Misapplied Brilliance

Now, this story is nuts. 

Here we have a brilliant woman (although she did not finish college she landed high-paying jobs on Wall Street) who lets a loser into her life. He claims to be a detective, but spends all day on the couch watching cop show reruns. 

Eventually, his sleaziness comes to a head and she brings charges against him. 

In revenge, he frames her. Not only does he frame her, he frames her so well that she rots in prison for 7 months, taken away from her child and her career in ruins. 

This guy has the brains to frame her and get away with it, and yet he spends his day channel-surfing. What sort of evil genius could he have been if he actually tried to excel? 

What a waste. 

Cornel West, Brother

The NYTimes Magazine was interviewing Cornel West, the prominent professor, writer, thinker, you name it.

A few thought provoking points:

NYT: But you have also acknowledged that this is more than just political — you’ve said that after campaigning for him at 65 events, you were miffed that he didn’t return your phone calls or say thank you. 

 
CW: I think he had to keep me at a distance. There’s no doubt that he didn’t want to be identified with a black leftist. But we’re talking about one phone call, man. That’s all. One private phone call. 

 

NYT: He was running a successful candidacy for president. He might have been busy. 

 
CW: So many of the pundits assume that it’s just egoism: “Who does Cornel West think he is? The president is busy.” But there’s such a thing as decency in human relations. 

Always remember to show hakaras hatov.  

NYT: How can Obama be the president you want him to be when he’s facing this Republican Congress? 

 
CW: I’ll put it this way, brother: You’ve got to be a thermostat rather than a thermometer. A thermostat shapes the climate of opinion; a thermometer just reflects it. If you’re just going to reflect it and run by the polls, then you’re not going to be a transformative president. Lincoln was a thermostat. Johnson and F.D.R., too.  

That analogy really got me thinking. If one wants to bring change, as we learn from the Chofetz Chaim, one starts by changing themselves, not the world around them. One person can bring a difference by not reflecting the current world order.  By the same token, one cannot demand change if they go along with everyone else.

And he also has a sense of humor. 

NYT: What’s with the black suit, white shirt, black tie outfit you always wear? Do you have anything else in your closet? 

 
CW: I’ve got four black suits that I circulate, and they are my cemetery clothes — my uniform that keeps me ready for battle. 

NYT: Your cemetery clothes? 

 
It’s ready to die, brother. If I drop dead, I am coffin-ready. I got my tie, my white shirt, everything. Just fix my Afro nice in the coffin.  

Be prepared, but don't fear death. I like it.  

Terrible Means to What End?

I recently heard this story, and it left me chilled. 

There is a couple out there, who were, until now, happily married with two children. Except that the wife has just discovered that her husband has a debilitating, degenerative, eventually fatal, disease. 

If that isn't horrible enough, it turns out that he was diagnosed . . . before they married.

This tale had me break out into a cold sweat. Never mind the halachic consequences (the kesubah can be rendered void) but the emotional toll, how so many people's lives are shattered. 

So many steps to get to this point - parents hearing the news their child will suffer and die, and how that tears them up inside, but then to marry him off while withholding that information, knowing what havoc this will eventually cause, but being so frightened and wanting a normal life for their child while it is still possible. 

One can feel the family's pain. But that doesn't make it okay. 

I am not going to blame "society" for this; I have always found the argument for peer-pressure to be a weak one.  In the end, we are all, every individual, responsible for our own behavior. 

A few years back a woman wrote into Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis in The Jewish Press; her son has bipolar disorder and was dating someone seriously. The girl did not know about the illness. Her husband told her not to tell the potential daughter-in-law. 

I found the fact that the mother had to consult someone to begin with was disturbing. Despite all we are taught - morals, the evils of gneivas daas, the prohibition of lying, it is now acceptably thought of  by some that the ends justify the means. 

But here, the ends are merely transitory! It is a band-aid, a temporary measure. Eventually the truth will out and harm many more. 

It is at times like these when the training we have had as Jews should begin to kick in. It is about doing what is right in painful situations such as these. The choice should be clear.

David Mamet Quote

A few weeks ago, David Mamet was interviewed by the NYTimes Magazine. It seems, in his old age, he is identifying with his people more.

This part is interesting:  

NYT: Sometimes in the book I thought you were just trying to anger some of your liberal friends, like when you wrote the West sees the Middle East conflict as “entertainment.”
 

Mamet: No, I think that it’s true. There has always been a different standard for the Jews. We’re like “honorary Aryans,” as Hitler said of the Japanese. That means that we’re human beings only when it suits the world to treat us as human beings. There’s a pretty good book on the subject — the Torah.

