- My older daughter, who recently received a lot of expensive birthday gifts from my overly generous and indulgent family, asked me if she could use her savings to buy herself a fancier cellphone. Apparently, her friends had mentioned that her brand new phone was "cheap" and that the "Sidekick Slide" (at $220) was "much cooler". Unfortunately for her, we were standing in Amazing Savings at the time, and I was trying to decide if I should splurge on a children's book that cost 89 cents. Let's just say that my answer was swift and merciless.
- Two weeks ago, I contacted a local Jewish organization that provides help to teenagers, asking if they could help me find someone who could learn gemara with my son from time to time. They never returned my call. Yesterday, we received a letter from them addressed to my son, asking for a donation. Instead of helping us, they simply added his name to their mailing list!
- My next door neighbor hates me. Intensely. She is in her 80s, has lived here for over 40 years, and is quite unhappy that the Jews have moved in to the neighborhood. Over the years, she has complained repeatedly about us to anyone who would listen. Lately, she has become obsessed with lining up my garbage cans. I see her out there every morning, obsessively moving my garbage cans around until they form a straight row. So, of course, every night, I go out there and mess them up. But there's no defeating her. She's very determined, like some psycho OCD robot. I'm losing patience with this game.
So. What ticked YOU off this week?
17 comments:
I find it funny that just the other day she was so happy that she got a new cell phone, and now she is just jealous of the other people with better phones. Just goes to show how people are never happy and that the grass is always greener on the other side.
As for learning with your son, why not try asking the Minahel if he can hook him up with an older buchur as a chavrusa. I'd think that the yeshiva would be glad to do this. Good Luck.
Try to give the old hag a heart attack: Simply CART OFF all the garbage cans one night, she'll wake up, see them missing and keel over :P
I have a good one. I asked the assistant director of the preschool (preschool, not Harvard!) where I am applying my daughter to for next Fall what the criteria are for her getting accepted. Her reply? "It's not first come, first served. It's really more what connection you have to the director". Straight to my face, it's who you know! As someone with no connections, I found this despicable. Then again, if I had a connection, maybe I wouldn't feel this way
I was thinking something along the line of what JDJ suggested, except that my version of it was to just move the garbage cans just 2 mm off of the mark.
As for people who tick me off, my nutjob of a professor. She is a lousey teacher, and then complains that she "Can't understand why we don't know (fill in object of complaint)as we went over it all last week." Ummm..no, you just complained about everyone last week. Was there supposed to be a lesson in that rant?
If you lived in Highland Park, I could probably find you someone to learn with your son.
Shabbat Shalom.
1) i may need to get a fancy phone for work, but in the meantime i'm using a piece of crap that i shnorrered off of Teaneck Shuls:
http://agmk.blogspot.com/2007/01/cell-phone-tzedakah.html
make her use my phone for a week and i guarantee you she'll be happy when you give her her's back.
but what do you care if she blows her savings on a new phone? (i assume we're not talking about a college fund or something like that.) just make sure you have the will to refuse her next request that should have been paid from her now-depleted savings. let it be a lesson to her.
2) there must be some type of tutoring gemach? or contacting the local mesivtas? but that's some real chutzpah that they ask now for a donation.
"What ticked YOU off this week?"
a) being informed that after all the vacation time for jr in תשרי, there will be no school this week for veterans' day
b) after sinking $1100 into my car, i drove home to find 2 new problems that the mechanic swears aren't related to what he just fixed. one problem can be fixed for $300. the other he says is not even worth fixing. so in the meantime i am driving around praying the car doesn't stall out on the highway on ערב שבת
"is quite unhappy that the Jews have moved in to the neighborhood"
tell her that her house is worth 10 times what she bought it for 40 years ago (even taking into acount the recent market drop) precisely because of all the frum jews.
put a bunch of very heavy things in the cans for a few days. she will get worn out and stop.
I appreciate your honesty, but I have to say I have a soft spot for anyone over 80. Give this person a break. I learned the most beautiful lesson getting to know an aide at a nursing home where I frequently visited a relative. I watched as this African American women was repeatedly called horrible names by some of the elderly patients (mostly with dementia). She continued to treat them all with loving kindness. I asked her one day how she did it. She said that if she was brought up by racists she probably would be no better and that she was not going to judge someone so many years her senior. She also said she couldn't judge whether the comments were the result of true racism or mean spiritedness or were the result of dementia.
So while this person should not be given a free pass for anti-semitic comments made 40 years ago, give him/her a break on the garbage can thing.
Let the neighbor line your garbage cans, but get a lawyer to send her an official letter that if she injures herself in any way by doing it, you're notifying her that it is her sole responsibility. Any damage she does to your property, or herself, is her responsibility, and she can be sued.
Put up a no trespassing sign, too. If you don't know a lawyer willing to do a favor, the law colleges usually have services for that stuff.
I sympathize over the 3 issues!
Wow! Thank you all for your suggestions. I am seriously considering taking Rafi's advice and weighting the garbage cans down.
anonymous-
You are obviously a much nicer person than I am. This woman has been bugging me for years, and I have no desire to be nice to her. (And her anti-semitism- and racism, BTW- is not 40 years old, it's very much current.)
As for my son's need for Gemara help: it never ceases to amaze me how God always jumps in and helps out when I need Him. Flash came home from shul on Shabbos, saying that the Rabbi was starting a Saturday night learning group in the shul. He went there with his Gemara notes, and found a neighbor who helped him study for his test. He plans on going every Saturday night to review the week's lessons.
And- wonder of wonders- my daughters is no longer kvetching about her cellphone. She has found lots of new things to kvetch about.
She has found lots of new things to kvetch about.
I love that!
What ticked me off this week:Proud Racist Jews, Driving in Brooklyn.
I would suggest getting out the ladder and piling them on top of each other...TIMBER!!!you never know what might work....
I can imagine those things being annoying. But what's wrong with the old lady straightening your garbage cans?
Lion Of Zion: "but what do you care if she blows her savings on a new phone?"
cause then she's wasting her money, it probably won't teach her a lesson and she will always want to take from her savings. My view is that children's money shouldn't be touched.
Very good point about the value of the house, I didn't even realize that, that's so cool!
Super Raizy: what ticked me off this week...at first nothing, but now that I think about it, I can list so much.
1- Being asked to babysit till 12 at night 2 days in a row, and when I said it's a bit late for me, being told that she can prepare a bed for me in her house, as if that solves any problems!
2- forgetting about a midterm, and getting back the grade and doing horribly!
Thanks for stopping by. I did read the book The Boy Who Loved Anne Frank, and like you, thought it compelling.
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