treppenwitz

Gentlemen (and ladies), start your pedometers!

You've bought yourself a pedometer, right?  Oh c'mon people... the next walking competition starts Sunday morning... what were you thinking???

There's still time... but not much.  Go out to your local sporting goods store and buy a pedometer.  Splurge and buy one of the better ones.  The features and reliability will make you happy you did.

Now go sign up for walker tracker.  It's free and will allow you to track, graph and share your walking routine with pretty much anyone you want.  It will also give you a fantastic rear view mirror through which to view your progress.

Once you've done that, be sure to log (add) a day or two of steps, even if you have to make up a number and back date your step count a day or two.  This is because the competition is only open o people with an average of 100 steps or more.  Bedridden folks log 100 steps a day just going to and from the bathroom, people! 

Now where was I?  Ah yes, the competition.  Once you have your pedometer and have signed up for walkertracker, you'll need to register for my 'Six days and then you rest' competition.  Again, free of charge, but if you aren't signed up by midnight on Saturday... you'll be left behind.  Again.

So what are you waiting for?  Go!

Not feeling very witty just now...

I had a witty little post all lined up for you today... but I've put it back in the closet for a sunnier day.  I'm not feeling very witty just now, because a friend just got some unwelcome news.

Rivka is a friend of long standing.  We met and became friends when we were both in university (me at YU and she at Barnard).  Our circle of friends overlapped on several levels, and gradually we ended up thrown together often enough that we noticed that we had similar interests and liked each other immensely.

As often happens, we didn't stay in touch after graduating, but since we knew quite a few people in common, we tended to hear updates about each other.  So when Zahava and I moved our family to Israel I wasn't particularly surprised to find Rivka also living here with her husband and family.  And again our circles of friends overlapped.

Eventually our daughters ended up attending the same high school and became fast friends... even spending occasional shabbat together at our home or theirs.

You might already know the Rivka I'm telling you about... she also keeps a blog.  It's called 'Coffee and Chemo', a cute name for a blog that was inspired by Rivka's habit of inviting friends to sip a cup of coffee and keep her company during her regular chemotherapy sessions at the hospital.

Yes, Rivka has cancer.  Here own short-hand description of her condition and history:

"Diagnosed with DCIS (stage ZERO breast cancer) at age 39. Three surgeries and 2 years later... I became a statistical anomaly: breast cancer mysteriously metastasized to my bones, liver and lungs.  Diagnosis: Cancer is a "chronic illness." You can live with it   (Translation: I hope to be on chemotherapy for a LONG time!)."

And live with it she has.  Despite the rather 'in your face' blog title, Rivka's life isn't a pity party by any stretch of the imagination.  She has lived with her cancer the way someone might live with adult acne or arthritis; treating it as a chronic condition and enjoying life to fullest extent possible.

I can't remember Rivka mentioning her cancer on any of the occasions we've seen each other or attended functions at our daughters high school.  I guess she saves that for her blog.  But even the blog is usually up-beat and full of hope and life.  Oh sure, occasionally she gets overwhelmed by something and uses the blog to vent about a particularly painful treatment or her fears about the future.  But by and large, I would have to say that Rivka is one of the most positive people I know.

Which is why the latest news over at her blog took my breath away when I went over there this morning.  Even if you aren't a regular reader, you should go over anyway and lend some support. 

In the mean time, please pray (or have a good, happy, healing thought) for my friend RivkA bat Teirtzel.

Trouble falling asleep last night

I was actually completely exhausted when I went to bed last night... so I have no idea why I had trouble falling asleep.

I ended up watching 'The Big Lebowski' on the laptop in bed, and spent most of the night dreaming about drinking 'Caucasians' and bowling.

[zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz]

Fantastic Quote

I'm sure most of you have seen this already, but it's too good not to share:

"On a more serious front, I sincerely hope that when the president goes in for his annual check-up, the doctors at Bethesda will do a brain scan. Surely something must be terribly wrong with a man who seems to be far more concerned with a Jew building a house in Israel than with Muslims building a nuclear bomb in Iran."

