So

No one's got anything to blog about, huh? Some of us are trying to procrastinate, you know. This blogging famine is making it very difficult.
I mean this blog is certainly in the decomposing stage. Which is a shame, blogs these days just ain't what they used to be. Course I'm just being a snob, I post about "your mom" jokes. But seriously, too much angst these days, it's becoming a cliche to feel desolate and blog about it. And so many blogs are just angsty.
So here's to original, angst-free, blog-thoughts! For my procrastinating, reading pleasure. And yours.
On that note, I'd like to take this moment to convince everyone once more to move to Oregon where it's ok to just lie in the myriad of dandelions of a grassy hilltop. For hours. In the sunshine. With the background yelling of stoner-skateboarders in the nearby skate park. Which in itself acts as a source of entertainment. Hard to say no, right?

The reality and global warning.

This story takes us back many years. 2.4 billion in fact. this is where my awareness first existed. Previously it had been a small crack in a glacier somewhere off the coast of nowhere. The thing was that all the other cracks in glaciers all the world over were losing their identity by the huge pieces of ice closing them off. This was of course a tremendous blow to their ego, and so some of them, by force of instinct and a tremendous will to exist, became what we now take for granted: our own awareness. Of course the fact the that these awareni and the homosapians collision is a total coincidence and you can of course see many people who lack this special quality.
Many years passed before my awareness developed brain cells and what not. Legs seemed like a good idea till i realised i could not fly with them. It took a further billion years to notice that they look better in flat fronts.
One thing it really hated was having to breath that obnoxious oxygen, i mean of course anything in the universe tastes better than vile oxygen, it took several million years to develop a taste for it after it came into style.
So anyway i was just getting wind of some carbon dioxide in the atmosphere when everyone starts going green. I mean please, just when something good starts some people have to ruin it. I would even consider just waiting a couple billion years till the next ice age and i can snuggle back into a comfy glacier if it werent for the 15% i was saving with Geico.

Borsch

New Yorkers think that the disgusting blue stuff they see in bottles in their grocery stores is the real borsch. Maybe in Poland it is. But not in Russia or Ukraine. I am not going to make any disparaging remarks about other people's food. And I actually like beet borsch (when it's cold and has some boiled eggs crumbled into it). But the difference between Russo-Ukrainian borsch and Polish borsch is the difference between Chassidus Chabad and Chassidus Chagas.

Some examples (click on the last image to enlarge and view in full glory):




(garlic is in the picture, because borsch is eaten with garlic dipped in salt and sometimes rubbed onto toasted rye bread)



(presence of meat and sour cream together for demonstration purposes only)

עומד לשרפה 2 aka the onion post

לכבוד ידידי הגר"ח הרה"ג כראלינג עקס שליט"א:

בענין שאילתך לגבי הברכה על בצלים יש כמה צדדים ברכת בצלים חיים דנקרא "רא" בעכו"ם היא שהכל משום דלאו דרך לאכול כמו דאיתא בברכות שילהי דפרק כיצד מברכים ובקצה"ח שם אבל מאידך גיסא יש לטעון דזה הוי מנהג יוצאי רוסיא יוקרע"ן וקצת פולין דרך אכילה דידיה הוה וליברך האדמה אגב אורכא מצד יוחסין יש לי מדור רביעי לומר מנהג דידן אבל אין לדקדק בזה כדידיענא מכ"ק מסאקמער שאין גורסין "שפיץ יחוס" אלא לסוסים וכלבים (ויש מוסיפין שידוכים וד"ל) וא"ת דאין לברך את האדמה משום חוקת הגוי של עובדי כוכבים שעובדים עפר הארץ דמתקרי למיניהם טרי האגערז וכדומה אין לחוש לזה דאין מברכין את האדמה ממש אלא ברכת הנהנין באיאמה"ע בורא פרי האדמה דיש לנו לזה מסורת אבותינו אבל יש לבא לההוא מסקנא דאין מברכין מזונות מטעם אחר דבתר רובא אזלינן ואין לתמוך על מנהג שאין מנהג המקום וכידוע בכל עולם הישיבות דאין שייך מה"מ כלל באמעריקא דכולנו מבולבלים כמו טשלענט ואין שום קהילה חזקה דיש לה מקום ומנהג ולאו גורסין מציאות דמכשיש כלל דפתיחת העניים מביא לידי כפירה דמביא לידי כאלעדז דמביא לידי זנות דמביא לידי ב"צ רחמנא לצלן! ולענ"ד הדבר תלוי בסביבה כדי שרוסי שאוכל בינו ובין עצמו (כמו שרגיל באוכלי בצלים) יברך האדמה ובורא נפשות ומי שרואה אותו יברך משנה הבריות אבל אם הוא אוכל עם חברים שאינם נוהגים כן יברך שהכל ויש כמה ראיות לדבר.

