Oh… *ehem*… my apologies…
So it’s Rosh Hashanna, the Jewish new year. The year is 5778. For two days, we celebrate and eat far too much delicious food, so that the week after, on Yom Kippur, we can fast for around 24 hours or so to atone for our sins (because unlike Catholics, we only have to feel guilty once a year, instead of year round… we spend the rest of the year making everybody else feel guilty. BOOM! [I can make that joke because I’m Jewish… you can’t… unless you’re Jewish]).
So apparently Agent Orange thinks he can bring peace to the Middle East…
Despite bleak prospects for success, President Donald Trump promised on Wednesday “to do whatever is necessary” to forge an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal.
At a White House meeting with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, Trump pledged to reinvigorate the stalled Mideast peace process that has bedeviled his predecessors and said he would serve as “a mediator, an arbitrator or a facilitator” between the two sides. “We will get it done,” Trump confidently told Abbas.
(Quick note… this is the last of the overly religious posts for now, my fellow atheists. I just enjoy this holiday and want to share it with y’all.)
The first night of Passover ended on Monday, April 10. Well… okay… it actually ended today, March 11th, just after midnight. And it was a lot of fun… well… it would have been, but I’ll get to that…
First things first…
Of course there was a lot of religiosity, here. It’s a Jewish holiday, after all, which means services, prayers, and all that jazz. I don’t mind it, personally, because I grew up with it, and it’s not boring. Since my atheism isn’t exactly a secret, I got to make little asides and jokes last night that my family largely found funny because they know where I’m coming from. I have to be more careful tonight, because tonight’s seder is with some of Dad’s congregants, and they don’t know. But I’m okay with that, since I’ll probably be more focused on my fingers which… again… I’ll get to that…
We actually shortened things up nicely last night, so we got to the meal quicker than we have in the past, which was great. And the meal, of course, was delicious!
But I’m getting ahead of myself (largely to pad out this intro before the fold… 😛 )…
(Quick note: all but one of the links in the paragraph about music go to YouTube videos.)
So… sundown tonight starts the eight-day Jewish holiday of Passover. I largely enjoy the holiday. The seders on the first and second night are quite a bit of fun, and the food is amazing. Wine, horseradish (my brother and I are making the horseradish sauce from scratch this year!), homemade haroset, brisket (So. Much. Brisket.), surprisingly amazing desserts (surprising because of the Kashrut restrictions for Passover) and more… the food is wonderful.
I’d be lying if I said that the food at the seders isn’t what makes it for me. It’s a bit of a joke that most Jewish holidays (with the exception of Yom Kippur, since it’s a fasting holiday) basically just exist as an excuse for massive feasts, but there’s some truth to that. Jews really know how to eat, and Passover seders are just one really good example of that.