anyone think that telling Olmert to shut up until the war's over will change his mind about carving the heart out of the country? If not, why shouldn't we encourage the emperor to walk around in his new clothes? It'll give us a fighting chance of showing the country and the world what lousy taste he has in tailors.

Knitting as a metaphor:

To my friends from Karnei/Ginot/Kedumim

2006-07-28T18:22:00.000+03:00

Riddle me this.

On Wednesday, the army sniffs out a terrorist in the village outside Kedumim.

Thursday, between Karnei and Emmmanuel, the army finds the burnt corpse of Yakir resident Dr. Daniel Yaakovi HY"D.

Today, you're demonstrating on the Azun road in protest over the recent spate of stone throwings.

And you won't let your kids tramp in my area because it's dangerous?!?

A few links and some tests

2006-07-27T13:42:00.000+03:00

Giyus.org has a Windows based desktop application which will make giving knee jerk support to the Israeli government's decisions easy.

Wait, wait, hold your fire. I know I'm sounding horribly Leftist. I don't automatically supoort the Israeli government's decisions in this war? Well, no, of course not. The soldiers killed yesterday died because the Israeli government decided not to bomb and to send in ground troops instead. Protect Leban civilians who have been told to get out (and who know the consequences for not getting out), who have been given adequate time to get out, and the Hezballah terrorists lurking among them or protect Israeli soldiers?

And the day before, with Olmert going to visit people kicked out of Gaza last year and telling them, "You think you should still be in Gaza. The government thinks not, and we're right, so we're going to screw the country by giving the West Bank to terrorists, too!" (OK, he didn't put it that way exactly, but come on. We left Lebanon and got more terror. We left Gaza and got more terror, You'd have to be an idiot not to think the same thing will happen out here. Even Ha'Aretz says so.)

But whether you approve of what the givernment is doing, the soldiers still need support. Send them a hug and Elite will send them some chocolate.

So, those tests the Teens took? The Middle Teen flunked her driving test, much to the relief of everyone but her. (Overconfident teenager + car = bad idea. A little humbling is a good thing.) The Oldest Teen won't know his results until September, but he thinks he did well and showed that he has leadership ability without being pushy. The Youngest Teen has been sent to the plastic surgeon to remove a beauty mark at the top of her chest (quoth the doctor: "You'll want a pretty scar for when you wear low cut blouses." Uh huh. Someone explain to me why the local doctors think the Russians are their only customers and learn nothing about their other market share, the religious settlers?) and the dietician wants her to live on diet soda, black bread, and radishes. I'm just surprised she wasn't given a daily vodka ration, too.

Yestarday we took the Middle Teen to interview in the school where she may be volunteering for 12th grade. She fell in love with the principal, and if she gets accepted there she will have private tutors for three subjects: chemistry (which is her major but is not offered--a Russian chemistry teacher working in Hadera as a lab tech tutored the Shelef volunteer girl last year), history (no one in the school is taking five units as she is) and math (her school does the 003 & 005 tests by the end of 11th grade, everyone else does the 003 & 004, so they'll all be learning for 005 and she needs to learn 005, but since tutoring goes more quickly than a classroom, she may even be able to do 5 units instead of her projected 4). She won't be able to do her Bible thesis, so she'll have to make up last year's work (Bible's an easy subject for her, though) and she's already finished English, so her classroom time will be limited. Works for me!

And--lookee here, no visualization exercises for you today. (Well, if you insist, you can keep visualizing that black stockinette sweater. By next week I may actually have something worth showing). But here's some spinning--2 ply, 14wpi. Not finished yet, because I still ahve to ply it with a strand of blue mettalic, but that'll be done once the whole kilo is spun up, and this stuff's a bitch to spin: full of VM and neps. Never, ever will I buy rovings off Ebay again.

We interrupt this war

2006-07-24T14:11:00.000+03:00

Even in the middle of war normal life goes on, especially when you're far (at least an hour) from the battlefront.

Tomorrow is a crucial day in the Moze household. The Oldest Teen is taking a day off of his first aid course to interview for an ROTC program with the army, the Middle Teen is taking her driving test, and the Youngest Teen has a slew of doctors' appointments. I don't know how any of these things will go: the prep course which Oldest took told him he's ready to go and has a good shot, as long as the army will accept people from our area. He has no police record (I taught him long before last year to pretend to be a tourist when picked up at a demonstration), has good grades, his hearing problem is unnoticable in an interview situation, he's personable and has leadership qualities. Really, the only reason I could see him being rejected is his address, which just--let's call things as they are--sucks. And not in a good way.

The Middle Teen--well, she drives well. Too well. She's just an accident waiting to happen with her over confidence, but when she had to do a lesson with a substitute driving teacher on Sunday she said her legs turned to jelly, so we'll have to see what side of the bed she (and the tester, for that matter) wake up on tomorrow.

The Youngest Teen? Well, no one will listen to me, so she's been going for tests on her achy stomach for nearly a year. Clues? The ache gets worse when both The Spouse and I are out of the country. The giorl could live on corn schnitzels and pasta. Mom's diagnosis? Missing her parents and bad nutrition when on her own. But will the doctors listen to me? Ha!

Wednesday the Middle Teen has an interview in what I assume will be her new school. Officially she hasn't been told which city she'll be volunteering/living in, but since the high school in Hadera called her in for an interview and we've heard nothing from Beit Shemesh, I'm assuming Hadera's the choice. Now if only Nassrallah would go away...

Where's PETA when you need them?

2006-07-19T16:35:00.000+03:00

Israeli TV channel 2 reported that dozens of cows were killed by a Katyusha attack. I'm expecting worldwide protests to begin shortly. Of course, it will all turn out to have been Israel's fault.

Knitting: Black, back, knit knit knit knit. Black, black, knit knit knit knit knit.

Happy Shiny People

2006-07-17T19:10:00.000+03:00

Lisa Goldman has written an account of yesterday's anti-war demonstration in Tel Aviv, contrasting the "sullen curiosity at best, or outright hostility at (frequent) worst" of the right wing with the "sincere, goodhearted people" of the Left.

Well, let me tell you a story about another anti-war demonstration, this one last Friday in Jerusalem. I wasn;t there, but my son was, and I'll trust the accuracy of his reporting.

Friday my son was hitching back to Jerusalem, to spend Shabbat at his yeshiva, and the car that stopped picked up not only him, but a former elementary school classmate name Assaf Gavish. It let them out in front of the Kings Hotel in Jerusalem, across from a small plaza where an anti-war demonstration was taking place, near the Prime Minister's residence.

The boys got out of the car and saw the demonstration. "My friend," the Oldest Teen reported, "went a little crazy." He waded into the small crowd, yelling "What do you know about terror? What do you know about death? Have any of you watched your parents being slaughtered before your eyes?" You see, Assaf's brother, grandfather, and both his parents were murdered in their own home, with Assaf and other family members present, a few years ago.

