Pragmatist
Pragmatist

The puter just did a screen freeze, so I'm hoping I can complete an entry before the puter gets tired again.  Or contrary.

Yesterday I'd typed about a page, more or less, when the puter got tired or contrary, and froze.  Of course, everything is lost once the reboot is initiated, either by me or by the computer.  Wish there was some way to save what's already there.  If there is a way, I haven't discovered it.

Yesterday was pretty much an up down up down sort of day.  I slept until 9:30 after having trekked to the bathroom five times during the night.  That's the up.  So I'm mooching around in my jammies when Caitlin called and wanted me to go to her home and bring the ice cream to the school.  Her grade was having an ice cream party before lunch at 11:00.  This is 10:20 when she called.  That's a down.

OK, so I get into yesterday's clothes, slightly soiled, (hasty hair brush, no tooth brush, no makeup) and rush over to her place, around two corners and a couple blocks away.  Get the ice cream and schlep it to the school.  I get the ice cream to the school office at 10:55.  I think that's an up.

As long as I'm already out, I may as well go get blood drawn.  Should have done that a couple weeks ago, but there was something else going on that made it sort of slip my mind.  Y'know how that goes.  So I got that done, went home and discovered I was hungry, so had breakfast.

Last Saturday, Rabbi asked us all to have our mezzuzahs (the plural is properly written mezzuzot, but customary pronunciation is mezzuzahs) checked to make sure they were all kosher.  Some bad things have happened recently in our community, and he wanted all of us to make sure our mezzuzahs were protecting our homes.  (Bit of superstition here, but why not go along?)  So, the Sofer (inspector of mezzuzahs) was to be at the shul at 1:00, so I gathered my 3, plus two that were new and never used.

Here's the down:  Not a single kosher mezzuzah at my place.  

Oh, I should explain: The mezzuzah is the scroll that's inside the case.  The case is not, as some people have misunderstood, the mezzuzah.  It's the scroll on which the Sh'ma is written that is put inside the case.

Anyway...the beautiful olive wood set sent to me by my son, crafted and printed in Israel, was not kosher.  The Sh'ma was written on paper!! instead of parchment.  This from Israel.  Can you believe it?!

The two on my doorposts in the house were written on parchment, but the letters on one had been damaged, so lost it's kosher status.  The other was written on parchment, too, but poorly written.  

Somehow, when I placed the mezzuzah in the third case, which was on the doorpost of the outside door, I put the plug in the wrong way, and it couldn't be unscrewed.  So we don't know if the mezzuzah is still kosher.  It was when I placed it in the case.

So.  I bought three, guaranteed by the Sofer, new kosher mezzuzahs.  Two I put in the olive wood cases, and the third will go into one of the old cases, which will be placed on the outside doorpost.

That's the up.  My home is now kosherly protected.

Sunday a very nice friend came over and put up the second lattice in my patio.  Two sides now are enclosed with lattice, and makes the patio seem like another room of the house.  He had to put up a board between the two posts to attached the lattice pieces. The lattice is in two pieces, as the standard lattice wasn't long enough, so he took the piece that was left over from the first lattice, and attached it to the long one, and covered the extra-long space.  Is that clear?  Didn't think so.  Maybe I should take a picture.

Anyway, the two pieces of lattice are firmly attached to the board across the space between the two posts, but not attached to each other.  So I got some vinyl twine and tied them together.  Very solid now.  I think I'll get several vines of (fake) ivy and "plant" them, then weave them in the interstices of the lattice.  

The patio is an up!

Granddaughter Rena called while I was out cleaning up the patio yesterday.  Didn't hear the phone.  When I called back, I was connected to a stranger's phone.  So, I manually dialed the number on the other phone, and got yet another stranger's phone.  That's a down.

So I dialed the number programmed in my cell phone, and EUREKA!, Megan answered.  Rena was out walking with a friend, so Megan and I talked awhile, and she would have Rena call me back.  By this time, further conversation was cut off by a "dropped call."  Been having those lately.  I couldn't tell Megan to tell Rena to call me about 9:30pm, because my Tuesday night class was being held Monday night this week.  So she called back when I was in class.  So I called back on my cell phone, because I knew that number would dial correctly.  Again, Rena wasn't available, but would be in a few minutes, so we hung up, and I waited.  She called back and we finally got to talk.

I'm thinking of going there the first week in July and bringing Rena back here for a week or so, if Mom will go halfsies on her fare.  Gotta go check that now.

Screen freeze should be coming up again about now, so I'm closing this.

Shalom