Something I Do Not Like

I actually enjoy standing in the sun hanging laundry out to dry. And I enjoy how much lower our electricity bill is when I line-dry our laundry. I don't really mind the extra step of a short dryer cycle before line-drying to ensure that our dry laundry doesn't have better posture than we do. However, I do not like it when birds poop on my clean laundry.

Passports

I was thinking of this and that last night, and my mind wandered over to the subject of passports, and getting them, and what they looked like, and... hey... where are our passports? I figured it out within a minute or so (and double-checked just now: they are where I thought they were), but it was an odd feeling.

In America, I always knew exactly where our passports were. What if we suddenly needed to go to Israel on a moment's notice? I couldn't afford to start looking for passports: I needed them in-hand! Now, our passports are just another set of important documents that I really, really need to not lose. Really. But there's no urgency about them anymore.

It's a good feeling.

I'm home.

Speaking of Which...

I've been hearing a bunch of things over the past few months. More terror tunnels have been discovered leading from Gaza to Israel. Reports of unrest. "Code Red" drills. Just vague feelings that last summer's "Operation Protective Edge" has in no way ended a story. Then, last night, rockets were fired at Southern Israel. Not good. Not good.

What's really bad, though? I was talking with Mrs. Barzilai today as our kids played in the pool (speaking of which, the three of them had So Much Fun, and I'm really glad I popped over to Yerushalayim this morning and bought said pool in preparation for today's 98°-high). She mentioned that they plan to visit her in-laws in Be'er Sheva this summer, "Assuming, please G-d, that there's not a war." She hadn't even heard about the rockets yesterday. It's just a pervasive feeling that things are very much Not Over.

Shavuos and Such

I had lots of spare time on Erev Shabbos/Erev-Erev Shavuos, so I cut a bunch of hadassim from my front yard and a bunch of rosemary from behind my house, and managed to actually decorate the house with lots of greenery in honor of Shavuos. It was fun.

I'm still a little confused about how little I had to cook. Granted, we only had Shabbos+One Day here, and we ate Shabbos lunch at the Ornas, but still. I'm cooled out that my food preparation was: baking one (1) cake, spicing one (1) salmon fillet, steaming one (1!) bag of broccoli, and making two (2) salads. That's it. Granted Husbinator made meatballs for Friday night and two types of sauce for Shavuos night, my freezer contributed challahs and cookies, and each of our guests brought a side dish, but still. I had to do very little, and that's what counts.

I was going to bake a cheese cake, but we found a 20₪ cheesecake in the store, and that's cheaper in both time and money than making one myself. Unfortunately, when we cut into it on yontiff, we discovered that said cheese cake was absolutely tasteless, so it's a good thing that Dikla sent BSM home with a cheese cake that actually tasted delicious.

The other disappointment involved the "bagels" I was so excited about a few days ago. Sure enough, they're just round bread with a hole in the middle. Blerg. Luckily, I had a hunch that would be the case, so I went back to the bakery before chag and bought myself a nice artisan baguette which was very nice with cream cheese and lox. And since Husbinator's ideal bagel is Thomas' Everything Bagels, he wasn't too disappointed. And poor Israeli BSM was just thrilled with the new type of bread. I shall have to teach him the proper Way of the Bagel before it's too late.

Surprise Goal Reached

Growing up, we had a yearly goal of putting away the Pesach stuff by Lag B'Omer. If that due date were somehow missed, Shavuos became the new "No, really, we need to switch everything back NOW," date. I didn't expect this household to make the Shavuos last-ditch deadline this year. But we did. On the 47th day of the Omer, our friend/neighbor Yonah came over and helped Husbinator shove all sorts of odds and ends up our new stairs and into the attic. Including our Pesach stuff. We have so much space now.

