miscellaneous

Shavuot was good. More about that later.

One of the other people on that cantors'/etc list turns out to be worship chair at her own congregation and a year ahead of me in the Sh'liach K'hilah program. It's been interesting to compare notes with her, and she's given me some good information about the SK program. Last year's class was 17 people, she said; this year's is bigger, though she doesn't know how big. So it sounds like a fairly intimate experience, which I like.

She also warned me that the air conditioning in the classrooms is set for "arctic", and there is no internet access in the dorm but there is in the library. That's managable.

I got an information packet from the program in the mail a couple days ago, including a class schedule. Sounds like good stuff. I will assume that the word "chugim", which appears daily, corresponds to "SIG" or "BOF" -- subgroups on specialized topics. (I can imagine four ways to spell "chug" in Hebrew, and I'm too lazy to try them all in the dictionary.)

My professional world is getting a little bit smaller: two past coworkers will be joining my company soon. Nifty.

I heard an ad today from Subway for "low-fat" and "Atkins-friendly" sandwiches. I presume this represents union, not intersection. I'm not sure what the options are for fulfilling both criteria in a sandwich/salad context. My dentist, in whose office I heard this, didn't know either.

A man is suing the Atkins people for his heart problems, saying he needed angioplasty to clear his arteries -- and is asking for $15,000. Usually these suits ask for a heck of a lot more than that; it makes me wonder what the figure is based on.

I've been needing a new pair of non-casual shoes for a while. ("Non-casual": shoes you can wear with skirts, like for Shabbat.) I went to the higher-end store in Squirrel Hill a while back and ended up buying something I ought not have (I went looking for flats and let the clerk talk me into a slight heel). Today I noticed a PayLess in the same mall as my dentist's office, and I believe I've solved my problem for $12.99. I know what I'm doing in the future... (I try to support independent businesses over chains when I can, but they've got to work with me here.)

I watched the season finale of Enterprise. I thought they had promised a complete story in one season. Technically they might have, but I'll bet they address this ending next season...

Off to the annual congregational meeting and, technically, the end of my board tenure.

Shavuot

I didn't make it to the evening service (with confirmation), due to impractical timing, but I did go to the tikkun that followed. There is a tradition of staying up all night studying torah on Shavuot; our congregation doesn't do the entire night, but we usually go until about 1:30 or 2:00. (If that's not enough, you can always go over to Kollel where they go all night.)

We had a small but good group this year (peaked around 16-18). Three of the eight confirmation students joined us, and they had good insights and questions to offer. Another wanted to join us but lost an argument with her mother. ( Sinai, chosenness, talmud, modern midrash, and is persecution necessary? )

At morning services, after the torah and haftarah, we read the book of Ruth. I don't think I'd quite noticed before that the slacker relative, the one whose responsibility is to bail out Naomi and her family after her husband dies but who punts, doesn't even get mentioned by name. I guess some people just aren't meant to be remembered. :-)