                                                     ~Columnist Burt Prelutzky~

Getting down off the soapbox and mingling with the crowd

If you passed someone on the street holding forth from atop a soap box on your way to the office, and stood listening to him/her for a few moments, you could be forgiven for not stopping to listen on subsequent days if what you'd heard was not compelling. 

But if you make a point of building time into your daily commute to stand and listen to to this soap box orator day after day - or even go a few blocks out of your way to do so - that would indicate that there is something there that makes you want to come back for more.

But how big a fan would you have to be to invite someone that you only know from hearing a semi-regular, 10 minute harangue, to speak to your colleagues, friends and family?

I have to admit that it is endlessly flattering to have people from all over the world come to my small corner of the Web in order to 'hear' the random things that fall out of my head on any given morning.  Seriously, it never grows old.  And even more flattering is that many of the people who don't agree with me seem to come back again and again in order to voice their disagreement. 

But what blows me away is that occasionally I'll get an invitation to give a live presentation here in Israel or abroad, based solely on my 'status' as a blogger... and I can't help thinking; what the heck are these people smoking?  For all they know I might be an ax murderer or a raving lunatic ... or worse; a religious settler!

Well, it's happened again, and I couldn't possibly be more flattered... or shocked. 

I've been invited to speak in the UK at this year's Limmud Conference which is scheduled to take place (IY"H) during the last week of December at Warwick University (located on the border of Coventry and Warwickshire). 

I have to admit that having spent no more than a day or two in the UK, I was unfamiliar with Limmud.  However, after receiving the invitation I went to their site to see what it was all about, and found that the list of speakers from previous Limmud Conferences was simply astounding.  Seriously, world renowned Rabbis, political figures, scientists, artists, writers, musicians... it was a veritable 'Who's Who' of Western Society. 

So as I sat there looking at this invitation, I had to figure out if perhaps...

a) ... someone was playing a practical joke on me;

b) ... whoever arranged for my invitation to speak wasn't carefully supervised and had made a rash decision for which they will likely to be sacked.

c) ... the vetting process for potential speakers had taken a sudden turn for the worse.

Just to be on the safe side I dashed off an email to the woman who had sent the invitation just to make sure it wasn't a joke.  I should point out that this is far harder than it sounds, because you have to walk a very fine line between sounding genuinely interested (grateful, even), and not wanting to walk face-first into a pie.

In the end it turns out that the invitation to the conference was not only quite genuine, but they want me to give four sessions! Woot!

So now that I've accepted the invitation all I have to do is:

1. Convince Zahava to join me for a week (during the winter) in the UK.

2.  Let my office know I'll be taking some time off.

3.  Come up with some compelling topics (I'll be asking for your help on this one, don't worry!).

The best part (for me, anyway) is that I get to step down off this virtual soap box for a moment and actually meet some real live people.  It'll be nice to finally meet some of the UK treppenwitz readers.  I hope I can live up to my billing.

Updates to follow...

Winners of the treppenwitz 10k challenge

Some of you may recall that a little over a month ago I issued an open invitation for people to join a walking challenge to see who could accumulate the highest daily average of steps over a 34 day period.  The idea was to get people to do at least 10,000 steps per day... but the sky was the limit.

I was pleasantly surprised by how many people signed up for the challenge since it required making a small purchase (going to a sporting goods store and picking up a pedometer) and actually getting out and walking every day. 

The competition ended on Friday, and the final results were tabulated over the weekend by the elves in the servers at WalkerTracker.com.  I'm pleased to announce that a very nice woman who calls herself 'lighthouslady' ran away with the top spot with a blistering daily average of 31,000 steps!

First of all, everyone who actually finished the 34 days is a winner in my book (awwww, group hug!).  That's a long commitment and I'm proud of everyone who toughed it out.  Hopefully it will lead to good habits and make all of us aware of how much we actually don't move unless we force ourselves off the couch.

But as promised, there are multiple prizes in this competition:

First place (as already mentioned) goes to 'Lighthouselady'.

