Oooh, Purim’s a’comin’ and that means it’s a mitzvah to raise your glass ’til you can’t tell the difference between a Haman and leperchaun. Or something.

It’s also the season of song parodies—and they get better every year! Jew-ish rocker mama-to-be Pink seems to have penned the choice tune to Yidify in 5771. Yes, “Raise Your Glass,” her catchy anthem to all the “dirty little freaks,” has spawned two different Purim spoofs that’ll have you head-bobbing all week:

First, fresh off their Chanukah superhit (yo, it went mainstream!), are Yeshiva University heartthrobs The Maccabeats—cute, cheeky AND kosher.

Mashing up the same song with a wild Israeli flair (and women) are the Fountainheads, encouraging us to “raise our masks”—a reminder that all the cool mommies and daddies go in costume!

Of course, it wouldn’t be right if I didn’t raise a toast my very favorite Purim spoof from waaaaay back in 5667, Shabot 6000’s Shusan Shabot:

Oh, you’re looking for a version of the Purim story to go with your hangover? Shalom Sesame keeps it simple. Cheers!

I don’t know how the completely fabulous Dana International has flown under my radar considering my adoration for rockin’ trannies. (I think my affection comes from the deep respect for the bravery it takes to be who you are and also the superior make-up application abilities that far surpass my own.)

I feel so darn provincial: This supergorgeous superstar is considered one of the most famous transsexual (transgender?) celebrities in the world. The disco queen will be representing Israel in the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest in Dusselfdorf in May—13 years aftershe won the entire shebang in 1998 for her song “Diva.”

Check out 2011’s “Ding Dong“, which may or may not have the same intended double entendre as Lady Gaga’s “disco stick”:

I’m thinking we need a full-on Gaga/Dana collaboration wearing giant horns in weird places dancing around an effigy of Quaddafi…

I’ve been neglecting my Yenta duties since I’ve added the chapeau of “Office Manager” for El Yenta’s Man’s new venture to my arsenal of hats. I’m working hard to set him up for success, which means figuring out where to buy tri-fold paper towels, keeping sharp objects out of his way and not rolling my eyes every time he pretends to know how to use online bill pay.

Tell me, wives: If you’ve ever had to work for your husband, even temporarily, how do you manage to not stab him in the face with the plastic spork that came with the takeout lunch you brought to him without being asked and then he complained there wasn’t enough mayo? Deep breaths, yes…

There’s also been more to handle in Yentaland:

Tuesday night, a trio of Ethiopian Israelis came through Savannah to present “Israel at Heart” programs at Savannah State University and the JEA. A few days before, Ben, the JEA program director, asked me to host all three for the night after their program. Ben is a very nice young man who does not have children. He wouldn’t understand that he should be slapped for asking a harried Jewish mother with no guest room to find beds and breakfast for three strangers on a school night. But because he was so polite about it and was willing to shave it down to just one Ethiopian Israeli if someone hosted the others, I agreed with a grumble. He also used the magic words that key right into every Jewish mother’s heart: “It’s a mitzvah.”

Great, just what I needed. A guilt trip from God. But the “mitzvah card” always works on me. I mean, if Abraham and Sarah could wash people’s stinky feet after they’ve traveled through the desert, surely I could throw some sheets on the futon and scare up an extra cup of coffee in the morning for a young person who’s educating folks about Israel.

Tomer Marsha turned out to be a lovely houseguest for the few hours he was here, and the children adored him. He didn’t even mention all the dog hair on the futon.

I sort of forgot to mention it to El Yenta Man, who stayed out late at a Fat Tuesday party (what Jew can resist a good Catholic throwdown?) and was preparing to leave at dawn for an early client when he scurried back into the bedroom and whispered “Did you know there’s a black man sleeping in the office?”

(Of course I had mentioned it, but I didn’t mention it the magical number of times it takes to stick in his brain without going over the amount threshold where he accuses me of nagging. Husband-wife communication is an inexact science.)

