Old McDonald Had a Farm

I confess to loving McDonalds. Yes I have read the horror stories, and I know its not good for me in ANY stretch of the word, but lets face it the fries are like heaven. Deep fried, salty, potato heaven. Don't pretend you don't know what I mean, they are good.

I knew off the Ronald McDonald house, having seen the quarter collecting jars at the front of the store and some TV specials but had no idea there was one in New Orleans. But at the HPA meeting not only did I find out that we had a Ronald McDonald house, but were going to cook dinner with them for the Hunger is Not a Game Campaign. Ironically I had started reading the hunger games that day. But more on that later.

My family and I showed up this afternoon at the house at 4, right on time. Maybe a few minuets late. However one thing we didn't know was the amount of traffic everyone else ran into on the way over. We hung around the house for a half hour, took a tour, and then thinking that no one else was going to show up, started making a pasta sauce with vegetables as a back up plan.

A few more people trickled in, with the recipe and supplies and we put the pasta sauce in the fridge and started cooking. We made crawfish Alfredo, some sort of salad, and cupcakes made with soda. That's right soda. I didn't end up trying one, but they were fluffy and good looking.

I loved the feel at the house. It was brightly painted, warm, and somehow had a sense of privacy. They are looking to move to a bigger location, right now the house can have 15 families, and somewhere closer to the hospitals. OH and did I mention the play room. It was full of books, games, dolls, everything a kid could ever want. And the kids were free to run and play while their parents did other things in the next room. It was awesome!


Volunteer Update: 4.3 days volunteered so far! 

WOOOOH I'm Half Way There!

Admittedly I am not caught up blogging about books, but as of yesterday I am half way towards my goal of reading 100 books this year. Totally behind schedule, should have been here last month but as summer starts I will have more time to read! Sweet tea all around!

In Which I Finally Finish Talking About the Bar Mitzvah

Alright Ev, I know its been about a month since your Bar Mitzvah but I've been busy ok? Anyway when we last left our heroin she was at her first, and possibly last, New York Bar Mitzvah. One thing I discovered was that conservative services are about twice as long as reform services. However the service was absolutely breath taking, and Ev did a fantastic job. Sadly there is no photographic evidence because you can't take photos on Shabbas in conservative temples. I was invited to the bima to read a prayer for our country and sing some blessings with other people. I wasn't really warned about it, it just kind of happened. However I was honored to be asked to say a prayer at Ev's bar mitzvah, especially because he was to young to speak at mine.

After the oneg my dad and I went to the Grand Central Station Apple Store and to see the Dead Sea Scrolls, both of which were fascinating in different ways. I had seen the Dead Sea Scrolls in Israel when I was 12 but the exhibit at the Discovery Center was amazing, with historical background and even a mock Wailing Wall where people could place prayers that would be placed in the real Western Wall.

Dad and I made it to grandma's apartment just in time to quickly get ready and go to the Yale Club to get pictures taken. And pictures were taken, many of them with every position and combination possible. After that we went to cocktail hour in the library with all sorts of food and drink. But then, the real party began. We were ushered upstairs into this grand room with tables for adults and a buffet for kids. There was a photo booth and a dance floor, everything you could ever imagine for a bar mitzvah. We sang, danced, ate, drank, and talked the night away. I had a seat at a table but spent a lot of time with Ev's friends and just in general had a ball. It was the quintessential New York Bar Mitzvah.

You Can't Win Them All

This weekend NFTY-So's spring conclave was held in my city. Although I wasn't elected as a conclave chair, in fact I didn't run for anything, my advisor and Hilary (the conclave chair) appointed me as the other one. It was the best experience I've had in a while, and although this weekend was incredibly stressful, with making sure everything was running smoothy and my friends were all getting along, I loved almost every minuet of it. Well there was about a half hour where I totally crashed and just laid on a couch recharging but other then that it was amazing.

One of my signs of progress with this whole self esteem thing is that I ran for regional board. I'll tell you now I did not win, I ran against the most popular boy in NFTY-So, and I'm sure he will do a great job as regional SAVP. But the fact that I had the chutzpah to run is something I, and my family, are very proud of. This time last year I never would have been able to put myself out there like that, knowing that even if I didn't win at least I tried and that there is always next year.

Can You Say Stereotype?

My people, the Jews, have been stereotyped for centuries. I have the belief that all stereotypes have some basis in reality but some of the things I have heard have been ridiculously over blown. I will spare you all the details but generally when people write jewish characters they tend to over blow the stereotypes. Now I don't want you to take that to mean that I think all authors do that, but it does tend to happen, and honestly is a pretty easy thing to do.