Last place prize (but having completed all 34 days) goes to 'nycspark1'

A 'Middle of the pack' prize was picked out of a hat (actually a paper bag) from among all the walkers who completed all 34 days... and the lucky winner is  'Ilanadavita'.

The winners (in all three categories) will receive a genuine treppenwitz coffee mug:

  

Winners can claim their prize by emailing their shipping address to:  treppenwitz [at] gmail [dot] com.

Just as an aside, anyone who wants to feel like a winner can order this mug (or any of the other products) from the 'treppenwitz swag shack'. 100% of the profits from sales go to support this site, as well as to enable the philanthropic impulses of the site-owner.

So what's next?  Glad you asked.

Starting immediately, you can sign up for the next treppenwitz walking challenge which begins this coming Sunday morning.  Rather than being a month-long slog (which seems to have scared off a lot of people off), this one will be for 6 days only... and is appropriately named 'Six days and then you rest'. 

Not to be discriminatory or anything, but for this competition I have limited the field to those with an average step count of between 100 and 15000.  So this will require you to have at least a day or two of steps registered before you can join the competition if you are new to the site.

If you aren't already a WalkerTracker member, come on over and sign up (it's free!).  It's really kind of nice the way a micro-community springs up around these competitions and everyone offers encouragement to one another.

What are you waiting for?  =:~)

Not realizing which team he's on

The other day Zahava came up from her studio late in the afternoon to find all three kids camped out in front of the TV, watching something that was highly inappropriatefor the youngest member of the group (Yonah, age 5). 

After giving Ariella and Gilad the the requisite lecture about what kind of shows are appropriate for a five year old to watch, Zahava gave them the stink eye (something only mothers know how to give properly) and then went on about her business.

Fast forward to a tender moment on the couch in the living room.  Zahava asks Yonah if he'd like to watch something on TV with her.  Yonah considers her offer seriously for a moment and answers, "OK Imma, but make sure it's 'propriate for me".

I don't think he fully grasps that he and his parents are playing for opposing teams in this competition.

I can't believe I ate (almost) the whole thing

I would have liked to have played hookey from work yesterday in honor of my birthday, but unfortunately life as a grown-up doesn't always work out the way you'd like.  However I did the next best thing; after work I went with my lovely wife to Tel Aviv for the evening.

We started out at the Ramat Aviv Mall where Zahava had to shop for a new computer for her design business.  The iDigital store there at the mall is wall-to-wall Mac products... heaven!

While she was meeting with a technical adviser about the machine she wanted, I explored all the neat Apple toys and accessories.  BTW, if any of you noticed a hit on your sites from Ramat Aviv last night, it was because I caught up on some blog reading on one of the ginormous 30" screens they had hooked up to their demonstrator computers.  I didn't even need to put on my reading glasses!

In the end Zahava, closed a deal on their top-of-the line professional machine which has more raw computing power than the old Cray Supercomputers, hard disk space in the terra-byte range and more RAM memory than my last computer had storage!  Since they'll have to ship this monster to her Mac technician for configuration and transferring all her work files over from her old computer, we left the mall happily unencumbered.

BTW, the mall itself... OMG!

Don't people wear clothes in Tel Aviv!  :-P' ' '     I mean seriously, who needs 'pron' when you can simply stroll through the mall and be literally assaulted by thongs, bikini lines and boob jobs for free?  And irony of irony, I forgot to wear my concealed holster for my gun (which I try to do when in Tel Aviv), so as we walked through the mall, people were glaring at me like I'd just opened my raincoat to flash a bunch of girl scouts! 

Whatever.

Anyhoo, the technical negotiations regarding Zahava's computer went later than we'd expected because they apparently aren't used to actually selling this high end computer. I guess they keep just one in the store to make people drool... so it was really late when we finally hit the road.

As we got into the car I asked Zahava if she wanted to get something to eat since neither of us had eaten dinner before heading out.  She readily agreed, and we immediately settled on one of our very favorite restaurants in the Tel Aviv area; Dr. Shakshuka.