So what did the "sincere, goodhearted people" of the Left do when this victim of terror told them off? They assualted him, verbally ("murderer" "fanatic" "Jewish terrorist") and physically. My son started towards them to intervene, but Assaf managed to break free and run over to the Prime Minister's residence guards and ask to file a complaint. The guards talked him out of it by agreeing to break up the demonstration.

Points to note:
1. For a kid from this area to go running to cops is almost unheard of. Cops, out here, are usually seen as biased, ad not in our favor. Today, with all the rocket, Kassam, and Katyusha attacks, with abandoned homes in the north being looted, with terrorists caught in one place and suspected in others, and with the possible kidnapping of another soldier, the police found time to break into a yeshiva, tear gas the students, and rough up the rabbi over an old police file. This isn't the first time they've played Cold Case when there were better things they could be doing, so no one local really trusts the Israeli police; if they were the better alternative, you can imagine what the worse one was.

2. For the police to break up a demonstration of the Left is nearly unheard of.

In the comments on her post, Lisa writes:

I guess if a country cannot "withstand" a few hundred people peacefully demonstrating, then its democracy is not very strong.

Well, I guess if the "sincere, goodhearted people," the "friendly, relaxed and open" leftist demonstrators cannot "withstand" a single 18 year old victim of terror telling them they're full of [I won't say what, but George W. Bush was caught using that word today], then their committment to peaceful demonstrations is not very strong, is it?

Knitting to clear the mind. Black bulky weight. On size 10.5 needles. In the round. Stockinette. Pictures? You don't need a picture. Just close your eyes and you'll see something close enough.

The Orange Teens

2006-07-16T09:23:00.000+03:00

It's odd to know the country's at war (oh, sorry, a state of emergency in limited areas of the country) and it not be anywhere near me. There were a few planes overhead yesterday, and the local Arabs must have turned up the volume because their 3:30 am prayers woke me, but other than that, it's been quiet. (Well, aside from the sound of the police coming to drag young girls--remember NN?--in for questioning, even though the charges were a year old and even though she was babysitting her brothers and sisters, and going with the cops meant leaving them, including a year old baby, alone.)

It's nearly a year since Israel abandoned the Gaza settlements, yet the Orange Revolution continues. The ManBoy and The Oldest Teen want to go hiking up North this week and The Middle Teen wants to go to Haifa for her birthday Tuesday and then down to Sederot this coming weekend. Because We Are Not Going To Let Arab Terror Stop Us. Because We Have To Show Solidarity. Because, quite frankly, these are teenagers and they don't get enough tension and adventure in their lives. Thankfully, The Spouse returns Friday, so I could tell The Middle Teen no about her weekend plans. I todl The Oldest Teen to check with the head of his yeshiva and see if he could get a pass out of learning; I'm betting that the answer will be no. (Delegating responsibility, that's my superpower.)

The first casualty of war chez Moze is my Amazing Lace entry #3. I've done the scarf, finished the socks,

but do not have the concentration needed to do a very large lace shawl with multiple charts. Oh, well, maybe when Israel's not at war anymore (like about the year 3043?).

Instead, I've been focusing on smaller projects. It's lavendar season

so I've been making up a bunch of sachets

Sort of look like bombs, don't they? Well, at least their smell takes my mind off what's happening. Still, I can't help but thinking this has nothing to do with the 3 captured soldiers. Oh, sure, that was the excuse for the start of it, but Olmert's said his real goal in Gaza is to prepare the ground to kick me out of my house, and I think the real reason behind the bombardment of Lebanon is that the blood of people living in Tzefat, Nahariya, and Meiron is redder than that of us living out here or than those living in Sederot. I have the very bad feeling that the soldiers are going to become the Sultaan Yaakub soldiers/Ron Arad of my kids' generation.

Just a quick note

2006-07-13T21:15:00.000+03:00

Just a quick note to say that I'm fine. My area of Israel isn't under attack; in fact, it may be the quietest area at this point. We've been spending the day calling friends up north and inviting them to stay with us, but the stereotype of our area being dangerous is too persistent, and most are afraid to come here, even though the katyushas are falling one after the other and causing casulaties.

More about vacations, knitting, dying parents and crazy teenage kids when I can tear myself away from the news reports.

A small rant about kippot

2006-06-01T09:49:00.000+03:00

I followed a link from West Bank Mama to Jameel at the Muqata, and it reminded me of a rant I've been building up for a while.

Almost the entire plane was dressed in nice yeshivish clothes; dark pants, button-down shirts, shoes, some wore jackets & hats, most wore black suede kippot – there were a few knitted kippot sprinkled throughout the crowd. I honestly don’t think that anyone was wearing jeans, even though many normally would – if even just to fly in comfortable clothes.

(emphasis added)

I don't mean to pick on Jameel. He's not the only one who does this. But--

crochet is not knit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There. I feel better now.

I can understand why it happens, sorta kinda. In Hebrew, both crochet and knit are the same word--serigah. You can do it with one needle (crochet) or with two (knit--but that you could do with more needles, too), but it's always serigah. But why should Hebrew language limitations make such a difference to people whose native language is English, where there is a difference? (Most people I know who speak of "knitted kippot" were wearing kippot long before they started speaking Hebrew on a daily basis.)

Here's a quick primer.

1. There's a difference in the needles.
Knitting needles:

Crochet hooks:

See the difference? Knitting needles look like pins, crochet hooks like -- well -- hooks.

2. There's a difference in the technique. Beware of gross generalizations below. I know it's not quite as simple as I'm making it out to be, but this is just a primer.

Crochet:

In crochet, each stitch is a separare element, a knot. Only one stitch at a time is active.

Knitting:

All stitches in the top row are active, and the stitch itself is more rectangular than square.

3. The product looks different.

Knitted kippah:

Crochet kippah:

See the difference the technique makes in the finished product?

Now go off and ponder this. You're supposed to be up all night tonight studying, anyway. Make some use of your time, take off your kippah (or that of a loved one) and take a good long look at it. Contemplate it over blintzes. Get to know it over cheesecake. Be one with it over a cup of coffee, and then go and mis-name no more. Oh, I'm beginning to feel like Avshalom Kor. Or at least Balashon.

Chag Sameach!

Project Spectrum--Green

2006-05-31T15:15:00.000+03:00

In honor of the last green day for Project Spectrum, a photo essay.

How does my fiber garden grow?

Very well, thank you.

Sprouting flax

Sprouting hemp

Green cotton (hydroponics works!)

Brown cotton

White cotton

Milkweed

For my bookmark swap partner

2006-05-30T11:51:00.000+03:00

BOOKMARK SWAP SURVEY:

1. What genre of books do you enjoy most?
Just about anything but horror and fairies-and-wizards fantasy. And books that say Israel and/or the settlers are responsible for all the evils of the world.

2. What sort of bookmarks do you like best?
Long enough to stick out both sides of the book; other than that I'm open for anything.

