Life of Spud

Well, it doesn't start until tomorrow afternoon; but I needed a title for my blog, so there it is. OK, some updates: Mazal Tov to my oldest brother, who just had his third child (a girl). He's living in Israel and things between us are complicated, so I haven't spoken to him yet. I did send off an email.... Stop judging me, please. We just got our driveway redone last/this week. It was an expensive and frustrating experience. I never realized just how convenient our driveway was until those guys dug it up and spent a week and a half putting it back together. It was also one of those situations where - against my better judgment - we hired a "local" company (see: Eruv List) to do the job. It was never really clear to me what was going to happen and when. We never signed a contract and the work took longer than we had originally intended. It was a stupid move (I watch a lot of those Judge shows and I should now better), but I figured I could trust the guy. Well, luc...

Tonight's the last night of Chanukah, so it's a good time to summarize what's happened over this past week: The holiday has been pretty enjoyable. My wife made delicious latkes and special holiday cookies. We also decided to jump on the presents bandwagon this year to ensure that our daughter will always have a positive feeling toward Chanukah. We've been giving her one gift each night of the holiday and she's really enjoyed tearing open the wrapping paper and trying her "prizes". She refuses to touch the candles (a good thing, I guess) and she cries whenever we start to sing (she only likes to sing her songs), but we consider the plan an overall success. We went to a couple of parties during the holiday. The first was a Sat. night party for our friends' daughter who turned two. They had a lot of family in town, so the place was pretty full. We debated buying a gift and decided, at the last moment, to do so. We were lucky to find a "Mrs. Potato H...

We got our first snow today. Unfortunately it didn't start until after the school day, so no day off of work. Baltimore is famous for its low tolerance for snow and all day the students (and faculty) at my school were waiting for the fateful announcement that never did come. It was really putting a damper on my day until I realized that I did not teach past fourth period and could duck out early (to avoid the carpool rush). We'll see what the deal is for tomorrow. It's not supposed to snow anymore, but a delayed opening would be great (don't have to deal with students and Tefilah - not that there's anything wrong with that). The snow didn't keep me in the house tonight, though (Ironic that I almost NEVER leave the house, but on a snowy night - that's when I decide to get out for a bit). I was over at the JCC to meet and hear from Nathan Englander. I first read his work when I was in Israel ("For the Relief of Unbearable Urges") and really enjoyed i...

So last Thursay morning I was playing "row, row, row your boat" with my daughter (I was the boat) in an attempt to avoid the Barney videos while keeping her entertained. All seemed in order until I got my daughter ready to go to the babysitter, at which time my back started to spasm. I really thought the pain would subside over the course of the day but I was mistaken. By Friday morning I was in some serious pain, but I had a ton of work to catch up on at work and had to wait until after that was done to see a doctor. I dropped my daughter off at my father-in-law and headed over to Patient First (which is where people with no real doctor go if they need to get checked out) where I waited for two hours to see a doctor. And what a doctor! His name was Dr. Hooper and, at first glance, it seemed that he was probably an older relative of Mr. Hooper from Sesame Street (yes, that old!). He also reeked of cigarette smoke, but that was a good thing because by now I had given up hope...

( People have been telling me that my blogs are a bit too edgy and negative for them, so I'm going to write about my daughter again. It's a happier topic ) So last week my wife and I went away and left my daughter with my father-in-law and his wife. We were worried about how she'd deal with being "on her own" but she did really well. I guess she was ready to start living on her own, and our trip away was her chance to play. Trouble is, though, that while we came back ready to assume the role of parents, she continues to stubbornly cling to her independence. This wouldn't bother me too much if she would go out and get a job (let alone get dressed, fix her own meals and change her own "pishee"s and "poop"s), but she seems content to leech off of us while asserting her needs. Apparently this is what is meant by "Terrible Twos", which is a total misnomer in this case because my daughter won't be two for another couple of months. Q...

So I'm thinking of starting a Do-Not-Schnor List (like a do-not-call list, but for schnorers who go house to house and ask for money) for the Baltimore area because it's getting a little ridiculous. Last night, at 9 pm, my doorbell rang. For some reason I did not process that it was probably a schnorer, so I peaked through the peephole and - for some inexplicable reason - opened the door. On the other side was a man with a beard who spoke to me in Hebrew and explained that he was collecting money. I gave him my "I'm sorry, but I don't give at the door" and he turned on the whole Jewish guilt thing (if Moshe rabbeinu came to your door asking for money, would you refuse him?). I resisted the temptation to give him some money and he offered to give me an envelope so that I could send money to him. I accepted this envelope and was relieved that I did not give him the cash. The important cause was for a Kolel organization in Israel... The theory of how the schnorer...

Thanksgiving weekend is behind us... It was my wife's 30th birthday on Friday, so I had arranged for us to go to DC for a couple of nights. Her dad and his wife took care of our daughter for that time. It was the first time we had left her alone since she was born (someone else putting her to bed, and all that). She did just fine, but we were pretty nervous about it. Thankfully, everything went well. On Wed. night we left Baltimore and headed south to the DC-area. We stopped at Siena's for dinner and then went to an Off-Broadway show in Bethesda called "I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change". My wife enjoyed the show, but it was a little too much for me. It passed without incident, and we headed off to our hotel (Capitol Hilton - fancy). We awoke pretty late on Thursday morning. I had packed some bagels with cream cheese and lox, so we had that for breakfast. We then decided to take a walk over to the White House to check out what was happening (not much). I then...