For those of you not in the know, Dr. Shakshuka is a landmark eatery in old Yaffo (Jaffa) whose menu only begins with pretty much every kind of Shakshuka known to man.  From there it branches out into middle eastern grilled meats, soups, salads, breads, desserts... you name it.

Ever since our friends Imshin and Bish introduced us to the place we have been addicted!  It is located around the corner from the old clock tower in Yaffo and is in one of those old Arab style stone buildings with outdoor courtyard seating for the overflow crowd.  Inside the walls are packed with memento photos from soldiers and celebrities, and the ceiling is strung with hundreds of antique brass 'Primus' cooking stoves.

We normally go for just the Shakshuka when we're there, but since it was my birthday we let the waitress talk us into the 'sampler menu'.  She started by bringing us a big skillet of Shakshuka with grilled Margez (a spicy South African sausage) mixed in, a dozen or so different salads and a big jug of lemonade.

From that point, we started getting a couple of new dishes every 5 minutes or so.  Grilled beef kabobs, pergiyot (spring chicken), steak, lamb in gravy, beans and beef in a spicy tomato sauce, a spicy North African meat and vegetable soup, and on and on and on.

Somehow we also attempted to have a couple of draught beers (Zahava finished hers... I managed only half of mine)... and that, just to keep things moving in the right direction.  But finally we both leaned back in defeat and signaled to the waitress not to bring anything else.

She seemed mildly hurt that we hadn't finished everything but agreed to wrap up the remains of our favorite entrees.  As she was taking away some of the wreckage of our meals she asked us about dessert and tea or coffee.  It was like that scene from 'The Meaning of Life' where the obese guy is being offered 'just a tiny after dinner mint' ... if you've seen the movie you know what I'm talking about.

Finally we were talked into just a glass of Nana (mint) tea... but naturally it came with a few 'small' pieces of spiced honey cake (and sparklers since Zahava had told them it was my b'day).  Oy!

On the ride home Zahava tipped her seat back and went to sleep, leaving me to concentrate on driving... and digestion.  All in all, a great way to spend a birthday evening (even though I consumed my calorie allotment for the rest of the month).  :-)

48 things you may not have known about me

Yeah, it's that time again.  Another trip around the sun means yet another list.  If you are interested in the lists from previous years, you can go here, here, here, here and here.

So let's get right to it:

