“I’m your personal AI assistant. I can help with any questions about your site or account.” Anyone who knows me well is aware of my above-average verbal fluency. But that comes from a lifetime of communication with fellow members of my species, where with a little give and take, a little clarification, a smile, a gesture, I can get my point across, even if it involves a little effort on both sides. But with greater and greater frequency, I am (make that ‘we are’) being asked to have a dialog, a conversation with something non-human, in which you ask a question and an answer appears on your phone or computer. I’m not as clueless about AI as the current U.S. Secretary of Education, who confused AI with A-1, a bottled marinade you can slather on a steak, but I’m never satisfied by outperforming the dumbest person in the room.
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The Oy Gevalt Group
We have a few friends who worry a lot, so much so that Barbara and I worry that our friends are spending too much of their time and energy pursuing their worries. I have on several occasion told these worry-warts that they have crossed the line. They’ve gone beyond worrying and are in fact obsessing, and that’s not good. What do you mean I’m obsessing? If you are letting someone or something live rent free in your brain, you are obsessing. (Imagine your washing machine filled to the brim, endlessly cycling, and never getting your clothes clean. That’s what it’s like.)
The Oy Gevalt Group
We have a few friends who worry a lot, so much so that Barbara and I worry that our friends are spending too much of their time and energy pursuing their worries. I have on several occasion told these worry-warts that they have crossed the line. They’ve gone beyond worrying and are in fact obsessing, and that’s not good. What do you mean I’m obsessing? If you are letting someone or something live rent free in your brain, you are obsessing. (Imagine your washing machine filled to the brim, endlessly cycling, and never getting your clothes clean. That’s what it’s like.)
Coffee, Catheters, and More Coffee
Bad-Ass or Badder-Ass?
Should I start out this episode by discussing what I do have (…at least I have some coffee.) or what I still don’t seem to have (an appointment to get my prostate shrunk to its normal size)? Let’s begin on a positive note because…, well, because life seems better when we’re all properly caffeinated.
The Oy Vey Club — Part Seven
If I can use the story line in something I’m trying to write, then who’s to say it can’t and won’t happen in real life? Two people are chatting about something of minimal consequence, when their gabfest turns into a real conversation. It did happen to me, and I’ll tell you all about it. But first a little background information.
It was Monday, and I was coming back from the shuk… Wait a minute, don’t you usually go on Thursday? Well yes, except the Thursday in question was Yom Kippur. (Digression: when I was a callow youth, I composed a little ditty entitled, ‘I’m feeling chipper, ‘cause tomorrow is Yom Kippur.’ It only works if you do it New York style, Yum KIPper) I wasn’t going to wait until the last minute, i.e, Wed., to head into Jerusalem, and I had other plans for Tues (see below), so it was Monday or never, because I had, and you will agree with me, important things to take care of, to wit:
The Oy Vey Club Redux
Here are some thoughts that came to me as we were sitting around the table on a Fri. night, Barbara and I, with a woman we’ve known for many years and her twenty-year-old daughter. Why not share my musings with those assembled near and far?
A Dream about a Dream
Prologue
Don’t ask me why I still remember such a trivial incident, something that happened some twenty years ago, but here it is…
It must have been on a Friday, because I was heading home from work mid-day, walking the one block on W. 40 St. between the subway station and Port Authority. And there were two guys duking it out in the middle of the street. Not going at it, as in a bar room brawl with fists flying. More shuffling than scuffling, a lot of dancing and prancing, with every once in a while, one of the guys attempting to land a punch. One of the combatants was a good ten years older than the other, and it was obvious he was running out of steam.
Having Something to Do with a New Granddaughter
You mean you put everyone in a big machine and smush them around until they’re all mixed up?
Well, not exactly.
Try explaining to an eight-year-old what a blended family is. Probably better off giving an example, as in: Liel is Gil’s daughter from his first marriage, and one day this young lady was explaining to her cousin that she now has two mothers. No, said the cousin– a year older and hence much smarter – you have a mother and a step-mother. But she’s a nice stepmother; she’s not a mean stepmother. That’s what Natania became when she married Gil, the nice kind. And by extension, Barbara and I became blended grandparents – the nice kind. As my wife puts it, we’re related by love, not blood.
The Oy Vey Club — Part 6
You have an appointment at the clinic at Ein Kerem in the morning and a wedding to go to that same evening? That should keep you on your toes. Well, yeah. The appointment at the urology clinic had been scheduled in the distant past (meaning months and months ago), and we were going to show up, come hell or high water. The wedding? Miri-tal and Michael were getting married on Aug. 7 at Lago, the meat restaurant at the Puddle at the new entrance to our fair city. That got scheduled much more recently. The moral of the story? It’s easier to schedule a wedding here in The Land than to book an appointment with your favorite medical specialist.
The Oy Vey Club — Part 5
‘Maybe you should be glad your body parts don’t connect to wi-fi? Our wi-fi only works when it wants to…Feel better!!!!’
alittlebiteast 