I have a date with a beautiful French babe

But that's not the point. Tonight I went to a secular wedding with Rav Yehoshua (of Bat Ayin fame). My second wedding this week! I nibbled on the enormous and glorious array of appetizers. He didn't-- you know-- issues with the hekhsher. What's a hekhsher?? Good question. Someone answer.

Cheese? These Israelis have these gorgeous function halls with elaborate gardens and sultry mood lighting. This place was up near Pardes Chana, where I once smoked cigarettes and ate felafel with Amber Rogers, and where Jason met Sara (and, some say, where Harry met Sally). I am going to take this moment to mention how beautiful and smart and kind and generous Sara Kravitz is, in hopes that she might COMMENT ON MY BLOG at least once.

Ah yes-- so the Chuppah (the little tent under which a Jewish wedding is performed) was on a little dock in a little pool in this gorgeous garden. As the bride and groom walked the little bridge to the little dock in the little pool together, the little DJ played a brutal instrumental version of ABBA's Dancing Queen, slowed down and writ grand with the addition of an angelic chorus singing the melody. That's how I want my bride (may she appear in my life soon and in glory) to walk to the Chuppah-- accompanied by ABBA. Or even better, maybe I can get Chris Meade (who has probably never read this blog) to bring his Harpsichord and play an instrumental processional version of Give it to Me, Baby by Rick James, z"l.

But wait-- take 10 steps back. The ABBA begins, the handsome couple approaches the bridge, and when they reach it-- shaznizzle!!! the remote-controlled sparklers explode on the sides of the bridge, spraying sparks of the purest white into the air. Actually a nice touch, and yet.....

But wait-- at the end, at the very instant when the groom smashes the glass in memory of the as-yet-unrebuilt Jerusalem (classic moment in any Jewish wedding), the oh-so-Israeli DJ cues a SOUND EFFECT OF SMASHING GLASS to accompany the just-not-real-enough sound of actual glass breaking---- the music kicks in, and the wild rumpus begins.

This wedding, with the gorgeous people in the gorgeous garden eating gorgeous food also featured a real-live ARAB WOMAN baking pita in an oven-- right there while-you-wait.

Reminds me of that Alabama wedding I once went to where they had the "plantation theme," and a few unkempt Negroes sitting on some bales of hay and pouring black-eyed peas onto freshly-baked cornbread.

Look-- I found a picture of both of the people to whom I referred earlier in this post. And me!! At my big birthday dinner and Karaoke bash. You weren't there? Hell with it, I'm in far-off Israel, I'll tell the truth--- you weren't invited. Really.


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By the way-- tonite I had my worst gin and cranberry ever. Cheap gin, cranberry syrup gunk and the Israeli inability to mix a cocktail. Blech. But all in all, a wicked good time, and a great drive with Rav Yehoshua, who became a Rabbi at JTS, and then moved over into the Orthodox world a few years after.