Send a picture of Burt!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BURTON STUCHINS!!!

He is 41!! (give or take a few decades...)
Burt lives in Natick, Mass with his lovely wife Marion. The two of them have been among the (if not THE) dearest friends to our family over the years, especially my mom Esta. Burt is a pharmacist, and has a gorgeous Massachusetts accent, which makes him a phahmacist.

He is a wonderful and dear friend to me.

Burt is the anti-Wanderingstu. Not that he is against me (au contraire), but he is the most amazing example I have ever seen of staying collected, calm and smiling no matter what cards life deals.He has endured many hard times, including the loss of a child, and has never stopped being loving, supportive and inspiring to those around him. He is even-tempered, cheerful and humble-- all to perfection, and I bloody love him.

Someone send me a picture to post of this awesome guy.

Israeli Waiter

Slicked back ponytail, little goatee, tight black shirt-- what's he staring at? Good God, he looks bored. There's only 4 occupied tables in the cafe... he's staring into space... why won't he look at me? Now he's shifted position about 8 feet and is staring out of the window again. I've been here for 10 minutes..... sure I was on the phone when the waitress first walked over, but why won't anyone come back? He is brutally bored..... wouldn't he love to come over and take my order? Wouldn't you buddy? I'll stare at him, send him a vibe, he'll have to respond---- nope. What the hell ishe doing? Come here! Here! Come here!

Sometimes the service in this country makes you think that people only tip like 8 percent......

ahem.
______________________

By the way, Lisa Whiteman is as brilliant (and adorable) as ever. [almost adorable as her pal Gigi, who starred in Lisa's short film, in which i had a cameo as a homeless guy in Brooklyn]

CLICK her name-- it's a link, silly, not just me praising a pal.

praise the Lord for my transgressions!

Here's a nice little bit from Rav Sholom Brodt, in relation to the consecration of the Priesthood and the Mishkan (the Tabernacle, selah!), and the sin of the Golden Calf:

I once heard that a student of the Ropshitzer
Rebbe asked, "Rebbe, the rabbis teach us that before we do something, it
is announced in heaven that 'so and so is about to do such and such'.
Now I can understand such a heavenly announcement before one does a
mitzvah, but why would they make such an announcement before one does a
transgression?"
The Ropshitzer Rebbe replied, that in heaven they don't announce that
so and so is about to do a transgression, rather they announce that so
and so is about to make a new pathway to return to Hashem.

Tech note: Sorry about the bad formatting (which bothers me more than you, I'm sure); Blogger doesn't get along with Apple's Safari browser as well as with Mozilla Firefox

crackered

This is me, holding a big cracker during Passover. In Israel. By the highway. In 1999. Picture by Tommy Meade. "Boy oh boy has a lot changed since then..."

Meticulous fans of wanderingstu.com will notice that only 40% of the comments on the previous post are from people that I even know. Fastidious fans of wanderingstu.com will detect a familiar tone of mild (?) embitteredness in the previous comment.

All of you now know that my return to Israel has been accompanied with an olde-fashioned shitty mood and sense of utter confusion.

Cool.

--------------

couple of hours later--- at 10:30, I was set to go to sleep.
Now, 12:35, I can't. Had to get out of bed and come to the Beit Midrash (the Study Hall) to catch a better wireless signal so i could upload the photo for this post.

The Yeshiva feels dead-- about 40% of the guys are around during this break, but the place feels totally isolated. The dining room has been locked for Pesach, so there is no access to food anywhere, and I am kinda hungry. For the record, I am the oldest single guy at the Yeshiva, by at least 3 years. The youngest married guy here is about 22. I don't know if this is redundant, or bitchy or what, but I have said the following to a few people in the past and was surprised that they were surprised to hear it. So something you might not know about me (although it has been true since about 1984): I hate being single. No. Scratch that. Let's use my real voice: I fucking hate being single.

New survey: How many of you would consult a rabbi who cusses???

you speak

Question:

What is the biggest thing that you have had to sacrifice for your own better good?

note: I am not asking about sacrificing for others, but for your own better good.

note: "better good" sounds redundant and even meaningless. here's a great opportunity to employ some intuition and non-rational thought....

note: for those who can't get past the "better good" entanglement, try this:

What have you had to give up for the sake of your own well-being?

Get yourself BORN!!!!

