My blogging history:
2012: diagnosed with and underwent treatment for Primary CNS lymphoma in my brain.
2012-2013: blogged on Caring Bridge.
2013: moved to Blogger.
2017: diagnosed with bladder cancer and blogged through 14 chemotherapy treatments and 37 sessions of radiation therapy, each with its own t-shirt and musical selection.
2018 to February 2020: Treated every 3 weeks with pembrolizumab for spread of bladder cancer to lymph nodes. As of June 2020, continue to be cancer free.
I am having so much fun with Chanukah songs, so I am going
to keep up that theme for all eight days.
Today, I share a 1999 recording from Tom Lehrer, who sang of
spending Chanukah in Santa Monica.
Here are a couple of pictures from last night. We got started a bit after Noah had gone off to bed, and Joshua was at basketball practice. The whole family will be together on Sunday evening so I look forward to having some more to share.
In a little while we are heading over to Maya’s school for a 4th and 5th grade Chanukah concert. It is bitterly cold here today so we are spending this evening in our apartment but we will hopefully be able to make it to synagogue tomorrow morning and to lunch with Dina and Aaron and the children.
This evening we will light three Chanukah candles, and today
I share the newest release from an acapella group called The Maccabeats who got
their start as students at Yeshiva University 10 years ago and have released new
songs for each Chanukah for the past five years. “The Sill” refers to the
custom to light the candles in front of a window to publicize the holiday.
The Maccabeats: Candles
on the Sill
Ten years ago we played our first set
We were singing for
just family and our friends
And our hearts beat
with the rush that comes from a cheering crowd
We were younger then
Who could know that
then
We’d rise at dawn
for early shows
Praying backstage
before we go
Cry together tears
of joy and hope
Who knows where
this goes
We just hope you
come along
We find our way
Led by the light of
those eight nights and days
Singing to Al Hanissim
And we bless the
days each year
Thankful we got here
Beautiful memories
lighting the candles on the sill
A week in deep dark winter's when we celebrate
Shining bright on
the shortest days with the ones that we love
Don’t know what we
did to deserve this light
Hoping we learn to
use it right
But we were younger
then
Take us back to when
We found our voice
despite our fears
Through ups and
downs over the years
We never dreamed of
being here for so long
And as we grow
We just hope you
come along
We find our way
Led by the light of those eight nights and days
Singing to Al Hanissim
And we bless the days each year
Thankful we got here
Beautiful memories lighting the candles on the sill (3)
One for teachers of song
Two for those who
sing along
Three for new
friends who share
Four for old
friends that care
Five for partners
by our side
Six for sources of
our pride
Seven for those who
raised us and eight
Can’t wait to go
home
We find our way
Led by the light of
those eight nights and days
Singing to Al Hanissim
And we bless the
days each year
Thankful we got here
Beautiful memories
lighting the candles on the sill (3)
I had no idea where this song came from, so I did a little snooping around and found that the original song was done by a fellow named Ed Sheeran, who wrote and recorded “Castle on the Hill” in January of this year.
Ed Sheeran: Castle on the Hill
When I was six years old I broke my leg I was running from my brother and his friends And tasted the sweet perfume of the mountain grass I rolled down I was younger then, take me back to when I
Found my heart and broke it here Made friends and lost them through the years And I've not seen the roaring fields in so long, I know I've grown But I can't wait to go home
I'm on my way Driving at ninety down those country lanes Singing to "Tiny Dancer" And I miss the way you make me feel, and it's real We watched the sunset over the castle on the hill
Fifteen years old and smoking hand-rolled cigarettes Running from the law through the backfields and getting drunk with my friends Had my first kiss on a Friday night, I don't reckon that I did it right But I was younger then, take me back to when
We found weekend jobs, when we got paid We'd buy cheap spirits and drink them straight Me and my friends have not thrown up in so long, oh how we've grown But I can't wait to go home
I'm on my way Driving at ninety down those country lanes Singing to "Tiny Dancer" And I miss the way you make me feel, and it's real We watched the sunset over the castle on the hill
Over the castle on the hill Over the castle on the hill
One friend left to sell clothes One works down by the coast One had two kids but lives alone One's brother overdosed One's already on his second wife One's just barely getting by But these people raised me and I can't wait to go home
And I'm on my way, I still remember This old country lanes When we did not know the answers And I miss the way you make me feel, it's real We watched the sunset over the castle on the hillOver the castle on the hill
Yesterday, I forgot to give credit to Patricia, a former Pfizer
colleague, for posting a link to the Mayim Bialik video on Facebook, which is
how I first saw it.
