Not All Who Wander Are Lost

Celebratory Randomalia

It's my 31st birthday today. As a gift to myself, I'm not going to worry about creating a single cogerent entry; what follows is instead a cyclical, intertwined laundry list of current brainfodder, i.e. a trifecta of trite tight colon-heavy post-modernistic tidbits, titles included, which otherwise might have made great blog entries -- or so that little homunculus that lives in the back of my brain claims. Well, (s)he's always been right before.

Jewish By Association?

I'm a happy participant in a mixed-religion marriage: in rhyme, a Reconstructionist Jew married to a Unitarian U. Niceties result: not having to choose between one set of relatives and another for major religious holidays, since the Jew-lunar spiritual calendar hardly ever coincides with the Christ/Gregorian holy timetable. Yes, there was the initial concern about Judaism-as-race from the parent, but my ace-in-the-hole -- a faux-innocent suggestion that surely my God wouldn't have found me love in someone he didn't want me to love seriously, because what am I, Job? -- put that behind us quickly. Nary a negative in sight, so far (knock wood). But perhaps I spoke too soon: In the mail today, the Simon Weisenthal Center mailing asks for a signature to support "The Growing Threat to World Jewry," but the nine by twelve is addressed to her. What, I'm not Jewish enough for you, Simon Weisenthal Center?

Taste Buds: Nurture or Nature?

Shouldn't be surprised, I guess, having started out in such a mecca of Jewry. 31 years ago today I was born just outside Atlanta, Georgia, in the midst of my father's two-year first-draft try for a corporate lawfirm partnership; we returned to the Northeast within my first year and never looked back. Notably, my nine month old was barely eating solid food by nine months. So why is it that every year what I really crave for my birthday is southern barbecue? Tonight, for example, catfingers and crawdad poppers, pulled pork and Memphis ribs at Easthamptonian Smokin' Lil's, courtesy of Darcie, with a little help from her babysitting parents; luckily, there's a mess o' great rib joints this end of Massachusetts. Redbones when we can in Somerville, home visiting my parents. Even had my first legal drink over a plate of cornbread, beans, slaw and rubs at East Side Grill in Inman Square back in Cambridge. If there's a homunculus in my head, there's a good ol' boy in my gullet.

Think Globally, Travel Internationally

It's not like I've been to the American South much -- and Florida doesn't count after three decades of Disneyworld and old folks retirement. Louisiana a couple of times in high school and soon after, mostly for the Jazz and Heritage Festival (now sadly off-limits for me, as it's too close to the end of the term). But heck, I've only been in less than 20 of "our" fifty states. Been in more overseas countries than that, some which don't even exist anymore (yes, the USSR was too a country, dude). Is this like living in New York and never climbing the Statue of Liberty? And yet I teach American Culture now. Ah, irony. If I had my druthers, I'd be spending my birthday touring the Heineken Brewery in Amsterdam. Now that was living -- a quick tour of copper vats and Percheron stalls, and then all you can drink in fortyfive minutes, all for a buck. And speaking of beer, did you know the only place to get Sierra Nevada Pale Ale in Bangladesh is the American Club? You gotta know somebody to get in, though.