Sinful Indulgence

As Greg reported a few months ago, a new Cold Stone Creamery has come to Baltimore. While the store itself isn’t kosher, all the ingredients in the store are kosher (similar to Baskin Robbins). Speaking of Baskin Robbins, since they’re now closed, there’s no time like the present to go to Cold Stone and get yourself a Creation. I put my change in their tip jar, and the girl sang something along the lines of “Here’s our tipping song, it aint very long” (the end). The ice cream itself was amazing. Especially with all the toppings. And if you go to their website, you should be able to find a buy one, get one free coupon. And while you’re at it, sign up to get a free Creation on your birthday. It’s worth it. Here’s what I got (total calorie count: 1300):

Thank you

Someone sent me the following video which is very apropos for Thanksgiving.  Here is an emotional thank you to some troops returning from Iraq:

Scholarship for being white

Finally, a step in the right direction, in my opinion. With so many scholarships focusing on the minorities, the majorities often get left behind. In fact, I’ll bet that when you combine all the minorities together, they’ll come out in the majority. A group at Boston University was tired of this and decided to make a statement and offer a scholarship to people just for being white:

Looking to draw attention to what they call the “worst form of bigotry confronting America today,” Boston University’s College Republicans are circulating an application for a “Caucasian Achievement and Recognition Scholarship” that requires applicants be at least 25 percent Caucasian.

“Did we do this to give a scholarship to white kids? Of course not,” the scholarship reads. “Did we do it to trigger a discussion on what we believe to be the morally wrong practice of basing decisions in our schools and our jobs on racial preferences rather than merit? Absolutely.”

Where’s the old David Chu’s?

I just had lunch at David Chu’s, and I came out very disappointed. I had previously written about how David Chu’s has been getting busier and busier and that their service was heading downhill. This time, the restaurant was pretty empty, and the food came out almost right away. I ordered the usual: wonton soup, egg roll, and extra-spicy General Tso’s chicken with white meat.

On receiving the soup, I proceeded to start eating it, but noticed right away that the taste was different. In fact, it had no taste. My wife observed the same in her soup. We requested salt, but that didn’t change anything. At this point, the waitress started saying something about a new chef (it was hard to understand her fully because of her accent) and that the recipe may have changed. She took our soup and promptly got us new bowls of wonton soup. While this time it had slightly more taste, it was still very watery. The waitress again mumbled something about a new chef, and nicely took away our soup and apologized profusely. Apparently, she told the manager, because she came and asked us what was wrong, and when we told her that the soup had no taste, she, too, apologized. When it came time to pay the bill, we weren’t charged for the soup.

Anyways, we then started on our egg rolls. After one bite, my wife and I looked at each other and agreed that this also tasted different. But for once, I actually like these egg rolls better than the original egg rolls. It was hard to place my finger on what it was exactly, but I think it was slightly spicier.

On to the next course, we were served our chicken. While the chicken was delicious, the sauce was noticeably not as sweet as it is usually. General Tso’s chicken is supposed to have a sweet batter. This just tasted like regular batter, with no sweetness whatsoever. My wife observed the same in her sesame chicken.

Thinking back to what our waitress said about getting a new chef, I now remember Kosher Bite advertising that they were proud to announce that they now had the former chef from David Chu’s cooking their Chinese food. Is it time to go try the Chinese food at Kosher bite?

Black Friday overachievers

I was reading this story in the news today:

Two armed thugs tried to rob of line of people waiting to buy the new Playstation 3 gaming console early Friday and shot one who refused to give up the money, authorities said.

The two confronted a “bunch of people who were in line” outside a Wal-Mart store shortly after 3 a.m. and demanded money, said Lt. J. Paul Vance, a spokesman for the state police. The new Sony consoles are selling for around $500 to $600.

“One of the patron’s resisted. That patron was shot,” Vance said.

I just posted yesterday about the Thanksgiving day sales and all the deals, and I know that this is the type of stuff that happens on Black Friday. I think its insane. If there’s a great sale, I’ll admit, I’ll be there at 6am. But if it comes to pushing, shoving, and now shooting, forget about it, I’m not interested. I’ve heard only great things about the Playstation 3 (except for the price tag), but to get in line at 3am just to be able to say that “I had it first” seems extreme to me.

