Bad Influence

All right, one last one for tonight.

My mother and I have come to the conclusion that we are mutually bad influences on each other. See, she's on a diet, in which she tries to eat less in general but particularly tries to limit her carbs. So she's been buying very little food in the attempt to have less around the house to tempt her. I, on the other hand, eat. And furthermore, I like to keep things around so that I can eat when I'm hungry. So I've been eating, and asking what's available, and it makes her think of food, and so she complains that I'm corrupting her.

On the other hand, when she does eat, she eats fairly well. She has certain things she likes, which are often the more expensive items and also often enough come from restaurants. Meanwhile, I moved in here for the very specific reason that I want to save money during this period of time. I did just come from the no-kosher-restaurant land of Ithaca, however. So you can imagine it is not a good situation for my wallet when I am hungry and it is time for a meal and she suggests going someplace yummy because hey, we don't have much food in the house anyway. No, not a good situation at all. :-P

Great Buy

I have a new leather jacket.

It's SO much fun to buy something with an original ticket price of $258...and pay $39.99 for it! :-D

Need a Good Laugh?

Call 518-272-2400. You'll reach an advertising agency with the best automated answer system I've ever heard. Don't press any buttons; just listen to the whole thing, through to the very end. Then hang up. (Unless of course you really have something to advertise and you've been understandably convinced that they know how to capture people's attention!)

You don't need your hands....do you?

Did you ever have a teacher (or several) who would tell kids who waved their hands around too much while they were talking that they should sit on their hands and try to make their point with words alone? And these kids would have such a difficult time...sometime one of their hands would sneak back up for a gesture without their even noticing.

The other day I saw two young women engaged in an animated conversation on the subway. By observing them I could tell that neither was seriously hearing-impaired (no hearing aids, perfectly normal speech, not always watching each other's lips, responsive when they were getting off and the one continued speaking behind the other, etc.) and yet one of them was signing everything she said. Not gesturing, signing. I wonder whether she has a family member or close friend who is deaf, and, having learned to sign whenever she speaks to them, finds it hard to break the habit when speaking to someone else? And I wonder how long she's been doing it. And I wonder, if she was doing it when she was a kid, whether she ever had a teacher like that...

Where did it go?

My weekend seems to have disappeared. I mean, I'm relaxed, but I didn't do very much. And here I planned to catch up on all the things I didn't blog from the last week. Oops. Oh, well...I'll get to it. Most of the thoughts will keep.

The Problem With Having Choices

...is the necessity and the responsibility of choosing. Not that this is a particularly astute or original realization, but it goes a long way towards explaining the motivational problems of so many people of my generation. When something must be done -- not when it should optimally be done, but when there really is no acceptable alternative -- one does it. End of story. But, as I was discussing with a friend tonight, technology has hugely expanded our realm of choice. And when there are so many different ways of accomplishing something, and so many alternatives to doing it altogether, it takes so much more focus to actually pick the right activity and the right method and stick with it from moment to moment.

Having said that...I think I'll get off the computer and go to bed, even though I don't have to wake up at dawn to feed the chickens and milk the cows. ;-)

Rhinos have feelings too!

And feuds as well, it seems...

The Club

A week ago, Sarah was musing on different people's associations of dress with certain elements of identity, particularly Orthodox Judaism. I've always wondered about this stuff; namely, how close does one have to be to the "club" in order to be able to automatically recognize its other members?

I'll elaborate. I went into women's clothing store (in NY) a few days ago that just happens to be owned and run by frum Jews. I walked in and caught a glance from one of the women, looked down at my own ankle-length skirt, and chuckled to myself. But I wondered several things at once:
1) whether I was as obvious to them as they were to me
2) whether they were as obvious to everyone else as they were to me
3) if the answers to 1 & 2 are different, why??? True, I don't wear a long skirt, or even a skirt, every day. But I am observant, and I was dressed "accordingly" today. What exactly is it beyond the skirt itself that constitutes the label?

