Weather It Is (So Goes The Cool Weather)

Good Evening:

Folks are still complaining about the heat -- and I don't blame them.  True, it has been a bit cooler but temperatures are still uncomfortably hot

To make things worse, high pressure will develop over Africa and the clockwise flow around it will combine with weak low pressure over the Mediterranean to bring back the heat again as the week moves towards its end (Shabbat).   The heat will arrive on southwest winds, and it will probably turn dusty as well.

My wife, who is from Venus, is even complaining about the heat.  She doesn't remember a time where the windows were closed so often, and the air conditioner worked so many daylight hours.

Even though I am from Mars -- and I look forward to winter cold (and hopefully snow) -- I grew up in the "it's not the heat, but the humidity" eastern United States -- so I able to tough it out (after all, I am a man).

Still, being from the cold of Mars never prepared me for marriage.   As you all know, men and women first meet on the moon, where its neutral ground allows for a synthesis of bliss to overtake the young couple as they stride happily to the marriage canopy (the "Chupa").

But, they have to live somewhere, and when they do they soon realize that they are quite different, and it is usually the men who have the hardest time adjusting. For instance, did you know that the garbage is full?  If it is (and if you didn't know), this means: "take it out." Of course, you'll never hear these words, but husbands being smarter than their animals do eventually learn.

There are plenty of other examples.

This evening the Wife said that we should meet at the Mall ("Canyon") for dinner with the kids. It wasn't too long ago when "The Canyon" meant the mall in Malcha, Jerusalem. But now, The Canyon means the mall in Gush Etzion (Just so you know, until our neighbors the Palestinians started knifing and running people over, the mall and adjacent big supermarkets were a paradigm of coexistence).  Of course, I assumed that she meant the "original" mall, and had to settle for eating my sushi in the house.

So, yes, we have a mall here in Gush Etzion, as well as schools, farms and vineyards, two or three pools, soccer (and softball) fields, as well as a performance hall.  Gush Etzion is not one big "settlement," but a place where many Israelis live in different cities -- just like they lived and still do within the old borders of Israel (before the Arab countries tried to destroy the State of Israel in 1967). There is also one more husband who has been reminded its better to ask than think for himself.

Barry Lynn
P.S Gush Etzion is located to the southwest of Jerusalem, and was populated by Jewish people prior to the first war (of 1948), when Israel won its independence).