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'''December 9th'''

We had a pretty uneventful week.  We all worked a lot, we’re all tired.  Weather’s been typical for the season, though dry (for now).  The Torah portion is [http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0128.htm#10 “ויצא”], mostly about Jacob’s sojourn in his family’s ancestral home in Haran and all the complex family interactions which ensue.

Speaking of which, Sarah had a get-together for her friends this week, since some of them won’t be here for her birthday.  She prevailed on her mom to make apple-pie, and Esther acquiesced.  The pie was a big success (as was the lasagna!).  I contributed almost nothing to the event, making everyone happy.

We announced a “year-end sale” on 8th last week.  This week we sent out renewal notices for our existing customers whose year of free upgrades was about to expire.  So far, the responses have been encouraging: our customers seem to want to renew, by and large!

We also [https://medium.com/@8th_Dev/real-world-8th-debugging-a-client-server-application-with-zeromq-1a8b7be635b4#.xazqe23w0 wrote a short article] on using 8th to debug an application, which seems to have driven more traffic to our site.  I’ll have to do some more of that writing thing…

Things of varied interest:
* Identity-politics [http://www.nationalreview.com/article/442580/killing-aida-fatal-clash-art-and-identity-politics is killing art]
* 19 lessons [http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/12/_19_lessons_for_political_scientists_from_the_2016_election.html from the 2016 election]
* RIP [http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/12/08/252101790/john-glenn-first-american-to-orbit-the-earth-dies-at-95 John Glenn]
* US life-expectancy [https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/us-life-expectancy-declines-for-the-first-time-since-1993/2016/12/07/7dcdc7b4-bc93-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html?utm_term=.0bd031adddbd declined for the first time in two decades].  Nothing to do with John Glenn, though perhaps having to do with the financial stresses of the last eight years
* More [https://theintercept.com/2016/12/07/american-and-british-spy-agencies-targeted-in-flight-mobile-phone-use/ NSA shenanigans]

We expect the weather to remain mostly cold and dry until Tuesday, when a major storm system is supposed to come in and give us lots of rain… and maybe some snow by Thursday!

This ''shabbat'' it’s just the three of us. We’ll have:
<br>
[http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/chicken-cacciatore-recipe.html chicken ''cacciatore''],
[[Recipes/Ron's fried tofu|Ron’s fried tofu]],
split-pea soup,
rice,
various [http://www.joyofkosher.com/recipes/collection/recipe-terms-salatim/ ''salatim''],
and apple pie.

Until next time,<br>
''shabbat shalom''!

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