Battle of the Bulge: The Joys of Whole Wheat

In my teenage years, I would be stricken by violent stomach upsets every Motzei Shabbos, and I didn't know from what. Experimentally I tried whole wheat challah, and they went away. 

White flour is a scary being. 

White flour is stripped of the most nutrient-rich parts of the grain. It also is processed in a way which makes it instantly absorbed when it reaches the intestine. Unlike whole grains-which take a much longer time to be digested, absorbed, and broken down into energy, white flour immediately raises your blood sugar levels, much in the same way sugar does. 

That means that after you eat it, your body has two choices: either burn it off immediately, or store it as fat. Usually, unless you are working out while eating your flour tortilla, that means that it is stored as fat. 

Lastly, because of the instant elevation of your blood sugar level (which is also shown to be unhealthy), the later instant drop of your blood sugar will likely leave you hungry. White flour and sugar are very similar in the ways they effect our energy, bodies and health. Both can be major contributors to weight gain. 

If your diet is filled with a lot of white flour, you are likely missing out on some major nutrition necessities, and feeling very hungry a lot of the time. It's OK to have a little now and then, but it's much better for your health and your waistline to eat whole grains instead. - Answers.com 

Due to recent years whole wheat awareness, there are many, many products available. 

Whole wheat lokshen is now available in supermarkets, and by kosher brands.

For cakes, I use whole wheat pastry flour. The only brand that I have found to be light and airy enough is Arrowhead Mills Organic Pastry Flour (it's carried my local kosher supermarket, and Shoprite, to my knowledge).

Be aware that when baking with whole wheat flour, baking powder should be omitted. I found that out the hard way, after cleaning out the oven after repeated overflows. The resulting cake has a great dimension, and is filling in its own right, meaning that unlike white flour cakes, I can actually say, "I've had enough."

I adore this cereal: Barbara's Bakery Shredded Oats. It's delicious, despite the name; I buy it from a nearby Trader Joe's. It passes the real test: the kiddies love it as well as the whole wheat cake. It's currently my picky nephew's main food supply.

Favorite Matzoh: Kemach Whole Wheat Matzohs.

Favorite cracker? Landau's. The ones that are hexagon-shaped. 

Practically all wheat-based products are available in whole wheat nowadays; I've even found soup croutons. But being whole wheat doesn't automatically make it healthy; still check the nutritional facts for fat, sugar, and fiber content (less of the first two, more of the last). 

BBM leads to . . . Botox?

There is now a sharp rise in Botox injections for the "young" bracket. 

"Smartphone Squint" causes fine lines and wrinkles on women long before they would otherwise occur, sending rather young women to plastic surgeons for "Blackberry Botox." 

Another objection I have to cellphone technology . . .

Shabbos Face: Indestructible Eyeliner

Having taken care of the initial layer of face by priming and foundation-ing, time to move onto the eyes. 

I start with eyelining first since it is easier to fix any errant traces before eyeshadow is applied.

In order to make powder eyeliner last a really long time (and, my, does it last) I invested in Make Up For Ever Eye Seal. I have discovered that it works best with loose powder, rather than pressed, and the previously mentioned Bare Escentuals Liner Shadow is a great match with it. 

  

Shake or tap a very small amount of liner powder out of the holder into a plastic disposable, like a plastic cup or plate. Drip a drop of the seal onto the liner powder, and quickly mix together with the liner brush, creating a richly colored liquid. Then line the lower eye-lid (not the waterline). 

A dampened q-tip can fix any boo-boos. 

The seal, after it dries, makes the brush bristles rock hard. Before I line, I take a cup (plastic or otherwise; my choice is the enamel cup I use for my paintbrushes) add a little water and soap. I let it soak over Shabbos. Then it's good as new. (Whenever drying brush bristles, run the towel in the direction of the bristles, not against.)

When I use this seal, it won't even wash off on Motzei Shabbos. I have to moisten a q-tip in oil or makeup remover to get it off. I started instead to use it for the two- or three-day yom tov, and man, it lasts all three days. No kidding.

Nars Pure Matte Lipstick in Carthage

I just had to gush about the new member of my makeup family: I introduce Nars Pure Matte Lipstick in Carthage. 

It has the matte consistency that, until now, I thought was only available in Mac. But Mac doesn't have many vibrant pinks in Matte; they tend to be very tame. 

I love the tube, that it is tall and thin. It provides accuracy with applying, meaning I don't need a lip brush. Carthage is a color more appropriate for the summer than winter, so I am having fun with it now.  

