Don't say Haman.

Is it a full moon?  It's got to be.  Because people are friggin' crazy today.  Last week at work I obsessively flipped between People.com and Lifehacker.com to pass away the time.  I was just bored to tears.  And all of a sudden it's like I have no time to breathe.  People in Edinburgh are yelling at me in emails, people in Luxembourg are laughing so hard on conference calls that they are snorting, and people in Boston are so stressed they're reclining in their chairs and splaying their limbs everywhere.  It's all very distracting.

Chris Wyman is convinced that when Patrick Swayze dies, they will play a marathon of his movies.  ALL his movies....not just the one good one.  Which means that I will have to suffer through Point Break.  Again.  I, on the other hand, am pretty sure that TNT will only play Dirty Dancing.  There's no denying it; it was a strange conversation to have.

Yesterday I went over to Theresa's house around 2:30 and left around 10:30.  It's weird, but I think we paid the most attention to each other in the car to and from her house.  When we went grocery shopping, we were concerned with why Stop & Shop doesn't carry Peter Pan peanut butter and whether or not to buy fat free mozzarella cheese or 2%.  Then, when we got to her apartment, I was concerned with uploading my video to youtube (not successful) and she was preoccupied with taking a shower.  And then we watched some tv while both playing on our own computers.  So, not really paying attention to the tv or each other then either.  We kinda glanced up as we ate our pizza, but not really.  It's amazing how 8 hours can feel like only 2 when you're not paying attention to anything.  This is why I feel like my weekend hasn't started yet.  I want a do-over.

Now it's 8:08.  I should be out listening to the Megillah and twirling my noisemaker while eating hamantashen.  But I'm pretty sure sitting here drinking decaf coffee while checking blogs counts the same.  Right?  Right, God?  

Winky Face ;)

This weekend I was told I remind people of Sarah Silverman, Ellen Degeneres, and a penguin (not in the same sentence). I don’t mind the first two (although I’m not fucking Matt Damon), but a penguin?! Ted has been telling me that I look like a penguin since the 7th grade. Have I really not changed so much that after 24 years I still resemble the same arctic creature? And why, for the love of God, do people say penguin? Is it the combination of white/gray and black hair? The small stature? The propensity to waddle instead of walk? Or perhaps it’s my habit of laying eggs and then finding men to sit on them? Well in any case, I suppose it’s better than when my “friends” told me I looked like Filbert, the turtle from Rocko’s Modern Life.

Jews are not people to pass up a sale. This includes my mother who will call London from the Houston airport to ask me, nay TELL me, that I need a Swatch watch because they are 40% off.

I went to a barbecue/barbie/braai on Sunday (you know, to celebrate Jesus H.) and HOLY FUCK was it cold. This weekend was crazy for London weather – I saw lightning/thunderstorms, snow, hail, and sunshine all in the same day. But Sunday was mainly just cold. So I chose to warm up by standing near the grill. The only problem with this strategy (other than when some goofs drunkenly threw a phonebook on the coals) is that my peacoat now smells like burnt sausages. I forgot to wash it last night and so today I’m sure my co-workers and the people on the Tube are wondering what that disgusting, yet savory, smell is.

(Speaking of co-workers, G loved his hug this morning. He lingered a bit too long, but he’s helping me run reports today so I let him.)

After the craziness of the barbecue had died down, about 5 of us were left sitting on beanbags watching awesome YouTube music videos like Travis’ cover of Britney’s “…Baby One More Time,” Tegan and Sara’s “Umbrella” rendition, and Damien Rice doing his version of Radiohead’s “Creep.” But, and here is where you need to get ready to run to your computer, I was introduced to two videos that give “Oh My God Shoes” and “What What in the Butt” a run for their money. The first (search for ‘woman punch’) is a 9 second clip of a woman getting sucker-punched right in the face (oh MAN is it hilarious), and the second is a series of this crazy cartoon called Happy Tree Friends. A word of warning about these so-called Happy Tree Friends…even though it’s a cartoon, it was disturbing enough that I almost ralphed. I still recommend you check them out for yourself, though. Just maybe refrain from showing your children. (And yes, I’m going to hell.)

Sidenote – has anyone ever watched, I mean REALLY watched, old Betty Boop cartoons? I’m pretty confident in saying that the people who made those cartoons were on some serious drugs.

Snippet of a conversation between my mom and dad at dinner last night:
Mom: You know that woman in our condo building who loves you?
Dad: Which one?

P.S. JK about G.
P.P.S. It’s funny to type JK and mock the rest of the world. LOL.

It’s all about the Pentateuchs, baby

Saturday morning I went to the synagogue near my apartment (or what everyone suggested was the synagogue from the quiz responses). Here are the highlights:

· Before being let in, I was told repeatedly that if I wanted a tour, I should come back tomorrow because there was a sermon going on right now. I guess I just look like a tourist and not a Jew.
· An old man limped in wearing a Yankees baseball hat.
· The synagogue was an Orthodox synagogue. But instead of the typical black hats Orthodox men usually wear, these British men wore top hats! Top hats, I tell you! I was waiting for them to pick up their canes and tap dance to Puttin’ On The Ritz.
· There was what sounded like a barbershop octet instead of a cantor. Even the ‘amens’ were sung in harmony.
· The ladies sitting in the balcony with me looked like they were about to go to the Kentucky Derby with their fancy hats.

After services I went to meet D at Nando’s, a popular Portuguese-style chicken chain. Little did I know there was a New Zealand pub-crawl going on outside. Of course, no one came right out and told me that’s what it was; all I saw were throngs of drunk 20-somethings wearing All Blacks shirts with beers in their hand and Australian flags on their back (or worn like a skirt around their waist in some cases). I figured out it was a pub-crawl by reading people’s shirts that cleverly said “Waitangi Circle Line Pub-Crawl 2008.” (Waitangi is another way of saying New Zealand Day.) The gist of the pub-crawl is that you go to a slew of bars along the Circle Line, the Tube line that goes around the heart of downtown London. I think the highlight of watching all the drunken Kiwis was when one girl stopped in the median of the very busy Bayswater Road and funneled a beer.
*You can read some guy’s experience of last year’s pub-crawl here.

They don’t refrigerate eggs in the supermarket.

I have a tendency to pass by huge buildings that are obviously noteworthy and important and have absolutely no idea what they are. (This happened when I moved into my apartment on Tileston Street in the North End and had to ask what they big church was right behind my building.) So just in case you come to London in the near future and see a big, fancy domed building downtown, it’s probably St. Paul’s Cathedral.

What’s really cruel about a city that is already filled with hard-to-navigate streets is when they decide to name three pubs all within a 2-block radius O’Neils.

I was reading an article in Time Out London written by an American ex-pat about the differences in American humor and British humour. (Other than the ‘u.’) These are two jokes that he said an American would find funny but a Brit would be offended by (I can at least concur on the American opinion):
- President Bush said, “If one more person compares me to Hitler, I’m going to gas them.”
- Two Middle Eastern fathers were comparing pictures of their sons. One of the dads said, “Ah, they blow up so fast.”

I’m sure you saw it in the news, but you remember that picture I sent of the Punkyfish store in Camden Market? Well that’s exactly where the fire was on Saturday night. It’s a creepy feeling to know that I was JUST there and now it’s gone. Weird…