1. I hate being subjected to snap judgments.
2. I admit I often judge others in a snap.
3. I can feel my older kids starting to pull away, and although I know that's normal and healthy... I can't help myself from fighting to try and keep them close.
4. At 21 I couldn't wait to jump on that ride called 'adulthood'.  Now that I'm 48 I wish I could slow it down just a bit.
5. I love spotting religious Jews in Tel Aviv.
6. I love spotting secular Jews in Jerusalem, too.  Maybe more so. 
7. My favorite soft drink is Root Beer.
8. The only thing better than a tall glass of Root Beer is a tall glass of Root Beer with chocolate ice cream floating in it!
9. I love giving gifts.
10. I'm impossible to gift shop for.
11. I'm a great secret keeper... mostly because I forget most things people tell me.
12. Although I'm a total coffee snob... I'm starting to understand and appreciate (good) tea.
13. I used to think glasses were the coolest thing.  Now I just find them to be an annoyance.
14. I traveled the length and breadth of Israel by bicycle in my 20s.
15. I want to do it again before I'm 50.
16. I have a secret desire to hike Shvil Yisrael (the Israel National trail that goes from Eilat to Dan near the Lebanese border) with my family.
17. I have resigned myself to the fact that I am not 'special' in the way that all people think they are somehow destined for greatness when they are young.
18. I look into my wife's and children's eyes and finally know I am special.
19. I've stopped asking 'why me?' when bad things happen.
20. I look around at my life today and my relative good fortune (tfu tfu tfu), and ask myself every day 'why me?'... what did I do to deserve such 'riches'.
21. I love that we use the good silver, china and crystal at least once a week.  They're for us to enjoy now... not to save for 'someday'.
22. Using the good silver, china and crystal means occasionally losing or breaking a piece. 
23. We can always buy more silver, china or crystal... We can't buy more enjoyment from life.
24. I often wish there were some sort of cable that would allow me to transfer my hard-earned life experience directly to my kids.
25. I know in my heart that the previous is a silly wish since much of my enjoyment for, and appreciation of, life has come directly from those life experiences.
26. My wife works from home and I have an hour commute each way.  I know I'm the lucky one.
27. I miss my brother and sisters because we live so far away from one another.  I feel bad that I don't tell (or show) them that enough.
28. I would love to take a serious carpentry/cabinet-making course.
29. I've have promised myself that, one day, I will own a fine swiss watch... but I'm OK with the fact that it may not happen soon.
30. I hate shopping for clothes so much that I have very little presentable clothing left to wear.
31. When I get angry about the relatively minor stupidities that my older kids perpetrate, in the back of my mind I silently wonder what kind of saints my parents must have been to not have given up on me during my tumultuous teenage years.
32. Naps (especially on Shabbat) are more important to me now than when I was 3.
33. Although I miss my family when I'm away... I never tire of all the new experiences that come with traveling. 
34. I wish I could travel more with my family.
35. I want to learn how to use a slide-rule.
36. I wish I knew how to use a sextant.
37. A couple of times a year I decide on the spur of the moment to call up someone with whom I've only had an online friendship. 
38. I have never regretted reaching out and turning a virtual friendship into a real one.  In fact we have hosted an incredible number of such friends in our home.
39. I've regretted not asking for something far more often than I've regretted asking.
40. If you asked my two older kids if I've ever had 'the talk' with them, they will probably say no.  But in truth we've had hundreds of talks that contained far more useful information than I could have ever packed into one tense, sweaty-browed lecture.
41. I'm not done talking to them... there's still lots more for them to learn.
42. If I could have only one wish granted, I'd still ask for two or three.  At least that much I've learned from living here. It never hurts to ask!
43. Although I don't have the patience to write a real honest-to-goodness letter... mail it and wait for a reply... I genuinely miss the anticipation, surprise, touch and even smell of real mail.
44. When I was younger I had enormous appetites. 
45. I still have huge appetites, but my desires are now focused on quality over quantity.
46. Without being morbid, I wish I could make my kids understand that they should be nicer to each other since one day they will wake up and find that there is nobody else left in the world who truly knows and understands what makes them tick.
47. I once greeted an Indian client of mine with a casual 'How are you?'... expecting to get an equally flippant reply of 'Fine'..  His response surprised me:  He said, "I am the ocean, David.  On the surface the ocean might appear calm or angry... but the ocean is so huge and deep that nothing can change it.  It is always just the ocean.".
48. I don't know what the secret of life is or what happens after this life is over.  But I sure am enjoying the ride.

Happy "New Orbit Around the Sun"

[A Guest Post by Zahava]

Someone I know quite well has an aversion to the "B" word. So please join me in wishing him a "happy new orbit around the sun!"

[and many happy more!]

If you make something idiotproof, someone'll build a better idiot!

The title of this post is one of my favorite sayings.  I have no idea who to credit for this bit of wisdom, but I have seen it proved on countless occasions.

What I didn't realize until this past week is that there is a parallel bit of wisdom that goes like this: "The inclusion on otherwise standard technology of features that are subject to foolish abuse will guarantee that otherwise responsible individuals will aspire to ever higher levels of foolishness." 

You can credit me for that last one.

Here's the deal.  My company just upgraded all of our mobile phones last week, and aside from some basic gripes I have about screen visibility (non-existent out of doors) and battery life (better invest in one of those solar chargers), the phone has some pretty cool and useful features.

However, in keeping with the axiom I coined (above), rather than avail myself of all the time-saving and work-related functions, I have concentrated most of my efforts on the feature which allows you to assign a unique ring-tone to as many people in your contacts list as you want.

