Leak in the Mikva

I knew something was not Kosher when I found myself actually turning the pages of Kashrus Magazine. I noticed an strikingly odd advertisement for a Jewish radio/TV personality. The full page ad touts, "More informative than a trip to the mikva." Now, I'm for all forms of informative radio even though I choose not listen but what exactly is the comparison? And how is the show that-extra-special-something that even mikva information couldn't provide? What on earth is informative about a mikva? Can anybody just show up at the mikva and the librarian-like mikva lady will whip out her card catalog and direct said person to the appropriate reference? Well, I've been trying to get an interview with the mikva lady to delve into those depths but with no success. Apparently things are well covered up even in the mikva.

Was this a feeble attempt at punning whereby 'knowing' a woman in a biblical sense is very intimate knowledge and his program offers intimate knowledge of the issues? Is he implying that he is exceptional at uncovering the issues? Feels like a stretch, even to a punster like me. To be frank, or whomever else you want me to be, it feels like quite an inappropriate use of language in a kosher magazine. I think his advertising agency will be all washed up after this one.

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Free?

To me 'free' is a four letter word. Actually it is four letters for everyone who can spell. 'Deal' is another, so is 'sale'. Whenever someone tells me of a deal or I can get something free, part of my ethnic DNA wants to jump at the opportunity, marvel that there is a God who is cutting me a break. But, alas, my luck denies me that which others easily partake. I just tried to get free music online. All I had to do was start my i-tunes and go to i-store then click on their icon. I got rerouted to upgrades and other nonsense. All said and done, I upgraded but no music and the icon to get the music is gone. Truth be told I don't care about the songs or that I didn't get it. Instead this is just another example of my luck.

I switch to Verizon Fios to save money then get hit with a $900 bill. I fought and won but only after four months of aggravation and hours wasted on the phone. I switched back to cable begging to get the early termination fee just to rid myself of Fios nightmare. Yet my neighbor switched, no problem. Another example of my luck.

I switched to Sprint for the everything for $99 package not realizing that Sprint has a horrible network and drops many of my calls in my neighborhood, kitchen or by my work. My first phone died after 33 days, that's 3 days past the stage when I could have canceled the contract with no termination fee. Three phones later, many wasted hours on the phone, payments in advance for all these phones later credited appropriately but, oy, the aggravation.

How many times have I shopped and saw something on sale only later to realize that the register scanner didn't ring it as such.

Clerks ask me if I want to take out a store visa to get 15% off. I say, charge me full price, ignore any sales. I don't want to hear it. I must shut my brain when I see Sale or Deal or Free. Invariably, all the effort and nonsense that follows is NOT WORTH IT.

Just for the record, the worst four letter word is 'love' because it gets you married. And when things don't work out, court, lawyers, divorce takes everything else. But at least I'm not bitter.

Clocksuckers

Read that again. Yeah, I said CLOCK-suckers. Everyone knows life is short but what do you do when the person you're with drains the life away from you? Their indecision traps you in a dysfunctional relationship, one that should've moved forward already or fizzled out months ago. Perhaps a child has an educational or emotional issue but one party's refusal to reach a conclusion allows the problem to persist for an unacceptable amount of time. Should you get all wound up?

Who has time to even address the issue of boring lectures or speeches? Five minutes max or I'm a snoozin' (and that's being downright generous). And all those that make phone calls just to talk on and on about themselves and really have nothing to say;) Or clients that talk on and on when your schedule is getting backed up. Now I'm all for building a rapport with a client but at what point can you begin to charge psychologist rates as well? Worst of all, people who write long winded notes, blah blah blah, droning on and on, sucking the time right out of you. It's gotta stop, for God's sake!

