Shabbat

This Shabbat I stayed in Dimona. There was supposed to be a big party in the village on Friday and there had been a huge argument as to whether we should have made a pool for the party or not. There were emails going back and forth with some saying it would be fun to have it and others saying it was just a huge waste of water. In the end there was no pool and the party was just about six of us.

That night, a few of us had a small dinner in Keren's caravan. She wanted to have it at her place instead of the Moadon so it would be more homey. It was, though a little bit crowded. I left a little before midnight to take Shoko on our Shabbat walk and then we went right to bed.

This morning, Shoko woke me up at 6 am. I decided that this was as good a time as any to start getting into the habit of waking up in the morning to walk him, since I won't just be able to open the door for him and go back to sleep when I get back to New Jersey. So, after lots of prodding, whining and nibbling on my hand, I got up and went for a run. Hopefully I'll keep that up, but I think I'll start by just making sure I do it again tomorrow morning.

We got back and Shoko went back to sleep under my chair and I got dressed for shul. But since we switched the clocks, services began at 8 instead of 7 when I got there. Oy. So I came back and read for an hour. When Boaz and I got back from shul, we both passed out and woke up a 3 hours later to Gal pounding on our door. We were about to miss lunch. So we hazily made our way down to Ma'ayan's caravan where we were eating. I think I like having these smaller meals at homes instead of having them in the Moadon all the time. While I was there I got to read an article about Benny Morris' new book (shameless plug). In it he explores how the US not only coerced other nations to vote in favor of Partition in 1947, but even bribed some countries (like Costa Rica for $45,000). He also examines the War of Independence from a religious point of view rather than political (Jihad as the motivator rather than Arab nationalism), though since the article was in Hebrew and I was therefore reading slowly, I didn't get to finish it. I guess I'll have to buy the book to find out more (but not from Tzomet Sfarim).

After Mincha, Boaz showed me some pictures from his time in the army. I think they may have been misleading, unless, that is, the IDF has its soldiers just hanging out, swimming in lakes and going on nature hikes. We then took Shoko for our own little nature hike out in the dessert or as the Dimonans called it "the hills.) When we got back, Shabbat was over and after a quick havdalah, Mor suggested we go see a movie. We saw "Sherlock Holmes." It was a fun movie and there were murmurs whenever they showed close ups of the spell books that were covered in Hebrew. Funny, I don't remember learning any magic in Hebrew school.

Here is Shoko looking pretty vicious... but really I just caught him in between a sneeze and a yawn.