Happy Easter!! Happy Passover!! Pesach Sameach!!

I am in a towel, and need to leave to go to synagogue in about 3 minutes, so here is half a thought of holiday profundity:

This weekend (starting now) is all about rebirth, renewal, salvation, holiness. Me being who I am and where I am and so forth, I will dish a bit about the Exodus, but feel free to contemplate the Resurrection of our Cousin Josh, if that's yer idiom.

The Israelites' crossing of the Sea of Reeds (not literally the Red Sea..) is the passage through the birth canal, from Egypt (Mitzrayim-- a place of narrowness) into the expansive potentialities and challenges of the desert, where life truly happens, where God is encountered.

Freedom!!

Throw off the shackles of narrowness and limitation!! Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, like Bob Marley says! Liberate your spirit from all oppression! Honor no Master other than the vastness of the Universe and your deep inner communion with the Source of All.

Find your path through the dry wasteland of an unfulfilled life, follow the pillar of fire-- your burning spirit-- as it beckons you to the Promised Land.

Amen! Selah! Halleluyah!

(i'm not actually this fired up in person at the moment, folks, but i reckon in the sperit of the season, i can preach it for a minute...)

I Scare Women

Erik Garcia has been having some weird online experiences with his new guitar lesson business. He has decided that his name is somehow striking terror and repulsion in the hearts of all who receive an email from him. I thought he was overreacting until something similar occurred to me, but with my FACE! This occurred twice in 24 hours....

Yesterday afternoon I got off my plane in Atlanta, and took the MARTA to Sandy Springs, where Valerie was supposed to meet me. After 10 minutes waiting, I realized that there might be another station exit across the street, where Valerie might be waiting. I have no cell phone in the States, and the station had no payphone in the area. I asked a woman who was coming up the escalator from the train station if there was another potential pick-up area. She didn't know. Nobody knew nothing.

After a few minutes of concerted pacing, I saw a van pull up to the curb, obviously waiting to pick up a family member or friend. I walked over to the passenger side, and waved at the woman in the driver's seat in that hey-i-need-a-tiny-bit-of-help way. Without even looking over at me, she shook her head fearfully and then refused to acknowledge my existence at all. Although the windows were closed, I yelled:

"Hey! I need a tiny bit of help!"
and
"I'm lost!!"
and
"I'm not a murderer, I'm an American!!!"

No response. I trudged back towards my luggage, cussing colorfully. Where the hell was human decency? Where the hell was Southern Hospitality? It's bullshit that New Yorkers are rude and Southerners are gracious and genteel. Any New Yorker would stop to give directions, frowning or not.

Anyway, today I was driving in Sandy Springs, got lost, and couldn't find the highway. At a traffic light, I pulled up next to a white SUV, and leaned out the window for a bit of help. Again, I made the innocuous signal wave. This time, the woman driving turned, took one look at me, then JUMPED UP AND COVERED HER FACE IN TERROR AS IF SHE HAD SEEN A CORPSE DROOLING BLOOD LEERING AT HER WITH MAGGOT-RIDDEN LIPS.

She continued to look at me, with an expression of "now what do you want from me???" But refused to open the window, or help in any way. She took off as quickly as possible when the light changed.

Conclusion: women in Sandy Springs are afraid of me. Afraid of my very face. And girls in Brooklyn just don't give a damn.

[note: I didn't actually shout, "I'm not a murderer, I'm an American!!!" that's actually a quote from one of my 1998 Israel stories, soon available in the new Harper Collins anthology, WanderingStu: The First 30 Years.]
______

Famous! The classic tale "Good Muffin" is featured on lisawhiteman.com. And did I mention that Lisa Whiteman is wicked cute? So is her Jewish consort, Todd Levin.
_________________________________
A fun fact from Jason Rogers (check out his site!):

On Wednesday, April 5th, at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 this morning and in the afternoon, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.

That won't ever happen again.

Also check out this, which has nothing to do with our Jason. Be sure to click the photo and bio links...

The Doctor is IN

Give up some love for Doctor Craig B_., M.D., the only one of my elite inner circle who every reads this damn blog. This kid's moving to Massachusetts, and he's gonna teach at HARVARD.

the doc felt underrepresented here on the site, so i decided to play catch-up. and just think: these pictures are only of the last year!! Imagine the storehouse of memories i must have of him since 1993....