We didn’t attend the JEA lecture, and Tomer was happy to tell us about his upbringing near Tel Aviv over fresh chicken eggs and (too weak for Israelis) coffee. He was born during the weeks his parents risked their lives to emigrate from Ethiopia to Israel as part of the mass exodus the 80s—a sabra by the skin of his teeth. Though some Ethiopian families have had a difficult time melding into Israeli life, Tomer and his family planted roots and thrived. He grew up very religious but finds more meaning in the inclusive spirituality of many Israeli youth and now lives a secular life interning at a law office and enjoying the great big fun that is Tel Aviv.

The kids asked good questions, and the boy even showed off the Hebrew that he’s been learning from all the awesome Israeli shlichim (ambassadors) who spend a year in Savannah. I’m grateful that we had the opportunity to expand our awareness of the world, and the mitzvah was worth any inconvenience.

But please, Ben, no more school nights.

It’s Friday, hallelujah!

While the hard-and-fast rules of a kosher Shabbat continue to elude me, and I may never, in the words of The Big Lebowski‘s Walter, be shomer f#*king Shabbos, I do have my own ways of observing the Fourth Commandment:

No laundry or dishes or anything that feels like work. I also shut off the computer, so no blogging or Facebook or email, though Saturday morning cartoons on Netlfix Wii are OK. No grocery shopping or mall loitering—but should I happen to be somewhere and a pair of shoes speak to me, I might indulge.

Some Sabbaths we loll around the house, some we show up for synagogue, some we ride our bikes through the wildlife refuge. Once in a while the whole thing falls apart and I end up driving carpool to two different soccer games or talking on the phone for hours, but I do what I can. If we light candles before midnight on Friday and get through the next day without any bloodletting, I count it GOOD.

The idea is to create a pocket of rest that is doable—even if it doesn’t meet halachic standards—because not only does it honor the Creator, we just need it. It’s the antidote for information overload, a chance to actually finish a thought, a conversation, even a book. A day without your phone or checking email can feel like weeks away, especially if you’re sharing the time with those who are most important to you.

Those hip kids at Reboot share this sentiment and have created the heretic-friendly Shabbat Manifesto, “designed to slow down lives in an increasingly hectic world.”

Check out the Ten Principles:

1. Avoid technology.
2. Connect with loved ones.
3. Nurture your health.
4. Get outside.
5. Avoid commerce.
6. Light candles.
7. Drink wine.
8. Eat bread.
9. Find silence.
10. Give back.

See? Doable. And not so serious—as shown by filmmaker Tiffany Shlain, creator of one of the best Jewish identity films ever, The Tribe:

You don’t even have to be Jewish to dig this, right? Of course, sometimes it’s way hard to find a Sabbath on a Saturday—especially if your son has to be in Statesboro, GA for the Social Studies Fair Regional Competition—but you find that pocket of rest where you can. Like in the parking lot at Georgia Southern University, or maybe later with a beer in the garden.

The National Day of Unplugging starts tonight, March 4, at sundown.

Both Charlie Sheen and fashion designer John Galliano both deep-sixed their careers after making anti-Semitic slurs surfaced last week:

First, bipolar alcoholic maniac Sheen sneeringly called producer Chuck Lorre “Chaim Levine” on a radio interview. Lorre, the creator of the beyond-idiotic sitcom Two and A Half Men in which Charlie has inexplicably starred in for seven asinine seasons, responded by canceling the rest of the show’s season—after he had already put it on hiatus so that Charlie could attend “rehab at home” with his pet porn stars.

Anti-Defamation League director Abe Foxman donned his superhero cape and went immediately into action: “By invoking television producer Chuck Lorre’s Jewish name in the context of an angry tirade against him, Charlie Sheen left the impression that another reason for his dislike of Mr. Lorre is his Jewishness.”

