Harry Potter

(Ok, let's see if this will post today.)

We went to see the Harry Potter movie Monday night. Before that, though... this had to have been the most unappealing set of previews I've seen in a while:

• Spongebob Squarepants: Um, I think they might not quite have this movie's demographic nailed.
• Spiderman 2: Eh. Didn't see #1 and won't see this, but they're closer to the demographic.
• Sleep Over: Eww. Just... eww. Inane gigly teenage girls sneak around their parents and have cat-fights. Um, yeah. Maybe Spongebob wasn't so bad after all.
• Catwoman: If, like me, you have not read the comics (I assume there are comics), you get no information about this movie beyond "babe in black doing acrobatics". Maybe that's enough for their target demographic. (Oh, and I gather the cat-woman died and was recycled or something?)
• Cinderella Story: Cinderella set in modern-day LA. Looks cute, but if the glass slipper has really been replaced by a cell phone, I would think that identification would be anti-climactic. ("Each of you, quick: what's your phone number? Ok, let's ask the phone.")
• Princess Diaries 2: This looks like it could be fun. Or rather, it slightly motivates me to find #1 (this is a sequel). Dani has good things to day about the book.
• Polar Express: Eww eww eww. Even if I did Christmas, and even if I had kids, I still wouldn't take them to see this bit of insipid Santa-is-love fluff.

Now, on to the HP spoilers. ( Read more... )

Assessment: Much better than #2, not a rich as #1. I'll go to the next one.

We made extremely good time getting to the theatre, but were still surprised to be the first ones at this particular show. That's not really a win, though; it just meant we got to watch more commercials. Remember when you could spend pre-movie time just talking, with quiet music in the background?

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Oddly, this script didn't work under Mozilla 1.0 (browser hang) or IE 6.0 (404) earlier, but it worked ok for me under Mozilla 1.6 now. I wonder what that was about.

synagogue leadership

This article on synagogue leadership is nominally aimed at synagogue presidents, but I find it has a lot of good advice for leaders in general -- and a fair bit of it applies to other volunteer-run organizations too. Thanks to cahwyguy for the pointer.

A few ramblings inspired by the article...

I recently ended a three-year term on my synagogue's board of trustees. There were certainly some stressful moments, and a couple times I thought of quitting because my way of doing things seemed to clash too much with theirs, but I decided I could do more good by sticking it out and, overall, it turned out to be a positive experience. I'm not at all interested in the executive track that ends at synagogue president, and I'm not going back to the board any time soon, but there are other ways to contribute. (In particular, I'm still a committee chair, and I have the sh'liach k'hilah program ahead of me.) Overall I'd say we're pretty functional, ahead of the curve.

(Aside: that board seat is directly responsible for my ~bi-weekly study sessions with my rabbi. For that alone it would have been worth it!)

One of the points that Rabbi Thal brings out, and I definitely saw this, is the question of when to let things die (so that other things can grow in their place). Few things have more ego-stake than pet projects and special-interest groups. The topic of a recent brotherhood discussion was something like "men: an endangered species" -- but what they really meant was men participating in brotherhoods. I wonder if they considered the possibility that men (and women!) no longer need gender-segregated organizations in order to be at all involved in their synagogues? I for one cannot see myself ever being part of the sisterhood; I define my participation by what I do, not who I am.

I'm glad that in the area of worship we are adapting and experimenting -- everything from new music to new opportunities for lay leadership in the informal minyan to adding mome special-interest events that seem to be going well (e.g. a monthly service aimed at families with small kids). Often change comes very slowly, but that's good -- because while you don't want to stagnate, you also don't want to be changing things out from under people. Gradual is best.

It can be challenging for larger congregations to remain cohesive. It's easy when everyone knows everyone else, but we don't have that. Even if everyone did come most weeks, rather than just on the high holy days, it would be hard to get to know everyone. There's always a tension between encouraging and supporting the subset who show up and reaching out to the rest. It's a hard balance to strike.