Actually I never went away. I've just been too tired, distracted, without the time and just not in a blogging mood.

So what's been happening? (If I just said "a lot", then someone out there in Blog-reading land would probably put out a contract on me.)

So instead I'll break it up.

The Home

We've been living here for over a year. It's really nice being here, definitely larger than the apartment, but inadequate storage. I bought a shed, but it's already full.

S loves the place, she says she's never slept better.

The kitchen we finally settled on (we took a private carpenter rather than a kitchen place), has lived up to our best expectations. Not that it's perfect, but we can live with all the problems.

We left the Entertainment center at our old apartment (it was later stolen by our renters). Read "The Apartment" section below.

The television is on the sideboard, and that arrangement works fine. The display cases we had build, are nice, but don't really fulfill their expected role.

I installed shelves above the computer desk. Although the bookshelf we bought for the computer room is taller than the large one we had in the apartment, it's already full.

We got new furniture for the kids' room.

We didn't have to rewire, but the electrician "ballsed" up the job of putting in the Shabbat clocks and that was only fixed by the air-conditioner technician.

The grass is dying in the back yard, so we can't use walk there for a while, especially  we are not to let L run around in it. (See "L" the dog below.) The "birds of paradise" didn't flower this year.

"L" our dog

We went soon after Pesach 2005 to the dog shelter. We saw one month-old black puppy, who wouldn't look at us. Just keep on hiding. The books warn against taking such a dog, but who reads the books and we wanted him anyway.

Just before Shavuot, we picked him up. And he's great. The kids love him. He sleeps in a corner at night and on the front patio during the day. He loves basking in the sun.

People describe him as a big dog, but he's really only large medium.

He's only partially trained, doesn't bite, but leads with an open mouth and sharp teeth. He doesn't foul inside the house, but he does throw up every so often.

Since this year was our first Pesach with him, we had the interesting experience of having to buy Kosher-lePesach dog food.

Work

I was retrenched from my long-term employment at the end of 2004. Worked almost a year at another company in the same industry. It wasn't a good move in some ways. In 2005, I started with another company.

S started work in  kindergarten as a kindergarten teacher. Her feelings about the  place are mixed, but she enjoys the work in general.

Health

I had another bout of vertigo last year. Went for tests that told me that it's just in my ears. (That is, it wasn't worse than that.)

Family tree

My main obsession.

I have details of over a thousand people in the database. The descendent tree (showing the descendants of my earliest ancestor) is about 15 pages long.

I've found people that were just forgotten. It's really an issue of using the dead to find the living and the living to find the dead. It's sad just how many died in the Holocaust. There's enough work in it to keep me happy for years.

The Apartment

The first family we rented to, were thieves. Apart from stopping to pay us rent after a couple of months, when we finally got them out (after 6 months and going to court) they stole every piece of furniture that wasn't tied down (and some that were). Apparently they owed money "from Metulla to Eilat" and the husband of the family would rip off cars from people while pretending that he would sell it for them. Despite his long criminal history, he still hadn't served any time. A TV show that deals with people being ripped off, did a segment on him and gave us some (un)welcome publicity. According to what I've heard he's now in jail. Of course, we'll never see any of the money.

The current people are nice and honest, but apparently having their own problems with their own renters.

E's batmitzvah

This was probably the biggest event in the last 12 months. E was great. And there were no major disasters, except for the sewerage entering the house and for the presence of my in-laws.

Well the sewerage wasn't my fault, but some of the bad interaction with the in-laws was.

Maybe I'm just trying to do too much. Or may be I'm just stupid. Or both.

On the home front, we still haven't signed on a kitchen. Either our expectations are too high and we really can't afford what we want. Or have we just not received fair pricing for the design. Buy a kitchen; pay separately for the cupboards, the counter, the sinks, the taps, the appliances and probably more that I haven't put in this list (and how could I forget delivery). S is getting really down on this whole thing. Just getting the company designer to give us a quote on the design we've been heading toward brings comments like "the design is no good, it doesn't make good use of dynamic space." Dynamic what? But when we have a set of quotes, we'll be able to make a decision: with who to go ahead and whether the design needs to be modified. We definitely won't be able to move in until the kitchen is complete.