Sheen has gotten busy with damage control (in spite of his overworked publicist’s sudden ship-jumping,) telling CNN’s Piers Morgan last night that he shoulda known better than to piss off the Jews:

“I regret it in a way that I didn’t even think about it,” Sheen said. “I should have thought about it. Stupid, stupid move.”

Yes—if you don’t like Jews, keep it to yourself, dumbass. Have you not learned anything from your friend Mel Gibson?

One could argue that Sheen’s comment wasn’t really overtly anti-Semitic, but we Jews are quite sensitive after the all the pogroms and Holocaust and everything, so eat it, douche.

There’s no room for doubt in Dior designer John Galliano’s “I Love Hitler” rant captured on a cell phone at a Paris café that was posted yesterday (then removed), which included the charming line “People like you would be dead. Your mothers, your forefathers, would all be f—ing gassed.”

Galliano is also being investigated for assaulting a couple and making anti-Semitic slurs in a different incident in another Paris cafe—luckily for him, he was fired this morning, so he’ll have lots more time to pursue this very productive hobby.

People always say “Jews run Hollywood” as if it’s an epithet—but it’s just WHAT IS. In fact, Jews INVENTED Hollywood and will continue to insist that those making gobzillions of dollars there not make rude, racist remarks.

If you don’t like it, go do Aryan community theater with Charlie Sheen and Mel Gibson. I’m sure John Galliano will be happy to design you something with a swastika.

Mucho mazel to Rahm Emanuel on his victory in Chicago!

In spite of an attempt to render his run ineligible by some who questioned his ChiTown residency (to whom I’m sure he would have flipped his right middle finger, if he had one), the former Official Presidential Foulmouth soared into office with 55% of the vote against five opponents.

“Rahmbo” is already kicking tuchus and taking names in ChiTown, starting with the chief of police and the CEO of public schools. I just love dis guy—can’t wait to visit my dear friend Kitty just so’s I can drop in on a City Council meeting.

Speaking of City Council meetings and mayors, Savannah’s got a SITUATION that keeps on getting uglier and more embarrassing like a zit on prom night. The nasty blemish is boiling with the Council’s inability to come to compromise on the hiring of a new city manager, a process that’s hanging in the gallows after a botched search, racially-charged accusations from Mayor Otis Johnson and those who support the installment of acting city manager Rochelle Small-Toney in spite her inability to be approved for the required million dollar bond, questionably-legal closed door meetings and internal affairs investigations and a whole lotta bad press and bad feelings, including a Facebook page called “Step Down, Mr. Mayor” with over 1400 followers.

The prom is St. Patrick’s Day, when legions of beer-swilling tourists descend upon the city for the second-largest Irish-themed party in the country. The green fountain in Forsyth Park and the seven-hour parade attract plenty of national press, and if someone doesn’t get some political Clearasil on this fast, the city’s adolescent attitudes will be on display for the world to gawk at.

City Council meeting today at 2—I’ll keep ya posted.

Much of the almost seven years’ worth (!) of this blog’s subject matter is about how I find the whole religious deal more than a little intimidating. I may be a heretic and unapologetic shrimp-eater, but I am always drawn to learning more about Judaism and those who practice it in its observant form. I am also curious about the administrative realities of two sets of dishes and getting the toothpaste on the brush in the dark on Friday nights.

I hold a deep respect for Jewish women who make and keep religious homes. The observant women I know in our community are always so lovely and patient with my questions, and it’s wonderful when we can transcend our differences and talk about spiritual matters. It’s not an easy to cross the bridge, and I was honored to receive an invitation last week to attend a women-only talk at someone’s home with Aliza Bulow, educator, author and “spiritual midwife.”

