Torah study: VaYera

My favorite moment from Torah study this morning occurred when we were hanging out afterward drinking coffee. D. was really annoyed at the God in this week's portion, who does things like enabling the exile and almost death of Ishmael, telling Abraham to kill Isaac, and destroying Sodom and Gemorrah even though there were probably good people there. "Isn't God supposed to be about forgiveness?" D. asked. Together, 70-year-old M. and I looked at him and, in a tone that implied "you're crazy," said, "No."

I gently suggested to yeshiva-trained D. that his ideas about forgiveness and turn-the-other-cheek stuff come from a different religion. Sure, we have Yom Kippur, when we atone for our sins, but that's about ourselves, not others. While I'm certain there is something somewhere about forgiveness in the Torah, it's not one of the ten commandments, it's not a mitzvah, and it's not part of the endless dietary and cleanliness laws. To have God be forgiving, to have God say that we have to be forgiving of others, and then for us to obey is too easy. To me, it is better that this petulant, vindictive, error-prone, laws-obsessed God is leaving room for us to choose to how we all behave toward each other. Forgiving is something we do out of our own free will, not because we have been told to do so.

Mmmm ... cured meat.....

I'm on another cured meat kick. A while ago, it was prosciutto: I ate it with my fingers, I cooked with it, I couldn't get enough of it. Kind of an expensive habit. Now I'm on to salumi, which I think sounds pretentious, so I say, "salami-like things."

For lunch today, I had my Fra' Mani sopressata and Vermont cheddar sandwich. I eat this almost every day. I don't like sandwiches, generally, so when I find one I like that I can make at home and save myself some lunchtime angst and bucks, I do. This is an awesome sandwich. I don't know what sopressata is (I don't know if I want to know), but it's good. The Market Hall people sure know how to recommend salami-like things.

This evening I went to a friend's surprise birthday party at Adesso on Piedmont Avenue. Delightful to be returning to my old neighborhood, particularly to visit an eatery that I hadn't been to before. Adesso is new, in the new Il Piemonte building, a building I longed to live in because of its Piedmont location and palazzo exterior, but I didn't like it enough.

I did not know this until I got there: Adesso is a salumi bar. I opened the menu and saw more salumi-like things listed than I could count (the reviews say that there are more than 30). And I was there with a great group of people who like salumi as much as I do. We were pleasantly overwhelmed at the selection. So we ordered a chef's salumi platter, some cheeses -- and the cheeses were superb and a superb mix (and I am a cheesie) -- and then some panini, which also involved cured meats. The sausage panino was to die for. We were in heaven. And then they brought out the Baskin Robbins mint chocolate chip birthday cake, and we all got quiet as we ate it, focusing intently on the exquisiteness of our individual nostalgia trips.

As Joey would say, here come the meat sweats.

D'var Torah class

Tonight I sat for two hours in my first d'var Torah class, a class to learn how to provide an analysis of a Torah portion, or parasha. I've been looking forward to this for so long. The analysis of the Torah portion is always my favorite part of a service. I sometimes go to Torah study, where a member of the congregation explicates that week's portion (last week, Bereshit, when God creates the universe, was explicated by a Berkeley astrophysicist who pulled in the prophet Einstein and tried to teach us about 11 dimensions, among other things).

It is said that, since there were 600,000 people at Mount Sinai when Moses received the Torah, there are exactly 600,000 interpretations of it. Or of each passage. Or of each word. Or mark. I couldn't help but think of physics analogies: those 11 dimensions, all rolled up so we can't see them; fractals, which retain their complexity no matter how close you get to them. Jews have been analyzing Torah, and then analyzing the analysis, for more than two millennia. And yet there are always new approaches: apparently there was an instant classic analysis done at Torah study this past year when someone took a passage in Deuteronomy where someone got stoned and analyzed it in the context of pot, ending with Bob Dylan's "Rainy Day Women #12 and 35." That counts as one of the 600,000. We are also going to learn how to recognize when we've found 600,001st, the one that is wrong.

And I am so humbled. One man in the class had three translations in front of him. Another would suggest sort of historical analysis that the rabbi said needed to be tabled because of their complexity. One woman could read the marks on the letters and chant the passages correctly. I think the purpose of the session tonight was to give us a framework for understanding how to approach a Torah portion. But the content of every sentence was so full of new information for me that I took a ton of notes and feel like I know nothing.

Not to mention how to take notes in English and Hebrew when they are written in opposite directions. I really wanted to write a "bet" (the first letter of Bereshit, a letter that is written larger than the others and that certainly has had 11 dimensions worth of analysis), and I couldn't for the life of me, even staring at the printed letter itself, resolve how it should show up on my paper.