3. What are your favorite colors?
Intense, saturated hues of any color.

4. Are there any colors you don't like?
Muddy colors (but pastels are all right).

5. What sort of "theme'' would you like your bookmark to be?
Handmade. Other than that, I'm easy.

6. Are there any "themes'' that you wouldn't like??
Religious (except Judaism).

7. Can you send internationally?
I'd have to!

8. If your partner wants to send along extra goodies (like tea, candy, cocoa, etc), what do you enjoy? And is there anything you don't like/can't have??
Any food must have some sort of kosher supervision. And nothing religious except for Jewish stuff.

9. What crafts are you going to use to make your bookmarks? Is there a particular craft type you would like to receive? (knitted bookmarks, plastic canvas, etc)
I'll use either knitting or crochet, and I'll be happy to get anything.

Those 250,00 Israeli teens I wrote about yesterday? They're all complaining that the tests were too hard. Even the Middle Teen, who never complains about hard tests, is planning to redo it during the summer.

250,000 Israeli teens can't be wrong

2006-05-29T17:18:00.000+03:00

If you were in Israel today, you may have noticed increased numbers of teens on the streets, looking to hitch a ride, looking hopeful, sullen, scared, worried... A quarter of a million Israeli teens between 10th and 12th grades are taking their math bagruyot today. The Oldest Teen is gloating, the Youngest Teen is laughing, and right about now The MIddle Teen is sharpening her pencils.

Now, I don't know much math, but I do know that 1+1=0.

One Broadripple knit, plus another Broadripple knit equals no projects left on the needles!

Can't have that, can we? So Team Moze started the lobg summer trail that is The Amazing Lace. First a quick morning warm-up

and then off we go--2.5 repeats down, 20-odd to go. What have I learned so far? I hate mohair-y wool.

(Odd--this looks much better in the picture than in real life.)

The stress about my mom is still here, of course. When stressed, I revert to old bad habits. The worst? Hooking.

We'll be staying by my father's cousin in Las Vegas, and the only thing cuz's wife can't do is crochet, so I'm making a checker set for their 4 year old twins. (Yes, my father's cousin is only about The Spouse's age.) Finally a chance to use up the horrible fuschia acrylic I bought when I first moved to Israel. What was I thinking? Oh, yeah--it was the best of the bad lot of yarn they had in those days.

2006-05-28T18:26:00.000+03:00

First off, thank you all for the good thoughts. Dad says Mom's been doing better over the weekend (which in her mind validates her decision not to go for dialysis), but since it makes Dad happy, it makes me happy. Anyone who's got the time to say a kapittle tehilim, her name is Mecha Esther bat Sosha Sora.

Scout asked about our knitting/crochet spots. I'm almost (but obviously, not quite) embarrassed to show mine. Click on the pic to go to Flickr, where there are descriptive notes.

The spinning/weaving/fiber stash corner of the living is a little better. Then again, it's not where I spend most waking hours, like the knitting/crochet/office space is.

Oh, look--the cotton's taking. :::happy dance:::

My mother is dying

2006-05-25T13:30:00.000+03:00

My mother's health has deteriorated drastically since her visit to us. I guess those three weeks refusing to take one of her meds led to damage much more serious than she thought it would. On Tuesday my father called, just as we were heading out the door to a wedding, to tell me that the doctors are giving my mother four months to live. She could extend that a little by going for dialysis, but so far she refuses to.

I go between just sitting around, sick to my stomach, head buzzing, to gulping down tochoclate, to coming up with stupid questions like "what do I wear for the shiva--if they cut one of my usual tricot shirts, will it run over the week? Should I buy a rip-stop type shirt in preparation?", to selfish concerns like "what do I do if the funeral/shiva are the same time the government plans to move me into a ghetto?" I'm losing my mother, losing my home--and neither of them is any fight I can make on my own.

It's odd, being at a wedding where you'd like to be happy and leibidik but having no energy to, trying not to break out in tears. It's hard, keeping all this from the kids until finals are over because there's nothing they can do to make any difference. It's strange, knowing that thiis is how my summer will be, this limbo, these random thoughts, this listlessness and fear and anger and denial.

Another stray selfish thought. How will I go a week of shiva without knitting? It helps the stress, keeps the buzzing in my head down.

Sixth Sense socks from the Six Socks KAL.

And finally, it's May 25. Do you know what May 25th is?

Even rabbis are doing it!

A whole new meaning to p'ru ur'vu

2006-05-23T12:47:00.000+03:00

According to Olmert's adviser for settlements, Uzi Keren, I'm going to be replicated! Is that anything like cloning? Are they taking me off to a high tech factory, or are they going to bring the machinery to me? And what will the world do with two Mozemen?

Oh--you mean I'm going to have my house destroyed and be forcibly resettled in a different location. (Isn't that what happened to my father in Hungary? Any similarities must just be coincidental...)

Gotta love the government. "Convergence." "Replication." Was there a new translation of 1984 that I missed?

The Amazing (Relay) Race

2006-05-23T08:32:00.000+03:00

When I was in high school, I was on the track team. (Don't laugh. OK, go ahead, laugh, I'll wait until you're done. And wait. And wait.) Mainly, I was a miler, but I also did the middle sections of the 4x110 relay, somewhere between the first sprinter and the last sprinter. So I know the value of good teamwork and choosing the right team member for the right slot.

Summer is long, no matter how you measure it. Daylight hours? We get so much daylight here we might as well be in Norway (except their Eurovision entries are so awful. Then again, who am I to talk? We usually manage to have at least 2 representatives in the contest, and neither of them are worth the time). Miles? Let's see, there will be NYC, Las Vegas, San Diego, West Palm Beach, Port St. Lucie, the Israel National Trail... Relative time? Summer with three teens off from school--it'll feel like at least 4 or 5 years. Things to do? I work full time from a home office (see above, relative time), have to start preparing for The Spouse's fall convention schedule, possibly move to Athens in mid-summer, get the Oldest Teen ready for college (probably Machon Lev, but we're still waiting to hear from the Technion), and possibly get the Middle Teen ready to go off to do her senior year in a development town, through B'nei Akiva (link in Hebrew only). And supervise the Youngest Teen and the ManBoy. Summer of KALs? There's this Amazing KAL, 6 Socks, 2 dishcloths a month, the sock Trek, and socks to count all summer long. If I'd been faster on the email, there would have also been the pomatomus along, but between last nigth and this morning it was closed to sign-ups. [sob]

All in all, at least a 4x220 race this summer.

And now, the moment none of you have been waiting for: the team members!

Sprinter: Branching Out is a fast little scarf which is familiar with the track. Since it's for the Middle Teen, who's a shrew in the making when waiting for her knit goods, BO should get the team a nice lead before the altitude portion of the race.