With her broad smile, stylish glasses and self-assured manner, Ms. Bulow bears more than a passing resemblance to a frum Sarah Palin, but her message, thank heavens, had nothing to do with tea or grizzlies. She leads the Jewish Experience program in Denver, Co, and mentors women all over the country in the laws of kashrut; she is also a “Jew-by-choice” who has taken Torah study to its highest scholarly levels. I was delighted to learn that the meaning of her lecture, “Fine-Tuning Your Receiver,” could apply to me, even if I was the only one in the room with bare knees.

Quoting from the Talmud and reciting obscure (to me) prayers in Hebrew, Ms. Bulow constructed a case for “turning down the physical to hear the spiritual,” which she asserts is the true reason behind tzunis, or the modest dress required of women. I liked that she announced herself as a feminist right away and spoke against tzunis to keep women held back. She spoke of blasting through ego to reveal one’s true self, of bringing down the clamor of our needs and wants in order to hear the Divine will, of using Torah as a beacon that guides us towards that will.

It was captivating, interesting, applicable and authentic. I had no idea this was going on the other side of mechitza (the partition that separates the men and women in Orthodox synagogues.) All I could think was, “If this was what was being talking about on the bima in Reform shuls, they’d have a packed house.”

Make no mistake; I am a long, long way from kashering my kitchen or wearing a sheitel, but I can dig how following the laws of the Torah and the wisdom of the sages can bring us closer to God. I hope I’ll get another invitation to hear Ms. Bulow speak if she ever passes this way again—I promise I’ll cover my elbows this time.

Though I wasn’t able to find any videos of her lectures, here one’s about her path to Judaism:

You can read more by Aliza Bulow at Aish.com.

I would like to give a giant smooch to all the members of the Jew Man Group for giving my ivory-banging firstborn a version of Cee Lo Green’s ubiquitous song that won’t land us in a meeting with Children & Family Services.

It used to be enough for humans just to grow up, spawn and leave behind a good-looking corpse. But we’ve evolved into a bunch of overachievers, haven’t we? Keeping a catalog of all the things we must do before we expel our last breath or our lives will have been for naught. It’s not such a bad thing to have goals—like, one of these days I’ma gonna get around to finishing a real, live book—but some of us don’t need any more pressure, m’kay?

That’s why your Bucket List should always include a few things that overreach the boundaries of common sense (dressing up like a man and running with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain) and reality (performing an interpretive Afro-Judeo dance with Lady Gaga wearing my very own pair of prosthetic horns) as well some manageable things to achieve that feed the illusion that we’re actually in control of our own lives.

As it turns out, this past weekend was a bang-up weekend for crossing some things on my Bucket List, two of the easy variety and one bordering on the notsomuch commonsensical.

First, with the help of a one-armed little girl, I finished a mosaic art piece made from the shards of the many dishes and teapots I have accidentally broken over the years. (And by accidentally, I might mean thrown across the room in a PMS-induced fit.)

It’s called “Midnight in the Backyarden” and we’re very excited that it will be shown at this year’s “Gallery on 49th,” the annual art show hosted by the kidlets’ wonderful school, Charles Ellis Montessori Academy.

That very same day, I also finished my very first knitting project that didn’t look like I kicked a Muppet in the face and stole its lunch money. It’s a simple twine washcloth I started last week while Little Yenta Girl was in the hospital, and there’s no photo because she’s already playing “hair” with it in the bathtub.

And then, there was Sunday morning. Now, I must preface this by saying this next activity is extremely dangerous and should never, ever be attempted by anyone else and if you do decide to get dumb, you did NOT get the idea from me.

OK, here goes. Ever since I set foot in Congregation Mickve Israel 14-ish years ago, before El Yenta Man and I were even engaged, when my mother-in-law still had her wits and was the lead docent at the Temple and proudly led me through the Gothic sanctuary, I have been obsessed with the idea of climbing to the top of the bell tower.

As you can see, it is very, very far off the ground.

