We took a family trip to Jerusalem yesterday. I was thinking it would be weird because it seems like normally half the city is tourists and now there aren’t any. I wondered what the city would be like with “just the locals.” Turned out a lot of stuff was open – from just walking around…
Read moreShavuot Shopping
Shavuot starts tomorrow night and this year its on thursday night and friday, so it goes right into shabbat on friday night and saturday. Because most stores will be closed for both, you’ve got to get all your shopping done for both shavuot and shabbat ahead of time. So yesterday we decided to stop at…
Read moreThe Land-Ball
Hebrew is cute. Despite the obvious condescension, to my American ears Hebrew is biblical and holy and deep and meaningful, and sometimes in its modern formulation, just plain cute. I heard a story on the news today about how Jessica Meir, the American Jewish astronaut who returned from the space station a month or so ago….
Read moreShuls Reopen
They just yesterday announced that synagogues could reopen with up to 50 people at a time, social distancing, masks, etc, (and that each synagogue has to appoint an official person in charge of “virus defence.” Jogging this morning, I ran by a minyan at a shul which was open but had people overflowing onto the…
Read moreBack to School
Today was the kids second day back at school in the COVID era. The rules are as follows: They have a backup mask in their backpacks for when they break their first one. (this week has been a heat wave with temps above 100F; so far they have waived the mask requirement for the kids…
Read more“Mineness”
I was reviewing my ulpan Hebrew language book last week and came across an interesting usage for the possessive word in hebrew, “yesh – יש” Hebrew doesn’t have an exact translation for the words ”I have.” Instead of saying, “I have a book,” in Hebrew you’d say, “there is to me a book” – יש…
Read moreStreet Minyan
This past shabbat for the first time I decided to scout out the “street minyan” they were having at our shul. We used to daven (pray) inside the small shul in the Open University campus (a small college in Ra’anana) located just down the street from where we live. Its a very nice campus on…
Read moreOpening back up
Today was the first day they opened up the shopping malls. Most of the stores in the mall were open even though the mall itself was not crowded. Many of the stores had signs saying how many people could be admitted at a time, and that masks are required. Many of them had a large…
Read moreMy Zoom Minyan Ended
Three days ago I got out of bed around 7:30AM as has become my COVID routine, got dressed, made coffee, put on my talit and t’fillin and then logged in to the zoom minyan I’ve been “using” (attending?) for the past month. There were only exactly 10 people logged on – the leader said that…
Read moreFriday Afternoon
Friday Afternoon. Things are starting to open up here a little bit. I dropped Val off today to get a pedicure, which she hasn’t had in several months, since the shops just reopened up, much less busy than usual, etc, fewer people allowed in the shop, masks, alcohol sanitiser, etc, and while she was there…
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