My sister called this morning and left a message telling me that Rabbi Marcus passed away. I hadn't seen the man in quite some time (It's been a while since I've been to Toronto, even longer since I've been to Bnai Torah and almost forever since I last spoke with the rabbi - probably at my aufruf a few years back). I did know that he was sick, but I never really process these things well (out of sight, out of mind?). And as inevitable as the news was for some, it really caught me off guard. The first time I met the rabbi I was a five year-old kindergarten student at Eitz Chaim. Over the course of the year we had been learning our Aleph Bet , earning stars for every letter that we covered along the way. I, of course, had procrastinated for most of the year so that, by the end of the year, I had only gotten as far as the fifth or sixth letter (not for lack of knowledge, mind you). With time running out, I tried to corner my teachers to have them listen to me run through a...

It's tough to keep up with a blog. When there's a lot going on there's not enough time to sit down and write about it; when things are slow it's really difficult to find things to write about. I guess I could spend some time bitching about how complicated blogging is (or did I just do that?). I'm currently in a "not-much-happening" stage, so here's a summary of the past few days: The weekend came and went... Shabbat starts so early that I nearly missed it. At 4:30 pm on Friday I was on the computer and watching TV when my wife asked if I planned on getting ready for Shabbat. Of course, it was a little too late at that point to do anything m ore than turn off the TV and shutdown the laptop... An early start to Shabbat means an early end on Saturday night, which, in the past, meant a chance to get out. But now that we have a kid (and each other) that doesn't really happen too often. We spent the evening watching a movie ("Science of Sleep...

I often complain about the way people drive around here. The stereotype is the 15 passenger GMC van that doesn't stop at stop signs, makes short left-turns and wide right-turns and drives on the wrong side of the road. It's really a frustrating experience, especially on Fridays (I use my horn often. My wife has still not gotten used to that). These driving skills often play out at the supermarket as well. People amble along with their carts, stopping dead in the middle of an aisle as they ponder their next move, blocking it completely for everyone else. They come out of aisles, completely blind, and don't bother to stop. They often are so unaware of their environment that saying "Excuse me" doesn't work. Today, my daughter and I went shopping for groceries at the local supermarket (my wife read my blog and started to bother me about how lazy I am and how I don't help out as much as I could). We had a pretty big shopping list and - because I'm not so ...

It's the end of the week and I'm glad it's over. Being a teacher, parent and homeowner is stressful at times, so it's nice to not have to worry about one of those responsibilities for a little while. I haven't really written about my family at all since I've started this blog. I guess it's only fair to mention them every once in a while... My wife started working about a month ago. We realized that the single-income family thing wasn't exactly working for us so she applied and got a full-time job that started right after we got back from Israel. This changed a lot about our daily routine. For my wife, it meant rolling out of bed before 9 am and not having most of the day to take care of things around the house. As for me, I now pick up my daughter from the babysitter and watch her (alone!) for about an hour or so unitl mom gets home. I, of course, am supposed to be helping out more around the house to make things easier, but I've been a lazy ass thes...

It's been a while since my last blog (the Israel trip) and, of course, a lot has happened since then. But it would take me too long to go back and recap the past month, so I'll just take it from the top. Israel expenses keep adding up: I was sick to my stomach for a lot of the time that I was in Israel. When I got back I went to see a GI and he ordered an endoscopy. Needless to say, these things aren't free. And since I got sick on the way to Israel, I decided to add it to the expense of the Israel trip (it's all the same back account, but mentally, it helps). Then came the credit card bills. Well, that was a bit of a shock. When it's on the card, you really don't feel it. Our most expensive days were those "second days" that we opted out of. Maybe G-d is punishing me for keeping only one day of Chag (or maybe I was just too irresponsible with my money). I just remind myself that spending money in Israel is a Mitzvah. Finally, despite trying to figure ...

We made it to Israel last night. We decided in the summer time that we would go for Sukkot and I figured that we should spend Yom Kippur here as well (they change the clocks in Israel based on YK; the fast is just as long but ends by 6 pm). We flew Air France and it was a decent experience. My father-in-law and NR drove us to Dulles (in record time) for our flight to Paris. There was extra room on the flight but we all had a hard time sleeping. When we got to Paris we were all set to hop on the RER and head into the city but we couldn't figure out what they had done with our stroller. Turns out that when they took it from us at the gate they checked it through to Tel Aviv! I was pretty annoyed as Elana was tired and we weren't about to carry her through Paris. But the woman at baggage claim managed to track it down for us and the problem was solved (although we did lose an hour of free time). Turns out, that wasn't such a bad thing... we were so tired that walking in Paris,...

It's been a while since I've blogged, but last night I presented my Centropa experience to my shul (synagogue) in Baltimore and I though I'd write about it a bit. Due to the makeup of the membership, my audience was mostly older people, with a smattering of the "under-40 youth". It was pretty intimidating being up in front of people who have experienced so much more than me in life, and probably lived through some of the history that I was going to present. What worried me most, though, was that they wouldn't get my jokes. But things went well. While some of the jokes flopped (maybe they weren't funny?), the material really presented itself. I entitled my lecture "Revival of Jewish Life in Austria and Hungary" and spoke about the Jewish life that I encountered while over in that part of the world. While I only planned on speaking for a half hour, I actually took an hour. After the Q and A people came up to me to tell me about themselves and where...