What S calls an "entertainment center" won't fit in the new place. Our current dining-room table is great, but will need the extra space that the entertainment center would have taken. We'll have to place the TV on the sideboard. Not a real problem, but we will still need display cases for the things we have on display now.

We need a new table for the kitchen 70 or 80 cm wide would be good. (A 70 cm wide table requires a 220 cm space taking into account pull-back space for chairs.)

The built-in desk, in the room we intend to place the computer, my books, the bed for S's parents if they ever visit and one of our filing cabinets, takes too much space. My current computer desk will do fine, but I'll still need shelf space above the desk. The current bookshelves, stuck currently along one of A's room too small walls, is the right length, but since it's 15 years old I don't think it will move well. In addition, the cupboards underneath the shelves are deeper than the shelves, and this extra 10 cm also takes too much space from the room when the guest bed is open. So we need new book shelves.

The wardrobes (at least in the girls' rooms) were not designed for hanging long dresses. We'll need a carpenter to alter that.

Of course the kids' rooms all need new desks, bookshelves and other shelves. I'll need something next to the bed.

Then there could be a need to rewire so that we can make good use of Shabbat clocks to control the lights on Shabbat and Chagim (holydays). And a shed for the bicycles. And let's not talk about getting a dog. AAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!!!!!

OK, let's move to a different topic.

I've really started working on the family tree. F in America has started sending the details he has on my mother's side, so I really only have to concentrate on Dad's side at this time. Already I may have located the missing name of my great-grandmother. I have found more names of children of my grandfather's siblings. But there is still a need for more depth to the tree, rather than breadth. In addition, I want to make sure to computerize the data.

Which brings me to computer expenditures. I have a freeware genealogy program, but I really want something stronger. I intend to buy Reunion. But I want to wait until the new Mac operating system (Tiger) is released in the first half of next year to make sure there is no compatibility issue.

Then I want a faster computer. I can get a CPU board for the computer that would make my computer 3 times faster just in terms of clock speed. But even if the board has dual CPUs, my computer would only be just a little over half as fast as a new computer. Again compatibility with Tiger will delay any purchase.

We really should have a higher level graphics program and an updated version of the kid's graphics program and iLife. (Not this year!)

Then I am the moderator of the ilblogs web ring. (A web ring is a method of joining like web sites together in a chain; in this case Israeli blogs (web logs, just like the one your reading now.) When people want to join the ring, they have to put the linking HTML code on their page. So when I receive expressions of interest I send them the HTML code. And then they don't install the code on their page. And so I follow it up (but I can't do it at work). Do they really want to be on the ring? So "meander" don't worry about the size of the ring and I may take your previous suggestion about dumping the old list of members, but it all takes time.

S is suffering from pains even though she swims and goes to a chiropractor. She's been to a Orthopedist, the next step is a Rheumatologist. Her unemployment is bothering her as well.

R got her belt. Now she and E have the same belt, but E still has status above R as she has had the belt longer.

R's into doing her nails and doing crochet. She's crocheting a scarf and intends to make hats and kippot (skull caps) for the little children who make up her "fan club".

E was invited to join the city choir. (R was too at the same age.) E has to decide if she has the time for the city choir along with English, Karate and Scouts.

A was suspended from school one day for violence. He attacked a boy at school who he says was bothering him. At first I thought he had been defending himself, in which case he would have been congratulated. But then we found out that he had attacked the kid, boy was he in trouble. Doubly so, as he hadn't told us the whole story properly from the beginning. Even the teacher says he is a good boy, but this lack of good behaviour is troubling.

In comparison, A's basketball lessons show improvement. At the last lesson, he was able to sink 4 baskets.

Christopher Reeve died at age 52. His visit to Israel in the summer of 2003 was very impressive. His contribution to raising the awareness of spinal cord research was invaluable. (His picture was on all the channels and in all the papers.)

