I’m humbled and astounded by the positive reaction to this week’s Civil Society Column in Connect, “Lunch with the Romeos.”

People have been emailing and calling all week with stories of their own about this particular group of Old Guys who Rule. I even got a shout-out in Adam Solender’s weekly newsletter—shepping nachas, yo!

What I didn’t mention in the column was that all those bolded names are, of course, huge players in the Jewish community. They’re the reason why the JEA exists and each synagogue has working bathrooms. Their presence and generosity ensures solid respect for Judaism in a traditional Christian town. They are Savannah’s machers.

And I’m not gonna call out a single one ’em for eating shrimp at the Golf Club.

Speaking of the Golf Club, I thought it was a weird place to hold this little shindig since it’s been my understanding that this one of the handful of nasty places that didn’t allow Jews (or blacks) to be members until far into the 20th century. The Savannah Yacht Club and the Oglethorpe Club are known offenders who opened their doors after greed trumped bigotry, but I haven’t been able to confirm or deny the history of the Gold Golf Club.

(Oops, the Savannah Gold Club is a totally different place that would be completely inappropriate for a Romeo lunch, not to mention far more unkosher than shrimp cocktail.)

The Golf Club is reported to be the first course built in the United States, which I’m hoping golf historian and macher Joel Zuckerman can help confirm. As far as the other history, anyone in the community have any info?

(Speaking of Jewish folks who like to hit little balls, how ya like these “Mazel Putts” golf markers from Yontifications.com?)

In the meantime, a stellar Shabbos to all and mucho mazel to the Cohen Family on their oldest son Max’s bar mitzvah eve!

Here’s Lunch with the Romeos:

My father–in–law called me up last week in the middle of the day, which was odd.

First of all, he usually avoids me during work hours lest I chase him down with a request to carpool a gaggle of yammering Girl Scouts. Second, ever since he bought a Droid he has become an obsessive texter.

But even weirder than hearing his voice on the line was his request:

“I want to take you to lunch at the Savannah Golf Club with the other Romeos.”

Mystifying. Even more than a jabble of Corps of Engineers water data from the last 60 years, which is what I was looking at when he called. As far as I know, this recently retired oncologist has never played golf in his life.

And though he is a very nice–looking man, I think the nurses who worked with him through 40 years in practice would agree that no one but my mother–in–law would classify him as a “Romeo.”

After I asked him if he was planning to pawn me off so he could make way for a newer model of daughter–in–law, maybe one that didn’t crab at him to quit texting at the dinner table, he explained that “ROMEO” is an acronym for Retired Old Men Eating Out.

This still sounded slightly dangerous, but I’m never one to turn down a free lunch.

Click here to read the rest.

Normally, I’m kvelling all over the The Groggers, some very cute Jewish boys who manage to sound respectably punk rock while jumping around in their tzitit.

They caused quite a tsimmes with their single, “Get,” about a douchey husband who refuses to give his wife a divorce, and you’ve gotta have love for a song called “The Shidduch Hits the Fan.”

But what’s up with the new single “Jewcan Sam”?

Does this not seem weirdly self-hating? And am I understand that adorable Dougie ACTUALLY got a nose job and chronicled it here?

Maybe I’m just getting old because I don’t get it. At all.

I’m sorry, you guys, I know it’s been ages since I’ve written a proper rambling post but I’ve just been writing so much other stuff lately that the letters on the keyboard are starting to swim.

Words keep following me home and harrassing me while I’m trying to relax. I swear I was feeding the chickens yesterday when one turned into a giant feathery comma. I’ve been having dreams that I’m lost inside a thesaurus and the only way out is to find a synonym for “thesaurus.”

I think I may be having a communications breakdown with language itself.

It doesn’t help that El Yenta Man just sent me this mind-melting illustration showing how every Hebrew letter is contained within the Star of David.

Fabulous.

Now I’ll have alephs and lameds chasing me down the street while I walk the dog.

So sez Charlotte Glynn, a Columbia MFA student tryin’ to get her film made of the same name.

I happened upon her Kickstarter page and I have to say, the plot sounds hilariously blasphemous:

Our film starts with Tova, our feisty and cutting protagonist, who is looking forward to hosting the first night of Passover with her brother, Sol. But Sol has disappeared with the brisket and Tova has woken up from a one-night stand with a hickey on her breast that looks like the Virgin Mary. Colin, the one-night stand, thinks he’s witnessed a miracle and will not leave her side. To make things worse, angry drug dealers have thrown a brick through Tova’s window, threatening her for a late payment. With four hours until sundown, will Tova be able to find Sol, shake Colin, avoid the drug dealers and get Passover off without a hitch?