In case you're wondering, I could only see this woman from the shoulders up, as she was standing behind a clothing rack. And of the several other women around the store whose religious identities were equally as apparent to me, not all of them were married (hat/wig), nor could I see the lower half of some of them. In addition, I must I point out that I have had this experience in many other settings, lest you imagine that my prior knowledge of the store's ownership was at all relevant.

So, to return to my question, given the myriads of women who wear long skirts for no other reason than that they like to, what is it about frum women that allow them to be immediately identified, and how widespread is the recognition factor? Is it only other religious Jews who can pinpoint them? All Jews? Anyone who has spent time in their presence?

Over and IN

Yay! Thanks to the good people at RCN, I finally can access the internet on my own computer, using my own router, in the apartment in which I am living! (As opposed to borrowing my mother's computer, or using my computer on borrowed bandwith from the unsecured wireless router upstairs, or checking my email at a public terminal in a Columbia building...)

Henceforth, if conditions remain favorable (i.e. with some luck, hashgacha pratit, and time management on my part) you might hear from me more than once a week. But for now, shabbat shalom!

When Life Throws You A Curve, Bend

No, I have not fallen into a black hole...unless Ithaca counts, in which case I have just narrowly escaped.

The short version of the ending to this entire episode was that being sick drained all my energy to such an extent that instead of coming home on Friday morning, which was my absolutely last "deadline" so that I could spend my mother's birthday with her, I ended up calling friends to ask if they'd be willing to take in a miserable waif for shabbat, and coming home Sunday morning. And calling another friend to meet me at Port Authority to get me and all my bundles downstairs and into a cab, because I had more than any person has a right to take on a bus. Thank you, friends!!! :-) Sorry, Mom!!! :-(

But after adjusting my plans about five times this week, due not only to my usual inability to pack and make deadlines but also to circumstances completely beyond my control, the lesson learned is: When life throws you a curve, bend.

Further Evidence of my Nincompoopiness...Nincompoopity?

I've been feeling achey all over, like I do when I have a fever, although I don't think I did -- or at least not much. I attibuted the feeling to just being sick. But then my mother asks, "Have you been drinking enough?"

Oops. 20 minutes after pouring 20oz of water down my throat, I felt about 50% better. What a surprise. (Granted, I'm still coughing myself silly and am now a bit dizzy, but let's solve one problem at a time, shall we?)

Who Ever Thought Panic Could be a GOOD Thing?

Lost: one slightly oversized set of panic.
Last seen: approximately one year ago.
Reward offered: never mind, you don't want any.

It used to be, when I got close to a big deadline and the relevant task was (as usual) nowhere near complete, panic would kick in, activating adrenaline and a compulsion to finish the job at hand, despite exhaustion and other physical discomfort. The last time I remember having that feeling was during my move from NYC to Ithaca last year, although it might have surreptitiously checked in once or twice last semester. Its companions, anxiety and nervousness, didn't go anywhere. They're still my pals. But all they do is send me (and my tummy) in circles. They don't actually make anything get done.

I thought this little vacation my panic took had to do with my situation in school. This time around, it saw it wasn't needed to keep me from flunking out, and that I'd be able to get done pretty well without it. Thankfully, it was right.

It'd come in handy right about now, though, but it's still AWOL. I have an entire apartment full of belongings, all over the floor, in boxes and out of them, on the walls and partly on the shelves, and I have so little energy or motivation to do anything about it that it might all get put away in its proper place and cleaned by next week, if I'm lucky.

Oh, yeah, and did I mention I'm supposed to start work this Wednesday, specifically because I went out of my way to avoid any further delay in my start date? My only out (which also probably plays a small part in my lethargy) is my hacking cough and froglike voice, which is giving me a major headache. Every time I cough my brain feels like it bumped into my forehead.

I needed a cheerleading squad. Now all I need is cough syrup and a TV. And, uh, a continuance?

Who Am I Talking To?

I can live with not being a very popular gal, if that's the case, but I'm curious. If you've been reading this blog, light as it is, and your initials are not stg, jig, jdr, mhb, jng, or a?b, please say hi! I mean, you're welcome to lurk if you'd really rather, but I'd like to know you're out there!

