THE WEISS CHRONICLES

Thursday, October 31, 2019

I Didn't Think I would live to see a World Series Win but 

The Nationals won the World Series on George's birthday although it was 10 minutes to midnight local time.

It was quite a season. They were 19-31 on May 14 but finished with 93 wins.  

During the season their bullpen was a near disaster. The bullpen had the 2nd worse ERA in MLB (surpassed by the Orioles). 

Some of the players had great seasons. Anthony Rendon at 3B had a .319 BA with 34 HRs. Juan Soto (age 20 during the regular season) also had 34HRs. Trea Turner had 35 stolen bases and hit .298 with 19 HRs. Turner came off the injured list in early May which probably accounts for some of the turn around. Geraldo Parra changed his walk on song to "Baby Shark" in early June and that song became the Nationals unofficial anthem. I find myself humming this song at odd times.


They won the Division playoff, then the Division Championship, then the League Championship, then the World Series.

In doing that they came from behind in 5 games in which they faced elimination. They were the first team to win 4 World Series games on the road. Steve Strasburg was the first pitcher to go 5-0 in post season play (he won 18 in the regular season). Juan Soto hit one world series HR before his 21st birthday and two HRs after (his birthday was before game 3).

Lots of captioned images here.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 10:15 AM

Wednesday, October 30, 2019

George's Birthday 

This was George's Birthday.

Sometime ago we had decided to have special meals on people's birthdays partly based on the difficulty of figuring out what to buy.

Our meal for George was many pieces of fried chicken, some dried white toast and a coke.

This is something of a tribute to the scene in the 1980 Blues Brothers movie where Jake and Elwood go to the Soul Food Cafe with the objective of getting Matt 'Guitar' Murphy to join the to-be reconstituted band. Jake orders 4 fried chickens and a coke. Elwood orders some dried white toast (I think neither was ever actually served a meal). 

Pengy is in the image (on the left). In the scene, Aretha Franklin (the cafe waitress and presumed owner of the Cafe) tells Matt (cook and presumed co owner) that the Blues Brothers look like Hasidic Diamond merchants (we have Pengy dressed as one of these - the second image has Pengy with his diamonds from a post at 
the Stuffed Animal Blog).

posted by Martin Weiss  # 8:57 PM

Back to Work for Beth 

Tamar went back to work today.


It was her first day physically at work in over 4 months (she had done some limited remote work).


Apparently, they were glad to have her back. 

It was the fourth day for Oz in child care. The first three were for 1 then 2 then 4 hours. This one was for 8 hours).

posted by Martin Weiss  # 8:41 PM

One more about Oz and the Sukkah and fall colors 

Somehow I forgot to post this image.


I think it was taken after we reconstructed the sukkah but on a day when it was too wet outside to eat in the sukkah.


Anyway, the image shows some nice colors as well as Oz (and me).

posted by Martin Weiss  # 2:45 PM

Monday, October 28, 2019

Discussion about me meeting the President and First Lady 

 I was on mashgiach duty.

The event was at the residence of the chief executive of The George Washington University.

The event was to celebrate the process of building a new Hillel House for the University. I think this is why they wanted a kosher caterer for the event.

After the food service had ended I got a call from the owner of the catering company:

Owner: So how did it go?

Me: Pretty well.  The President and First Lady really liked the food.

Owner: Really!!!


Me: Yes. They came in to the kitchen to thank us.


Owner: Really!!

Me: Yes and their administrative assistant came in earlier and had us wrap up a sampler of various hors d'oeuvres for them and some of their guests.  


Owner: So you met Donald and Melania.

Me: I don't remember their names.


Owner: You don't remember??

Me: Oh. You are thinking of the President and First Lady of the USA. This was the President and First Lady of The George Washington University.


Anyway, the four images are essentially the backyard of the Residence of the President of the University. I actually like the way they use a relatively small space and make it both classy and informal looking.

Note the title on the bench (second image).

posted by Martin Weiss  # 11:11 PM

Sunday, October 27, 2019

Fall Afternoon at Clopper Lake 

After some heavy rain in the morning the skies cleared.

Ann and I went for a drive through Senaca Creek State Park.

We have been there before. One of the best times to go is for the winter festival of lights. This has thousands of lights in designs of elves and squirrels and bears, etc. 

This time of year the leaves were nice. The picture was taken at an overlook of Clopper Lake which is at the southern end of the park. The trees created the shadows on our clothes.

The lake is a 90 acre man made feature dating from 1975. More about the lake is here.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 3:26 PM

Oz seems to like the Gan 

B

Tamar has a contract with a child care place.

They are called "Gans" in Israel when "Gan" means garden (the garden of Eden is called Gan Eden in transliterated Hebrew - coincidentally we read that portion last sabbath).

There are a lot of Gans near Tamar in Ramat Gan (Ramat Gan means 'garden city' or 'garden heights').



Probably there are fewer Gans then shwarma stands and fresh vegetable stores near her but still there are a lot (and they do cost a lot more than fresh vegetables).