The yearning to climb sacred bell towers actually started when I traveled around Europe with my friend Amy after college and saw Notre Dame in Paris—I thought it would be supertough to sneak in and explore Quasimodo’s tragic path. Amy possessed more sagacity than I and pointed out that tourists are actually allowed into the bell tower, and what’s the fun in that? Thankfully, she also talked me out of speeding over on the train to Pamplona with the pair of steel-toed boots I’d shlepped around in my backpack, bless her.

Years later, standing in awe in the nave of my future husband’s childhood synagogue, a renewed zest to see the view from the highest point in a holy place overcame me. I peeked around the pipe organ balcony for an entry point while my future mother-in-law recounted the history of the stained glass windows but discovered nothing. I vowed that should it work out with this Savannah guy, I would one day find a way up to the tower that stood with its rounded keppe with the dozens of pointed church steeples in the Savannah sky.

Almost a decade and a half has gone by—our wedding, our move to Savannah from California, three years of teaching Sunday School in the building—all the while, the thought of climbing the tower fluttered like a moth around my dimly-lit brain. I would clamber up to the organ loft any chance I got. During Friday night services, I would turn around to wish the pew behind me “Good Shabbos” and my eyes would wander up, wondering how, how to get in.

Well, last year, I figured it out. I’m not going to reveal any specifics because I have too much respect for the synagogue administration and board and they’re probably already really mad at me. Let’s just say that what was hidden became clear.

I’ve been biding my time, waiting for the combination of wearing the correct outfit for stealth (this is not an undertaking for high-heeled boots) and opportunity (i.e., not during Yom Kippur services.) And last Sunday, when I was wearing sneakers and yoga pants and supposed to be helping make challah dough, I seized the day.

The first ladder was no big deal, except that it was kind of dark and I had to move a trapdoor with one hand. The next three were a different story. This was the second level of tower, light spilling in from the windows on the unfinished concrete. I was surprised that it wasn’t painted, though I guess it was never meant to be for the tourists like at Notre Dame. I looked up and saw a series of the rustiest, scariest wrought iron ladders that could have been excavated from Dostoevsky’s Russian prison.

I almost chickened out, big time. But that meshuggeh 22 year-old who really wanted to run with the bulls that summer kept whispering “C’mon, you can do this. You’ll feel like a douche for getting this far and not going to the top.”

Now, I’m not one to succumb to peer pressure, even from the voices in my head, but this felt truly important. Not just to have something to check off my badass list but to prove that I love this temple and its history, and this was a way to have an intimate connection with its story, a visceral experience that combines body, soul and spirit. Of course, baking challah with the rest of the Sisterhood is a wonderful visceral experience, too, but maybe I do need a little bit of badass factor. It’s also true that’s there’s a new rabbi and a new chief administrator in the synagogue’s near future, and should someone do a security sweep, I might never get another opportunity. I put hand over hand on the rusty rungs.

Someone had nailed a couple of 2’x4’s across one section, but I scaled them pretty easily. At the first landing, I made the mistake of looking down. I pictured my broken body on the wooden scaffolding and realized if I fell, no one knew where I was. My mangled corpse might not be found until some other moron had the same demented idea. But then I decided I was not going to die in ugly old yoga pants and kept on.

The second landing was bolted to the concrete wall under the pointed windows just like the other ladders, but for some reason, it WOBBLED. My intestines in my throat, I shook it a few times. Would it pull out from the wall under my weight? Surely it had been built to withstand someone bigger than me, generous tush and all. Then I started wondering why ladders had been built in the bell tower at all—as far as I could tell, there was no bell.

Above me, just one more orange-flaked ladder up, was another trapdoor. By now my arms were weak as egg noodles, my legs tensed from fear. I stood on the shaky landing for what seemed like a long time, talking to myself, talking to God, wondering what the right action would be. Did I climb all this way to fail? Was the attempt enough to be a part of the larger story of Savannah’s Jewish history? What the hell kind of mother and citizen does this anyway? What is wrong with me?

