147: One question might be whether, unless the dancing is in a separate room, where the dancing is so the men can’t see the women’s side from their shared table.

Also, for a lot of people there doesn’t seem to be a difference.

My school did Ruchnius vs Gashmiyus one year— it was very entertaining, to say the least! (That was grades 1-6, with help from teachers.)

All ones I’ve seen:

Shemesh vs Yareiach

Shamayim vs Aretz

Ketchup vs Mustard

Pesach vs Shavuos (we did Chanukah vs Purim one year, but that obviously wouln’t work)

Torah vs Avodah vs Gemilus Chasadim

Are you doing this all yourself? Do you have a parent or mentor doing this with you? If so, they will probably be able to give you a good answer.

First of all, though, figure out what you want. Correction, what you NEED. The only way to figure that out is to figure yourself out and what you want out of life. A mentor can help there as well.

One of the great things about shidduch resumes, however much people may hate them, is that they really minimize on the amount of time it takes to research someone. For instance, if you wanted to know something simple like what school someone went to, you’d have to call people. Now, it’s on a piece of paper. So you really just call to get a real feel about the person from people who actually know her.

No.

A non-muktzeh Kindle or Nook. I have so many books on mine that I can’t read on Shabbos, even though that’s my best time to read.

Csar: I’d say that there isn’t a rule, just some educated guesses which are sometimes right, sometimes wrong.

I do not know any only children who are spoiled, can’t share, can’t relate to the other gender, etc.

bekitzur: Awww! Thanks!

I really think that it depends on the issue being discussed. I’ve seen some people write brilliant posts on some issues and not such brilliant posts on others.

Also, I don’t usually notice who writes which post unless I comment on it, so it’s hard to decide :).

As I mentioned in my previous post, ask your Qualified Medical Doctor. Don’t go around asking people in an anonymous chat room online.

I saw Ushpizin when I was ten or eleven (after a lot of parental begging) and it was REALLY good. The actors were FANTASTIC. I don’t think this is what you had in mind, but I’m just putting it out there.

Ask your QMD.

To be fair, I’ve seen it affect both. However, one person I’m basing this on is a naturally skinny lady who is a REALLY good cook, so I probably shouldn’t judge her husband :).

PBA: “Women are twisted and crazy.”

HEALTH: “So TRUE!”

I could be deluding myself, but I never thought of myself, my friends, nor many other delightful women of my acquaintance as “twisted” or “crazy” in any sense of the word. Except my junior high principal, but I digress.

As Sam2 noted, there’s a difference between using another person’s dvar torah and using it without attribution. Patri, please make sure that you are doing the former and not the latter. Even repeating a speech someone else prepared verbatim, without either their permission (like a speechwriter) or attribution, even if they themselves quoted other people, is probably a bit iffy. Either way, try to make the dvar torah your own. Customize it. Make it unique.

apushatayid: Amen!

I just came back from a Pesach hotel, and what HIE is describing is NOT necessarily the norm.

We go pretty simple at home: we bought the Lay’s potato chips and cereal for my brother (nobody else would touch it), but for the rest we usually eat our homemade stuff. And it’s great.

I don’t see what is wrong with Patri’s question. I volunteered to speak at my cousin’s sheva brachos (yes, even though I’m a girl) and I had to back out because I couldn’t find anything in that week’s parsha that had to do with marriage or my cousin. It’s tough.

Even if it was written in a somewhat funny way doesn’t mean that he has bad middos.

Instead of finding something from the parsha, go and find a generic passuk from something not timebound, like tehillim, or find a gemara that has to do with marriage or the chassan and kallah. Or, if you’re in a rush and there’s a dvar torah in the next week’s parsha you want to do, go ahead, especially for shabbos sheva brachos. I’ve done it on short notice.

If you want an actual dvar torah, I really like the sefer Tallelei Oros.

Centralized billing cannot work unless all schools are absolutely equal in tuition and services, which frum schools are obviously not. That’s why it works in public schools.

How will you decide which kids will go to the more expensive and possibly better schools, and how will you decide how much each family needs to pay? Will families with more kids need to pay more? Will families with kids in better schools need to pay more? Will parents be able to choose where they want to send their children?

There are far too many holes in this plan to work.

If I’m misunderstanding the plan please explain, but this doesn’t seem possible in a private school system.

Is there a 21 year old friend you could bring along? My cousins had this issue, and in the end they just took along an older cousin who was 21. They had a blast.

Health: Do you honestly believe that popa’s a girl?

Personally, I treat the CR as though I’m having a conversation with people. They say what they say, I say what I say, etc. etc.

I try not to be offensive. If I am, I request your mechilah and assure you that I don’t mean to be.

I don’t think there are any standards. I know frum people who do all the different things you mention. Okay, only one person I know calls Shabbos Saturday, but all the others are pretty common.

I don’t think I know more than one person who calls Friday night Leil Shabbos, though.

Most of these are rubbish. I received a self-defense for women class once and the instructor went through this list item by item and rebutted most of them as absolutely ridiculous.

If you want stuff that makes sense, then:

A) If you’re grabbed and you’re facing your attacker, knee up HARD and push out your arms, with your elbows pointed, very forcefully.

B) Be on the alert at all times. Don’t get caught unawares, for instance if you’re on a cell phone.

C) Look around BEFORE you enter a place, not while you’re there.

D) A purse can be a weapon, and a very effective one.

E) It can’t hurt to carry around pepper spray. (I’m serious.)

I took the class 3 years ago so I don’t remember so well, but that’s stuff that comes to mind fast.

May we never have to use it.

EXCUSE ME!!!

This is an insult to all literate teenagers.

However, it’s not your fault, Goq— I blame the ILLITERATE teens who don’t seem to care.

Seriously. Some of the mistakes I see make me cringe (and not just teens— adults too).

My friends in other schools told me that their English teachers don’t even correct spelling anymore. It takes too long. It’s ridiculous.

And as a message to all posters on here: take the extra ten seconds to proofread and spell out all of your words. It’s not that long a time.

I don’t know— as a Monsey resident, I listen out for the school bus in the morning. When I hear a car driving, I know it’s here.

I was at my friend on Avenue I and I kept turning my head every time I heard a car. I got a serious crick in my neck.

I’ve only really ever been to Brooklyn a couple times, and I don’t feel like I’m missing anything. All I can say is that anywhere with a jaywalking law is too citified for me.

What’s really irritating is that I downloaded a whole bunch of awesome Jewish songs from a website to try to play on my flute and I couldn’t do it. It was so frustrating. They were SO HARD. GRRR.

I hate having to remember the flats and sharps and do a billion sixteenth notes in a row along two octaves.

zahavasdad: No, not true at all. My elementary school banned Facebook and didn’t care about the internet in general.

I’m not saying that that was a good policy of theirs (it DEFINITELY wasn’t) but many schools don’t think that way.

I’m not entirely sure about banning stuff like that myself, just because as Bais Rivka obviously knows, Facebook can be useful and necessary at times. My mom has Facebook for work. I can’t understand all those schools who don’t let internet at all, even filtered, and take pride in it, because the world is changing and they can’t just ignore it. A better way to control it, in my opinion, is to teach how to use it, supply a filter, etc.

Maybe they could find a filter company to cooperate with the school and mandate the filter for homes but at a reduced rate. I don’t think that’s practical, but its more practical than the situation now.