Avram in MD

Wolf,

When we count sefirah, we mention the number of days, and also the weeks and remainder. In a sense, counting like “today is the 44th day… 6 weeks and two days…” is equivalent to saying (6 * 7) + 2 days. So counting via mathematical formula is already built in.

That said, since the Torah mentions counting the omer via days and weeks, I’m not sure if multiplying by a non-week number would suffice, since it would be like saying, “today is 4 periods of 11 days and no days of the omer…” which puts the focus on something other than a day or week. But it ultimately does add up to the right number of days, one may have fulfilled the mitzvah by saying it like that (though lechatchila not in the best way to do it)… so I guess one would have to ask a shaila at that point whether they can count with a bracha. I can hear the Rav now, “you did what???”

Lightly poking fun at oneself in order to “break the ice” or otherwise relax a conversation or audience, or to reflect true humility is one thing.

Self-insulting, which lowers one’s stature in his own eyes as well as others, can cause a person to not try as hard to reach their potential, or it may reflect low self-esteem.

A Rav joking with a person who forgot to bring his sefer to the shiur by saying that he would be likely to do the same thing is poking fun at himself in order to make the student feel better.

A student saying to himself, “I’m stupid and not cut out for this anyway, so why study?” is selling himself short.

I drink it in the morning… I buy whole beans and grind them right before brewing, it tastes great and is a lot cheaper than buying coffee each day!

dunno,

Who cares if he has more than one screen name? If it makes him happy, good for him!

Using a bunch of sock-puppets to carpet bomb or artificially steer conversations can be very disruptive to a forum. Especially if the sock puppets are pushing straw man arguments disguised as Torah positions, which is downright dangerous.

Replacing white, bleached flour with whole grains is a high impact healthy change. Replacing sugary soda with water is another (a 20oz coke has almost 16 tsp of sugar in it!). Snacking on fruit or vegetables (apples, pomegranate, blueberries, carrot sticks, etc.) and almonds instead of chips and cookies is another.

Some big healthy changes to get started without significant alteration to your meals!

Joseph,

Is Facebook worse than television?

Joseph,

What’s the big deal?

Hashem’s honor.

Tipping is very nice, it makes a kiddush hashem, its very much appreciated, but who says one is required?

Ask your Rov if, when faced with the choice between making a kiddush Hashem and a chillul Hashem, are you required to make the kiddush Hashem?

On many other topics, you come down on the strict side. Why, however, when it comes to your gelt, does derech eretz become optional?

If tips these days are mandatory, it is still false advertisement to say FREE delivery.

The tips are not mandatory… unless you fear G-d and His Torah.

Just because someone agrees with me it doesn’t make me him!

In this case, we’ll have to agree to disagree.

Joseph (in the guise of real-brisker, Trying my best, and Cedarhurst):

Saying “excuse me” or “sorry” if you smash into someone and knock them down is also totally optional, but in U.S. culture, one who doesn’t apologize is seen as a total boor. Tipping for certain services is also a part of U.S. culture, to the point that a non-tipper is seen in the same light. To NOT tip in this culture is to communicate that you are either highly dissatisfied with the service provided, or simply rude.

A Yid in golus should not do something that would cause others to view him as a total boor. If for nothing else, do it for that reason.

All that said, seriously, if you didn’t tip the poor deliveryman, I recommend not getting delivery from the same place again.

PS – In many places, the tips ARE included in the price if the party size is large (look at the small print on some menus).

To get parnassa from a blog, one would have to garner readers, Web traffic. Sometimes this can be done by filling a niche, providing valuable information or ideas to the community. Sometimes, however, a blogger might try to drum up Web traffic through controversy, shock, or gossip. Another issue is privacy. A public blog can be viewed by anyone.

As far as pros, it’s a quick, easy, and free way to publish one’s writings!

So many people running around trying to prove that they are “better” and “different” from those savages known as the “goyim”

Oy, I really don’t think that’s what’s going on here. I think we are all working with different definitions of love.

