We went to the Lapps for new Years Eve. We four brought in a Chinese dinner, ate and talked until 11 p.m., when we had a champagne toast and then went home. We fondly recalled the good New Year’s Eve square dance parties we used to go to. I surely don’t miss staying up till the wee hours, but I do miss the dancing.
Category: Pleasures
Rosh Hashana
Our Rosh Hashanah dinner last Monday was great. All the food tasted wonderful and the company [*] was a loving and lovable group.
All of us had attended services at Beth Israel and heard the same sermon, but you’d have thought we ten people had heard three different sermons, so different were the reactions. I was in the high approval category!
[* In addition to Seymour and Bernice: Barbara and Harold Richman, Lakey and Charlie Grossman, Doris and Isaac Shapiro, David Saltzman, Maureen Festi.]
At the theatre
Last night we and the Lapps went to see Phantom of the Opera now having a 7-week run at the Bushnell. Every seat sold out for every performance! We had 1st balcony seats ($50 each!) which were quite good. The staging is incredible, the music gorgeous.
Dad had seen the show in New York last year on one of his genealogical forays there, and had sat in the sixth row. He said this version was just as good and maybe more enjoyable, since he’d had time to hear the music in the interim on the CDs he bought immediately after the first viewing, and understood everything better.
I knew the story from listening to the novel on a recorded book. But I was totally unprepared for – but enthralled by – the music, the scenery and costuming, the creative genius of the whole production.
Spring blossoms
We are finally starting to get some spring time here. I’ve got some hyacinths in the house from several clumps of bulbs that David planted for me last fall in the front. I love them! The jonquils and forsythia are in full array and the tulips are starting to blossom. The trees are very pregnant with budding leaves and magnolia and dogwood trees are bursting too. Our apricot tree is covered with blossoms (may they all turn into fruit!). It stands right in front of one of the living room windows so that I keep the blind on that window up all day and every time I walk past the living room I can look out and see the tree. It’s like a beautiful painting.
Persimmons
Two weeks ago Waldbaum’s was selling “Sharon” fruit [persimmons] from Israel. I bough a bunch of them at 50 cents each. They look like beat-up, bruised pale orange tomatoes, but they are deliciously sweet at that stage.
The next week they sold for 69 cents each and I bought some more.
This week the Crown was charging $1 for one (according to Dad).
I plan to go to the Crown for my next shop and speak to the manager: “How do you expect to promote Israeli produce when you charge such an outrageous price?”
… My book group last week gobbled them up. Same for the two I took over to the Richmans. I hope they’re available when I’m in Israel. It’s my new favorite fruit.
Scrabble
Rita and I played three games of scrabble this afternoon – the first time in about 2 months!
Square dancing
I finished three weeks of radiation [for breast cancer] (the half-way point) this past Friday after which we and the Lapps went to Troy NH for a square-dance weekend at East Hill Farm.
… The weather was lovely (spring), saw many of our old and oldest friends in the square dancing world, danced only a little less than usual and altogether had a grand time. Especially because I knew Boss was okay [following surgery] before we left.
Israeli songfest
Attended a wonderful event last night. The Hadassah meeting at Emanuel Synagogue was an Israel 40 celebration. After 45 minutes of speeches (interesting and laudatory of Hadassah), Sim Glaser and Laura Deutsch performed a medley of Israeli songs. Sim played guitar, flute and keyboard; Laura played guitar and keyboard. The audience was huge (elderly but enthusiastic). Sim and Laura are wonderful together. Their voices blend beautifully. Sim wrote some introductory poetic remarks and wise-cracked wittily. He really knows how to get an audience to participate.
Just before the end (Hatikvah), they sang an oldie (which they said they were reviving): Halleluyah! Boy did that bring back good memories of square dance days.
Israeli fruit
I had the pleasure of finding Jaffa oranges and Carmel tomatoes at both the Crown and Foodmart this past month. Bought them and got people around me to buy them, too!