At first glance most people find that The Victory Gardens of Brooklyn by Merrill Joan Gerber is full of stereotypes. At originally I would agree. But after delving into the characters, their motives, and situations, I really feel like it is how most people, jewish or not, would respond. Overall, The Victory Gardens of Brooklyn was fine. It didn't inspire me, or leave me feeling anything powerful. Its not a bad read per say, but I can't say its my favorite.

Oh. My. God

Last night I finished reading The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs. And by last night I mean last month, but that's niter here nor there. The point is I was floored. I never really expect much from kitting books, generally they are pretty straight forward and predictable, that is unless they are a mystery. Yes I enjoy them but I always know what is going to happen. Not so much with The Friday Night Knitting Club. I don't want to spoil it, but all I can say is that I stayed up till almost midnight finishing the book, and when I was done my head was spinning.

On GoodReads a lot of people said it was cliche, poorly written, and boring. I disagreed. Now it may not be every ones cup of tea but isn't life full of cliches? They have to have some sort of basis or they would have never come to be. I personally would recommend it to the chick lit loving population but I can't guarantee they would like it. However I did, and you might.

The Law

Recently a girl in Morocco killed herself. Now this happens everyday, and is awful already. Suicide is something I am sure I will talk about a lot, it is something very connected in my life. But the reason that this 16 year old girl killed herself is appalling. Amina Al Filali was raped at the age of 15, and some sources said beaten also, and then forced to marry the man that abused her. After the marriage the abuse continued, and Amina killed herself by swallowing rat poison on Saturday.

I for one am appalled that things like this are happening. Article 475 of the Moroccan Penal Code "allows for the ‘kidnapper’ of a minor to marry his victim to escape prosecution, and it has been used to justify a traditional practice of making a rapist marry his victim to preserve the honour of the woman’s family." 
So instead of being punished for this awful crime against a young girl, the rapist marries her for the honor of the family. Now I understand that family honor is important in some cultures but what about the girl? Does she not have rights? A lot of people online are outraged by this, and justly so. There is even a petition to get the law changed. Its in french but not to hard to understand. If any of you are as sickened by this as I am then I urge you to sign the petition and tell your friends about it, so that this never happens again. 


Rest in Peace Amina, I am so sorry that you had to suffer this way. 

Juana La Loca

I must confess that I don't know very much about Juana of Castile. Her sister Catalina, I do know about, she falls into my original area of interest, that being Tudor history. However in every passing year that interest widens. And so when I saw a book on the shelf about Juana of Castile, I figured it would be an interesting read about her. And that it was. in The Last Queen by C.W. Gortener, I learned about Spain's "mad" queen.
Now of course The Last Queen being historical fiction I can never know for sure what really went down with Juana and if she was really mad or not. However The Last Queen did portray a very good balance of her sanity, with Juana quite sane originally and eventually driven mad by scheming and plots against her and her family. Gortener breathed some life into a pretty much forgotten historical figure, and and made me genuinely interested in her plight. The Last Queen was a truly interesting and intriguing read.

1,000 Pages of War and Love

Oprah. The word alone is inspiring, and something that everyone trusts. When she condones a product everyone immediately knows it good. So when she endorses a book, you know its great. My dad got my mom a year of books from the Oprah Book Club for Christmas one year, and one of them was Pillars of the Earth. My mom and I both read it, and loved it. At my summer camp there was a library no one ever really used. We would hang out there and I borrowed books over the summer including World Without End the second book in the Kingsbridge Trilogy and adored it as well.

When I saw Fall of the Giants by Ken Follett, I figured I couldn't go wrong reading a book by an author I loved so much. And I was right. Fall of the Giants was amazing. It had a little to much detail about the war for my taste but that is to be expected. The writing was exquisite, the characters had a breath of life in them, and the interpersonal dramas were believable and not over dramatic. I would love to see Fall of the Giants on the silver screen, however I feel like it could never live up to what played in my head as I read the book. It may seem like a tome at first but it reads fast and is worth the time. Its a truly amazing representation on the events before during and directly after world war one and shows the point of view of many people in many countries.

Rant

So this blog is about what runs through my brain. Normally it has to do with my bucket list. But I figure sometimes something is going to come up that I want to talk about. That isn't on "The list." And I think that I am going to sometimes just Rant about things. I promise that any of my rants, or really all my posts, are my thoughts. No one is bribing me. So here goes.

Its safe to assume most people in the continental US have been to Sports Academy or Sports Authority or really any store around. I went to one of those such stores today, to get a pair of yoga pants and a mat. I went to the pants first. They were either to tight or baggy in weird places. Maybe they don't make yoga pants for people of my shape, but I feel like thats a total lie.