Bagels

We generally go for a very simple meal for Shavuot lunch: Husbinator stays up all night learning, so we never know when we'll want to eat. This year, we decided on bagels, lox, and cream cheese: it's a real treat and takes about 5 minutes to prepare the meal. But this is Israel. The Jewish Homeland. The country that is chock-full of Jews and mysteriously devoid of bagels. So after giving it a good bit of thought, I decided I'd buy some artisan rolls, since they have a good crust. Not a bagel, but it should be good with lox and cream cheese. However, while wandering around the bakery today, shamelessly poking their bread and rolls, I found an entire shelving unit full of bagels. They look like real bagels. They feel like real bagels. I am all nerves waiting for Shavuot to see if they taste like real bagels.

The Saga of the Car

I just wanted to say that we pretty much wrapped things up with the car today, but that requires some back-story. So here's the saga.


Last week, the hood of our car broke the windshield of our car. UN peace negotiators were called in, making the situation much worse. Sorry, I'll try to keep that in check. Right, so one of the ladies in the car with me very kindly called my insurance company and all of the phone numbers they gave her, a guy passing by stopped and tied down the hood for me (and told me to drive to the checkpoint and wait there, as opposed to staying on the side of the road), and Shimon of A.A. Glass (real name and company) was the nicest person ever: he acted just like Abba would in that situation, keeping everyone calmed, informed, and hydrated.

The net results of my conversation with Shimon were (a) I became completely calm and (b) we decided not to fix the car windshield, since doing so was predicated on fixing the car hood, and that would cost around 2000₪. (Have I blogged about our car? I think so. I love it. But even before the whole Hood versus Windshield conflict, we had decided not to invest the 1500₪ in yearly registration fees that will come due in August, so pouring thousands of shekel into the car now is just plain silly.) It works out well that we have a good reason not to fix the windshield, because between my talking things over with Shimon, the lady at the office (also really nice) tells me that the car registration we have is in Husbinator's cousin's name, and she's tried, but there is no way she can get money from the insurance company unless we can produce something called the "transfer of registration," proving that this is, in fact, our car. And that is a tiny slip of paper we know full well we are never going to find.

Enter a guy who lives on our street. Call him Oved. He's a wheeler-and-dealer type, and he's been offering to fix stuff about our car for a while, now. Naturally, when he sees the smashed windshield, we talk. The net result of talking to Oved is... we decide to fix the windshield, after all. After all, Oved points out, insurance covers the windshield, and if we get that fixed, we can sell the car as a car as opposed to selling it for parts. It's an investment. Also, he wants to buy the car from us if we fix the windshield. Also also, he has a friend who can replace the hood for about 150₪. Also also also, it's really easy to get the missing paperwork: just go to the DMV in Talpiyot (the same neighborhood that the glass shop is in), ask for a "duplicate registration," fork over about 30₪, and be done with it. Okay, fine then.

We planned to go Sunday, but that was Yom Yerushalyaim, so Husbinator and I went back to Talpiyot today. I dropped Husbinator off at the DMV, figuring that I'd put cash on the table at A.A. Glass, and when Husbinator got the registration in a few hours, A.A. Glass would get authorization from our insurance company, and we'd get our money back. We switch places, I get directions to the glass shop, I make a U-turn and pass the DMV again. Just then, Husbinator calls. He's done, registration in hand, let's go together. Wow. I'll say it again, louder this time: WOW.
Good, so we drop off the car, wander around Talpiyot, and drive back to the Yishuv a few hours later. Finished. Oh, and Husbinator got them to Close the Jammed Driver's Side Window as long as they were at it. (No extra charge.) Doneskies! (Dikla let me leave BSM at her house until 4 today, so we could get all of this done. BSM was not at all phased that I didn't show up at 1:30, and did not miss us at all. This is good, I guess, but also kind of sad. I missed him!)

***

Addendum: 15 minutes after we got home, the guy from the attic store called me to say he could come by in half an hour and install folding steps to our attic. This has been another saga, but I'm drained by all this epic storytelling. Suffice it to say that not only do we once again have a reasonably working car, we also have a viable way to get to our attic, at last. Coolness.

