(no subject)

[desh]

Had an awesome birthday weekend in New York. Friday night I hit up KZ for services and dinner. Services were great as usual. Dinner and post-dinner had less singing than I expected, but I was too caught up in catching up with people to be bothered by it. (ML from Penn was there! Randomly! and she works at Marvel comics!) Went back to where I was staying, at Mom's boyfriend's, where there was a mini celebration with Mom, the boyfriend, the other people in the house, and an ice cream cake.

Saturday morning at Hadar, services were quite excellent. (RF did an awesome Hallel.) And I'm always amazed at the number of people I know at Hadar, but this time was over the top. As the shacharit repetition was starting, in walked Rabbi Mike, RG, MJY, and approximately the rest of CJC board. Apparently I picked the right weekend to come to New York -- everyone else was doing it too! Jake was there too, so we were able to wish each other a happy birthday in person. And, as usual, way too many former Penn and former Akiba people. I love it. After Hadar was a lovely lunch with ER, her sister, BZ, Ruby K, and MH.

After Shabbat I bar-hopped (no, seriously) with cameronkate and some of her friends until late (well, late for me), and then crashed at her place on Roosevelt Island. (Though not her place for long...she's moving to the Philly suburbs!) Yesterday I took the LIRR out to have lunch with coralrockstar and family! After some lovely catching up with them (and finding out that they do exist when it's not the summer, that they do own warm clothes, and that they don't usually live in a tent when I'm not around), I embarked on the 4-hour nearly-bathroom-free-unfortunately train ride from Long Island to home.

Right, home. Where I just found out that yet another friend of mine is moving away. And it's someone else from my Jewish circles. I'm gradually getting more and more frustrated with the size of the Jewish community my age in Center City. I like my friends, but there aren't too many of them. I either have to do a better job of meeting the new people, or something. If I didn't love my job so much, I might start considering moving out of Philly. ....naah.

--

Maybe I'm too naive, but isn't the best way we can show that The Country Is Ready For A Black And/Or Woman President is to stop talking about it so damn much? Besides, when did presidental campaign announcements fully 2 years before inauguration day become full-day above-the-fold news stories? Especially when they're obvious? Geez.

--

Recent CDs purchased:
Rodrigo y Gabriela (self-titled)
Regina Spektor: Begin To Hope
Cold War Kids: Robbers & Cowards
Van Morrison: Moondance
Ditty Bops: Moon Over the Freeway
Josh Ritter: Animal Years

--

I've had a pretty good streak of awesome rosh-chodesh-on-Shabbats lately:

Rosh Chodesh Shevat 5767 (January 2007): Hadar in NYC
Rosh Chodesh Iyyar 5766 (April 2006): Would've gone to JITW-DC but for a home emergency
Rosh Chodesh Tevet 5766 (December 2005): NHC reunion in Virginia
Rosh Chodesh Av 5765 (August 2005): NHC Institute
Rosh Chodesh Adar II 5765 (March 2005): NHC open house in Mt Airy, I think?

Comments

[alanscottevil.livejournal.com]

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!! Not REGINA SPEKTOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAUGGGGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[desh]

????

[alanscottevil.livejournal.com]

O Regina Spektor, how crazy you are....She played the student union building in binghamton once, my senior year. Actually, she was set up in the entrance room with the couches where people waited for busses and taxis. Her and her keyboard and maybe a guitar and some weird-sounding metal percussiony things in a one woman show.

Me and some friends were wandering around on a Friday or Saturday night and we ecountered her performance unawares. Her songs were random and she made lots of repetitive bird-call noises. She would shoot firey suggestive looks around the room, as if daring us to crack up at her. "Regina Spektor" became a catchword for us, of things too off-the-wall to exist in reality. Any mention of her name was followed with the phrase "Oh My God".

And then one cool winter night me and Ari Naveh drove up to the Bronx to find the lamp post that makes wishes come true which Regina had prophesied...

[(Anonymous)]

"Maybe I'm too naive, but isn't the best way we can show that The Country Is Ready For A Black And/Or Woman President is to stop talking about it so damn much? Besides, when did presidental campaign announcements fully 2 years before inauguration day become full-day above-the-fold news stories? Especially when they're obvious? Geez."

It's not trying to show that we're ready, it's the fear that we're not ready and that biased but otherwise normal voters will unexpectedly swing the election.

And is campaigning for president 2 years ahead of time less reasonable than sending out Shabbat meal invitations on Tuesdays? :)

[dagoski.livejournal.com]

Rodrigo and Gabriella amuse me to no end. The press is saying they started out doing Speed Metal in Mexico, but are now doing flamenco infused folk. Bull! They're still doing Speed Metal. They just doing it unplugged! Sounds really good too.

I wish the press would stop talking about the gender and skin color of the nation's first black female president and start talking about what kind of policies this critter will produce. I see black folk all the time. I'm married to a woman. This stuff is old to me. The only way it would intersting is if the black woman president started out as a white man. The weird thing about the Obama/Clinton horse races is that the media has manged to conjoin the two despite the fact that're competing with one and other.

[desh]

Re R&G: There's not enough acoustic speed metal out there. Or something. But this is a whole CD of stuff like California Guitar Trio's cover of Bohemian Rhapsody that I heard once, only better.

Re politics: My only consolation is that if we shut our eyes, cover our ears, and hum to ourselves for about 11 months, when we come back they'll actually be talking about how the candidates differ in policy. If we have to have the black/woman/whatever conversation before someone actually wins, better to have it now than when the details actually matter.

[jdcohen.livejournal.com]

Wait, who is this who works for Marvel? Do I know this wacky person? Because I SHOULD.

Also, the day they stop talking about how black Barack Obama is or how many wombs Hillary's got (answer: 1.5 - she took half of Lewinsky's as punishment) is the day that angry Campaign Managers storm out of the HRC and 08ama headquarters looking to lynch dem newspaper mans for cutting off their free* press releases. Ain't no press better than free press.

--Jeff

* Free as in beer, not necessarily free as in freedom/France.

[desh]

I don't think you ever met her. She was in the theater community and a little Reform Hillel stuff, but not much. You two aren't facebook friends. Also, my friend Derrick K-C, from my committee at Fest, who I also saw this weekend, works for MoCCA.

Subtexts to look for

[bumonyou.livejournal.com]

articulate and well spoken black candidates (see point 2)