Keith "Nugget" Miller has died at age 84. The end of a cricketing legend, probably Australia's greatest all-rounder. (No apparent recognition on Israeli TV or newspapers. Maybe he didn't make a trip to Israel.) A cultural icon.

2 Supermen who will be sorely missed.

It's been a long busy time since I wrote last. Rosh HaShana (Jewish New Year), Yom Kippur (Day of Repentance) and Succot (Tabernacles) are all past. But I'll try to remember the highlights.

I'm finally at some definition of well. It took until the doctor gave me antibiotics (and changed the diagnosis from URTI to Sinusitis), but I'm definitely better. It meant taking tablets with water on Yom Kippur, something I don't remember doing before. However, my voice for all the Chagim (Holydays) was little better than a croak, so I lost the enjoyment of joining the singing in the synagogue.

Middle of the September the "israeli blogs" web ring was restored to life. Not a lot of life, just a little. I contacted the Israelbloggers group and sent a mass email out to previous members. To say that the response was mild would be to overstate the result. About half of the emails I sent out were returned. Although about 70 people have been to the web site of the group, only a tiny number of people have joined at this stage. To those that joined, I am very thankful. I aim to put more emphasis on establishing the ring now that the Chagim are over.

We've started looking at kitchens. We won't be moving until the kitchen is built and it will take from 2 to 3 months for a kitchen to be completed once the measurements are taken. While we should be able to get the measurements done before we get the key, it may delay our move.

Kitchens are marvelous things now-a-days. They seem to come in 3 types: (real) wood, veneer and formica. Formica and wood are supposed to be tough, veneer is less. Formica is cheapest, wood is the most expensive. Wood expands and contracts like a accordion (which is a problem if there is a panel in a wood frame). Any crevices on the doors are repositories for dust. However, if everything is flat, a line of cupboards look like a wall. Once a cupboard door is "out there", the color of the door changes making matching very difficult. If a straight piece of counter is too long, it looks like a train. Shelves are designed to take a specific weight. Equip your kitchen with special shelf inserts, corner usage ideas and quiet self-closing (when pushed). Add walls, take walls down.

The fashion is that some companies will sell you a kitchen that looks as though it belonged to your grandmother. So it's old even though it's new.

I really want S to be happy with the kitchen. So her needs are a big part in deciding the design. She has a whole page of wants.

To complicate things, even though the house is bigger than our apartment, in some ways it's smaller. There's no hidden storage space like in the apartment (and no storage room either). S wants all the Pesach kitchen stuff, which we have currently stored in various cupboards and in the storage space, in the kitchen. She wants space for electrical appliances, space for the plastic reusable containers, special dividers for the cutlery, 2 sinks (separated if possible), and so on.

I want to know where we will put the bicycles (for easy access) and the suitcases (away until needed). (This doesn't relate to the kitchen, just to the lack of a storage room.)

This Succot I used only palm branches from the tree in the yard for the Schach (cover) of the Succah. Normally I do half (branches) and half (so-called permanent Schach), but this is probably the last year I'll have access to this tree so I went for it all. It looked very nice.

Chol HaMoed Succot (the intermediate days of the festival) was spent mostly looking at furniture and kitchens as well. We haven't signed on a kitchen yet, but we did buy beds for the girls and one for the bomb shelter (for guests). We also bought Little Prince sheets for E. We went to the first time to IKEA. We weren't impressed. Firstly the road to the store was packed, the parking lot was packed and (of course) the store was packed. And then despite the expectation, we didn't buy anything. S saw a good price on a toilet brush, but didn't want to queue to pay for it.

R and E normally go on a scout trip during Chol HaMoed Succot. We gave them a choice: to go on the trip and S and I would decide about their beds and furniture, or to miss the trip, be bored with their parents when we looked at kitchens, but have input on their bed and furniture. They decided to miss the scout trip. (I don't know if I would have at their ages.)

R tried to go up a belt in karate last night, but didn't succeed. She hadn't practiced and they ran out of time. S went to watch her be kicked, but it never got to that stage.

