What did you do during the break?

By -
Hope everyone had a comfortable and meaningful fast.

We finished davening at 2:45 and Mincha was at 4:45.

Of course, I had already taken a break during mussaf for 20 minutes. I just can't sit so long. I went to the library which is a 2 minute walk from my shul and started reading what promises to be a fascinating and gripping book "The Last Theorem" by Arthur C Clarke and Frederick Pohl, 2 elderly giants of science fiction. It's Clarke's swan song before his death earlier this year. I hope to get to the library before Shabbat to take it out.

During the break I went home, sat in my easy chair and somehow made the strange choice to read cookbooks. I was reading "Mediterranean Vegetarian Cooking", a poor strategy for dealing with fasting, but now I'm all fired up to try making chick pea soup, fava bean falafel, and others tasty sounding recipes.

What did you do during the break on Yom Kippur?
------------------------------------------------------------
Update 10/20/08: The Clarke/Pohl book wasn't worth it. Some cool ideas to read about, but as a novel it failed completely. Very little in the way of plot and one of the most boring protagonists I've ever seen in a fictional work.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Israeli Democracy in Crisis

By -
What's going on in Israel is extremely alarming. The fact that they could have a constitutional crisis where the judiciary and the Knesset are staring each other down is unprecedented, with the judiciary threatening to strike down the law that's intended to neuter the judiciary. Mass protests, members of the government calling for the arrest of opposition leaders? Democracy there has never been more at risk. Of course it's easy for me to blame Bibi, and I do, for cozying up and elevating extreme elements. But honestly, one can blame the center opposition parties as well. Was it worth rejecting Netanyahu so utterly that you end up with a coalition like this? The only stable coalition that would govern from a normal center-right place, that would preserve democracy, is a national unity government with Likud, Yesh Atid, and a few others. That would be stable, would still lean to the right, as Likud voters obviously wished for. And you wouldn't have this moment of crisis. L...
Read more

Tisha B'Av post from 2015

By -
http://evolvingjew.blogspot.com/2015/07/a-lesson-of-tisha-bav.html A separate thought - the loss of the Beit Hamikdash is very abstract. We mourn, but many of us who mourn struggle to feel it personally. But in this year of mourning for my father, I suddenly understand what loss is on a new level. 
Read more

My Father, Yitzchak Staum

By -
Image
I just got up from sitting Shiva this morning. I will write more about my father when I have had time to process things more. But I want to share a picture of me and my father some years ago (before my beard grayed to match his). I miss you, Abba. May the neshama of Yitzchak ben Avraham Yosef Halevi have an aliyah.
Read more