The class itself was enchanting. We jumped back and forth through Genesis and Exodus, taking apart passages and pieces of passages and names of passages and diacritical marks on passages ("Abraham | Abraham" versus "Moses Moses"). At one point, the rabbi decided we needed to look at the real sefer Torah, so he reached into the ark and pulled it out; we rolled it out on a tallis. (It was startlingly casual. Where was the standing and singing and praying?) He wanted to show us that there are gaps, like paragraph breaks, in the Torah and that they are so important that they are indicated in the book form of the Torah we are using.

I've got degrees in literary studies. I can take apart any text using a variety of methodologies (Marxist being my favorite). I've been doing this my whole life. But to analyze the Torah is an entirely different process.

It reminded me of when I started playing hockey a few years ago. With absolutely no athletic experience talent, I knew from day one that I was in over my head. I knew I was pretty bad. I immediately made plans for extra practice -- I had to work three times as hard as my teammates just to keep up with them. Saturday morning 6:15 practices, stick time, skating clinics, hockey camp. And I did succeed in keeping up respectably in beginner's hockey.

So I asked the rabbi for extra work so I can start feeling like I have traction. He was kind enough not to say, "Learn Hebrew," but I will at least brush up on my numbers so I can follow the verse numbers (hah -- I know how to count to one) and my writing (which is screwy because I can write in script and not print, but even most of my script letters are gone). He gave me the name of a book to read and an online Torah to take a look at. This is like starting from scratch. I do not often feel this far from understanding what can be understood.

What I love is that it is a central principle of Judaism that it is all connected. Everything in the Torah has purpose and meaning. Our job is to work to understand it.

Dental musings

Because I know I am not alone in this, I am not ashamed to say that tend not to listen to my dentist. Years and years of hedging about flossing! But I like my dentist and my hygienist, and I've decided to see what happens if I do what they say.

Step one for me was using a rinse. I read the directions and saw, "Pour 20 ml into the cap." And, rather than trying to find the 20 ml line in the cap, I wondered how on earth they came up with that measurement.

• Is it because there needs to be a certain ratio of liquid to tooth surface area? Not everyone has the same number of teeth. And what about my six or so crowns -- do they count toward surface area when they aren't true enamel? What if someone had only six teeth: should they use less mouthwash?
• Since you have to swish it, wouldn't it be better to calculate the volume based on mouth size, since a larger mouth will be more able to forcefully swish 20 ml than a smaller mouth? Should they recommend people calibrate their usage based on jaw size and number of teeth?
• Then my mind goes to high efficiency front loading washers. You have to use special, more concentrated detergent in them because they use less water (but can often wash more clothes in that water). How is the 20 ml impacted by the saliva content of the mouth? Perhaps they could market different products based on mouth pH, or perhaps everyone should be required to spit a certain number of times before using it so that everyone starts with a baseline dry mouth.
• Here's another one: A different mouthwash I own has you use 10 ml, and the directions say, "Do not pour past 10 ml line." OK, then what happens? Is it a structural issue for the cap? Would it be too overwhelming for the average user to swish 11 ml? What about someone with a bigger mouth?

I don't measure: I just use however much I want, which is certainly less than they suggest. I assume the makers of mouthwash will be annoyed that it takes me longer to go through one of their bottles, and I feel self-righteous as I swish away.

Then there's the two-minute toothbrush. I have a sonic one, and it has a 30-second timer on it to make sure that you brush your teeth for a full two minutes. Boy, does that get boring. I would stand over the sink and reread the mouthwash instructions, spending my two minutes coming up with more questions about their 20 ml measurement. So I decided to take those two minutes back and catch up on my New Yorkers.

The problem is, I am one of those people who can't walk around while brushing her teeth. I need to be standing over the sink, preferably with a bib on.

So there I am leaning over the sink trying to read the New Yorker, getting it soaking wet. And sometimes I finish the page before my two minutes are up, and then I either have to spend more time on the mouthwash instructions or figure out how to manage a spraying sonic toothbrush while trying to flop a wet magazine to the next page.

Today I solved the problem: I bought a cookbook stand for my bathroom. It allows me to look at a full spread of two New Yorker pages at once. I can turn the page with two fingers. It props up the magazine so it doesn't lie in a puddle of water and get dripped on.

I am pleased with the greater reading opportunities afforded me by my new dental program.

Talkin' baseball

I am still not really watching baseball.  This year, I've missed two rare events, the kinds of things I'd gleefully call everyone to say I'd seen:

• An unassisted triple play (15th in major league baseball history)
  
• A perfect game -- by one of my favorite pitchers, Mark Buerhle.  Eighteenth in MLB history.  Every year, I dream of seeing a perfect game.  I missed this one.  

Southwest's compass bearing

I seem to have a new puzzle interest that has been sparked by Southwest Airlines. Flying last weekend, trying to kill time during takeoff, I flipped through the magazine to see the puzzles in the back. I love sudoku, so I did those. The next page had something called shinro. It took me a while to figure out how to do these puzzles, and then I fell for them. I ripped the page out of the magazine so I could remember the name of this game.

