Blog/June 2009/Jun 19th

June 19th (See this week's devar torah)
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Hi again!

Another jam-packed edition of the Aaron family follies for your perusal!

One night this week we went to see the Jerusalem light festival. Click on that link -- that's right: a tourist-oriented event whose web page is only in Hebrew. Their web-site isn't all that wasn't brilliant, unfortunately. The most interesting part of that outing was seeing our next-door neighbors there (who expressed surprise at seeing us "so far from home").

Another night, we attended the first "Maale Adummim Anglo Forum". I want to avoid offending anyone from our "Anglo" community who reads this blog (I know of several), but in my opinion it was a terrible waste of two hours of my life. There was no explanation of what the "forum" expected to accomplish (goals, that is); so there were seemingly random presentations (children from the local music conservatory playing some pieces; the mayor giving a speech which seemed somewhat like a fund-raiser, and a comic). The comic -- someone I've seen around fairly often, but didn't know he was a comic -- was so depressing, by the end of his routine I was ready to slice my throat. This was more of a waste of my time than the light festival -- since at least before that we had a pleasant dinner with a friend of ours.

Yet another night, we went to the Jerusalem Book Fair. That was promising (we all like books), but I didn't see anything I was particularly interested in. However, Esther did get some cookbooks. It's impressive just how many people come to these fairs. While we were there, a couple thousand people were milling about the stalls looking for something new or interesting.

Though we replaced all the pipes in the house before moving in, we discovered a spreading leak in the ceiling in Daniela's room. Since she's on the second storey and there are no pipes above her room (and the roof is bone-dry), we were mystified as to what the problem could be. So I stayed home one day and we called in a plumber; who told us he was stumped, and that in order to figure out the problem we would have to open a hole in the roof's insulation and dig into the roof -- and that it would end up being expensive. So he suggested we contact our homeowners' insurance company and see what they cover. I hadn't even considered calling the insurance company; but we did. They in turn sent their own plumber out, and after a bit he discovered that one of the electrical conduits leading into the house was saturated with water (not a good thing!). So he blew into that conduit, and expelled a lot of water into our house, just where the hot-water "boiler" switch is. Anyway, he sealed off that conduit -- but we still don't know why there was water in it, or whether or not the actual problem was been fixed (my suspicion is 'no'). Just so you know, the plumber charged less than our insurance deductible of 500 NIS (roughly $120 for you USA'ans) so it didn't matter we called them. But if the leak continues to spread, we'll call them back and then it will probably get expensive.

Having to work from home while waiting for the plumber(s) was excruciating, since I have to transfer large files back and forth -- and my internet connection has always been pretty slow. So I upgraded from (ostensibly) 2.5Mbps to 5Mbps. The difference is most impressive -- and the price difference was minimal. I say "ostensibly", because when I actually measured my connection speed it was 1.2Mbps (whereas now it really is 5 or thereabouts). No, that doesn't mean you can email me large files...

That man in the White House is trying to cozy up to the Muslim world. Of course, he is doing that by simply making stuff up -- such as that Hindu, Chinese and European discoveries were due to Muslim influence, or that Israel's justification for existence is the Holocaust (as if we weren't here thousands of years before that Austrian vegetarian psychopath started on his killing spree). If you don't think I'm correct, you may want to read a Muslim woman's take on Obama's Cairo speech. You should also view this honest response to Obama from Moshe Feiglin.

So it is important that our Prime Minister Netanyahu not give in. And in fact, the speech he gave was a pretty good one. And the fakestinian reaction was not only predictable, but good for us in the long term.

To end on an upbeat note: tomorrow is Esther's (secular) birthday. We (Sarah, Daniela and I) have prepared the shabbat meals from A to Z (or from א to ת). OK, we didn't bake challah -- but the girls took care of all the salatim and dessert, while I concentrated on the entrees. We'll let you know next week how they came out. Or perhaps Esther should let you know how they came out... or maybe not.

Until next week,
Shabbat shalom!

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