Dji Dji by Berroco, part of the Great Stash Haul of 2005

Altitude aka travel knitting. This team member needs to be able to go the distance, be light on its feet, challenging enough to be the sole source of entertainment for 2-3 weeks, and yet simple enough to be worked on in small doses. Introducing--Pomatomus (and friends. 22 rows is a lot to count, even on only 72 stitches). We're counting on the P-leg to be slow and steady; it doesn't need to hot-foot it for speed, but it shuldn't be a heel and make us lose ground. Only time (and frequent flier miles) will tell is if can toe the line.

Fortissima Colori Socka Color, color 9076, gifted to me by my SP6 spoiler

The back stretch is where we may totally lose it. This is the distance part of the race, and we'll have to see if the 2x31 days we'll have for it will suffice. But I've always wanted to try the "lace shawl" from Knitter's Shawls and Scarves. I mean, I'm headed to Toronoto next fall and Boston next spring. I'll need a good big shawl to add to my defenses. And I have this honkin' big cone of wool in a color I can't see as a sweater. And I'd rather have to pay outrageous amounts for the army, when they haul me away, to move FOs than stash. So--stash diving! Shawls! Lace! It's all good. Or crazy-making. Or both. Because I am all about the crazy good.

The bench warmer: Should any of these team members fall ill or forget to show up, the Mommes Lysedug doily will take over. (No link, because Yarnover is having some technical difficulties. Good thing I saved the pattern to my hard drive.)

The anchor: This is the team member who's got the hardest job, and the one most likely to slack off.

There she is, travelling again. Doesn't this woman ever stay home and knit?

The coaches can be counted on to whip up the pace with frequent cries of "You're still working on that?" and "Isn't my scarf/sock ready yet?"

These feet need socks. Knit, knitter, knit!

Team Moze. We're insane. You have a problem with that?

4 ways to excite a woman

2006-05-22T14:24:00.000+03:00

There's the natural way:

ooh, lookie, the cotton's in the ground!

The fabulous fake way:

Fiber Trend's flamingo pre-felting (which took a whole lot more yarn than the pattern called for--nearly three full skeins of Lamb's Pride, rather than just over two)

and felted--king of all he surveys.

The stupid way:
All the teens were away for the weekend, so The Spouse and I were in no rush to close out Shabbat. About 20 minutes after os shabbos the phone rings, and since it might be one of the kids, we made a quick hamavdil and answer it. The Spouse's brother is on the line: "Did you hear about the attack at the major junction near you?"

Now remember--we have 3 kids out on the roads, at least one of whom might have already gotten to that junction. We turn frantic. "What attack? WHAT HAVE YOU HEARD?"

My heart, never wonderful at the best of times, is going a mile a minute while I'm digging for my cell phone. The Spouse is turning colors.

"Didn't you hear about it?" the BIL goes on. "It was on the news."

"NO--WHAT???"

"Last Thursday. Two people..."

The Spouse interrupts him. "You called us just after Shabbat to talk to us abut something that happened last week? And you didn't state that right off the bat? What are you, an idiot?" (He is, but that's a different story.)

Because of my heart, I think, I have very bad reactions to sudden surges of adreneline. Coming down, I get chills, weepy, even hysterical, so there went our Saturday night date. But you've got to admit--BIL sure got me excited...

And the classy way:

Look what Trish, for whom I made Jaywalkers during Sockapaloooza, sent me!

Tea (sort of hidden there--I love all the flavors and don't want any of you stealing them from me, chocolate (and she even made sure it's kosher!), point protectors shaped like socks (which by now are on my Sixth Sense needles) and a pair-of-socks-to-be-made in Regia Summer Colors 4 ply. What a great color! I was thinking of joining the Pomatomus KAL but didn't have yarn I thought would go--*bing, bing,* ladies and germs, we have a winner!

San Diego, here I come?

2006-05-19T13:38:00.000+03:00

Started to work up the schedule for my next trip (next month). NYC, Las Vegas, West Palm & Port St. Lucie, Florida. The only hitch is San Diego, where we're scheduled to be from June 18-22. I just started looking at motels, and think I need to catch my breath. Sheesh, I found cheaper in Washington DC, in Minneapolis, in LA, even!

Anyone know of a cheap motel in the San Diego area? We'll be exhibiting at a show in the Manchester Grand Hyatt, but we will have a car, so anything within a half hour or so drive from there will work. We would need a mini-fridge, preferably also a microwave (but worst comes to worst, we could buy that at a Wal-Mart). Hi-speed net acess would be nice (I'm lost without my internets), but I can revert to dial-up, too, so a dataport or deteachable phone line will suffice. I'm looking around the $50/night range, for 2 people sharing one room. Any ideas?

Look what's got leaves. If baby sheep are lambs, what's baby cotton?

Leap of love

2006-05-18T20:30:00.000+03:00

West Bank Mama (hey, post a little more about where you live--I have it narrowed down to two yishuvim, and I'd love to see if I'm right) asked why we've made aliyah. I think that's like asking why someone chose to have kids, or what they see in their spouse--way too complex for a blog post, but here's a shot, definitely not in order of importance:

Socio-economic reasons
Have you ever tried to raise a family in NYC? And pay yeshiva tuitions? And maybe buy a house? The bandleader at our wedding is a computer programmer. Back then (1986) he was making over $100,000. But he had 10 kids, so that didn't go far enough, and he moonlighted at weddings and bar mitzvahs almost very single night, twice on Sundays. We had this radical idea that, having birthed these babies, we actually wanted to spend some time with them, and so needed to get onto a slower, less expensive track. Of course there was always out-of-town, but to two native NYers, out-of-town might as well be another planet, and if you're moving to a different planet, it might as well be Israel.

Safety
The week we finally decided to schedule a meeting with a shaliach aliyah (who refused to process our papers, but that's a story for another day) one of our friends had his throat slashed by a disgruntled former employee, another had been killed when his store was robbed, and a third we knew was kille din a car accident. Not long before I had been in Prospect Park with my (then) two kids, a friend, and her two kids. The Oldest Teen (then 3) came waddling out of the sandbox with a used condom in one hand and a used hypodermic needle in the other. This was NYC under Dinkins, a good time to want to get out of Dodge.

Education
The Oldest Teen was turning 3. Time to find a school for the kid. Toras Emes Kaminetz? Not a strong enough general studies program. The yeshivish schools? Too anti-Zionist. (I've never been much of a Zionist--my father was brought up a Satmar Chassid and studied with the alter rebbe OBM, but I didn't need to educate my son in schools which teach that world-wide anti-Semitism is a result of the existence of Israel, or that we should never have broken the three vows). Mizrachi L'Banim? Three quarters of the kids with whom the Oldest Teen would have been in kindergarten with had divorced parents. That's fine and good, but I never wanted him teased because his parents chose to stay together. If you can't find a yeshiva you like in Brooklyn, where can you, outside of Israel?