This particular Gan is run by Chabad (a Hasidic Jewish Organization) and the wife of a Chabad rabbi (a rabbitzen) is the manager of the Gan (third image)





Tamar introduced Oz gradually to the Gan. He had a one hour session last week and a two hour session  today.

Oz got along with the staff and even with some of the 'older' kids (first image).



He also likes their toys (although Tamar brought them one of his toys also - second image).



Everything seems good so far.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 11:45 AM

Friday, October 25, 2019

Beth and Oz back in Israel 

Beth got a shuttle to the airport on 23 October and arrived back in Israel on 24 October.

The first image is of the two of them and a big luggage cart in Israel at the airport.

Beth got a lot of help on the

way. Several people volunteered to hold Oz when Beth needed to use the rest room and others helped her with baggage, etc. 


The second image is inside one of the planes she used on the return trip.

Oz slept for much of the trip. The only major problem was that the airline didn't give her the stroller for the 4 hour layover in Belgium but the airport wasn't too crowded so she was able to find places to sit with Oz.

Today (25 October), she had Oz at the Gan (the child care place) for an hour just to see how he would take it.  Everything seemed to work out.

Also, the Air B&B  people that used her apartment when she was gone left it cleaner than when she left it.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 11:30 AM

Thursday, October 24, 2019

Trina misses Oz 

Our cat, Trina, aka Katrina, took a liking to Oz during his stay here.



In the image she camps out on Oz's rocker.  She also has spent a lot of time on the bed used by Tamar and Oz .




It is very cute

posted by Martin Weiss  # 9:00 AM

Sunday, October 20, 2019

Not in the Sukkah but it was during the holiday 

 Cheryl and Irwin came on the Sunday of the great circuits, a.k.a., Hoshana Raba.

The Sukkah was wet from a heavy rain so we ate inside.


They did get to see Oz (in image). 


We had both beef and chicken and I used the leftovers for stir fry on the two days of Shemini Atzeres.  

I didn't read all my email that day and didn't see the email that our seudah shelishi team was up for the next sabbath. This caused some difficulty on 25 October because I had to deliver the food to the synagogue instead of getting the caterer to do it.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 4:00 PM

Friday, October 18, 2019

Ann has a dream 

I've had dreams that I chronicled in the past but Ann had an interesting one that deserves this treatment.

In Ann's dream, she was sitting next to Kim Jong Un in an airplane.  In the dream Jong Un had a stuffed animal that Ann admired.

And then Jong Un gave her the stuffed animal.

And then she woke up.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 11:01 AM

Thursday, October 17, 2019

Tree Removed in Time; Fallen Sukkah of David, then Restored 

Our next door neighbor had a huge tree taken down and removed last week (image on left).

 
He was concerned that the tree had been damaged as it was losing branches. Two arborists confirmed this. 



It was good that he did this as last night (October 16-17) we had a big windstorm.


The storm was strong enough to blow the roof off our sukkah (second image, left). 



We started to reconstruct today but the wind was still too strong.



Coincidentally, one of the miscellaneous invocations during the grace after meals on sukkah asks God to restore the fallen sukkah of David. Of course this is a metaphor for the Kingship of Israel, not for an actual sukkah. 

But still.


The last image is of the Sukkah restored. George and I completed this on October 18 around 3pm. It was actually still too windy to do this in the morning of the 18th. 


You can see the twine on the table (we used this to tie the metal poles to the porch). Also you can see the extension cord which goes to a light we use to illuminate the side yard (used for access to the back yard).

posted by Martin Weiss  # 5:28 PM

Sunday, October 06, 2019

A Trip to Great Falls 

 We all went to Great Falls, Md today.



Everyone had saved a few hours in the p.m. Also, none of us had done Tashlich yet and Great Falls is good for doing that.



Lots of pictures were taken



The first was taken by a bystander. It shows all of us at the overlook just upstream from the Great Falls National Park entrance to the C&O canal footpath.

 
The second, third and fourth image are as we get closer to the overlook that is across the Potomac from the Virginia Overlook. The path between these is about a quarter mile downstream from the first overlook.




The second image is where the Potomac has a channel dividing the Maryland mainland from an Island in the Potomac.






The third image is where the Potomac has a channel dividing one Island from another Island in the Potomac.




The fourth image is where the Potomac divides these Islands from the Virginia mainland.

The fifth image is of the receipt I got as we left the park.





When we entered I couldn't find my National Park Service Senior Pass which entitled me to free entrance at any National Park.  So I paid the entrance fee.



Then when I got back to the car after the visit I fished around in my card holder and found the pass. So I went to the clerks at the entrance and explained the situation and they agreed to refund me the entrance fee.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 9:19 PM

Thursday, October 03, 2019

RH and Cat and Oz interaction 

Oz heard the shofer both days of Rosh haShana. However he was asleep for most of them.

He was awake for most of the Rabbi's sermon (says Beth).

This may reverse the 'normal' paradigm.


On a separate subject, I had some worried thinking about the way our cat would interact with Oz but it has turned out fine.  Trina seems to like Oz and will snuggle up to him occasionally (as in the image). 

For his part, Oz is mildly amused by the cat.

posted by Martin Weiss  # 12:26 PM

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