As a rabbi in Detroit once told me a few Thanksgivings ago, upon completion of a masechta (tractate), we say in the Hadran, “She’anu mashkimim v’heim mashkimim. Anu mashkimim l’divrei torah, v’heim mashkimim l’devarim biteilim…Anu ratzim v’hem ratzim. Anu ratzim l’chayei haolam habah, v’heim ratzim l’b'air shachas.” - We wake up early and they wake up early. We wake up early to learn for words of torah, and they wake up early for idle words….We run and they run. We run to the life of the Next World, and they run to the well of destruction. (I’ve got to figure out how to type in Hebrew)

Like I said above, I’d get up early if there was a great deal (which I might be doing this year…I need blank CD-R’s). I’m just complaining about the Black Friday overachievers.

Math Nerds

Bringing nerdedom (I just made up that word) to a whole new level, I found this a cappella group of what looks like high-school students singing their love for math and equations. But I must say, as nerdy as it is, its very well done and clever.

Black Friday links

We all know about the crazy deals that you can get on Black Friday. This year is no different. I found two websites that have all the deals posted, so you can start figuring out where you’ll be and arrange your schedule accordingly. The first has been around for a couple years, called Gottadeal. This website can be a bit hard to navigate, but once you figure it out, its ok. I just found the second site today, and I like how things are very neatly organized and they have the actual ads that you can download. You can check it out here.

Uneducated Graduate Students

This is my first post using the Performancing Firefox extension, so hopefully it’ll come out OK.

I’m taking an elective from a different discipline than occupational therapy (OT), and I’ve found several differences.  The one that stands out the most, however, is the lack of ability for people to give a presentation and give out handouts without mistakes.  There are 4 OT students in this class, and it has come to the point where we make it into a game to see just how many mistakes we can find.  For example, last week, one guy was giving his presentation on a case study from a textbook.  In his four-page handout, I counted 28 mistakes that should have been very obvious had he only looked it over one time.  I mean, how can someone confuse ‘foreman’ with ‘foramen?’

If this was happening to only one or two people, I would be able to understand it, but when it happens as consistently as its been happening, something is wrong.  Anyone who is in a 600’s level graduate course should know basic spelling and grammar.  The fact that in one night I found over 20 mistakes on two separate handouts from two people says that something is wrong.  I know that if I were to hand in a paper with that many mistakes in the OT department, it would be returned to me by the teacher.  If I was the teacher, I’d return it.  I don’t know if our writing is just that good (I doubt it), or if their writing is just that bad.  It’s scary to think that these people will be healthcare managers.

My First Sephardi Minyan

I don’t know how this has not happened to me, but until Monday, I had never been to an ultra-Sephardi minyan. There is an Iranian guy who lives in the building next to me who unfortunately just lost his mother (in Iran, so he couldn’t even go to the levaya) and was therefore sitting shiva. My upstairs neighbor is in school with one of the Iranian’s neighbors and asked for guys to come for minyan. So on Monday morning, I showed up (was one of 11 guys), and got to experience my first Sephardi minyan.

While I have seen their sifrei torah before, it was always from afar. Now that I was able to see it up close, I can see just how beautiful and ornate a sefer torah can be. There were lots of things I wasn’t used to, like Birchas Kohanim during chazaras hashas, but it wasn’t too hard to follow along. Sephardim also seem to say a lot of extra stuff at the end of davening, so I managed to finish a good 5 minutes before someone else before I realized that they were saying other things.

Anyway, it was an interesting experience, although going to daven at a shiva minyan isn’t the most optimal reason to experience this.

Anti-climatic voting experience

I just cast my ballot. No long lines. No registration problems. The electronic voting machine correctly recorded my ballot. And I didn’t even get my ‘I voted’ sticker that I got at the last election

Here’s a picture of my ballot that I managed to sneak. As you can see, I did end up voting for Rolle over Gansler, after discussing the two candidates with Soccerdad.

A whole new meaning for ‘tefillin dates’

Now that Tefillin Barbie has been introduced, we can have a whole new meaning for the term ‘tefillin dates.’ Only this time, its Barbie wearing the tefillin (and reading from the Torah) with Ken skipping minyan:

My November 7 Election Ballot

If you don’t know that Tuesday is Election day, you live in a cave. That said, here’s my ballot for the upcoming election:

Governor - Robert Ehrlich, Republican
I’ve had his banner up on the top right side of my blog for a while now, so I think this one is pretty obvious. People still haven’t been able to tell me what O’Malley has done for Baltimore that we should allow him to be governor. Ehrlich was able to turn around a huge deficit ($4 billion) left over by the previous administration and turn it into a $2 billion surplus. Ehrlich has an additional soft spot in my heart because of his untiring dedication, support, and advocacy for people with special needs. People may say that he chose Kristen Cox as a running mate just because she is legally blind, but I think it’s just part of his nature that he would choose someone with a disability.