History
The Spouse's family is old yishuv. I mean real old--Azriel, the grandfather of R' Yisroel Ashkenazi made aliyah in 1770, and was the Spouse's great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather. (R' Yisroel and his father Shmuel followed years later.) His family didn't leave until after the 1929 Arab riots destroyed the food stores in Jerusalem; his mother started out as one of 13 kids and by 1932 was one of 6. His father left at approximately the same time; his father was in teh US trying to earn a living, and after his mother died (when he was 12), he and his sister joined their surviving parent.

Politics
I was an early-adopter of right-wing views. As a college student and graduate student I was a board member of the North American Jewish Student Appeal on behalf of the Jewish Student Press Service and then Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry, and the most fun I had was battling the leftist student organziations. Over and over I told them, as they sought to fund some anti-Israeli government activity, "If you feel so strongly, what are you doing here?" Then one day it hit me -- same here. If I feel so strongly, why don't I move there? So as soon as we could find a shaliach aliyah who would actually process our paperwork, we were on our way here.

Whew--that was long. Good thing West Bank Mama didn't also ask us why we chose to live where we do!

What else do you expect from the French?

2006-05-17T15:14:00.000+03:00

Last night the French givernment and the Tel Aviv municipality presented what they billed as "the biggest fireworks show in the world" (link is in Hebrew, but the video should play anyway; the last 30 seconds are of the fireworks display). We'd heard about it through the ManBoy--his parents wanted him to go with them, and he said only if he could bring the Youngest Teen along, and we said we'd go, too, but not sit near them. (ManBoy's parents have rights to chaperone the young couple, too.)

Not sitting near them? No problem. Police estimated a quarter million people turned out to see the show. Biggest fireworks show in the world? It is to laugh. I've been to the Macy's 4th of July fireworks. I've been to Disney. Heck, I've been to Fort Hamilton when the army still put on fireworks displays. So not the world's largest that even the news media down-graded it to Israel's largest. Like that's saying something? Anyone thinking of small fish in smaller ponds?

Not that it was a total disappointment. It was too short (about 15-20 minutes) but they had some shells I've never seen before, and they did amazing things with movements, swirling the shells and doing a groosmen and the bride display with gold shells shooting out of the tower in double ranks. Very cool, but not enough to sooth the savage crowd, many of whom had been waiting in Charles Clore park for six or seven hours.

And then the traffic. Oh my stars, the traffic. We'd made the mistake of parking nearby, at thge Carmel shuk, because we thought we wouldn't want to walk back to the Central Bus Station. It took us 90 minutes just to get out of the freakin' parking lot, and only got out that quickly ebacsue someone managed to break some of the metal barriers and push aside a parked car so that a lucky few could escape out the bolt hole. It took us another hour to get out of the city.

(Image shamelessly stolen from Ynet)

I did learn one new thing, though, While we were sitting on the grass, waiting for dark and the show, I was plying my tahkli, spinning up some of last year's white cotton. A woman came up, I spun while she and The Spouse discussed me and my spinning, and she told us that once upon a time there had been a kibbutz named Pelach (spindle) which made its money selling locally-spun yarn. Israel's come a long way since then, and not in the right direction.

And before we go, a gratuitous cotton shot:

White's going like gang-busters, green is showing a little life. Brown? Nothing so far. Nada. [sigh]

Lag B'Omer survival kit

2006-05-15T14:31:00.000+03:00

Driving through the banana republic

2006-05-14T14:48:00.000+03:00

The Middle Teen took her driving theory test today and failed.

Let's see if any of you can do any better on the 5 questions she got wrong.

1. What does sign #56 mean?

2. What should you do when encountering sign #43?

3. When is sign #27 relevant?

4. You are entering a highway and see sign #18. Who has the right of way?

5. You would see sign #25 on what sort of road?

What's that you say? You'd need to see a chart of the signs to answer any of those questions? Gee, so did the Middle Teen. Too bad there was no such sign anywhere in the building. Several of the test-takers are planning to appeal the results. It won't get them passing grades, but at least it will get us our 116 shekel back.

But you came here for the cotton, didn't you? Looks vaugely illicit.

And the wool--aka the first of the Sixth Sense socks. Nothing like deadline knitting, is there?

No, this isnt my 'Trek with Me sock, though it is Trekking; for that (next month) I'll go with socks for one of the men in color 66.

Cotton Eyed Jew

2006-05-11T18:55:00.000+03:00

Spring hasn't sprung, but it's mid-May. The government's been sworn in and the budget narrowly passed, but I don't see how Olmert will be able to kick me out of my home by October, so I decided I'd better get my cotton started now or forget about it for the season.

Left to right: Brown, white, and green

Yes, I start my cotton on cotton. Got any problems with that?

Bang, bang blahs

2006-05-10T20:25:00.000+03:00

I think I almost managed to shock The Youngest Teen and ManBoy. (That's what we're going to call the 22 year old ben bayit turned suitor. Army service notwithstanding, and despite his chronological age, he's still a boy.)

I was on the phone with my BFF (since 3rd grade. She's also The Spouse's first cousin's daughter. We have complicated lives) and we got to talking about driving through Arab towns at night. I told her that on Monday, driving back from Efrat, we had picked up trampistim (hitchhikers) at the local border crossing and were driving home through our local Arab town when we were shot at. We all looked at each other.

"They're shooting at us?"

Another shot, accompanied by a flash of light.

"Guess so."

"Don't think we were hit."

The Spouse hasn't changed his driving one mph the whole time, and we just continue along the road, letting off passengers at their requested drop off points. We get home, look the car over for damage (that reminds me--it was dark out. I guess we should check it over when it's light, too) and came inside. End of story, never told outside the car.

When I got off the phone, Youngest Teen and ManBoy are staring at me.

"You were shot at?"

"Yeah."

"And?"

"Nothing."

"Oh. OK. Hey, can we open the Bamba?" (Like I said, ManBoy's still a boy.)

Takes a lot to shock the monkeys nowadays.

They're here!

2006-05-10T16:15:00.000+03:00

When I went to pick up my mail last night, this was in my box:

No, not the letter from the local IRS. That's just routine paperwork, no biggie. No, the handwritten note scribbled on it -- "There's a package from overseas in the mail room." (We live in a wonderfully formal town.) Could this be my socks?

I had to wait until this morning to get at them, but yes--they're here!

Just look at these beauties

Didn't my sockpal Kristin do a great job? I have got to find myself a copy of this braided stitch.

They're made from Cherry Tree Hill superwash, and they are so comfortable, it's like slipping my feet into melted butter, only not greasy.

But I wonder how the matches for sockapaloozas are made. First I get socked by Jackie from Kansas, now from Kansas City. Next time, will it ba Kansas again, or will the random matching process get me another City person?

I immediately took the socks out to get acquainted with their new hometown.

I think they know they're not in Kansas, or any City, not even one in Missouri.

How not to warp a loom

2006-05-09T21:13:00.000+03:00

In search of something even more warped than the Israeli government, I finished curtain #1 for the dining room and had to move on to #2. Which means the dreaded warping of the loom.