In for the Long Haul

If the past few days are any basis from which to judge, this is going to be a looooooooooooooong six months.

And arriving back in Ithaca in the stillness of the wee hours, treading carefully so as not to slide down the slushy hill...it comes home to me once again (sorry, I couldn't resist that pun) how much I'm going to miss this place.

So now I'm merchandise...

Initially (as far back as I'm going to bore you with), the plan for this week was that I pack the things that needed to be transported to NYC by Wednesday, and that my mother would drive up to Ithaca on Tuesday in order to do the transporting on Wednesday. The wishful version was that I'd have all the other things in storage by then and have the apartment clean and all errands accomplished, so I could be transported then as well. Needless to say (if you know me), this was not likely. Plan B was that I would stay to finish all of the above and travel to NYC by bus on Thursday evening, so that Friday I could register with the temp agency that will be paying me for my work this semester. (For logistical reasons, my "internship" is really a contracted temp job). All this was for the purpose of starting work this coming Monday.

A little background: Mr. C, who will be one of my supervisors and is the person who offered me the position, told me originally that all the details regarding my payment would be taken care of by the temp agency, so I should contact them about it and then inform him of the date I wished to begin work. Since the agency told me I could register as soon as a day before I started, I planned the Friday-Monday schedule as mentioned above. Last week, I emailed him again to remind him of this arrangement, but later the same day I received an email from the woman in HR saying she'd need a week to do the paperwork on me and find me a workstation after I registered with the agency, so I should plan to start on Tuesday the 18th instead (the 17th being a legal holiday). I said wa-ait a minute...if I had known she needed that time I would have come to the city a while back just to register and then come back to pack and move. How come they didn't tell me this before? Well, turns out it was simply a lack of communication (there's a shocker!) between my supervisor and HR, but the matter isn't really flexible because approval to hire me must be gotten from higher up.

Fine. So in order to avoid missing an entire week of work (and pay), I spontaneously came back with my mother (who was a real trooper, helping me load the car and then driving for at least half the trip on snowy, slushy roads on Wednesday morning), leaving my apartment looking like a tornado hit it, so that I could register on Wednesday afternoon, so that they could start the ball rolling and be prepared to welcome me to the office next Wednesday. Now I have to return to Ithaca for a few days before then to finish the job I left undone. It's a hassle, but the best compromise I could work out.

Here's the kicker, though: The forms they need to send in for me are not exactly for approval to hire me, because I won't be a real employee. They're more like a purchase order. In a way that makes sense, because they will be purchasing my services from the temp agency...but to me and my mom, standing amid the boxes and all the random things in my apartment, nothing could have been funnier. Mom wondered aloud if they were going to box me?!

On stereotyping...once I get there

I just did something I completely don't have time to do, but I was so bored...I watched a movie. Not Without My Daughter, with Sally Field and Alfred Molina, about an Iranian-American who begs his wife to accompany him, with their daughter, on a visit to his family in Iran. He tricks her, forcing them to stay and live there and becoming violent and abusive. Because of the government's oppressive restrictions on women's rights, she cannot legally escape and must find her way through an underground of sorts (after being trapped for over a year) in order to leave the country with her daughter.

The funny thing is that the cast and crew are -- no kidding -- more than 50% Israeli. I guess they were filming in the Middle East, so it might make sense (the percentage is slightly smaller if you include the second crew in Atlanta -- go figure!)...but there are hardly any Arabic names in the credits. Makes you think...

Oh, and I got even more sidetracked looking at the postings of people commenting on the movie on IMDB. First, I have to say it really amazes me how many people simply cannot speak English. (Disclaimer: I don't mean foreigners; I mean people who show where they're from pretty obviously by what they say, but can't manage to say it in anything resembling a real language.) It's also amazing how mixed-up people's thinking can be. There are some who are so busy defending Persian and Iranian people against the movie's "racist" attack that they fail to notice that the only generalization portrayed is of the Muslim attitude towards women. Yes, it's a dramatization of a true story, so yes, there will be stereotypes that are played upon to make a point and to add to the drama. That's true about most occurrences that are depicted within the framework of entertainment. The movie does not, however, cast blame on the general population of the country, but rather on the extremist religious political policy that validated and reinforced Moody's treatment of his wife.

