Magic Jewball

You may remember my description of Fifth Avenue, playground of Ladies Who Lunch and now, tech geeks. But there is another Fifth, as seen below.

Yes, this is Fifth, slightly further uptown in Harlem. Why do I bring this up? No reason, except I was there to catch a train yesterday and while I waited for this light to change, I couldn’t help thinking that this isn’t really what people think when they imagine Fifth. I don’t think Holly Golightly ever came up here. Or maybe she did. I never actually saw Breakfast At Tiffany’s although I did see the Seinfeld episode about it. Does that count?

Anyway, let’s pretend you don’t know where Harlem is (90% of you probably don’t and that’s OK; I don’t know where Wal-Mart is in your town). Ponder this math problem. Timmy lives in the 90’s and needs to go UP. Should he catch the train at 42nd or at 125th? I’ll wait for you to think about that.

The funny thing is, most people go all the way down to 42nd in order to then go back up to 125th and beyond. But, you see, 125th is in Harlem and people are afraid. Even royalty was once carjacked on 125th. Well, Queen Latifah is royalty, right? But I often take the train from there if I have no luggage (there’s a bit of a walk between the subway and the train station). It’s not that I’m so brave but it saves me ten minutes. Come ON. I need my ten minutes. Plus, 125th Street is really not that bad, despite what you’ve heard. Harlem has a rich history and not just of scaring the bejesus out of people who live further downtown.

This is the view most people get of 125th.

Not too close and with a Metro-North window safely shielding you. But clearly, I was OK enough to pull out my camera here. Of course I did. I was hoping to see Queen Latifah getting relieved of her car.

U2 – Angel Of Harlem
Queen Latifah – U.N.I.T.Y.

You didn’t really think I was going to link to Uptown Girl, did you?

So this weekend is another Jewish holiday. But Passover was just seven weeks ago! Yes, this is Shavuot (Shah-voo-oat) which literally means “weeks” because it falls seven weeks after Passover. On Passover we celebrate the exodus from Egypt. Seven weeks later, we celebrate the giving of the Torah to the Jewish people in the desert. The period between the two is called the Omer (see Leviticus 23:15 for more!). Before Casey Kasem, the Jews were counting down (or up, really) the days between the two fun holidays. But how can I remember what day it is so I can count it? Simple, I use the hOmer Simpson Calendar!

The tradition is to study Torah all night. My tradition is to go to sleep early and dream about blintzes. The reason we eat blintzes is because it is traditional to eat dairy foods. The dairy foods come into the picture because before the Torah, which we only got a few thousand years ago (give or take), we didn’t know the Kosher rules for meat. Because of this, we stick with cheesy goodness. So grab your Lactaid and party J-style!

“But Becca, will there be no new posts this Friday/Saturday? What will we do between cleaning out our sock drawers and watching the grass grow?”

Simple! The delightful Culotte Folle has helpfully agreed to be guest blogger on Friday and I have scheduled her post to appear then. In return, if I can get my act together, I may just get to guest-post to her blog next week! And joy was spread throughout the Blogosphere.

Garbage – Milk