assorted

1 - i noticed that i get my most focussed reading done on the train on my way to the library (where i promptly waste time on the interweb) and then (dissilusioned with myself) on the way home (where, i tell myself, i will work harder, except that i don't...) so, yesterday, i just didn't get off the train at my stop. i was wary of getting too far out for fear of getting stranded at new lots avenue or somesuch (and, given events of yesterday, it turns out my paranoia was for once perhaps useful). however, i rode most of manhattan and read two law review articles. not bad.
i also got to people watch.

1a - the reason i'm wasting time blogging about nothing right now, actually, instead of riding the train so i can get work done, is that I'm waiting for a UPS delivery. of course, the "infonotice" slip does give the would-be deliverer four possible three-ish hour windows to check off for "approximate time of next delivery." on this slip, helpfully, three of the four are circled...

2 - i'm growing avocados. I've tried this before, with little success. However, I'm still hopeful, especially since this time i have real toothpicks (in the past i';ve improvised with everything from twisty ties to paper clips) and a very sunny window sill.
the toothpicks are courtesy of the new West Side mikvah. as far as i'm concerned, actually, the availability of toothpicks may be the most significant difference between the new and old mikvaot. (the new one is very shiny and somehwat more professionally run as well, for better and for worse. it's been discussed elsewhere)
basically, the way they set it up at the new mikvah, they bundle a lot of the provisions. so, if you want q-tips. you have to open a package that contains not only q-tips but cotton balls and toothpicks as well. (similalry, but even sillier, if you want soap, you have to open your own personal bag that conatins not only soap, but a low quality manicure set, nail-polish removal wipes, travel size toothpaste, disposable slippers, and other things that, unlike soap, one might very well not want at all...) but what of the things you don't want? they tell you the whole bag is yours to keep. so, while i try to leave the tings i will never use anyway, i figured it wasn't terrible to take home the toothpicks for a worthy cause.

now aren't you glad to know all that...

Wexis bonus

The Jastrow Bonus (aka Jastrow Jackpot, closely related to the Frank Find) is one of those familiar staples we have all grown to love. Lately, as I've been using less Jastrow and more Lexis/Westlaw, I've had a curious thing happen: In the course of a (usually not so fruitful) search, usually of Law Review articles, for something I am working on, I run into something interesting that I want to read and would never have found otherwise.
For example, I ran into a student note by a high school classmate at a different school who wrote on something I had briefly toyed with working on over the summer.
The mechanism of these "bonuses" is different than with Jastrow, but I think it deserves to be canonized anyway. I just need an alliterative name...

af simchas

we went to a fantastically leibedik wedding tonight. the couple, and the rest of us, should have much nachat, simchah, etc, for a long time...
this probably doesn't reflect well on me, but the real reason i bring it up is not to gush about how lovely it was (which it really was), but rather to solicit thoughts on a practice that sort of disturbed me. the wedding was in a well-known hall where I have attended many previous weddings. this was the first time I saw people, err, "collecting" at a wedding, though. it struck me as really not ok. i'm not sure if that makes me a grinch.
relatedly, there was a troop of yiddish-speaking young men in army fatigues and motorcycle helmets who apparently come to wedings there regularly, do some shtick (which they didn't manage to do tonight), and ask for money. It struck me that they are the chassidic analogy of the guys who do breakdancing in times square. ;)

puzzlement

why is it that almost all of the spam that comes with the tag [SPAM##] in the subject line evades my spam filter? (in fact, these tend to be the only spam messages that get through...)

of klein bottles and "atomic" clocks....

a few months ago, oren and i received these glasses from one of my high school teachers (a Conservative rebbetzin) as a belated wedding gift. a Few weeks ago I finally toveled them and have since been using them a lot. (We were actually low on glasses...)
I really wonder who thought of the glasses, and who buys them. I would guess that "frum people" is not the answer to either. I would further guess that they are a common gift from moderately affiliated people to their "frummie" friends and relatives. But they're still fun. If a bit odd.
On the subject of funny wedding gifts, the most useless, but perhaps most amusing, was this.
One of my personal favorites was the atomic clock.
I originally registered for it because they have them at Drisha and I thought they were cool. Particularly when they reset themselves: seeing clock hands move spontaneously around the face of the clock multiple times per minute is rather amusing, if eerie...
What I did not know at the time was that our atomic clock would have a special habit of resetting itself to 3 hours 45 minutes slow every Friday, and then correcting itself by Monday morning. Again, amusing, if not useful. Actually, it took me a few frustrating weeks to figure out that there was a method to the incorrect timing, but now I think it's endearing...
I don't know what the point of this post is. Ideas for all out there who are in the market for inexpensive fun gifts around this time of year (or another)...

ummm...