Sounds like the most meshuggeneh onscreen seder since “When Do We Eat?”, nu?

All I want to know is if I donate, do I get a t-shirt?

Oh, the boys are back and they’re nicer than ever:

The 2012 Nice Jewish Guys Calendar is out and ready for you to take it home, pin it up and knit it some socks. You can spend a whole year with these mensches who love their mothers and always wipe down the toilet seat.

Of course all the important (and not-so-important) Jewish holidays are marked—so sweet to be reminded of Tu B’av by a smiling hipster wielding a spatula!

As an added bonus, you can bring in the first three months of 2013 with some Nice Jewish Girls, either for your single brother or maybe you swing both ways; who am I to judge?

My favorite is Pete here, who likes hardcore hiphop and describes his ideal woman as a “yenta.”

So sorry, babeleh, I’m already taken. 😉

Buy it at ModernTribe.com.

I suppose it’s inevitable that the “Sh*t Girls Say” meme infected the Jewish world.

It is not, kinehora, in the form of a wince-worthy Jersey girl spouting stereotypes in something tagged “Sh*t Jewish Girls Say” (though I’m sure it’s being produced somewhere as I write.)

No, it’s in the form of “Sh*t Christians Say to Jews,” and it’s wince-worthy nonetheless:

While I think the actress’ delivery is perfectly dopey, it’s obviously cribbed from “Sh*t White Girls Say to Black Girls“, but not quite as funny. Then again, I snorted tea through my nose when “Your mom converted? So you’re half Christian. Omigod, you’re half saved!”

I have far too many lovely, intelligent Christians in my life to be posting this video with unchecked ribaldry, but I have experienced a few moments like this over the years. Such as “So, are you guys, like, sho-MAR fuckin’ Shabbosh?”

There also may have also been a time when some blond girl asked me how many days were in a Jewish year in eighth grade, which many years later I realized was NOT an insult but a perfectly valid question.

Of all of them, nothing’s ever topped the time I ran into one of my son’s classmates and her mother in the toy aisle of Target a few years ago. We were chatting amiably about the holidays, when suddenly she hit me with this:

“So if you don’t have Jesus, what do you call God? That’s right, you people don’t believe in God.”

I choked for a sec and very calmly said, “You might want to check your sources, because according to the them, my people actually invented God.”

Haven’t seen her since.

Well, lookee here, it’s halfway through January and I just cleaned the menorahs.

I count this is as healthy, as I tend to be rather OCD about undone chores (El Yenta Man calls it “naggy freak syndrome.”) So far in 2012, I have been experimenting with defying my natural neuroses in order to live a more relaxed, enjoyable life. So if you happen to stop by, please know that it is this honorable attempt at self-improvement and not laziness as to why there is a pile of dirty towels threatening to sprout mushrooms in the hallway.

But I’ve got another source of hyperventilation for a Jewish mother: Since winter break, Yenta Boy has found himself completely without any extracurricular activities.

Soccer season ended in November, and Wednesday Hebrew group lessons disbanded before Chanukah as the pre-bar mitzvah kids study their Torah portions with private tutors. We’re even between piano teachers at the moment, which is somewhat shocking since the kid was practically on his way to the “X Factor” this time last year.

Of course, this is unacceptable. As every Jewish mother knows, a child cannot possibly succeed in life without weekly formal training in a sport, multiple instruments, a foreign language and possibly chess. As I understand it, large amounts of unstructured time after school cause brain rot and may possibly lead to fast-food jobs and meth problems.

Since I became a mother, I have been quite zealous in the educational enrichment department. Starting with phenomenally expensive KinderMusik classes where toddlers gleaned the basics of musical theory by bashing each other over the head with frog-shaped tambourines, and moving on to gymnastics lessons, composed of toddlers bashing into each other on room-sized trampolines, my children were enriched to the gills during the all-important 0-5 developmental stage.

Team sports and music and dance lessons came once they hit school, along with mid-week Hebrew for the big one. At one point last year, both of them had an activity every single day, resulting in a logistical conundrum that had me driving all over town and having nightmares about forgetting someone at ballet. In a weak moment, I was tempted to post a dorky “Mom’s taxi” stickers on the back of the Absurdivan.

Make no mistake, I’m no Tiger Mother. Each kid asked, nay, begged, to participate in everything that piqued their interest (such as the year my little yiddishe sweetheart was swept away by the Riverdance) Thanks to the Bubbie Scholarship Fund, they were able, and I, wanting them to follow their idiosyncratic hearts, chauffeured.