Everything at the sports store was geared to someone. Bright pink bikes for little girls, pastel yoga mats and starter sets with dainty but muscly women on them showing results that are not typical for the average user, and camouflage everywhere. Now I get camo, there is nothing wrong with it, but it accosted my eyes with such severity that I started to think about the branding in sports stores.

Everyone, and by everyone I mean the people that market the brands, want to to buy their product to be different, and inherently better. Real women do yoga, girls are princesses, and real men can not, under any circumstance, wear pink or anything pastel. You need to be slimmer, hotter, more toned, all with their products of course.

A lot of people are manufacturing pink guns. Now that sentence alone has nothing wrong with it, pinks a fun color. But the guns are pink to attract women to them. Because in this day and age women can't do anything that isn't feminine. I am a woman. I have shot a gun before, and let me tell you the experience would not be any different if the gun had been pink, or green, or purple, or tye-dye. When it comes down to it a gun is a gun, and the color is just for aesthetics. And attracting a different type of customer.

Whats so wrong with being who you are. Just you, who you are in your soul. Enough with this whole peer pressure thing. It doesn't end well for anyone. Growing up is hard enough without having to deal with what magazines and the "media" says we need to look like. Why can't we all accept each other for what we like. Hi I'm M and I like to read. I also love to bike and cook. I am not model thin and I don't wear the newest fashions. Most of my clothing comes from a thrift store and its not because thats all we can afford. Clothing today is so reveling, its easier to find modest things in a thrift store. There is nothing wrong with a  little mystery. But I will rant about that another day. And I definitively don't party. So I guess by all of those descriptions I am a nerd. Or a geek or a looser. I've been called a slut too. Because why not?

I think that we all need to get rid of those idea of what people should be, the social cast system. We should just accept people for who they are and what they like. Why shouldn't boys like pink, women wear combat boots, and men like to be pampered sometimes? I feel like as long as we aren't hurting anyone, why should we care what other people are doing, looking like, or enjoying to do. Why do we all have to be model perfect? Why can't we be something better. Us.

Warning: If Reading Have Russian Food On Hand

I blogged earlier about Russian food and how wonderful it is, both to cook and to eat. The Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah is what spurred me to make some. I first spotted this novel in a air port book store, which is the best place to find books to be honest. Anyway I picked it up, and read the back, and was intrigued but of course didn't have any money on me to purchase the book so stored the title in the corner of my brain and went on with my day.

Fast forward many weeks and as I was perusing the shelves as I am apt to do a book caught my eye. You guessed it The Winter Garden by Kristin Hannah. It grabbed me by the hand and took me on a journey of love, loss, confusion, and history. It is so descriptive, I felt like I was actually their. I brought The Winter Garden with me to a weekend long regional event and started reading it on the three to four hour long bus ride home. My pulse quickened as the story progressed and the entire world just stopped existing as I read on. On the rare occasion that I could pull myself out of the story the world seemed so much sharper, the details standing out. I don't know what it is about books that are written with spot on descriptions but they make me notice the world a bit more then I normally do.

The reason I say to have Russian food on hand when reading The Winter Garden is because Russia, and consequently Russian food are a large part of the novel. Because of the spot on descriptions each page of The Winter Garden made my mouth water and my stomach growl. I would recommend it whole heartily, it is a story that will stick in my mind for ages to come.

Well Hockadoo!

If memory serves I don't think I have posted about my confirmation class trip last year. I have a few stories that fit this blog, we did a LOT of museum hopping, but one of the highlights of the trip was seeing a Broadway show.

Let me back track. As most of you have probably figured out by now, I am Jewish. Most reform Jews have something called Confirmation in the 10th grade. Its separate from having a Bar/Bat/B'nai Mitzvah, and is basically a year that you spend learning about Judaism before making your decision about staying with the faith. Like I said this is normally done in 10th grade, but my class was so small (three people on a good day) that we were put with the grade above up. I have many interesting stories resulting from that, but those are for another day.

The first weekend in February our class got on a plane and flew to New York for a wild wild weekend. We all got lost in Times Square, missed the boat at Ellis Island, a few of us walked home at midnight, and I even did the Torah Blessings in front of hundreds of people. It was snowy and cold and exhausting but a  trip I will remember for the rest of my life.

A few months before the trip we had to decide what Broadway show we wanted to go see. No one really knew about the shows that were being put on, and so our Rabbi ended up choosing that we would see Memphis. None of us had ever heard of it, and after one of the guys inquired with one of his family members, we were told we probably wouldn't like it. But by then it was to late to change the tickets and so off we went.

