Tuesday Tally: More Talmudic Commentary

The five worst things about Passover:

Manischewitz: What is this 'wine'. It tastes either like stale wine spiked with Sweat and Low or grape juice spiked with fermented wine. Who thought this up and who thought it was a good idea? Sadly it is now a kind of unholy Passover tradition for American Hebrews. We cant speak for Israelis. *

Gefilta Fish: Made from cod and whatever they could scrape off the bottom of the boat. Just a rolled up ball of fish. Jesus, people. We can do better than this!

Elijah: In Casa de Stroock Elijah's arrival leads to a mass scramble from the dinning room in a race to open the door.  Last year we closed it on Elijah's foot. In previous years the cat has escaped. Thanks to a particularly virulent intestinal cancer we no longer have the later problem.

In-laws: No explanation required. Sadly, my own mother-in-law is fifteen years dead, but we dine on the table cloth she made for our wedding hoopa.

Culture Clash: In Familia de Stroock Passover was a solemn event requiring a coat and tie. In my wife's family it was more casual, like jeans and T-shirts with haggadahs courtesy of Maxwell House. God I was horrified at our first combined-joint Passover. Guess whose version won out? **

[oh don't be such a standoffish prick. You're grandfather could blow through the entire Seder in an hour and fifteen minutes-ed]

*Australia makes a fine kosher for Passover wine. Perhaps related, the commander of the Australian Expeditionary Force in the Great War was Jewish, General Sir John Monash. This is why the Israeli commando attached to the SAS in Operation Eastern Storm is code-named MONASH.

**One year, during the four questions, they actually called my wife's younger sister, then in Hawaii, so she could ask them.

***We also use my great grandfather's bris cup (1868). he would not have approved of my marriage. You see, we come from respectable Western (German) European Jewry, while my wife is descended from Eastern European (Lithuania) peasant stock. My great grandfather would stand at the door of the The Temple Emanuel Synagogue on 61st st. and ask the young girl's the names of their dates. If the name was Eastern European he wouldn't let them in.

****Further irony, my wife's mother's maiden name was Applebaum, which means while Lithuanian, they were actually descended from Jews that came to the country with the  Teutonic Knights, you know, Krauts.