Date Long and Prosper

While walking on a Shabbos afternoon last year, I came across my neighbor, a sweet girl of about 21, with a boy. We smiled and wished each other Gut Shabbos, and continued on our ways. 

I figured, if the two are "walking out" together, then the engagement must be imminent. Time passed, to the point I thought maybe it wasn't my neighbor I had come across. But three months later, the engagement was made official. 

The family didn't do the usual three-months-or-less wedding; the invitations were for six months from the vort.

Since a couple wouldn't stroll about in public unless they had already reached an "understanding," I calculated that altogether, they would have been a courting or engaged couple for a year.

Her older sister had the same time frame. And it was by her wedding that I saw, probably for the first time ever, a couple having the commune of souls.

I did not see, as I usually do, any of the worries that often surface on the couple' faces under the chuppah. No rigid stances, darting eyes, nervous twitching, hand-wringing, clinging to the mother, or prostrate sobbing.

In her eagerness, the kallah took the aisle at a dead run. The chosson kept gazing at her, and her alone. They  smiled and laughed. I had never seen before such certainty in a chosson and kallah; they were free of any doubts. 

They really knew each other. 

(To clarify, I am not a romantic.)

Despite the family's financial comfort, they felt no need to rush the dating or wedding proceedings, and their daughters went to the chuppah knowing everything about their grooms, their likes, dislikes, their personalities, through and through. 

It is very possible that by the third date, they were definite: this guy is for me. Yet they still dated, holding off the inevitable; I think, for the better. 

It was their chuppah that made me think very differently of weddings. These two experiences remain the golden standard, in my view. 

Dating for some is like ticking off a box on a checklist, as though getting married should be done as quickly as possible to prove efficiency.

Perhaps I will be so bold as to say that some really want a party as soon as possible, and don't even think about  the fact that they will be spending the rest of their lives with this person. 

The party will happen; if they were willing to wait a little, how can that hurt?

I don't know what the future will bring, or how long my own courtship will take. But I would love to be able to achieve with my future significant other, before marriage, that true sense of friendship, ease in each other's company, and that definite assurance, to the point of casualness, that he is my bashert. 

Periodically Bursting into Song

I spent a lot of my childhood watching musicals. Yes, musicals, where the characters are walking along, and suddenly an orchestra swells and backup dancers appear, only to conveniently melt into the shadows when the number is over.

In high school, I would sit on the bus with my walkman and the Les Miserables soundtrack I pinched from my sister, playing it over and over and over. I've since purchased it in CD form, and my fascination has not waned.

Not all musicals are equal, however. The catchiness of the tunes depends on the composer, and while some movies or Broadway shows are pleasant to watch one rarely walks along singing the tunes to themselves. Try humming "Trouble" from Music Man. Robert Preston, poor dear, couldn't really sing, like Rex Harrison, so the two perfected "talk-sing." Sometimes all the songs can sound the same in one musical.

For those at all interested in that lovely time (the '50s, mostly) where magnificent musicals took place (Sound of Music doesn't make the cut because of its overexposure), I'm starting a new segment: Knowing Your Musicals. 

Today's recommendation: 

Gigi (1958), which tops my list. If I'm channel surfing and this is on TCM, I stop. The topic matter (a family of courtesans) went completely over my head as a kid thanks to the discretion of the time, but it is superbly done, not over-acted, which has a tendency to occur in early films (hats off to Vincente Minnelli, the director). 

I'm Glad I'm Not Young Anymore, which contains many gut varts, which bored me the most as a child, is now my mantra.

Below are the lyrics: 

I'm Glad I'm Not Young Anymore

(Lyrics : Alan Jay Lerner / Music : Frederick Loewe)

Poor boy! Poor boy!
Down-hearted and depressed and in a spin
Poor boy! Poor boy!
Oh, youth can really do a fellow in!

How lovely to sit here in the shade
With none of the woes of man and maid
I'm glad I'm not young anymore

The rivals that don't exist at all
The feeling you're only two feet tall
I'm glad that I'm not young anymore

No more confusion
No morning-after surprise
No self-delusion
That when you're telling those lies
She isn't wise

And even if love comes through the door
The chance that goes on forevermore
Forevermore is shorter than before
Oh, I'm so glad that I'm not young anymore

The tiny remark that tortures you
The fear that your friends won't like her too
I'm glad I'm not young anymore
The longing to end the stale affair
Until you find out she doesn't care
I'm glad that I'm not young anymore

No more frustration
No star-crossed lover am I
No aggravation
Just one reluctant reply
"Lady, goodbye!"

The Fountain of Youth is dull as paint
Methuselah is my patron saint
I've never been so comfortable before
Oh, I'm so glad that I'm not young anymore