It's been a lousy 2 weeks health-wise. First the Vertigo (gone now), next some sort of sinus infection. Both have lasted about a week and interrupted my concentration at work. This week I spent 2 days at home due to a low-grade fever.

This week began though with S's cousin's son's bar-mitzvah party. It took place in Beit Shemesh, about 1/2 an hour to 3/4 an hour from here. One thing was very odd, the party was before the Shabbat call up to the Torah. Reason: the American relatives who had to get home before the Labor Day Weekend finished. The language of the party was English. (Their family has only been a year in Israel.) The hall was very nice, the food very American. My kids were very well behaved, but they complained that we hadn't told them that they had more cousins. S explained that the last time she saw their father, she was 18 and the new cousins hadn't been born yet. Once the circle dancing among the women broke up, R lead the formation dancing. They swapped email addresses, so I hope they will stay in contact. (Though I got thier father's email address and the first mail we sent bounced.)

The next day was the morning service at the Kotel (Wailing Wall). I stayed at home sick, but the rest of the family got up early for the drive to Jerusalem. They had a good time and I spent my time at home building the website for the Israeli Blogs net ring. R wanted to sing the service like she does at school, but she was advised not to. It was difficult for E to see what was happening on the men's side, so when it came time to throw lollies (candies for the Americans) at the Bar-Mitzvah boy, she had no idea where her's went.

I finally went to the doctors the next day and she gave me a decongestant. Unfortunately I didn't realize that the pills contained lactose, so I have to take tablets to take the tablets.

Today I went to work and it wasn't until the evening that I started to feel really bad.

I wrote a new note to RingSurf via their forum, I hope I'll receive an answer soon.

This week A started his basketball lessons and learning to play the keyboards. I hope he'll enjoy them both. A also reads from Harry Potter most nights, we're very proud of him. (E in comparison, just listens to the books-on-tape.)

R had a day at the beach with the school. It meant the school started late the next day. Not what happened when I went to school.

E burnt her fingers at Scouts this afternoon on hot caramel. She missed karate tonight due to the pain.

It looks like the English classes that S has been organizing during the week for the English-speaking children over the past few years will just have to stop. Not enough children and our children wouldn't benefit from being in classes with kids who speak less English. A needs to practice his writing and spelling, while E should also move up in her reading.

The title is only half a joke. The tragedy in Russia with its climbing death toll, sends shivers down the spine of most Israelis. Not only do our hearts reach out to them at this time, but behind each of us is the question "could it happen here?"

And we tell ourselves no. Not that our schools are invulnerable fortresses, but an attack of this magnitude would be difficult to setup. One or 2 people with suicide belts might be (God-forbid) possible, but not such a large attack with weaponry and explosives. Just the logistics would, we believe, be too difficult to pull off here. Think of the vehicles that would be required to carry that number of people to the school through all the security that is considered normal in Israel. In addition, in most of the schools here there isn't a single room with the space to hold all the students. So it would take even more attackers and weapons. And so we tell ourselves no.

Of course another issue for Israel is will the attitude change in Russia to the fighting of terror? (In other words, will Russia recognize that Israel is fighting terror?) The arrival of the Russian Foreign Minister in Israel this week may give some answers. (Probably not.)

R faced a situation of violence in school. During the bus ride (it's a private bus paid for by the parents), two girls decided to take apart the foam on the armrest and throw them at R. R told them to stop, but they didn't. When S heard about it, she told the girls' teacher. The next afternoon, a girl (I don't know if was one of the original 2) stopped R from getting on the bus. R avoided a fight (do I approve or disapprove?) and got on the next bus, which also passes our place. Many open questions on this one, we'll have to see what happens today.