בברכת כל טוב והצלחה רבה

דער הלבע כופר

The above was a cleverly written satire or a load of borderline sacrilegious crap depending how you look at it. The only part that was meant to be taken seriously in any way was the very last sentence after the exclamation point. Even so, I want to do some real research and ask my rabbi. I would say continue making shehakol until then.

About sports

Soccer is the most superior of all sports.

Baseball is about as interesting as a game of paper-rock-and-scissors.

Both facts are objectively true.

Gefilte chicken

Fine, since nobody posts anything, I’ll do another food post.

Everybody knows gefilte fish. But what about gefilte chicken? Click on the images to enlarge (and sorry for the quality).

Austin PSA

As I'm sure y'all have noticed, lately there's been a lot of spam in our little corner of the blogosphere. A lot of spam. Nasty shtuff. Anywho, back in the day, in the land before time, I used to have word verification on comments (On TRS). E convinced me to get rid of that, so I did, and replaced it with comment moderation. E convinced me to get rid of that too, so I did, and all was well for many moons. Now suddenly we are under attack, and it's quite annoying. What to do? Good Q. Obviously we don't want to stifle anyone's creativity, or the fights that happily happen between two bloggers (call them discussions if you will), but at the same time, who wants to provide a platform for spammers? The Japanese shtuff isn't so bad, because it's in a foreign language, but the other spam? Disgusting. I've taken the simple step of enabling comment moderation for all posts older than thirty days, which seems to have stemmed most of the tide. I think that the spambots detect that their spam isn't going through, and stop trying, or something like that. Far be it from me to suggest that anyone should follow my lead, but I thought it appropriate to say something on the matter.

How do thoughts look like?

Not like this:

(pyramidal neurons in cerebral cortex)

More like this:



(synchronized firing of pyramidal cells, in red, due to inhibition from basket interneurons, in black)

First picture mine. Second borrowed from some paper (forgot which one).

Click on the images to enlarge.

Guess who wrote this:

http://www.heightsdeals.com/blog/2009/11/12/24/

A series of events

Click on the images to enlarge.

Step 1:


Step 3:


Step 4:


Step 8:


Step 9:

The evils thereof

e's description of FB touched us all greatly, I'm sure, and I felt the need to make my own admission: In the beginning I friended people who I actively liked, and accepted friendings from people who I was friendly with. But now... twice in the last day I've been friended by people who I actively dislike, and I accepted them! Why? Because I didn't want to hurt their feelings? It's not like I'm trying to get as many friends as possible, because believe you me, I'm not. So what gives?

My apologies

It has recently come to my attention that some bad shtuff has been going down over at this particular forum. Some of it may very well have been my fault, and for this I apologize. "Oh!" you say, "TRS is going to get away with a blanket apology? Over my dead body!"

All right, all right, since I'd hate to have any dead bodies over here in the bloggerverse that we all know and love, I'll be a little more specific. First of all, one specific blogger attempted to stem the tide of immorality and point out a few things. Whether or not I (or anyone else) agreed with him, it was wrong to demonize him, for which I apologize. Secondly, I think an apology is owed to the organizers of the event, who never at any time set out to create anything more or less than a poetry slam that could be enjoyed by all. I am sorry if the organizers in any way suffered through the aforementioned particular forum, and I hereby beg their indulgence of our blogger criticism.

Now that I've finished groveling...

Brezhnev Exeter Kipkin Silva

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!
The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun
The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought—
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

And as in uffish thought he stood,
The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,
Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,
And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! and through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

LoT has no end! http://bit.ly/117FZ9 DIES MERCURII VIII ID. OCT. VDCCLXX A.V.C.

Stam L'haar

You heard of this thing called marriage? It kinda takes a lot of energy and whatnot. So if you don't see too much blogging shtuff from moi? Just know that the less time I spend online the more I'm spending with my lovely wife, and that can't possibly be a bad thing.