The society around us throws the word love around to describe many different feelings, including lust (what most modern songs about “love” are really talking about), infatuation (aka, falling in love, preoccupation), connection/intimacy (the love that G-d willing grows in a marriage), gratification (I “love” burgers and fries).

I don’t think anyone here has expressed that any of those feelings are inherently “wrong”, but that the non-frum culture wrongfully distorts and confuses them.

Real, i feel it will disturb the people behind you they will wonder why should i have bothered to gather all that i need and then get in line if others can get in line and then duck out to continue shopping, if something you do will cause animosity than you shouldn’t do it

TheGoq,

I understand what you are saying. If everything else were equal, then certainly don’t do something that could annoy someone else. There comes a point, however, when one should not make a decision based on whether another person may get annoyed, especially when, in our fast-paced culture, people get annoyed too easily. I know this example is not equivalent to the grocery store case, but if I am waiting in my car to turn at an intersection, I will not go if I don’t have a clear line of sight, no matter how much the person behind me honks their horn and perhaps thinks “Jews can’t drive!”

I would definitely agree with you that leaving the line should not be done if it would cause the next person to wait longer, but should I make my wife and kids waiting for me in the car wait longer just to avoid the possibility that the person behind me in line has no compassion or thinks I did it on purpose? Is there no room left in our society to have mercy on others?

This is all said with a given that the person leaving the line verbally told the next person in line to go ahead if he didn’t return in time, and would go to the end of the line if that happened.

Sam I Am:

If I may, I would like to turn your question on its head.

I am Ashkenazic, and my grandfather spoke with an Ashkenazic pronounciation, e.g., tav with dagesh, sav without, etc. I grew up in a Conservative home, and went to a Conservative Hebrew school where I learned the Israeli pronunciations for Hebrew (minus the unique “r” sound used by native Israelis of course).

Once I became frum, I was very interested in preserving as much of my family’s traditions as possible, doing things as my grandfather and his parents did. One thing that I did was to begin shifting the way I pronounced things in davening from the Israeli pronounciations to the Ashkenazic pronunciations of my grandfather.

In effect, I was changing my “custom” but adopting my family custom. Would you consider this the wrong thing to do or the right thing to do?

TheGoq:

When I choose a checkout line after shopping, I try to pick the line with the fewest groceries as opposed to shoppers, since it usually takes longer to scan and bag the groceries than it does to pay when there are no glitches. Therefore, from my perspective, it would be far worse for a person to hold a place in line for another person coming in with a cart full of groceries than for someone to quickly leave a cart of grocieries to grab one forgotten item. I have left my cart to grab a forgotten item when it was not yet my turn to check out, which causes no time loss for anyone behind me (since I would otherwise just be standing there in line) and saves me up to 15 minutes, depending on the lines. I will usually say something to the person behind me such as “I will be RIGHT back, just forgot one thing! Please go ahead of me if I’m not back by my turn.” and I usually get a smile in response when I return, out of breath, when it is still not yet my turn.

Because, IMHO, it more sense to say that the Rambam is talking straight

Do you really, in your heart believe that, if the Rambam were alive today and you went to him with a shaila about calling your children darlings, that he would say you were condemned to gehenim for it? When so many other actual sins don’t have that statement attached to it?

Or do you think that something was qualitatively lost in the translation of nicknames, and that the Rambam is talking about a case where the nickname can be destructive to a person’s life?

How much credit do you give to the Rambam?

PS – What makes names like Eeees a “nickname” vs. a special additional given name?

If you forgot that chances are you will forget what you came to buy as well.

Or if you already have a shopping cart (I think New Yorkers call this a wagon:-) filled with frozen groceries and bagged produce, would it be right to just abandon it in the middle of the store?

This is a half-serious question.

estherhamalka,

If ambulances, fire trucks, garbage trucks, and plows are having difficulty getting around, I don’t think the terrorists would have an easier time. Snow is an equal opportunity city stopper.

Wolf,

Do you say Ashrei three times a day?

I think I understand the point you are trying to make, but I don’t understand your strategy.

Wolf,

Touche.