Password Protected Photos

Mars and Venus all over again. I wonder what on earth women are thinking by password protecting their photo or not putting a photo at all. "Oh, I believe that a relationship isn't about looks...he should get to know me first to see if he likes me..." Translation to men, "I'm ugly but maybe I can sucker you in to wasting time and effort." Now truth be told, I understand, as do many men, that a relationship is more than just based on looks. There should be like-minded goals, compatible personalities and religious levels etc. But all you women have absolutely no concept of the male gender when you withhold basic elements like appearance. If a woman's looks fall nowhere within the parameters of my attraction, even if everything else is right, it ain't gonna work. I need to know I can wake up to that face and smile. You may find me outside your parameters and that's totally ok by me because I know there are others who are into the way I look (for a modest fee, of course). Men are very visual and we need to be attracted to our mates (and so do women so stop kidding your self). Any man who denies this is an evolutionary anomaly, liar, or been pussywhipped enough to say what you want to hear.

So you still insist that maybe your psycho ex is out there and you don't want him to see you. If you're so afraid that you feel you can't date safely maybe I don't want to take a chance that this guy will interrupt our date and kill us. As for general privacy, hellloooo, your dating, you need to meet people who don't know you. Anyway, people know your not married, should they be surprised that your on a dating site? What are you really hiding?

It is interesting that your modesty doesn't extend to facebook where everyone connects with everyone else. Even though you have privacy setting, Yanki is your friend. He in turn has Mo and Larry over who proceed to check you out through your legitimate contact anyway.

Tali had the brilliant idea for a gemach for shidduch photos. This would be a great service to all the men and women who must have better photos than the massacres they choose. Also make sure it is big enough and clear enough that we can get an accurate idea of what you look like. I don't care about the pet or the boat in the background, I want to see and hopefully get to know, you! And remember you are human and the mating game can't ignore looks. Sooner or later you gotta come clean and show me what you look like. So stop wasting everyone's time and put up your picture.

[Photo Deleted by Editor]
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Careful How You Tread

I was sitting at a Chinese restaurant with Tali last night when she allowed me to glimpse the inner workings of a divorced females mind possibly blinding me forever. It may well be the mind of females in general but that information is privileged. She said that she keeps waiting for me to do something wrong (or possibly she said Bad or Crazy but being a guy with a smaller...hippocampus than gals, somethings just won't ever stick in my mind). BTW, the hippocampus is where memories are formed. I'm still scratching my head (hush, now) trying to figure out her birthday. Just kidding but I sure as heck hope she doesn't randomly ask.

So let's assume she's looking for me to take a misstep. Does she anticipate that because I am from the opposite team that I will certainly do something to upset her? Well DARN TOOTIN she does and you better believe I will. Who am I to disappoint? Any two people in close proximity and especially in a close relationship will invariably do something to aggravate, irritate, or just piss the other off. Apparently, I have successfully avoided that already although I was certain I hadn't.

No one could be totally in tune and in the proper frame of mind, always. Even expecting a mild spate of sanity is unusual for most relationships.
I won't even go into the obvious things like trying to be sensitive and anticipate each others feelings and needs. Finger down throat. Hmm...finger...guy brain activated. Thoughts of sex become a clear segue to shark sex. Apparently, the shark if the first creature to invent/discover sexual reproduction around 400 million years ago (at least that's what Evolve on the History Channel claims). The male bites on the extra-padded dorsal fin to turn the female over and maintain position. He even has an extra protrusion by his penis that clasps himself in her while mating. Who's the hooker now? I told this story to a female coworker and like the typical female she says, "He raped her." I tried to animate the scene by playing the role of the female shark talking to her dolphin female friends who tell her she should wake up and smell the krill, she was raped. I'm only a little embarrassed to say I used my best gay voice to simulate a female chain-smoking shark, to say, "But, I really like it rough."

I began to recall my own 'experiences' (haven't tried shark yet, their not kosher). I find that I grab hold to my partner tightly during those climactic moments when all oxygen leaves my brain and my basal ganglia and rudimentary earlier systems go into overdrive. Is this a similar by-product of evolution? Just as the shark bites the dorsal fin to hold position whereby the female can't escape, to ensure a completed act, so too I increase my grasp or do I just have an odd technique unworthy of Cosmo or Vanity Fair.