I went to the wedding of a friend from work last Thursday. This friend lives on a secular kibbutz, so I had to check if the food was kosher (if it wasn't then I would have to decide whether to go to the wedding anyway, but leave before the meal). 3 of us shared a car ride and it was my first experience of watching a GPS system (on a HP iPAQ) give directions. It worked pretty well, but still sent us to the locked back entrance of the kibbutz instead of the front gate. We arrived on time (it took about an hour and a half) and congratulated the bride and groom, the parents of the bride and groom and then went to nosh on the pre-wedding food and drinks. Some time after we arrived the Rabbi who would perform the wedding arrived, and after a while came close and seemed to want to talk to me. The rabbi asked me if I would agree to be a witness at the wedding. I said yes, if the bride and groom agreed. They agreed and I advanced to from the role of simple guest to witness. Now my assumption was that the rabbi had asked the groom who would be suitable, but as assumptions often are, I was wrong.

Jewish weddings require 2 "kosher" witnesses. A straight-forward requirement is that the witnesses not be related to the bride and groom and that the witnesses be designated as "the" witnesses, which excludes from the role of witness all other guests. (There's more, but that's enough for now.) Rabbis normally prefer religious men as witnesses and I fitted the bill. I signed the government wedding certificate for registering the wedding with the Ministry of the Interior and the ketubah (the Jewish wedding certificate given by the groom to the bride. The rabbi also asked the groom if he wanted anyone in particular to say the blessings under the chupah (the wedding canopy). The groom said no, he (the Rabbi) should do it.

When the time came to gather under the chupah, several men (relatives of the bride and groom came forward requesting to say 1 of the blessings under the chupah, the rabbi allocated blessings and then surprised me by offering to me to say one of the blessings as well. This change of plans surprised the groom, but afterwards he said the choices of whom to say the blessings were very suitable.

It's a Jewish customer for the guests to entertain the bride and groom. Even on a secular kibbutz, this custom was not forgotten, with young girls and couples dancing in front of them.

Interestingly, because the friends from work came without partners, when the time came for dancing, none of us danced.

But what about my "incorrect assumption." Ah, I assumed that the rabbi went to the groom and asked who would be suitable. That wasn't so. The rabbi made a beeline to me on his own. So why me, from all the others who may have worn kippot (skullcaps) for the occasion. The secret must be that I also have a beard.

S and I have started looking for a kitchen for the new place. We hoped that it might be possible to extend the current kitchen, so we went to the people who built the current kitchen. It was correctly explained to us that no matter how much they tried, they wouldn't be able to match the colors of the kitchen exactly. It would look piecemeal. So with a slightly heavy heart we have now set ourselves forward to buy a new kitchen. We were also told that the kitchen will take 60 days from the day of measurement.

So it's the end of another month. ("So what!" I hear you say.) Well it's the day before school begins (strikes willing). It's the day after I missed my deadlines (hope the vertigo goes away). The Olympics are over. OK, nothing really earth shattering, but I've decided to write today anyway.

All of us visited the new house, to get the dimensions of the rooms. We picked up the room and kitchen drawings, but we forgot to measure the space taken up by the built-in cupboards. The new microwave oven I bought Friday will fit in the kitchen. (We donated the old microwave to R's school for the new Year 7 students to use.) But we'll still need to buy a new this, and a new that, and a new one of the other.

The weekend was quiet, with guests only for Shabbat lunch (HB and her son). Friday night I took a walk with E (the usual walk down to the Eruv line (marks the edge of the permitted carrying area of Rehovot for Shabbat) on the by-pass road). Sunday night I took a walk with R to the new house. Both times were excuses for the girls to talk. But no real deep things were said. Or to put it another way, the under-layer of deepness was not revealed to me. For example, R told me that a certain girl from her school had moved to another school. But it was S who told me that that girl was one of R's friends and that she hadn't returned calls during the summer.

I encouraged both to work on getting the next level of karate belt. R told me that she had to research a type of karate (and doesn't require my help). E told me she has to learn a lot more.

R started school on Sunday, while E goes back tomorrow. While R was suffering from end-of-school-vacation blues, I don't know if she is really happy in school.

S enrolled A in a basketball class (after school, 2 days a week). This will be a follow-up to the basketball camp he went to during summer. If he sticks with the class, it means we will have to buy him a proper basketball and put up a hoop at the new house. As always, it's not that we want him to be a star, it's just good upper-body exercise.