I put my hands on the rungs of this last ladder and took one step. Thirty seconds later, I took another. I made it to the top this way, slowly, and wrapped one arm around the iron to steady myself while I pushed up on the trapdoor with the other. Nothing. I couldn’t budge it an inch. It was too heavy for me to move with my adrenaline-depleted arms. I stood suspended in the air, breathing heavily with the top of my head touching the thick wooden slab. I’d made it to the finish line and couldn’t cross—perhaps a lesson to the insane person who lives inside me who should not be allowed to handle any decisions (or come to think of it, dishes.)

Suddenly, I pushed my head up. With the strength of my shoulders and the hardness of my skull, I lifted the door up three inches, giving me a raccoon mask-sized view. I felt the breeze immediately on my cheeks. I could hear children laughing in Monterey Square six stories below. I saw the Talmadge Bridge and the church steeples and the rooftops and the trees and the blue, blue sky.

If you had been a bird cruising the city’s highest points or flying by in one of the Army’s ubiquitous fighter jets, you might have caught a glimpse of the wide eyes a terrified but exhilarated almost-40 year-old woman who’d just pushed past her many demons to achieve a dream—a weird, inappropriate, probably illegal one, but a dream nonetheless. I whispered a prayer of thanks, and another for getting me back down safely, pretty please.

I made it back down in under ten minutes. I was just starting to creep down to the sanctuary when I heard my son’s voice. His Sunday School teacher had chosen this exact moment to bring the class in and quiz them on Saturday prayers. I flopped down to my belly like a Mossad agent—how would I explain THIS? My face pressed against the intricately-carved wood, I examined the six-winged angels along the columns from a whole new perspective and kvelled quietly as I heard my dear boy get all his answers right. I sent up another deep-hearted prayer of thanks that my children will never have to do another thing to belong to this synagogue and be a part of its story: They already are.

The fifth-graders finally marched out and I meandered back to the challah-braiding workshop. All in all, I had been gone less than a half an hour, and no one seemed to notice my absence. I jumped right in line with the other Jewish mothers and grandmothers and proceeded to make a total mess trying to braid six lines at once.

To anyone offended, I apologize and promise to never, ever to climb the bell tower again, and not just because my 40 year-old legs are still so sore. But I think I’d best get myself another pair of steel-toed boots and head to Pamplona before I’m 50, si?

Happy Belated Chinese New Year’s to y’all! I’ve always felt a particular affinity for this Far East celebration since this season eleven years ago, in the Year of the Dragon, Yenta Son #1 was born. Also, I’m kind of a pyro so any excuse for firecrackers is awesome.

Apparently, the Year of the Rabbit (tip o’ the kepa to Jewlicious to digging up this haimishe lolcat!) is supposed to be a calm, sanguine year after the Tiger Year’s hellacious nonsense, it is a time to “go off to some quiet spot to lick our wounds and get some rest after all the battles of the previous year” and that it “may seem possible for us to be carefree and happy without too many annoyances.”

So far, notsomuch. Little Yenta Girl took a spill at the playground this weekend and broke her arm. It was hideous—bone almost sticking through, dislocated elbow, emergency room on Superbowl Sunday. She had to have surgery to reset it and came through just fine, thank God! I’m so grateful the worst part of the entire experience is the ginormous bill. But because life’s like this, we just signed on with a bare bones insurance policy for self-employed people, so after I sent up praise and gratitude to the Supreme Creator and the angelic minions who kept watch over my baby under anesthesia, I went into the hospital bathroom and had a stall-pounding fit about high deductibles.

Of course, according to one of my favorite books, Blessing of A Skinned Knee: Using Jewish Teachings To Raise Self-Reliant Children, this could be considered a teaching moment for all of us. Mostly me, because to her credit, my baby girl shed maybe two tears in her pain, charmed the nurses and was the darling of the children’s ward the whole time we were there.

Maybe the Year of the Rabbit will when I learn the lesson of turning tantrums into meditative nose-twitching? Bring on the carrots.