Summer days drifting away...

Yes, I've been incredibly lazy about blogging. The truth is, nothing all that exciting is going on. Lazy summer days which are going by all too quickly. I suddenly realized that my new semester starts in 3 weeks (yikes) so I ordered my books for school. Once again I'll be taking 3 classes and stressing out about it so I can finish my degree before returning to Israel.

The biggest news is that Maor is off in Israel for a month. In July she mostly vegged out, did some math classes, and took swimming lessons at the Y. July 25th I flew down to Los Angeles with her and checked her in as an unaccompanied minor so she can spend August on Zufim. El Al was more of a balagan than I remember and of course some Israeli guy behind me complained/yelled at me because I "let" someone go ahead of me at check in. At the gate they motioned to us to come over and while waiting to show her passport and boarding pass I said to Maor, "prepare yourself emotionally."

"Why," she asked.

"Because I'm going to give you a kiss"

"No you're not," she protested.

So as I tried to kiss her and she pulled away the El Al security guy said to her in Hebrew, "nu, give her a kiss already." So she grudgingly let me kiss her and off she went.

The truth is I wasn't nervous about sending her alone. My parents shipped me off to Israel alone when I was 11 1/2 and I didn't know any of my relatives in Israel.

And she is having a great time so far. She's being well taken care of (thank you everybody) and she even remembered to call all the relatives right away. I hope she's also doing her math work so if you're in Israel and you see Maor, please ask/nag her about doing her math sheets so Mrs. Levy doesn't call me the first week of school!

The first week Maor was away so was Arthur which meant for 4 glorious days I had total autonomy over the remote control. It was a very exciting experience.

My job is still amazing! I've been at Yahoo for three months and I love it! Since I'm good at judging sites I've been chosen with about 15 others to become spotcheckers. That means that we will be doing less judging of sites and we will be checking the judgments that others make. Supposedly we will be hated by our peers (at least some of them) which is always fun. Today we got the final word that we passed the spotchecking training. And one of the project managers came to talk to me. He said that they want me on the spotchecking team but there's some concern that I'm abrasive. Me! Abrasive! Can you believe that? I think I know who ratted me out and it annoys me. Abrasive! You think the combination of being a born and bred New Yorker followed by living in Israel for 18 years has something to do with it? Me, abrasive! I am deeply wounded. I assured him that I can do nice when I need to. Ugh. Touchy-feely Californians. For the record, I may be cynical, obnoxious at times, outspoken, but I am NOT abrasive!

Since Arthur has been traveling so much (or for some other unknown reason) Arthur's boss offered to fly me for a weekend with Arthur. We were going to do it last weekend but Arthur couldn't change his ticket so we will be spending Shabbat Nachamu in Seattle, someplace we haven't been. And since Maor will not be with us, we can go to whatever museums or tourist traps we want without listening to her complain and whine. Hopefully, I will have pictures to post when we get back.

I posted my pictures from Yosemite on Facebook, my favorite new time waster.

That's really it for now. I am hoping that my addiction to the coffee at Yahoo doesn't it make it harder to fast on Sunday though I am quite worried about it.

"All who mourn the destruction of Jerusalem will merit the celebration of her rebirth..."

כל המתאבל על חורבנה של ירושלים זוכה ורואה בבנינה