Today’s link is from our daughter Simmie: Happy Chanukah
from the Space Shuttle Discovery!
We awoke to snow falling on Shabbat morning. We were unable
to make it as far as synagogue, but managed to make it to our friends Judy and
Lanny, who live just a block away and had invited us for lunch. I had
contributed a batch of “birds nest cookies,” which these days seem to be called
“thumbprint cookies.” I had not thought about
these cookies for years until Simmie made a batch of them a few weeks ago. They
are beautiful and delicious but extremely time consuming to prepare!
By the time we came home from Shabbat lunch just a few hours
later, Barry had a hard time pushing the wheelchair through the rapidly
accumulating snow. Fortunately, by Sunday morning the streets were fairly
clear, so we were able to keep our Sunday plans.
On Sunday afternoon we saw “Darkest Hour.” The film spans a
few weeks during the spring of 1940, when Winston Churchill took over as
British prime minister. His predecessor, Neville Chamberlain, had tried to
appease Hitler, who was moving closer every day to taking over the United
Kingdom. Hitler’s forces had invaded Belgium and France and pushed the British
army to Dunkirk in France. History tells us how the story ends, but the movie
takes us through the agonizing decisions Churchill was forced to make.
I would be surprised if Gary Oldman, the actor who played
Churchill, is not nominated for the Oscar for Best Actor. To be honest, the
name sounded faintly familiar but I had to look him up this morning to figure
out what other work he had done. It seems that he has played a wide variety of
dramatic roles, captured in a Variety piece entitled “Gary Oldman on His Path from
Sid Vicious to Winston Churchill.” Mr. Oldman’s earlier role was a reference to
a 1986 film, “Sid and Nancy,” which received an 87% approval rating on Rotten
Tomatoes. I do not think we had seen any of his earlier films.
After the movie we met our friends Ava and Jason for dinner.
They had some great suggestions for things to do with Maya on her upcoming
visit, and even offered to take her ice skating (she is now taking lessons), a
quintessential New York winter activity but something we are obviously not able
to do. Ava and Jason are so charming and so much fun I am only concerned that, if
she meets them, Maya will just want to spend the week with them rather than her
old grandparents!
After dinner Barry and I headed over to the 92nd
Street Y to see “Paul Krugman in conversation with Chris Hayes.” The discussion
was primarily about proposed revisions to the US tax plan. I should have been
taking notes because there were a lot of fascinating observations but I cannot
accurately quote anything. What is clear is that often the things we think make
perfect sense with respect to predicting the outcomes of various approaches to
taxation simply do not turn out as anticipated. One example he gave was tax
deductions for charitable contributions. Other countries have removed such
deductions amid gloom and doom predictions that donations would plummet, and in
fact that does not seem to occur. Interesting.
Lastly, I just saw some pictures on Facebook that make me want
to ask: which of these guys would you rather have carving your family’s
Thanksgiving turkey? Let’s just say that I prefer the first one unless he tries
to sing while he’s carving, and then I’d go with the second!
There were a couple of interesting things on Jeopardy last
evening. The first was in the category of “Religions” (at least I think that
was the category), and the answer was something like “In 3032, this Jewish
holiday falls in January.” The correct question? “What is Chanukah?” I just
looked it up, and sure enough there is no
Chanukah in 3031, rather Chanukah (25 of the Hebrew month of Kislev) begins on
the 1st of January 3032. Of course, none of us will be around for
that but it does qualify as a “fun fact.”
That leads to the next question: what is the latest civil
date on which Chanukah begins? Oh, don’t you just love the internet, where you
can quickly find such things? For the next 2,269 years, at least, the latest
date is January 6th; Chanukah begins on January 6th for
the first time in 4286. Beginning in 3450, starting dates in January occur more
regularly: once every fifty years or so.