Comptroller - Anne M. McCarthy, Republican
I honestly don’t know much about the comptroller’s role, but looking at the two candidate’s websites, I found that Peter Franchot was anti the whole slots idea that Ehrlich was pushing so hard for during the last election. I think that the slots could help revitalize Baltimore by bringing in more money to the area.

Attorney General - Douglas Gansler, Democrat
I also don’t know much about the attorney general and I wasn’t able to find anything very useful on their websites. I’m voting democrat on this one to show that I’m not a hardcore republican. If anyone knows anything about either Gansler or Rolle that might influence my decision, you’re welcome to leave a comment.

U.S. Senator - Michael Steele, Republican
I was undecided on this one for a while. I really liked what Ben Cardin had to say at the Baltimore Stands with Israel rally. While looking up their issues on their respective websites, I decided to vote for Steele because I like his ideas for change. And he actually took the time to write about his support for Israel on the website, something that is notably absent from Cardin’s site. I’m also opposed to Cardin’s stance on bringing home troops from Iraq immediately. Steele’s ideas are similar to Ehrlich’s, which isn’t too surprising, considering that he’s the current Lt. Governor.

Representative in Congress; Congressional District 3 - John White, Republican
Here’s another section that I don’t know much about. After reviewing both of their websites, I decided that I’m strongly in favor of White. John Sarbanes wants to help illegal immigrants obtain drivers licenses, college funding, and more. While that might be nice in reality, he’s forgetting that these immigrants are illegal immigrants. John White takes a strong stance against illegal immigration and that is an issue that I agree with.

There are several other sections on the ballot, however, they’re mostly uncontested. I’m not sure if there’s a point in voting/not voting for the uncontested candidates, but I figure I’ll cast my ballot in any case, if just to show that there are people out there that are voting.

The final part of the ballot, the questions, is another part I have trouble with. It’s hard to make an informed decision about changing certain laws or allocating funds to various causes without knowing the bigger picture. Therefore, if you have any input, I would greatly appreciate it!

Don’t forget to go out and vote on November 7!

Official graduation countdown begins

200 days!

Ehrlich Rally to be held on Sunday

Message I got:

Please join the community rally in honor of the Governor!

Place: Club Center - adjacent to Blockbuster on Reisterstown Road, at the old Joan & Gary’s Bagels

1496 Reisterstown Road, near Old Court Road

Time: Sunday, November 5 from 10:00 am to 11:30 am

Meet and greet, schmooze with the Governor, enjoy Kosher Bagels!

This is a critical event and an exciting opportunity - It is vitally important that our community have a strong turnout.

Please make sure to attend this very important event!

Unfortunately, I’ll be teaching during that time, so I will be unable to attend.

Two days of Yom Tov in Chutz L’Aretz

As most of us know, we celebrate two days of yom tov in chutz l’aretz (CL”A).  The famous question is asked, that if nowadays we rely on Hillel’s calendar, what is the purpose of having two day’s of yom tov?  We all know exactly when things are going to fall out, so we should have only one day of yom tov.  This would be great for a bunch of reasons, including no 3-day yom tov’s, extra day of expensive food, and not overeating.

The classical answer is given that since in the olden days, when we weren’t sure exactly when Rosh Chodesh was, thus we were unsure of the exact date of yom tov, even though we now know when things fall out, we’re just doing it k’minhag avoseinu.

I was listening to the OU daf yomi podcast from yesterdays daf (Beitza 4b) and the maggid shiur brought what I thought was a great answer from the Meshach Chuchma.  He said then in the days of Mashiach, things are going to return to the old ways, including rosh chodesh and two-day yommim tovim.  If were were to rely solely on Hillel’s calendar, it would be showing a lack of emunah regarding the coming of Mashiach.  By continuing to have the two-day yomim tovim, we’re showing our emunah that Mashiach will come soon by continuing the schedule as we have it today.