cellio | random bits

Dear Pittsburgh CLO: I gave you my phone number so you could contact me if there were problems with my theatre tickets. You lost points by calling to ask for a charitable donation, and you lost lots of points when your agent argued with my labelling of the call as a solicitation. His claim: you're not selling anything but asking for a donation, so that's not a solicitation. I recommend you buy him a dictionary. Unfortunately, you'll be doing it with your own money, not mine.

I'm used to size variation in women's clothing. (Why oh why can't women's jeans use waist and inseam like men's?) And I'm used to minor variations in shoes in US sizes (I seem to wear a size 7.75, which doesn't exist). I had not realized that there is significant variation in sizes on the (tighter) European scale. The size-38 Naot sandals I just tried are nearly half an inch shorter than the size-38 Birkies that fit (and that I bought). They're both the same style, your basic two-strap slip-in sandal.

Dani's company watched searching for evil recently. It's an overview of Internet security issues -- probably nothing new, but he spoke well of it so I want to bookmark it for when I've got a spare hour.

IANA considerations for TLAs was making the rounds at my company this week.

Via goldsquare comes this bizarre story: a man lost parental rights to his younger child, appealed, and was then killed in a car accident. Now state child-welfare agents want to support the appeal, so the child can share in his estate. The court says this is uncharted territory.

Specialized seasonal question: can anyone tell me, in the next 8 hours, if I use high-holy-day melodies in Hallel for Rosh Chodesh tomorrow morning? It's the last day of Av, not the first day of Elul (so we don't blow shofar yet).

From filkerdave:

Most recently from siderea, this modern song of a wounded heart made me laugh (warning, camera work is terrible): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S7MuwPlOiNQ.

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Thanks for reminding me that I need to replace my Naot sandals (which I love. Birkies don't work for me at all.)

I like the TLA piece and the music video.

And I really don't understand the story about the Florida girl. I gathered she was not actually adopted yet by the foster parents. So wouldn't the man still have financial responsibilities to her if he were still alive, despite the lack of custody? Weird.

I love April Fools RFCs. (Then again, I also like April Fools heraldic letters, so what do *I* know? ;-> )

The song was hysterical. Thanks for posting it.

I did telemarketing for Boston Ballet for two days, and that was *exactly* what they told me to say. Note the length of time I stayed...

I really want to like Naots, and I've had the occasional pair that have been quite comfortable. But Birkenstock has never disappointed me, so they're lower-risk.

I guess severing parental rights is sort of like getting a divorce; it cuts both ways. But it was being appealed, so I would think (IANAL) this would mean the daughter still has an interest in the estate. Even if the appeal later failed, at the time of his death the connection wasn't broken; wouldn't that be sufficient? Odd.

(And now, is someone representing the older child's interests going to argue against the appeal? Whee.)

I like well-done April Fools RFCs/posts/news/etc, too. I still remember Kremvax, 25 years later. :-)

Yeah, that's really pretty slimy. I told the guy (as I do all first-time charity spammers) that if he sends me something via physical mail I will consider it along with all the other solicitations I receive but I will not accept their phone calls. He then asked me how much I could pledge so he could send me the form, and seemed rather put out when I told him that's not how it works. I likely would have sent them a donation (it's for a scholarship fund), but they will not get anything from me now.

They also sent me email spam recently and have not yet responded to my response to that.

Sheesh.

I know it's too late, but here's my trei zuzim:

Since using seasonally allusive melodies for Hallel is merely a minhag and not halacha, I can't see why it would be a problem. And I (who am fiercely protective of nusach and of using the right nusach at the right time) think it's a fine idea to remind people that we're entering the season of teshuvah.

Thanks for the input. I didn't know if it was minhag in the sense of "you probably ought to", or something stronger. (Consider, for example, what might happen if during chol hamoed Pesach you decided to use "Maoz Tzur" -- it's just minhag, after all, but it violates people's expectations enough to be jarring. I wasn't sure if people would be expecting a two-day ramp into Elul -- melody on day one, add shofar on day two. I probably think about this stuff way too much. :-) )

It turned out that Joe the Hallel Guy was there so I asked him, and he suggested using the regular melody. Joe "always" does Hallel, which is why I haven't, but earlier this year he told me it was time for me to learn it. Today was my second time. (A bit shaky in a couple spots, but people, including Joe, claimed to be quite satisfied.)

What's wrong with singing Ma'oz Tzur on Pesach?

רָעוֹת שָׂבְעָה נַפְשִׁי, בְּיָגוֹן כֹּחִי כָּלָה
חַיַּי מֵרְרוּ בְקֹשִׁי, בְּשִׁעְבּוּד מַלְכוּת עֶגְלָה
וּבְיָדוֹ הַגְּדוֹלָה הוֹצִיא אֶת הַסְּגֻלָּה
חֵיל פַּרְעֹה וְכָל זַרְעוֹ יָרְדוּ כְּאֶבֶן בִּמְצוּלָה

The Chanukah verse isn't until later!

:-)

Ktivah vchatimah tovah!

Nothing wrong with the text -- for similar reasons,

osewalrus makes a point of singing it on Purim. But if you're just using the melody, that's not the association people are going to make. :-)

Ktiv vchatimah tovah!

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