Of course, all this pushes an examination on the definition of stereotyping. If something is portrayed that is stereotypical, it's not necessarily inaccurate. It may be, if the stereotype was initially invented as a form of hate propaganda. But if the stereotype developed because a certain behavior is regularly observed among certain categories of people, then where is the line between acceptable and inappropriate in the context of portraying that characteristic fictionally? How much credit should artists and entertainers give their audiences on the ability to recognize exaggeration when they see it? Or, for that matter, who's going to remind the general public that when they see a person behave a certain way in real life, his/her actions should only reflect on him or her, not on the entirety of his/her race or nation or gender or religious group or political party or sexual affiliation, etc??

Nincompoop

Or a dumcuff, whichever you prefer.

Yesterday I stranded myself at the mall...or at least I thought I did. After staying later than (I thought) the last bus left, I called friends to please come pick me up, and as I came out the door to wait for them, saw a bus pulling away. Now, to be fair to myself, it was pulling away from the drop-off stop, not the pick-up stop, and it turned in the opposite direction from the pick-up stop, so it may not have helped me. Still, I suspect I had the schedule wrong.

But in addition to having thought I missed the last bus, I foolishly spent (I thought) all of my cash, and none of the stores I went to subsequently would charge my card $5 extra and give me the cash back. (No, I don't use a debit card.) So I had no bus fare, anyway. Of course, today I discovered a $5 bill pushed deep into my wallet, under where the $10 had been, which I never forgot having put there but which I somehow thought I had spent or forgot to look for.

So my poor friends spent gas and time and effort coming to get me, and I spent way too much additional time going into stores with them "while they were there," all because I'm a nincompoop. Or a dumcuff.

Stuff

I have a small pile of accumulated things I'd like to get rid of -- things that aren't really trash but that I don't want, need, or have room for. They're the types of things that one might sell at a garage sale or on ebay, only I have no garage (or equivalent), not enough to constitute a whole sale, and not enough time to advertise one. And I can't sell on ebay because I don't like the idea of putting my bank account info online. I just listed a few of the items on Jittery, which seems to be an upstart ebay wannabe, because they don't require much personal information.

Does anyone have any other ideas for me?

Ah, yes. Subsequent reminder of my mom's earlier suggestion: take it all back to the city with me and post it on craigslist. I hope she realizes that means it'll be sitting in the hallway until I get rid of it, though.

Good luck

If this is as legitimate as it sounds...all I have to say is, good luck to them. It's really a monumental endeavor...and might actually spur the coming of the mashiach if they succeed. (Also see here.)

Sigh

Blogging is great. Unless you're supposed to be moving in 3 days.

Or unless you're a student who has homework or studying to do.

Or unless you're anyone else who does not yet have a handle on using your time efficiently.

Sigh.

Names

I have a close friend who recently had her third child, and she began the very long, detailed explanation of his name by emphasizing how important she and her husband feels names are. They believe that "a name is an essence, and is sometimes tells of a person’s qualities and strengths, perhaps even of his/her destiny."

Enter Beth, who comments on her own friend's practice of referring to her kids, in her blog, by nicknames that describe an element of their personalities. Beth mentions that she knows all the kids and wouldn't have thought of them as particularly possessing the characteristics their mom identifies, but now that she regularly hears about them according to these nicknames she magnifies those characteristics in her image of the kids' activities.

I'm trying to decide whether it's good or bad that people don't usually associate all the defining characteristics of a known name with a person, the same way they would if the name were a commonly used word. Would it be better to give an infant a name, trusting that there is some force (presumably Hashem) guiding your choice, which ensures that the name is appropriate to that human being? Or might there be a risk that the influence of the name will affect what kind of person the child develops into? Or is this likely but not a risk at all, because you are choosing a name that has wonderful connotations, associations and implications?

Just a thought.