Our seats were surprisingly good although at first it didn't seem that way. But as the show went on we all figured that it was a great show, and it totally drew me in. Not that anyone was quite surprised by that, I have loved musicals since the age of two when my Grandma insisted on taking me to see Beauty and the Beast. My mother and father told her that I would not like it, but she persisted and so we all went. And I sat, spell bound throughout the entire musical. In fact I still have the program from it.

Memphis was also spell binding. The man we saw portray Huey was the understudy, and he gave the role his all. It was phenomenal to see his energy light the stage as he sung and danced. My father remarked later on that he must be very tired of being the understudy and put his heart and soul into it. Because of this I became so entangled in the story, it was a remarkable experience that I will remember for ages to come.

Touching and Remarkable

To be frank, I have never followed politics. I know some, mostly the presidential candidates, but I probably should know more. I of course did not know who Gabby Giffords was, her being a congressperson representing Arizona. So of course, on the awful day she and 19 other people were either killed or wounded was the first day I heard of her. I distinctly remember sitting in advisory at my old school that Thursday, listening to one of my fellow advises and advisor talk about what had happened. I asked then who Gabby Giffords was, probably not the smartest thing to do because my advisor turned to me and said something along the lines of "you have got to be kidding me." I mumbled something and turned away blushing, going to Lord Google with my inquiries. I followed her progress some in the coming months, cheering at her triumphs and saddened by the unneeded deaths of 9 innocent people.

Gabby by Mark Kelly and Gabby Giffords is one of the most heart wrenching books I have ever read. It was ghost written by Jeffery Zaslow. I could write many blog posts about how much I love Jeffery Zaslow, and I will talk about him soon discussing a book he wrote called The Magic Room. But for now I shall talk about how wonderful the love story between Gabby and Mark is. Their love is so strong, and has overcome an assassination attempt and a few trips to the moon. Gabby was of course, incredibly well written. I would not expect anything less from Zaslow, but as always it pulled me in and took me on a roller coster, enjoying a book that I never thought I would have. Its a wonderfully spun story, and I am sure will be helpful for American Historians a hundred years from now, as they wonder not only about a congressperson and an astronaut, but also how an amazing author wrote in our times.

Oh the People You'll Meet

I know I haven't finished blogging about New York or Cajan Mardi Gras, and I promise I'll get to them soon but I have got to talk about this. My dad and I were going for a stroll in Audubon Park, when we saw a man biking holding a gigantic box. He ended up asking us to take his picture by a sign. My dad, being the people person that he his, took a picture and struck up a conversation with the man. We found out his name is Nick and he is biking from Dallas to New Orleans. Also, and this was kind of cool, he was from Australia.
This is his blog. He ended up asking us for directions to his hostel and we, and by we I mean my dad not that I wasn't cool with it, offered to take his bike box to the hostel for him. Nick biked away and we walked to the car with the box. Of course my Dad's mini was to small for the box so we ended up driving with the trunk of the car open as I contorted my body to hold the box and make sure it didn't fly away. We must of looked so weird.
On the drive to the hostile my dad told me the story of his bike across the country, with Bikecentennial. He was suppose to go to Greece with friends that summer, but they were at war or having some sort conflict with Cyprus and the trip was canceled. Instead he and his three best friends from high school biked across the country. He says that he is very glad the trip was canceled, because although going to Greece would have been an educational and cultural experience, there is no better way to see the country and explore then biking across the continental United States.
We met Nick at the hostel that was pretty near our house, which of course none of us knew existed. Dad gave him some tips about taking apart his bike and he gave us a flyer for his blog and a tiny stuffed koala, which now is sitting on my desk to remind me to keep peddling.

Behind the Wheel: Part 1

I've never been to antsy to learn to drive. Honestly the whole operation kind of scares me. You can do a lot of damage in a car and there are a lot of idiots on the road. Most of my friends have gone to drivers ed, some even have licenses and cars. But me, I had never been behind the wheel. Until today.

My dad has been talking about teaching me how to drive for a few weeks now, and I had looked up a few drivers ed courses but hadn't really taken much interest. For some reason, inspiration struck my father and I to get me driving. He and I hopped into his Mini Cooper and drove to an old closed down Robérts.

There it is. The first place I drove!

My dad and I switched places in the car and I sat behind the wheel for the first time in my life. I know I know I already said that, but it was kind of a big deal. 

Do I look scared to death? Because I am

I stalled the car a few times, and was sort of jumpy for a bit, but I got the hang of it after a while. My dad had prepped me for the worst, so by the time we went home I was feeling good about it. I am nowhere near street ready, but although my dad didn't say it I know he was proud of how well I was doing. It felt very freeing, and I am actually excited to get my license and go on a few adventures.