I have a Kromski rigid heddle (32"), and need a full width warp, about 7' long. Using the built-in warping board just isn't going to cut it.

Step one: set up your warping area.

(Ignore the mess, aside from the lump of red on the left. That's curtain #1, all folded up.)

I have two chairs at either end of the living room, with dowels between, to hold the ends of the warp. Yes, that's my half-brained way of measuring warp.

A loom's eye view:

(Notice how much cleaner one side of the living room is than the other? Hey--you promised you would ignore the mess in the last picture!)

Since the loom is supposed to be in the up position for warping, but since there's no warp tension to keep it there, I had to improvise.

Masking tape is our friend!

Unwrap some of the warp thread from the cone, thread it through the heddle hole, around the back dowel, through the heddle slot, aruond the front dowel, tie off. Lather, rinse, and repeat.

Almost halfway done:

(Pay no attention to the tension problems. Or to the mess on the couch. I couldn't put the laundry away when half the house was blocked off--or warped off. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.)

Steps not pictured: Warping the foot, unwarping the foot. (Of me, not the loom. Why my sandals are so attractive to warp thread is something I'll never understand.)

Herbie fully loaded:

Once you have the loom fully warped, roll the entire twenty gazillion inches of thread back and forth to even out tension. Try not to break too many warp threads as your rolling casues more tangles than a kid with a can of Silly String. (Note: do not photograph the pile of spaghetti you get when your Spouse calls about something unremarkable as you're holding a dowel with your entire warp on it. Cry. Lather, rinse, repeat.) Attach dowels to the back beam and the cloth beams, and Bob's your uncle. (Yours, not mine. Mine's Arnold.)

Aside from some broekn threads and some lingering wonkiness on on cloth beam, es fini Well, aside from the months of weaving to come.

She likes them!

2006-05-04T21:55:00.000+03:00

My sockapalooza socks are at their new home and, looking at the picture on Trish's blog, they fit. I alsway worry about that when sending off knits, because I'm a sucker for a live model. (Which is why the Sixth Sense socks are on hold, waiting for The Youngest Teen to come home and pass verdict on them, now that I've turned the heel.)

Spring has sprung with a vengance. We've had the four legged lawnmower pay a visit, I put out my annuals, and I'm going to plant my cotton next week. (It's late, but the weather was bad, and now the small tiller doesn't want to work right.)

And start-itis has struck, too. I've got the needles full, and getting fuller. The second Broadripple, the Sixth Sense, a felted Fiber Trends flamingo, the latest Dishcloth KAL, and an O which I F'ed without ever having blogged it in the first place.

Look at those cute little baseball cap buttons!

The Astra One-Ball Baby Sweater, knit in two days because we were "invited" to the baby's bris. ("Invited" in quotes because the father didn't actually have the poor manners to invite us, which in Jewish custom would then obligate us to attend. He just called to "make sure that we were coming to the bris and the meal." Same difference in reality, but a big difference legally.)

And speaking of legal: to the person searching for "how to turn on a 14 year old girl" -- if you're RR, slightly older friend of The Oldest Tenn, who's been hanging around The Youngest Teen a lot lately, you'd better start praying right now, young man. You want her, you'd better be prepared to wait 6-8 years, buddy-boy. If it was anyone else making the search, anyone over the age of 15, you might want to consider getting some help. And stay away from my 14 year old.

Sock it to me, baby!

2006-05-01T17:30:00.000+03:00

The sockapaloooza socks are washed, blocked, dried and mailed. Four countries, two socks, one envelope. And it's on to the next knit project...

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New word for the day

2006-04-24T14:07:00.001+03:00

Sucks is when you find out your parent has a terminal illness. Suckalicious is when you find it out not because your parents tell you, but because the non-terminal parent asks you to translate some medical documents which casually mention this as a pre-existing condition.

Sockapaloooza socks are done and photographed, waiting for washing, blocking, packing, and shipping. New socks have been begun, but I don't have the energy to download the camera.

Five places

2006-04-18T14:25:00.000+03:00

Kat has asked knitters to "Name 5 places other than your house or a knitting store where you have knit..."

Hard to limit it to 5, but:

1. In the middle of teh Tel-Aviv/Jerusalem higway, during a road blocking protest sit-in.
2. Floating in the Dead Sea.
3. At the Western Wall.
4. On a hospital gurney in the pre-op prep room.
5. On a boat ride down the Seine/climbing the Acropolis in Athens/standing on the Moon Pyramid in Teotihuacan (and that was just last month).

While you were bombing...

2006-04-18T00:04:00.000+03:00

We were out shopping today, and after finishing purchases that could only be made in specific stores, we had a choice for the clothing. Should we go for everyday things at the Central Bus Station or Shabbat clothing at the Azrieli mall?

Well, I wanted a beauty shot of my sock in progress, so I made everyone go with me to the boardwalk, from where it would be most logical to continue to Azrieli.

That picture may have saved my family's life; if I hadn't realized I didn't have an Israeli sock picture and really want a beach shot, we would have been crossing the old Central Bus Station area when the bomber was committing his murders.

Celebration of democracy

2006-04-17T21:16:00.000+03:00

A suicide terrorist blew himself up in Tel Aviv, and the 17th Knesset was sworn in.

According to the Jerusalem Post,

Interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said earlier in the day, "We intended to open the first session of the Knesset and the faction in a better mood."

Aw, gee. What a shame. 9 people inconveniently die and wreck old Ehud's mood.

And get this:

[Tzachi] Hanegbi later arrived, saying that traffic jams following the terror attack prevented him from arriving on time.

Damn those Jews. Always getting themselves blown up at the worst times. Tzachi missed a great party! How do I know? Check out this screen capture from Channel 2:

Just because the public expects you to show people crouching down to pick up the bits and pieces of what used to be human beings is no reason not to entertain us with the rockin' sounds of the guitar and organ hired for the Knesset party.

N.B. Yes, we were in Tel Aviv when the bomb went off, but thankfully we were walking down the boardwalk, where I had wanted to get a beauty shot of my sockapaloooza socks.

Anthropology & fiber

2006-04-14T14:30:00.000+03:00

Yes, we actually did do some things in Mexico City that didn't involve cows (well, aside from eating them).

We weren't supposed to get in to Mexico City until Friday, but we arrived Thursday night, so we did what the convention organizers tols us never to do and walked around. (Hey, we had to hit the Kinkos and we had to get food.) We were staying in Col. Polanco during the Water Forum, so the streets were very secure--there were more cops and private security forces out than regular people.

We really lucked out. Once again, Hebrew proved to be the universal language, as each of the four times we hit the Kinko's', though the clerk spoke only Spanish, we found a kippah wearer ready to serve as translator.

Friday the rest of our group arrived, and we went to The National Museum of Anthropology, which is lke two, two, two museums in one. On the bottom floor there's the history and archeology of Mexico, particularly the area around Mexico City, with the standard statues, like this one of the rain god

and some non-standard displays, like lots of skeletons. (Mexico City takes its skeletons very seriously)

But upstairs--ah, upstairs is a different world. A fibery world.