2 buses exploded in Beer Sheba, apparently due to 2 separate suicide attacks. At least 12 dead [1-8-04 16 dead] (86 wounded: 7 serious, 23 moderate, the rest light). First successful suicide bombing since March 14. We cannot stop them all.

Gal Fridman appears to have won Israel's first gold medal in the Olympics (and become the first Israeli to win 2 Olympic medals). Coming into the final race of the Mistral class (wind-surfing), he was assured of a medal. In the end he won by 10 points. (With the Bronze won by Ariel Zeevi in the 100kg Mens Judo, we (Israel) now are equal to Switzerland in the medal tally.)

Australia is in a different league with 14 golds (and 37 medals overall).

My vertigo is now under treatment with anti-histamines. So not only am I dizzy from time to time, I also see the world through an anti-histamine haze.

Not the movie, just the feeling that the room is spinning. Vertigo is a rotten thing to have. It started on Friday. Getting up from a prone position, lying down, rolling over in bed, all gives the same icky feeling. While it might be milder today, I'm going to have to make a doctor's appointment to see what can be done. I don't have much hope for any immediate cure. I was probably a little stupid riding my bicycle to work today, but it doesn't seem to kick in when I'm walking so I was probably safe.

Last week I spent some time putting older blog material, from my previous blog site, into this site. There is probably a lot I lost when my previous blog site went under, and I still have to check my home machine for any additional backups, but most of my material is now available on this site.

I also tried to straighten out my Webring connections, since two of them seem to be faulty. It will take some time until the mess is straightened out.

A recent video at home was Sense and Sensibility. R was interested to see "Snape" in a different role.

S's sister sent us a box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. She told us it was just so we could see them, as the product wasn't kosher. That disappointed the kids, so I did a little web digging and located the kashrut company that inspected one of the manufacturer's factories. Within 24 hours I received a note saying that they were kosher provided they were in the original packaging. As they were, my kids (and S) tried them this morning (they're not in my diet). The results were hilarious. One of those times when you wished you had brought out the video camera and taped the whole thing. A had the most trouble getting them down, while S ate the nice sounding ones and then had trouble with the less pleasant tasting ones. But what can you do with beans labeled "Vomit" or "Earthworm". R had trouble with black pepper.

Friday evening after the Shabbat meal, E and I had a nice long walk together. (A went to bed and R was with her friends in Scouts for the meal.) We didn't really discuss anything important. E was bitten by mosquitoes and due to the length of the walk E was so tired she went straight to sleep when we returned home.

E's started to think (and talk to S) about her Bat Mitzvah (which takes place, God willing, in just over a year). I hope I'll be included in the discussion.

The synagogue had a meeting of members to talk about various items. S and I attended, but out of 100 families, less than 20 turned up. First we elected a new member of the board, no real problem, only 1 candidate. Then there were 5 topics of discussion. First on the list, violence in the synagogue. Hey I know something about that. See my June 14 listing. But I kept my mouth closed. Amazingly enough the guy who was violent that day did most of the talking, in fact he didn't seem to stop all through the meeting. (Maybe I shouldn't be surprised as he talks all through the Shabbat service as well.) Nothing seemed to be decided.

Next topic, what time is Slichot services (prayer services done as preparation for Rosh haShana). According to the President of the synagogue we don't do them late enough. Solution, lets do it twice, those who want to do it really late can go to the second service.

Third topic, the third Shabbat meal (normally done between the afternoon service and the evening service on Shabbat afternoon. Should we have a meal at the synagogue? Normally we just have a lecture. The meal would cut into the lecture time, therefore no change to the synagogue routine.