I’m focused on the kid angle because the OP asked the question in that context (I think he ultimately wanted to go Joseph-fishing though and get a bunch of “it’s assur!” posts). But you are right, ultimately a person’s top human relational priority is to his/her spouse.

SJS –

I did not have the privilege of attending a Yeshiva, so I have been one of those who very much wanted to learn but did not have the background to understand even a single line on the page of a Gemara. When I discovered the Artscroll translations, I bought a few to begin learning them. I found them to be extremely helpful; with effort and reading all the commentaries, I felt that I understood what the Gemara was saying. Then I’d go onto the next page. After a while, I felt that there was something lacking in the learning I was doing. I read books describing the beis midrash atmosphere, of pairs engaged in a very lively discussion over the sugyos. I didn’t see any lively discussion in my learning. To me, the learning felt no different from university studies. Open the text, read, understand, move on. And there were no exams or essays to motivate me. A week passes, and more than half of what I learned I forgot.

I wanted to be able to learn Gemara in the original. The way it’s supposed to be done. So I joined a beginner’s Gemara class offered by a local Kollel. What a difference! The amount of Gemara covered in each shiur is far less than what I’d cover in the same amount of time by myself with an Artscroll, but we’d learn and review, and review again. Through the review each piece of the Gemara we learn goes inside me, it becomes mine. I remember it even after weeks have gone by, and I keep thinking about it during the day, even when not in the shiur or actively reviewing. It is such a different experience, and I don’t feel I am giving it justice with this description. IY”H I will continue to progress and learn and gain an ability to learn Gemara independently.

I do think the Artscroll has its place. If I didn’t have access to a shiur with a rav who knows Gemara, then the Artscroll would help me to ensure I wasn’t completely off the wall. But it’s definitely no replacement for the beis midrash style learning and the review. I think that’s why you might hear people “knocking it”. It’s not a criticism of the learning of people who don’t know Aramaic. I am one of those people (hopefully I won’t be in the near future!), and the rav teaching the shiur told me how valuable the learning we’re doing is. It’s a criticism of using the Artscroll as a “cheat sheet” rather than parsing the Gemara – in a beginner’s shiur even, if need be.

All that said, another person might be able to get that kind of learning from the Artscroll. A talented person may be able to retain what he learns and even learn Hebrew and Aramaic from the Artscroll. For me, however, I really needed a straight Gemara, a rav, a shiur, and a beis midrash.

not I:

That’s why the fedora brim should be up…. when it’s not on your head:-) Thanks for the reminder, I left mine down when I took it off this morning.

For kids: Boomers (mini golf, go-karts, bumper boats, etc.), near the Boca FAU campus/airport.

For the whole family: Butterfly World (just south of Boca off the Turnpike).

RuffRuff, I’m assuming you are Helpful aka Myfriend aka So right aka Joseph:

Creating a new screenname because your standing was compromised and you want a fresh start is one thing. A person creating multiple screennames for the purpose of hijacking threads; however, is something that any forum would want to avoid, whether or not the person’s viewpoint was correct. A viewpoint if indeed Torah-true does not need deceptive methods to bolster it, and the viewpoint is actually weakened when the deception is discovered or obvious.

Based on how prevalent the puppeteerring has been since I’ve started reading this forum, I’d say the moderators have been pretty lenient.

Wolf,

I certainly wouldn’t stop giving tzedaka online out of concern that it’s not helping you to develop your midda of kindness. Ultimately the point of tzedaka is the help it brings to a needy person or organization… otherwise there would be no point at all in giving, because it wouldn’t even be defined as a kind act.

One option is to put a pushke into your home or make sure to bring a quarter or dollar to shul on weekdays, and place a coin or dollar bill into it each day. That way you can afford to continue supporting your tzedaka online in a timely and regular manner (which really helps them with their budgeting) while at the same time train your hand to be giving. At the end of the month or year, a pretty good donation will have amassed in your pushke too!

AinOhdMilvado,

Please consider the possibility that some people can be shocked into silence and not know what to say.