Yeah, so you are probably already imagining the potential for foolishness here without my having to spell it out... but I'll give you a glimpse anyway.  Don't thank me... I'm a giver.

For my lovely wife I selected the theme song to the Mary Tyler Moore show ("Who can turn the world on with a smile?")

I haven't quite made up my mind about a ring-tone for when my daughter calls from her cell, but so far 'J'y Suis Jamais Alle' from the soundtrack of 'Amelie' is what plays when she calls.

My older son was easy.  When he calls from his cell phone, I hear the theme song to 'The Little Rascals' (Our Gang).

Calls from our home phone cause Hila Harari's 'Ze Haya Beiti' (Translation: this was our house...) to blast from the phone's speakers.

The default reningtone for anyone that didn't get a special tone assigned (yet!) is John Lennon leading the Beatles through a screamed chorus of 'Twist and Shout'... although I'm thinking switching to the theme song to the Bob Newhart Show since that actually starts with the sound of a phone ringing.

I have to say, although it wouldn't be a career enhancing move if it were ever to be overheard (and understood), I am sorely tempted to use Johnny Paycheck's anthem Take this job and shove it" for one of the more odious people in my otherwise delightful workplace.  But that one will probably remain a fantasy.

What makes me fairly certain that this pretty much proves my axiom is that I have probably invested more time in converting and installing these ring-tones on my new phone than I expended in building the pergola behind our house.  All for the convenience of being able to tell who's calling without having to take the damned phone out of my pocket.

Utter foolishness!

Note:  For those interested in converting music they already own into free ring-tones, go to www.zedge.net and use their free tool to create and save ring-tones.  I mean, why should I be the only one avoiding housework and personal hygiene?  :-) 

Not a good Shabbos... a great one!

The weekend already started out in a positive note on Friday morning when friend / fellow blogger 'the sandman' and his family joined us at the Gush Etzion Cherry Festival.  Many cartons of cherries were picked ... and throughout the morning, a careful process of quality control (i.e. eating as many cherries as were packed into the containers) was maintained.

After much cherry eating picking, and enjoying the other aspects of the festival (live music, games for the kids and lots of crafts, art and other stuff for the adults to consider buying), we parted from the Sandman and his family and went home to prepare for the arrival of some other friends who were joining us for Shabbat.  Our Shabbat guests were also at the festival but we only saw them coming in as we were leaving.

Shabbat itself was amazing from every aspect.  The weather was perfect, the company excellent and the food a delight.

I may be strange in this respect, but my favorite meal on Shabbat is one that few allow themselves.  In fact, many consider it problematic from a halachic standpoint; I'm talking about breakfast.

Here's the deal: According to many most pretty much all respected halachic authorities, one isn't supposed to eat a meal before saying the morning prayers.  Some people are very careful about this and others are, ahem, less so.  But I simply can't get started in the morning (especially on the weekend) without a 'little something'. 

Our 'little something' this Shabbat morning(which was consumed while lounging on swings and couch on the back balcony) consisted of:

• Fresh coffee & tea

• Orange juice

• Cherries (roughly a metric ton of them)

• Buttermilk scones with blueberries

• Fresh whipped sweet cream

• assorted yogurts

• chocolate croissants

I can already hear the frum folks deleting this apicoros from their blog-rolls... and rightly so!  After all, a grown man should be able to hold off until after shul when such things can be eaten as part of a proper 'kiddush'.  But unless I get up for the early minyan (a rare occurrence which requires me to rise at 6:15AM on Shabbat!!!), it means having to wait until after 11:00AM for my 'breakfast!. 

Look people, there are limits to my frumkeit.  I gave up BLT sandwiches and buttered lobster tails when I was 18.  That's got to count for something, right?  But a proper breakfast on the weekend is just too hard to do without.  Sorry, if that makes me a bad Jew, so be it.  At least it gives me something to 'klap al cheit' about on Yom Kippur.  :-)

But as I walked to the synagogue in the cool morning air with all those exceptionally yummy treats under my belt, I thought to myself; this wasn't just a 'Good Shabbos' ... it was a great one!