Next topic was the Parshat haShavua talks (on the portion from the Torah read that week) during the Shabbat morning services. At first the discussions seemed to be on whether we needed the discussion during the morning service as well as before the previous evening service. Then the discussion moved to what people were saying in the talks, which seemed to be the actual reason for the problem. (I must admit I'm rude enough to read the Parshat haShavua printed pages that are distributed to the synagogues rather than listen to what people are saying.) My talkative "friend" started to talk about a particular person, but that was frowned on, so he decided to say that if women would dance with the Torah on Simhat Torah, he'd leave the synagogue. I was willing to give a Torah to S to dance with that very moment, but the Aron (cupboard where the scrolls are kept) was locked. No real decision taken, except that if a person's talk was so offensive, then maybe he wouldn't be invited to talk again.

The final topic was "silence" in the synagogue. (Doesn't this have something to do with the violence topic earlier?) Several decisions were taken (no radical ones), much to the despair of the "friend." Of course one of the simple solutions would have been if he'd offered to shut up. Lets see if the synagogue is any quieter.

One of the disturbing aspects of the meeting was the tendency toward lack of respect for some speakers. The amount of interruptions, which came from certain people, sometimes within sentences, not just at the end of them, was disgusting. (And I hate that word.) By the end S was shaking (both from air-conditioned cold and anger) from the way the "friend" spoke to her.

Well, remember the accident from last week. Well we knew (at the time) the people in one of the cars as friends of one of our neighbours, but it took till this week for the following conversation at work:

[I enter an elevator containing 2 fellow workers from our company in the middle of a conversation]
[He was saying] . . . of course some people [looking at me] would say it was because I was driving on Shabbat.
[I said] I didn't say anything. What happened?
[He said] I had a car accident on Friday.
[I said] Funny that, I say an accident on Friday. (And then I go on to describe the accident.)
[He said] That was my accident.

Anyway I apologised for not stopping; I'd only seen the back of his head so I hadn't recognised him. I explained that although I had seen the 2 cars collide I hadn't seen what came before, so I was useless as a witness.

I missed the deadline yesterday and S stole me from work early to visit my cousin and her family on Kibbutz Saad.

It was an uneventful drive. We brought kebab for the bar-b-que, they had chicken and sausages. I let my cousin's husband handle the fire and the cooking, I must admit he did neither the way I would. Another reason for keeping quiet.

We talked about various topics: the kibbutz's plans for expansion, schools for our sons (they also have one boy), the repugnance we have for certain types of Jewish upbringing. It wasn't a fantastic afternoon, but I at least enjoyed myself.

In the past week, 2 events stand out (apart from the obvious fact that I'm about to miss an important deadline at work).

The first was that S took me early from work one afternoon and we went to a forest playground near Bar Giora to have a bar-b-que with her cousins, who live in Beit Shemesh. We brought the mangal (small aluminium charcoal griller) and they brought the meat. I prefer lamb to chicken kebab, and the sausages were large, but tasteless. But I grill well, and everyone said they enjoyed the meal. After all the meat was cooked, they melted marshmallows over the hot coals. Their kids and mine played well together. Their oldest (a boy) is a little younger than R, they have a girl a little younger than E, and 3 younger boys so A also had people around his age. We stayed until it got dark and everyone seemed to have a good time.

On Friday late afternoon (we bring in Shabbat early), after we (me and the kids) had finished at synagogue, we were walking home. We had almost reached the traffic lights close to home. A had run ahead and was standing waiting at the corner for us to catch up. The traffic lights weren't working correctly, so only the yellow middle light was flashing in all directions. Suddenly 2 cars entered the intersection at the same time. Crash. The car coming from in front of us was turned to the left and ran into the signals in the middle of the road; the car from the left turned toward the corner where A was standing and fortunately stopped before coming close to A. A ran back toward us when the accident happened and fortunately wasn't hit by anything. One of the hubcaps from the car had circled around him though.

The new week brings the Olympics to our TVs. Fortunately we missed the Opening Ceremony, which mercifully was held on Friday night our time. With input from anti-Semite and anti-Israel Mikis Theodorakis, I'm glad I missed it.

Channel 1 is turning almost its entire programming over to the Olympics. I must admit I still enjoy watching Australia get Gold, as they have already done in swimming. (It's embarrassing to admit that I have difficulties remembering the words of the Australian national anthem.) We'll wait and see if Israel can do it this time.