A world I could have played in all day, if only they'd have let me into the exhibits, instead of looking at these tools through glass.

Even the socks came along for the ride:

Don't have a cow, man!

2006-04-10T08:19:00.000+03:00

Have a bunch of 'em!

In the spirit of the last post

2006-04-05T22:58:00.000+03:00

More pictures, this time of Mexico City. They sort of remind me of my last post...

(Click on the link to see individual cows)

These are only some of the cows I shot, and I only shot a fraction of the cows in Mexico City, mainly the ones in the park off Urbina and on the road between the Polcano hotels and the museums.

By popular demand

2006-04-04T22:07:00.000+03:00

I feel like I should be quoting Sally Fields.

Since no one posted a hysterical, "no, don't show us," here's what a Moze looks like, complete with orange ribbon, Clapotis, and Holly (which has to go in for alteration--the neck is too big and keeps slipping off my shoulders, so I'll uncrochet it, pull out a dozen or so rows, and crochet it back to the body again).

The beret was my Paris compromise position for when I was out of the 9th district. Within the Jewish area I felt safe and comfortable, so I scarfed it, but walking around the other parts of Paris I looked like a stereotypical American tourist, bad beret styling and all (which came in very handy when we accidentally wound up in an Arab suburb, but that's a story for a different day).

April in Paris

2006-04-03T13:50:00.000+03:00

OK, would you settle for March?

The one nice thing about Paris is that it's close to home. Less than 5 hours, and I slept through the entire flight. In retrospect, I wish I hadn't -- it was the last decent airline meal we got until the El-Al flight home. (And when you're calling El-Al economy class meals decent, you know the rest had to be dog food.)

We landed at 5:20, figured our way through the airport (some English signage, and the world's screwiest conveyor belt system--once you get your luggage, everyone waiting for theirs had to back out so you could get out) and headed out of the airport. An Israeli chopper was waiting outside, offering cheap rides to hotels, in Hebrew. So of course we grabbed the bargain (and a bargain it was--30 Euro to our hotel instead of the 50+ a cab would have cost). We warned him we had a lot of lugagge, but still he screwed up, so we ended up getting in a van not with tourists, but with a businessman on his way to work. We got a tour of the Champs-Elysees (and a story of American tourists he had driven around, who wanted only to go to the "Champs Eli-says" -- it became a running joke for us on our return trip to Paris) and then were dropped at our hotel, the Best Western Aida Opera.

It's an interesting hotel. In the heart of the Jewish area of the 9th district, two blocks from the Folies Bergere

and directly across the street from a Tunisian restaurant named--get this--"Chez Bob."

(Forget what he claims, this place is not kosher. No hashgacha, and besides, he was in and out of there all Shabbat, bringing in groceries from the motorcycle he drove up on.)

There's a mezuzah on the front door, and breakfast is kosher. The doors work on keycards, but for Shabbat you can rent a regular door key. The night desk guy closes shop for half an hour to go to maariv, and the vending machine candy is from Israel. Yet until our last day there the second time around, we were the only obvious Jews in the place. Security at the hotel is tight, tighter than here at home: you have to be buzzed into the front door after a visual inspection.

We checked in, rested, ate breakfast, and hit the streets. Our travel agent said we could get anywhere we wanted to go by Metro, but it was a sunny (albeit cold) day, so we walked down to the obelisk at Place de la Concorde

(Oh, should I traumatize you all with a shot of me at the Place de la Concorde, knitwear and all? Vote yes or no in the comments.)

Then we went for a boat ride along the Seine -- The Spouse's choice. I was surprised to see the river much rougher than the sea the Greeks would not sail on.
Of course I took my socks along for the ride.

(Broadripple)

(Jaywalkers)

Both socks really enjoyed their view of an oversized broadcast tower sold to teh world as a tourist attraction. Actually, so did we, once we got off the boat and walked there. The Spouse especially liked this view

We also went to look at Notre Dame, but we didn;t go inside (church and all that, you know.)

And before we dropped for the night, we went to the Arch. Getting across the Champs-Elysees was a hassle, because all the signs were in French, but finally someone donated a clue to us about where the underpass is.

Then a long walk back to our hotel, with a stop at the Galleries Lafayette to look at the Phildar yarn (nothing enthused me -- most of what they had on display was bling, and the needles they had out were standard European sizes, while I was looking for a 3.25 mm, which seems to be more a British/US size).

For dinner we went to Chez Mimi, down the block from where our hotel, and under the supervision of the Beth-Din, one of the reliable hashgachas in Paris.

Yes, I do think it's an unwritten rule that all restaurants must be named after someone. Well, except for Cafe Dizengoff, which has great crepes but whose soup of the day is French Onion Soup--by Osem.

It surprised us that the French seem so unadventurous in their cuisine--it's either French food or North African (except for the fast food places, which are all American-style). Where's the variety I'm used to from the States, or even from Israel? And I'm not just talking the Jewish community; the restaurants we passed in our walks were more of the same.

And on a current note, happy 50th birthday, Spouse-Man!

Next: Hola, Mexico City.

Congratulate me!

2006-04-02T12:10:00.000+03:00

My daughter got married.

No, this isn't an April Fool's joke (it's April 2, after all). Yes, this is the Youngest Teen. Yes, we're thrilled with her choice of a life partner.

Oh--did you forget that the next post I *intended* to put up was the Purim post?

Our bat bayit, S, got a wedding gown which was going around the school and asked my daughter to be her "groom" on Purim. Notice how, even though she can borrow her friend's suit, her brother's shirt, and her father's tie and kippah, she still wears her own skirt and work boots. What a formal groom she makes.

The couple got some odd look as they walked around town, but most of my neighbors got into it, singing and dancing for them (including the young couple's former elementary school principal).

We ate, we drank, we partied with the best of them, and then, after the Purim meal, The Spouse and I abandoned the kids to fly to Paris.

Flash Your Stash

2006-04-02T06:23:00.000+03:00

Since it's still April 1 somewhere, and since Flickr is now cooperating, I present you -- most of the Mozemen stash. (A few cones of acryclic, a few of cones of ombre Peaches & Creme, a cone of blue metallic, and 2 cones of burgandy weaving warp cotton didn't attend the roll-call, aka pulling the stash from my office/Pesach kitchen):

Nothing special here. Wool and wool blend in the front left, sock yarns in the clear plastic bag and the yellow-topped container, acryclic mainly hidden behind the large empty container and in the big black hangy thingy, cotton and cotton blends in the back right, and metallics in the front right. Best of the bunch: the Noro which is sitting proudly on wools. Source of most of the stash: Goodwill, West Palm Beach.

We interrupt the travelogue

2006-03-31T15:24:00.000+03:00

Arab, Dressed as Jewish Hitchhiker, Murders Four

May G-d avenge their murders, and may the Israeli government not wait for G-d to do so.

