Latke Withdrawal

Funny story:

I picked up the fall/winter 2004 Heeb issue today from the virgin megastore (ugh - all the asshole college kids who work there don't leave you alone - it's like if you're not buying something, you're a terrorist) on Newbury street. I called my mom to tell her this, since my great aunt Elaine's picture is in this issue. She tells me she's reading this book by an Iraqi Jewish woman from Calcutta. I say, "that sounds like Shikha's mother or something." Turns out it is Shikha's mother. Small world. The kicker is that Shikha's mother is now going to talk about her book with my mother's book group.



The Heeb issue is enjoyable - lengthy interview with the beastie boys, shorter interview with Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn, endnote by Najla Said about being her father's daughter and being a palestinian among New York jews. Check it out. The full page CAMERA ad makes me want to hurl, though. Guess it's sort of like the nation and Fox News.



Joanna Newsom is younger than me? That's odd and depressing, for some reason. But i guess everyone's younger than somebody. I mean, i guess i can still take solace in the fact that i am younger than Alek. (Happy 24th, by the way.) But Alek spent his year before college doing interesting things. I spent my secod year in kindergarden fighting over blocks and rehashing lots of shit i already knew, thus developing the fallacious idea that i was smarter than everybody else. And now i'm 23 and people younger than me are legitimately famous for making good music, but the more i think about it, the more that should be a good thing, so i'm going to shut up and stop whining, and grow up. I miss my guitar.



I've spent most of the weekend in the union office. union pizza with Joey (and Sammy!) and Jeff and Katherine last night was really fun, and this morning's holiday party/union meeting, complete with lots of cute babies and a former e-board member/irish bartender dressed up as Santa Claus, was also pretty enjoyable. I still have mixed feelings about leaving, but i'm also really excited about the grad school thing and i hope i can pull this off. (CV is done or close to done, draft of personal statement is getting there.) I'm actually enjoying sitting alone int he office late at night and feeling like i'm making progress onthis stuff.



Oh yes, and as for the title of this post.



So i know i really should care that much about Chanukah. I mean, on the scale of like, Passover and Yom Kippur and shit, it isn't a particularly important jewish holiday. But i'm a militantly secular jew, and maybe it's just goyim envy, or maybe it's just the general sense of feeling lonely and up in the air and shit, but what i really want right now is a menorah. A menorah and some latkes. That would rock sooo much.



alright, back to work.