In 2013, the first day of Chanukah was on Thursday November
28th, which was also Thanksgiving that year. This is apparently as
early as Chanukah can fall.
The second interesting thing on Jeopardy last evening was
that the winner won despite a foolish mistake. Kyle Becker from Nashville, TN,
had won two games and was playing his third. Going into Final Jeopardy, Kyle
had $13,200 and both of the other contestants had $6,600. What could have
happened was a three-way tie. But what did
happen is that the neither of the two other contestants, who both wagered their
entire $6,600, knew the correct question. Kyle provided the correct question, so
of course he won. But here’s what made no sense: he had wagered $1. Why did he
do that? If either of the other contestants had known the final question and he
had not, he would have lost the game
by $1. He should have wagered nothing, because then at least he would have tied
one or both players and returned to play them again. I guess his nerves got the
better of him in that moment.
The Final Jeopardy answer?
This manual resulted from a military engineer’s
attendance at an unruly 1860s church meeting
The question?
What is
“Robert’s Rules of Order”?
I know there was far more serious news than the Jeopardy
outcome yesterday. I refer, of course, to the news that America plans to
recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move its embassy to that city. I am
just struggling to process it, praying that calm minds and negotiations can
prevail, and that Israel will also get lucky despite what may or may not have
been a bad wager.
For the past month or so I have been having some trouble
with Google mail. I was often receiving messages that read:
Delivery
incomplete
There was a
temporary problem delivering your message to xxx@yyy.zzz. Gmail
will retry for 20 more hours. You'll be notified if the delivery fails
permanently.
Not only would I receive hundreds of these messages, but I
could see that the number of page views were much smaller than I had previously
been receiving. Try as I did, I could simply not figure out what was causing
the problem. The good news is that the problem may have fixed itself, and my
most recent post clocked 93 page views yesterday. I am just happy to have
everyone back!
After a number of weeks of listening to and watching almost
endless political discussions, Barry and I decided we needed to take a break,
so he went through an enormous pile of movies we have recorded on DVD over the
years and pulled out ones included in the American Film Institute’s various
lists. Among the top ten romantic comedies, we have seen (but may not remember
too well) all of the ones released after 1971 but none of the earlier ones.
#
Film
Year
1
City Lights
1931
2
Annie Hall
1977
3
It Happened One Night
1934
4
Roman Holiday
1953
5
The Philadelphia Story
1940
6
When Harry Met Sally
1989
7
Adam’s Rib
1949
8
Moonstruck
1987
9
Harold and Maude
1971
10
Sleepless in Seattle
1993
One we happen to have on DVD is “Adam’s Rib,” starring
Katherine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy. Let’s just say that this film is seriously
dated. You really have to put yourself back in the past – the 1940s, before I
was even born - to appreciate this story of a married professional couple, both
attorneys, who find themselves representing clients on opposite sides of a messy
divorce. Of course, the acting is superb and there is much witty repartee. I do
have to admit that it was a welcome relief from the usual MSNBC evening
line-up!
Time does fly, doesn’t it? We seem to be having some problems with our Sub-Zero refrigerator. The refrigerated food is cold and the frozen food is frozen, but it is making some very strange noises. Our regular appliance repair person does not work on Sub-Zero products, so I had to search for repairs, and we now have someone coming later today. When I called, they asked the age of the refrigerator. I wasn’t sure but I didn’t think it was more than a few years old. But as I later pondered the question, I realized I was a bit off.
I can divide most of the events of the past ten years into “before” and “after,” where the dividing line is my CNS lymphoma diagnosis in 2012. I should have realized that this was a “before” event, and I finally managed to find the receipt and owner’s manual and discovered that in 2009 we replaced the Sub-Zero that was in the kitchen when we bought the house in 1999, and had probably been installed by the previous owner around 1991 during the gut renovation she had done. So that Sub-Zero lasted about 18 years, and I just hope whatever is going on with this one is just something relatively minor, because they charge a small fortune just to come out and diagnose the problem!
Looks like the cold weather is finally starting to settle in. Stay warm!