The Middle Teen is taking the news about Shaked (HY"D) hard, as she knew him, and it's taking her back a few years to when Rachel Gavish (her teacher) and Rachel Shabo (her classmate's mother) were murdered.

Blessed be He who revives the dead

2006-03-14T13:08:00.000+02:00

Or at least He who makes The Spouse loan his computer to the poor afflicted blogger whose computer suffers from an unmountable boot disk. (New computer coming from the States April 11.)

So, where was I? Oh, yes, my last day in Athens. (Notice how nicely I am going back in time and not discussing the election results. 63.8% voter turnout is not a mandate for anything but apathy.)

In the morning I had a meeting at the Elpis Hospital, where our experiment will be conducted (in Greece they don't use Institutional Review Boards; instead, you do your experiment under the auspices of a hospital.) My local guide and I took the metro there and back, since it's just at the outskirts of the city. Ever had a meeting where some of the participants did not speak the same language at all? The chief cardiologist, who was crucial to the discussions, spoke no English, and my Greek is limited to "hello" and "yes," which may be crowd-pleasing, but is extremely inefficient. Since the other participants had limited English, it all took much longer than it should have, but by early afternoon I was back in Athens proper and waiting for my next meeting, scheduled for 8:30 pm.

So what does a knitter do with time on her hands? She looks for a yarn store. Undaunted by the fact that the concierge did not know what "yarn" was and only bought a clue when I showed him my sock in progress, I set out to find a yarn store on my own, in a strange city where I did not speak the language.

First I tried Omonia Square
>
then headed down toward Syntagma Square and the Parliament building

(oh, look, it's Jaywalker again!)

(Of course Broadripple is never left behind.)

I finally found the yarn store by stumbling upon the fabric stores, and following the street until the fiber type morphed:
Dimitrios J. Sakalak & Son Ltd.
30 Kolokotroni St.
Athens
210-322-1710
sakalakwool@hol.gr

Lots of European yarns, primarily German. Not a must-see store (nothing local, nothing unusual) but a nice, pleasant place if you're in town and looking for a fix. Credit cards not accepted.

Another not-unusual but none-the-less welcome sight was Starbucks. I'm as little a fan of globalization as anyone else, but after a long day of listening to people around you talk a language you don't understand, and seeing around you a language you can't read, it's nice to settle down to a coffee of the day you can actually speak well enough to order and to hear English, in varying accents, all around. That is, if you can get to the Starbucks, if you survive crossing the street.

Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you--traffic runs backwards (well, correctly if you're British) on Aiogou Street. If you're trying to be like the Greeks and so are jaywalking, this is very important information to have.

At 9:30 I met with the last of my doctors, who took me to the airport. We only got lost twice, but that was OK. My flight was to leave at 1:20 am, and by midnight the check-in counter was still closed. You know things are bad when all the Israelis are in line, ready and waiting…

Next up: Purim!

We're on the road to nowhere

2006-03-14T11:39:00.000+02:00

When I came down from the Acropolis I got a call. The weather the next day was supposed to be bad, and the boat I was to take to Alonissos (to meet with George Vithoulkas) might not leave from Agios Konstantinos. Instead, I was to take a KTEL bus to Volos (a 5+ hour trip) and take the boat from there in the morning.

I was supposed, when I arrived in Volos, to find my own way to the port and find myself a hotel room. Good thing Greece is still very patriarchical--The Spouse called the woman I was dealing with in Athens and ordered her to find me a hotel room. After all, the wather was bad, I was in a city I didn't know, and had to navigate in a language I didn't know. She booked me into the Aegli, a nice old fashioned hotel with small bathrooms but nice balconies.

I walked around, bought my tickets for the boat, and woke to a rainy, cold, windy day.
Even the metal seagulls wanted to fly away.

My hotel was across the street from the port, so it was easy to find my boat.

But--after shlepping 5 hours in a stinky, smoke filled bus (it seems like everyone in Greece smokes, man woman, and child) -- the boat from Volos wasn't sailing, either. So back to the KTEL station (sort of a cross between the Tel Aviv Central Bus Station and the old NYC Port Authority terminal) and back to Athens.

But first, a little photo-op for my two prospective Sockpaloooza socks. I'll knit both pairs and send the better of the two out, since my sockpal's measurments are just about the same as mine.

Broadripple against the too broad ripples of the sea:

and Jaywalkers jaywalking across the port road of Volos:

On the way back there was a terrible traffic jam. Why? There were four tank carriers parked on the side of the road.

Greek men must do a year of compulsory army service. So why were a few tanks such a big deal? Ho hum, yawn--I've seen bigger tanks parked on my front lawn.

Next up: Yarn, yarn, yarn.

It's all Greek to me

2006-03-13T09:08:00.000+02:00

The trip of a thousand stitched begins with a single bag of yarn.

The Greek are just like Israelis, only more so. Very, very laid back--our flight was boarding at 5:15 for a 6:00 take off, and the gate agents finally strolled up to the gate at 5:45. Then the pilot flew double fast to keep on schedule. At the airport in Athens there were almost no signs telling you where to go, so people stood ont the Passport Control line only to find out that this was passport control for transfer flights, and we had to stand on a different line if we were staying in Athens. At least the luggage came quickly.

My contact person met me at the airport (SMS is a wonderful invention) and took me to my hotel, the Titania on Panepistimiou, then told me to go touring a while, as she had meetings to do.

Consulted my knitting, and it told me--to the Acropolis.

Simple enough--go two blocks to the Metro station, watch what everyone else is doing (buying tickets and putting them through the validation machine) and do the same. Maps in the Metro are in Greek and in English. Take the subway two stops to the Acropolis, get out and--no maps. But when this

is visible, it's pretty obvious where you need to go.

First stop was the Theatre of Dionysos. Since I have a B.A. in Theater, this was exteremly cool. To be somewhere you've learned about and never expected to go...

Then you climb and climb and climb to get to the temples on the top of teh mountain. Remember the ampitheater? Sure you do--it was about 2 lines up. Well, here's how it looks from almost at the top:

What knitting wants, knitting gets. Holly's neck band at the Parthenon:

Next: My big, fat, wasted Greek trip.

What a black hole looks like, part 2

2006-03-06T20:49:00.000+02:00

Packing for Paris and Mexico City, plus knitting to be finished--Odessa, Holly, and Glad Raggs.

And this was before I found out that I'm off to Greece at 6am, staying until Friday, then home, Purim, and off again on Tuesday night. Wonder if I'll get a chance to do my laundry between flights...

Knitting coming with me to Greece: Holly, Glad Raggs (both to be finished there) and Broadripple and Jaywalker, one of which will be my Sockpaloooza socks.

I'm supposed to go to the Greek island of Alonissos, but the weather may force the cancellation of the scheduled boat, in which case I'll be stuck in Athens. I'm not sure what to pray for.