Blog

I've started getting into book revisions this week, and it's an interesting process. Given that I worked as a freelance writer before rabbinical school, I've had the chance to be edited a lot. It can be challenging when the editor and I have different visions for a...

I asked the greengrocer how much longer artichoke season was, and he said, "Another week or two. Well, longer, but they won't be as tasty as these." I knew it. I knew it, the moment the words came out of his mouth, that "these" was actually the referent to, "the...

This is a very interesting piece in the Washington Post about a lot of things, including paying attention, what it's like to encounter a masterpiece without a didactic label on the wall or enthusiastic blurbs on the dust jacket, and the importance of tipping street...

My friend Bear Bergman has brought my attention to a rather interesting poem by Qalonymos ben Qalonymos - a Hebrew writer and translator living in Spain, ca. 1322. I offer no commentary of my own, but rather leave that job to you. Translation by (I think) Tova Rosen:...

Like a lot of Yidden today, I'm tearing through my kitchen in a hot streak. I have the great fortune of not being responsible for any early Pesach cooking, so it's just about cleaning, wiping, re-arranging, kashering (boiling certain utensils so that they're kosher...

My pre-Pesach cultural/theological preparation this week includes watching The Last Temptation of Christ. I haven't seen it in about 10-12 years, though it was actually pretty important for me in college. That's a whole other story. My goodness, what an exquisite...

For the last year and a half or so, I've been meeting some friends once a month for Kiddush Levanah, the sanctification of the new moon. It's great fun--we meet late Shabbat afternoon not long after the month has begun, do a little learning, and once it's properly...

I think I'm done with the rough draft. More or less. I need to add two more paragraphs to the epilogue, but I'm fried like a fried thing and it's not happening today. This afternoon is all about errands out in the three dimensions.

Hot dang, I'm dangerously close to sewing up the first draft. 77,140 / 80,000(96.4%) That inching past 96% you see there is the result of my having worked Chapter Nine into the ground until it whimpered for mercy (or until I did; still not sure which.) There's just...