When You Become Too Frum For Your Friends

Or the other way around, to be open-minded. I think most people have experienced this in some form or another. You change and your friends don't and you wonder how to, or if you should, stay friends with them. With chassidishkeit, it can be a little more complicated, because you know that the changes you make are usually for the better.
So I'm putting the question to you, fellow bloggers.
Tell us your story, and how you dealt, what choice you made.

שו"ת עומד לשריפה 1 aka The Shaving Post

It has come to the attention of these quarters that there is a lack of knowledge regarding the important halachos of hashchosas hazokon among קק"ק דבלאגער. To that end we the undersigned have decided to provide בירור in this matter -- at least to those members of the community who can read Yeshiva dialect aramaio-hebraicized English.

crack.

A shot rings out and the writer slumps over his desk in a pool of blood. A man steps through the bedroom doorway, smoking gun in hand. He looks at the old man lying across his notebook, fresh blood dying his gray beard the red of youth, and laughs.

"Once again ignorance is preserved."

Ok. No more leitzonus. ATTENTION: Here is the serious part

I was reading an old post on e's blog about shaving vs. picking when I came across some halachic stuff which I said I'd post about and this is it. (Note: e said I know what I'm talking about! Can you believe it?)

First off, there seems to be a misconception in Lubavitch (and other chasidusin) that shaving falls under the prohibition of transvestism (לא תלבש colloquially). While many authorities including the Chazon Ish among others have said this, upon examination it turns out that this is a statement of passion rather than psak as the Law simply does not stretch that way. (Perhaps another post if interest warrants)

That being said, the prohibition against shaving bears further analysis. Hashkafa, chasidus, and kabballa are beyond the purview of this post (I'm too lazy to look things up) and we will stick to straight halacha. Enjoy the ride.

EDIT:
Before proceeding further, it is important to note that the only readers of this blog to whom this applies are Shriki and myself, both of whom have beards anyway. The Tzemach Tzeddek assurs beard removal or abridgment in any way shape or form, therefore it is assur for his followers i.e. Lubavitchers.

The prohibition against shaving is derived from two psukim, the first states "do not razor the corners of thy beards" (emor) while the second states "he [the kohen] will not destroy his beard" (somewhat earlier in emor). By a combination of mesorah and אסמכתא the gemara derives that one has only committed the sin of shaving if one destroys the beard hair below the length of recognizable stubble, with a halachically defined razor.

A halachically defined razor is an instrument that removes hair at the root with a scraping (single-bladed) motion. The definition of stubble in halacha is a source of debate in its own right, though most poskim hold that a reasonably dexterous person must be able to take the hair between two fingers and bend it.

Following these criteria, we can form a list of permitted and prohibited activities.

1. Trimming with scissors. Muttar, leaves enough hair and is not a razor
2. Depilatory powder or cream. Muttar, is not a razor. The RaMChaL used this method
3. Crappy shavers sold in Jewish electronics stores. Muttar, they use microscreens not blades at all and leave enough hair
4. Good shavers. Some may be assur, particularly lift-and-cut models as they use single blades and some even work and give close shaves
5. Razors of any sort. Assur gamur. While there has recently been a spurt of kiddush-club halacha going around that safety razors are not razors this is completely unfounded.

ועל זה באנו על החתום
אנאנימוס

Mazal Tov!

Mazal tov to our two basementbloggers.
The ones who have gotten married, that is.*
We wish them only the best.**
Rumors have it that although they have [insert appropriate chassidic alternative for "tied the knot"], they decided against moving upwards in life....to an apartment, that is.*** Ahhhhh, once a basement blogger, always a basement blogger



Footnotes:
*the other ones who feel they deserve a mazal tov need to dedicate a post to that topic. for example, I finally made pasta that didnt immediately morph into a ball of pasta-mush. Mazal Tov to me!

**Well, I'm assuming we do.

***Just follow your nose to the nearest Dr-Prager stocked polka dotted-free sub terrian dwelling abode.

To remember 9/11

It's been 8 years. The memories are still clear in my mind.

It's a war that we have been fighting ever since then. It isn't over yet.

Take a minute of silence. Reflect. Remember. Don't walk away and never look back, because then you are condemning all who died that day to their graves. And they don't deserve that, they deserve better.

There's nothing we can DO to fix it, to change the past. But we CAN do something to change the future.

Light a candle for those who died. Give extra charity. Do a good deed in their memory. Help create a better future.

It's up to YOU.

Moshiach now!

For E