Now that they’re eight and almost 12, and I’m a working-outside-the-house mama again, we’ve lost momentum. Gone are the fanatic hopes that we have birthed genius prodigies or and Olympic ice skater. Little Yenta Girl takes violin on her brother’s hand-me-down fiddle on Thursdays, only because lessons are in the band room right after school. She’s also a Girl Scout because the leaders are rockin’ post-feminist moms friends of mine who let her tag along to their house after school. Slso, we’re in it for the cookies.

The boy, for now, has yawning chasms of afternoons to do his sixth grade homework, fold towels at his dad’s gym or plunk around on the piano when he feels like it instead of throwing artistic tantrums over the evil syncopation of “Maple Leaf Rag.”

Even though there’s been far less stress in the house since we’re not rushing all over town and being subjected to the same Handel arpeggios for hours, it’s hard for me to let him have this downtime. I’m worried that he’s falling behind, or worse, that this ridiculously articulate and talented ‘tween will end up selling 8-balls out the back door of Taco Bell.

And yet like the stinky pile of towels in the hallway, maybe this free time is the lesson in itself. Yesterday, we walked dog aimlessly for an hour, pointing out strange-shaped leaves and chatting about whether humans will make it Mars in his lifetime. After we shook the mud from our shoes, I noticed his foot is almost as big as mine. Later, after he’d putted around on Facebook and read a couple of chapters of the new Christopher Paolini novel, he wandered over to the piano and began sightreading “Stand By Me,” which I’d placed there hoping he would do exactly that.

Of course, the minute I suggested he add the left hand, he fled for the bathroom to fix his hair. For an hour.

Still, I’m going to ignore the neurosis and relax, because I know it will end soon: Middle school track season starts in March, as does his nose-to-parchment bar mitzvah training. And if anyone knows a Savannah piano teacher who can inspire a kid to love Chopin as much as he does Lady Gaga, let me know.

As promised, the women of the beleaguered Jerusalem suburb responded to the issue of gender segregation by gettin’ all footloose on Friday to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now”:

Of course, a bunch of Orthodox women dancing together isn’t exactly provocative, as many bloggers have already pointed out (including 972’s Roee Ruttenberg , who called the effusive performance “antagonistic and counterproductive.” Dude needs to relax–tefillin too tight, bro?)

Still, it made a statement heard ’round the world that not all observant Jews are psychos who expectorate on little girls or make women sit at the back of the bus. But a protest that included a penis would have been much more effective.

*sigh.* Why does life always seems to be one drag queen short of a revolution?

So, this may be soooo 2011, but maybe some of you haven’t heard about the ultra-Orthodox a-holes the Jerusalem suburb of Beit Shemesh who spit on an eight year-old girl last week…for going to school.

Oh, and they also called her a whore.

Seriously, look at her. It’s not like this poor child was dressed in those horrid pink velour kiddie sweatpants with “Juicy” emblazoned across the tushie. Her mother covers her hair and wears long skirts; only a freakin’ burka could be more “modest.” Perhaps that explains the riotous reverb from mainstream Israelis, who are sick of being bullied by extremist peyes-sporting sociopaths. These are the same sociopaths used Nazi costumes to draw attention to their victimization of being subjected to seeing a woman’s actual hair on the way to the grocery store.

See, in Judaism, much like in any other religions, there’s observant, where you have certain people who follow the laws and keep women separate in synagogue and do their best to emulate God. In my experience, observant Jews are good peeps who do their thing and don’t try to make you feel bad about being a heathen who dances around drunk in a bikini on New Year’s Day eating bacon. (Who did this? What? Shut up.)

Then there’s batsh*t fundamentalist, where no matter what religious background you think you identify with, you have crossed into the psycho cesspool where the Taliban wacks and the child-porn selling Christians all pray to the same phallic Deity of Misogynistic Pigginess. Anyone who spits on a child (or stones a woman, or harrasses anyone who doesn’t comply with their particular brand of religious crazy) is in the wrong. Few things are really that simple.

As if Israel doesn’t have enough problems, it now appears that it’s headed for a culture war between the fundamentalists and um, the sane people.

But the true ruach of creative independence remains alive and well: A group of ladies who live where the riots broke out have organized the ultimate protest: A pre-Shabbos booty-shaking flash mob. Add in some singing, and those creepy haredi men might dissolve into the spittle-covered pavement. I’ll post it here when it goes live.

Good luck, and bring those umbrellas, Beit Shemesh ladies!