Where was I? Oh, what I need from all of you is suggestions on how to take my first misstep. I want to make mine memorable because you always remember your first. I'm usually of the mindset that I should just be myself and ouila, poo on the shoe. Any thoughts?

On a warped side note and mixing metaphors, make up sex after overstepping the bounds of normal behavior lead to a ...
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The Eleventh/Second Plague

For all you skeptics out there, beware because God is listening and his vengeance is mighty. At first I couldn't pinpoint the source of my transgression, I scratched my ass wondering. Then it occurred to me that I had to go and rant about soap use on Passover. Well, for our blog-reading God, this was not taken as good clean fun. In fact, the punishment fit the crime. I ended doing Passover cleaning as SECOND time and I will be cleaning a few more times.

I wish the plague was blood, boils, beasts, power outage, or the like. Lice would have been unbearable but the cleanup from this was remarkably similar. The plague I speak of, the one that descended upon my house (me really), was frogs. But not your garden variety of Egyptian frog. It was more in line with the toad family. The NEMATODE one, to be specific. I was playing with our outdoor cat the first days of the holiday. It's a stray we took in after our white-trash neighbor kicked its teeth out. It is so friendly and it apparently didn't mind climbing and resting on my lap. Lo and behold, the wrath of God began in a place of darkness. 'Yea, though I squirm through the valley of darkness, I shall fear no evil.' The itch from these PINWORMS was quite titillating. Actually, this is not the kind of itch one should let his girlfriend scratch. It was driving me so crazy that I went to First Med and paid out of pocket just to be told that they can't look at the exceptional specimen I had so digitally gathered thanks to Scotch tape (wait, is scotch kosher for Passover?). It had to be sent to the lab. It upset me that they were prepared to let me go 3 days while the lab processed the results. So I just Rx-ed Mebendazole for myself and family ASAP rather than let a higher contagious and extremely annoying organism have free reign of the netherlands.

Clean-up was Passover-Obsessive Plus. Blankets went to the cleaners ($100+), sheets washed daily, some of my silkiest undies trashed. All my pants to the cleaners (now's a good time to visit me at work if you want a sight to see), clothes laundered daily, floors mopped, toilets spit-shined, carpets vacuumed (eggs survive well in the dust). No more scary movies with my bud because nail-biting is out since eggs do well under the fingernails. Everything is so clean you can practically eat off my as.....floor.

Now what to do with this fifth column, this seemingly pleasant sojourner cat? I believe he is a first born and as such, I wish the appropriate plague upon him. And I don't mean nematodes.

A Quick Passover Rant

Passover soap. As far as I know, soap is basically a Base. Bread is not one of its active ingredients or even a trace component. Although I'm sure some mad fundy chemists attempted to incorporated bread derivatives into soap and scores of other products just so Jews would be forced to buy the new safe-for-Passover product. Both bread and base begin with 'B' but that as far as it goes. Do people actually worry that they got crumbs in their liquid soap bottle?

My mind then wandered to the need for Kosher salt. Salt is a sodium and chloride combined, Na+Cl-. Perhaps there is a salt that has a Br+EaD- ion in one of its isotopic forms. Visions of my organic chemistry teacher shaking his head in profound disappointment set me straight.

Of course, there are many other absurdities but who has time to continue with all this cleaning and preparing to do?

Quick story:

My paternal grandmother used to move the whole family to a new apartment every year just before Passover because a new apartment had to be broom swept and painted. So instead of cleaning the house herself, she packed and unpacked an entire household and uprooted the kids. One day my dad came home after yeshiva and found the apartment empty. It seems no one told him about the move or where they were going to live next (purposely?)! He wandered around the street for a hour or so past dark until he ran into a friend of the family who was privy to his parents whereabouts. Isn't Passover supposed to be an all inclusive family holiday?