Challah!

BSM has been helping me more and more in the kitchen, lately. (By which I mean that I discovered BSM will let me cook/wash dishes if he's standing on a chair next to me doing something similar.) He helped me make apple pie, he helps me chop garlic in the food processor, and today, BSM helped me shape challah.

He rolled the dough, and patted the dough, and smushed in chocolate chips or shook on spices, and put his challot in the pans, and painted them with egg. Oy, he is my big boy. And by the time he was shaping roll #4, my big boy had an epiphany. "Eat?" he piped. "Eat? Eat? Eat? Eat. Eat. Eat!" Sure enough, he put his Eureka moment into immediate experimental phase, and was quite pleased with the results. I don't think we'll have such an effective ratio of dough given to dough baked for years to come.

It Takes a Village

A little while ago there was quite the bru-ha-ha on social medea over so-called "free-range parenting." Being too clever to actually read the articles and rants, I don't know much about the details, but I did see someone's brief rant about neighborhoods and all adults taking responsibility for all children, or something like that. I agree with the bit of that philosophy that I remember.

For example, I passed three children standing outside of the nursery school this morning. A boy who looked to be about nine and a girl who looked to be about seven were trying to drop off their three-year-old sister, but the gate was locked. I was late dropping off BSM, myself, but I couldn't just walk on! So I tried calling the number over the gate, but there was no answer. I tried pushing the button on the call box, but that wasn't working. So I did the only responsible thing I could: following the seven-year-old's instructions, I helped the kids break into the nursery school. Just doing my civic duty.

Cabbage and Meatballs

Sometimes, one finds oneself on a diet. In that situation, one is often avoiding things like spaghetti. In such a case, The Internet will suggest substitutions such as spaghetti squash or tiny strips of zucchini. I am here to say that such substitutions are worse than useless: they are just a sad reminder that one wants spaghetti but can't have any.

You know what's a good base for meatballs? Slawed cabbage stewed (briefly!) in tomato sauce. You don't wipe away tears of longing with every bite; you just wonder who was too lazy to stuff the prakas, and salute them for a perfectly reasonable time-saving alternative.

Darkaynu

We hosted a group of Darkaynu guys for Shabbat lunch. (Darkaynu is a post-high school yeshiva program for people with special needs.) It sounds horribly trite, but it really is a beautiful program. After having lunch with them, it's obvious to me that these boys need a post-high school yeshiva experience just as much as the next guy, so Darkaynu made them a program. It's very nice.

My other trite observation is that Shabbos prep is approximately a zillion times easier when I keep the house reasonably clean and dishes reasonably washed throughout the week. Okay, folks, take your heads out of your hands. I know it's obvious, and had you asked me, I could have guessed that, but some things really have to be learned experientially.

Lag B'Omer

On the advice of Mrs. Gold, I brought in everything we had outside. Husbinator saw me and asked if it was supposed to rain. I told him no, smoke. You see, the custom in Israel is to light bonfires on Lag B'Omer, and "bonfires" is probably too mild a word. Here's a picture of the bonfire that our shul made:

Most bonfires are constructed entirely by little boys, and are at least that large. I counted four bonfires in the empty lot behind the shul, and there were plenty more in other empty lots throughout the yishuv. Yes, firetrucks are on patrol.

As I've mentioned before, Israelis need to wordplay more. I wished someone a tentative Chag Sameach at the bonfire. Lag B'Omer isn't exactly a holiday, but it is a day of religious significance that marks the end of a mourning period, so I figured I'd give it a shot. No dice. So what's the obvious greeting? It's not "Chag Sameach" and the day is "Lag B'Omer..." Say it with me, folks. I greeted the next lady, "Lag Sameach," as any self-respecting punster would, and she was completely taken aback and impressed. Puns shouldn't be impressive...

