which seems funny to me, since the whole point of lj for me was to learn to embrace spontaneity. but instead of sitting down and writing things off the cuff, i tend to make lists of things to write about. and then lose said lists.

whatever, i also feel guilt about not updating this thing enough. lj may not wind up being a helpful relationship for me.

but let's see. it's friday, which mean we made it through our first blessed week of living in our own apt and (luckily) back into the book of life for 2008-2009. we did got to services yesterday, at the gay - not queer- shul - and it was fine. good. well, fine. it's still funny that the tunes are all different, and it's funny that folks accents often sounds like  they are lisping. i didn't fast, but marjorie did, which meant that by the time we got home from services all she could do was sleep on the couch, because she is so frickin skinny her body needs calories on a regular basis. i made matzo ball soup, with a turkey soup base, made from real turkey, of course, and a giant chicken. and yes, some vegetables, but I remain most excited about the bits of animals i crafted lovingly to perfection.  no dessert, though, because they don't sell oatmeal in the markets (i wanted to make oatmeal cookies) or any box cake or cookie things. (since we moved in last week we don't have things like flour or sugar, so i wanted box sweets.) it was fine, we ate nutella for dessert. 

we moved in last friday, to stoke newington, which has the cutest street in the world. filled with queers and well dressed babies and families.   turns out this street also has an all organic farmers market every saturday through the entire year. (it's outdoors - does it not get that cold? i don't understand.) it was surprisingly cheap, too. so we now have a standing saturday morning date. we got fresh eggs and spinach and salad greens and rainbow chard. for breakfast we went to the blue legume which has a back sitting area in an actual greenhouse. so you eat in a green house. and after the farmers market we went and got library cards, which of course made me very happy. i took out four graphic novels and four movies, including the almodovar boxed set. yay for leisure activities!

so we leave our house on saturday morning to start the day. and let me start by saying that there isn't much trash here that isn't, well trash. so i had kind of stopped peering around every corner looking for things to re-appropriate. and we walk out of our partially furnished new apt, walk maybe 40 feet, and i happen to glance at an apt door, set back from the road. and. there were 6-7 vintage suitcases. with sticker and tags hanging off them, in great condition. so of course we brought them home and put them on our shelves. it wasn't until we got them home that i realized that they belonged to the neighborhood mohel. he had his Circumscisions business card tucked the side of the bag. i love it.

what else: we've been to ikea twice this week. as it turns out, there is a bus to ikea a half block from our house. we're going back one more time for an all plants run. also, i've bought four new shirts this week. turns out in the uk you can get men's shirts in a size 14.5, which means the shirts fit me, or at least, fit me that is twenty pounds lighter than earlier this summer me. they were 9 pounds each, so i bought two, and then went to my closet and realized too many shirts that i brought are swimmingly too big for me. so i bought two more. now i have almost a week's worth of shirts that make me look sharp. sharp!

other things that still seem strange to me - you need to pay for little packets of things like mustard and ketchup, but they give away tiny pots of jam for free.  and they only sell smaller jars of things like peanut butter. oh, and at one supermarket you had to pay to rent a shopping trolley. and the water here is so hard that things come out of the washing machine crunchy. i need to figure out what to do about that. but we finally got a brita, so we are back on the hyrdation tip. and i do love that you can buy apple juice based on a type of apple - like braeburn juice. so good!

in the world of work, i've been applying for jobs for next year. applied for five so far - hopefully one of them will work out. we'll see. i'm back to diss writing on the 15th, which is when many of the job applications are due. but i have been thinking more about masculinity, esp looking at how differently men comport themselves here. there is way more man  to man touching than in the states. like the other day i was walking behind two high school age boys who were about to say bye and they reached over to shake hands but they hadn't gotten to the end of the street yet so they walked holding hands for a few paces. or two men that greeted each other by grabbing hands, hugging, kissing each cheek, then walking while holding hands to a table together. it's a far cry from that hug back slap thing that is ubiquitious in the states. and yesterday in shul i was thinking about something someone (Micha? Isac?) told me about last year about how masculinity in shul is about how big a torah you can hold and for how long and how high over your head.

we are starting operation make new friends but keep the old. last sat night we went to the cross stich and cupcakes event, and talked for a few hours with some nice folks. i also cross stiched a thing that says faygeleh. but - we haven't met any queers, never mind queer jews. so we're gonna work on that. also eating fish n chips. that's on the agenda. 

ok - i think that's all i got.

bye!