On my flight back, it had become August. I got on the plane and grabbed the Southwest magazine, eager to get new Shinro puzzles. Alas, they had a whole different set of puzzles.  No Shinro.

So here I am with a crumpled piece of paper pulled from the Southwest magazine, googling "shinro."  And I found this:

• I came across a new kind of puzzle called shinro that can be found in Southwest Airline magazines. According to the magazine, shinro is Japanese for “compass bearing.” The puzzle involves finding holes in a square grid. Like battleship puzzles, the number of holes in each row and column are indicated. In addition, there are a number of arrows in the grid that point to at least one hole.
  
• waa hoo! i found myself looking up shinro after flying southwest airlines, as well! thanks for the link. great puzzle!
  
• Yeah! I was just on Southwest last night and solved 4 shinro puzzles. Thanks for the info
  
• Me too! Southwest flight! landed, thirsty for more.
  
• I also flew on Southwest Airlines and was hooked!!! I Love IT!!!!
• Just discovered the Shinro puzzles on a flight on Southwest and am hooked.

Google has just four references to the paper-based game shinro on its first page of results, and all mention Southwest.  (After that, it references either shinro iPhone apps -- yay! -- or Shinro Ohtake the artist.)  My favorite is this:

If you're visiting this site, we probably have something in common... Most likely, you recently flew on Southwest Airlines and passed some of the time by working on the Shinro puzzles in an issue of Spirit Magazine. Like me, you later searched the internet looking for additional puzzles to work on and found little or nothing in the way of Shinro puzzles.

That person is creating the puzzles, so he or she is my new hero.

Who knew that something in an inflight magazine could inspire such passion?   

The banana pancake mystery

Brunch is pretty much my favorite meal. Carbs, sugar, salt (e.g., waffle, syrup, bacon). Like eating dessert with a little bit of dinner thrown in.

I'm not a great cook, but I'm pretty good at brunch basics. The first meal I hosted here was a brunch: two families, with kids. Chocolate chip pancakes and whipped cream, and plain pancakes and syrup for the more conservative. It was a hit. Everyone loved these pancakes.

My next meal was just with a few friends. Banana pancakes, blueberries, strawberries, two kinds of chocolate chips, whipped cream, and syrup. (I always serve bacon, too, to please the remaining taste buds.) Another hit. They said they were the best pancakes they'd had and encouraged me to invite them over next time I was using up an overripe banana.

One day I had a very ripe banana, and no one was coming over, so I made pancakes for myself. I like to make a full batch of pancakes and then save the leftovers to pop in the toaster oven later. I used the same recipe I've used my whole life, the "Griddlecakes" recipe from the Fanny Farmer cookbook. My cookbook opens to this page. (If I flip the pages, it also opens to the page for blueberry pie.) It was the same recipe I used for my hugely successful chocolate chip and banana pancake brunches.

The pancakes were awful. They tasted salty, bitter. I threw the entire batch out.

I double checked the recipe and decided I must have left out the salt, so the baking powder didn't rise or process or whatever baking powder does, so I figured I must have been tasting baking powder.

Next overripe banana: same recipe. I focused on adding the salt. And ... the pancakes were terrible. I was hungry, and they were perhaps somehow less bitter than the last time, so I doused them in syrup and ate them anyway.

This was a total mystery. How had the Fanny Farmer recipe stopped working? What was I missing? Do bananas mess with pancake batter, somehow, chemically? I had taken the short cut of not mixing the dry ingredients before adding them to the wet ingredients, figuring they all get mixed together in the end. Is that what broke it? I've made these pancakes a gazillion times, and I'm pretty sure I don't always (rarely, in fact) mix the dry ingredients first.

Next overripe banana: I carefully assembled the dry ingredients. And ... mystery solved.

The recipe calls for baking powder. Baking powder, as we all know, comes in a canister. Baking soda, on the other hand, comes in a box. Well, when I had gone to Trader Joe's to buy baking powder, I had grabbed the canister, had used the canister, had used the canister in all the pancakes I've made since I moved in ... and it turns out that Trader Joe's puts its baking soda in canisters. I'd been using backing soda all along. Pfffttthhh.

I made banana pancakes again this morning, this time with a new canister of baking powder. They were terrific, and, not surprisingly, were very different, with a lighter texture than all those other pancakes. The new mystery is: did the chocolate chips and whipped creams and berries and chocolate and syrup really mask the terrible flavor of those early pancakes? Did all of those people really not notice the bitter, salty, baking soda-flavored pancakes?

A Handful of Missing Commas

I like the phrase (just made it up while copyediting a friend's story). Is it the name of a band? A snack food? A chapter title in a historical mystery where a the murder hinges on typesetting?

Other ideas?

Perhaps I've been watching too much Harry Potter (Harry Potter weekend on ABC Family!), but somehow I imagine these commas as animated, like the licorice snaps in Dumbledore's office that Harry takes by the handful.