So It Begins

BSM has been requesting specific articles of clothing for the last few days, and so far, it worked out. Last night, he asked for his monkey pajamas. His one pair of monkey PJ's wasn't in his room, so I sold him on sports-themed pajamas, instead.

When I went to him this morning, he was standing in his crib with his balled-up sports pajamas in his hands, crying, "Monkey! Monkey!" Oh, boy. And no, we don't have any daytime clothing with monkeys on them. Again, I sold him on something else (airplanes), but we'll see what comes of this.

Shopping

I didn't go to Restaurant Depot often when we were in the US, but I liked knowing it was there. Today, I went to a store I heard about on Facebook (at HaTaasiya 12, for those who care), and was pleasantly surprised to see that is actually more like a Restaurant Depot than a Costco. Granted, the place is tiny, and they're missing the entire "restaurant-grade kitchenware" section, etc etc, but they do have soy sauce by the gallon and 18-kg buckets of techina paste. Not that I bought either of those items, but it really is nice to know that it's there.

While I was out, I successfully deposited a check in Israel for the first time. I asked for advice from both the security guard and another customer in line at the ATM, and I learned that, oddly enough, depositing a check here works just like it does in the USofA. But the rush of successfully gleaning another life skill is much bigger.

Fixed!

Well, I almost resolved (part of) my phone issue this morning, but it didn't end up working out. Luckily, Husbinator completely resolved my phone issue this afternoon, so that worked out nicely.

I spontaneously explored the tire store near Rami Levy, though, discovered that they are also mechanics, and got the brakes on our car fixed! So full credit all around, I say.

And while I was waiting for the car, I bought the complete works of Uri Aurbach: I was with neither phone (it was broken) nor book (I hadn't expected to go to the mechanic) so I wandered around the bookstore and figured I'd pick something up. I found Maybe They'll Throw Candy This Shabbat, which I recognized thanks to the Kornbluths tying that poem to baggies of candy and giving them out in shul on Aurbach's shloshim (or yahartzeit, or something). The clerk suggested I buy the whole set, and after skimming a few more poems, I did.

I smiled, I laughed, I groaned, and I've even cried once. So all in all, a productive sort of a day.

PSA

I seem to have run through another phone. Glory be. I hope to remedy the situation soon, but in the  meantime, please contact me through the internet or through Husbinator's phone.

Food

Below please find diverse brief anecdotes on the theme of "food."

Very soon after Pesach, I bought more finely ground black pepper. With it, I made Yerushalmi kugel, and thereafter I was informed in no uncertain terms by no fewer than three people, that the rumors I heard 10 years ago are true. Israeli black pepper is generally cut with flour. But not on Pesach.

Also soon after Pesach, I bought sunflower seeds. Being a savvy consumer, I looked at the expiration date before putting the bags in my cart, and I was suitably unhappy to see that the darned things expired two days ago. Then I looked again: they expire in almost a year from now. They were packaged two days ago. My friends, freshly roasted sunflower seeds do indeed taste freshly roasted. Yum.

Other indignities include buying "עלי סלק" and upon Googling "beet leaves," discovering that although סלק is certainly beet, "עלי סלק" is actually Swiss chard. Luckily, I forgot to buy spinach, and cooked Swiss chard is pretty indistinguishable from cooked spinach.

Possibly the most exciting food-related adventure is that I finally caved and spent over 100 on a percolator. Let me just say, "Cofffffeeeeee." There is nothing like actual brewed coffee. I resent instant coffee so much that I've been drinking the powdered Elite stuff that has a smell somewhat resembling that of coffee, but is so far removed from the actual product that the fact that it isn't the real thing doesn't really bother me. But coffee. Real, brewed, coffee. Oh my Gosh. It's almost as good as Aunt Chef's Pesachdik Jelly Cookies made with flour. (And those are marvelously delicious.) Because I finished my matza meal, and if it isn't Pesach, why shouldn't I substitute flour for matza meal?