This Shabbos

So, the second shortest Shabbos of the year, I throw a lunch for seven, meaning I had to leave work even earlier (1.46) than the time of year requires. Plus I'd got a meal at R. Jonathan Wittenberg's on Friday night, which required preparing a dish for. And whoever was down to take Maariv at Assif on Friday night didn't turn up, so I ended up taking that service; and I took Shacharis on Shabbos morning, and turned down an request to gabbai, on the grounds that I wanted to sit down (but ended up getting up anyway and bringing in more chairs, as the Drawing Room was full: we had over sixty people today!)

And then came home and fed people pumpkin soup, and fish roll along with vegetabubbles, and apple crumble,^* followed by a bit of Kabbala study.^†

* First time I tried this recipe. Good job it worked out! :o)

† Not really. I actually fed people Zohar chocolates. :o)

I think I've quite outdone myself. Not to mention doing myself in.

Next up for tonight: start learning my next piece of leyning.

Meanwhile, Limmud session planning: currently done (for shortlist values of "done") from Friday up to 12:50 on the Sunday...

There's nothing new under the sun

I forget who it was in their how-to-write book who advocated throwing away the first idea for any particular situation, as it's likely to be a cliché, and often the second idea will have been thought of before too; but I thought, on having a silly idea, I'd try googling it to see if it's possible to have a silly idea that hasn't been thought of beforehand.

First data point: Captain Pharaoh. (From misheard lyrics of "Whiskey in the Jar"—this gave the song a completely different feel to the one it should have had!)

Second data point: Lemon Curdistan (or Kurdistan).

More as I think of them...