UPDATE:  I almost forgot to tell you that as I came out of services on Shabbat morning, I was introduced to a beautiful little girl wearing the most attractive pair of delicate gold-rimmed eyeglasses imaginable.  Just when I thought the day couldn't possibly get any better... it did!

I'm more Israeli now than I was 6 years ago because...

... I enjoy 'light tuna' much more than 'white albacore'.

... I applaud at wedding ceremonies when the bride walks down the aisle.

... I understand the news broadcasts (but wish I didn't).

... I have no problem telling the guy stuffing my pita/laffa at the grilled meat joint, "Al TItbayesh... Sim, Sim!" (Don't be shy, put more, more!)

... I yell at survey takers for calling during dinnertime rather than apologize to them about my poor Hebrew.

... I am surprised now when people acknowledge my having given them the right of way... rather than when they don't.

... I can answer the phone and not think it the least bit strange to say 'hello' (actually 'hollow') half a dozen times (while the calling party also says 'hollow' half a dozen times), before the calling party finally gets around to telling me who they are looking for and/or why they called.

... I finally feel I have a handle on the whole 'tipping waiters at weddings' thing.

... I would have no problem asking someone about their salary or what they paid for their house.

... When I hear an Israeli politician talking, I automatically assume he/she means something different from what is actually being said.

... I've finally learned to stop worrying and love the fact that I can't do anything about the people, entities and countries that want to kill me.  Being powerless to change the reality is actually liberating!

Regarding Bibi's Speech...

I don't have much to say about the nuts and bolts of the speech.  There are plenty of people who can do a far better job of Fisking the speech... so I'll leave them to it.

But two not-inconsequential points are worth mentioning:

To begin with, there is no such thing as a 'de-militarized' state'.  Any independent state must have a security force to enforce order.  That force can also be used to secure the borders.  But in reality, any security force is a de facto army if the government wants to use it as such.  And once that happens there is nothing anyone can do about it short of declaring war and attacking.

Next, there is no way a Palestinian state ( 'de-militarized' or otherwise) can be prevented from entering into agreements and alliances with other countries.  That's what states do.  So even if the U.S. and E.U. do manage to limit the Palestinian arsenal to mostly defensive weapons (good luck with that!), an agreement with any other middle-eastern country for military cooperation would nullify the idea of being demilitarized.  

If the Palestinians feel threatened, any parties to military cooperation agreements they make would be obligated to bring their military assets to bear in order to 'defend' this fledgling state.  In such a scenario, it wouldn't be much comfort to Israel that the markings on the planes and missiles attacking Tel Aviv would be Syrian, Iranian or Lebanese instead of those of the Sovereign State of Palestine.

So that's all I have to say about that.

However, I can't help but offer the following general observation:

In diplomacy, as in business, you can usually tell if a proposed agreement is a good one by the simple fact that neither side is happy about it. Quite simply, for a deal to be good, nobody should feel they are getting too good a deal.  

So what worries me is that the U.S. and EU seem far more satisfied with the contents of the speech than the Israeli right.  And so far, the Israeli left and the Palestinians aren't making much noise at all... an indication that they weren't outraged by the speech's content.

Yes, worrisome indeed.

Maybe she's a fan of Tesla

A few weeks ago I was about half way home from work when I saw a young woman standing at a bus stop with her finger out (we use fingers to hitch here in Israel, not thumbs), so I pulled over to offer her a ride.

It turns out she was heading to a town not far from where I live, so she got in and buckled up.

A few minutes before we got to the junction where we were to part ways I noticed that a series of tall metal towers had been newly erected along the road to carry high tension electric lines through the area... although the wires had yet to be put up.  

So, as much to myself as to her, I said, "Wow, the towers sure look strange like that with no wires.".

She thought for a couple of beats, and then without a trace of irony asked, "You mean the new ones are wireless?"

I think when she got out of the car she may have taken some of my IQ points with her because, you know, nature abhors a vacuum.