ABRAHAM SCHWARTZ  BORN 5694  DIED 5733  A GOOD MAN AND A GREAT FURRIER 

The visitors are incredulous.  They ask the guide, "How can this be an unknown soldier if the grave has his name?"  Their host responds, "Sure, as a soldier he was unknown, but as a furrier -- he was the best!" 

Christmas is one day, same day every year. December 25. 
Jews love Dec. 25th. It's another paid day off work. We go to movies and out for Chinese food, and Israeli dancing. Chanukah is eight days. It starts the evening of the 24th of Kislev, whenever that falls. No one is ever sure. Jews never know until a non Jewish friend asks when Chanukah starts, forcing us to consult a calendar so we don't look like idiots. We all have the same calendar, provided free with a donation from either the World Jewish Congress, the kosher butcher, or the local Sinai Memorial Chapel (especially in Florida). 

Christmas is a major holiday. 
Chanukah is a minor holiday with the same theme as most Jewish holidays. They tried to kill us, we survived, let's eat. 

Christians get wonderful presents such as jewelry, perfume, stereos... 
Jews get practical presents such as underwear, socks, or a the collected works of the Rambam which looks impressive on the bookshelf. 

There is only one way to spell Christmas. 
No one can decide how to spell Chanuka, Chanukah, Chanukka, Channukah, Hanukah, Hannuka. 

Christmas is a time of great pressure for husbands and boy friends. 
Their partners expect special gifts. Jewish men are relieved of that burden. No one expects a diamond ring on Chanukah. 

Christmas brings enormous electric bills. 
Candles are used for Chanukah. Not only are we spared enormous electric bills, but we get to feel good about not contributing to the energy crisis. 

Christmas carols are beautiful. Silent Night, 
Come o Ye Faithful.....Chanukah songs are about dreidels made from clay or having a party and dancing the horah. Of course, we are secretly pleased that many of the beautiful carols were composed and written by our tribal brethren. And don't Barbara Streisand and Neil Diamond sing them beautifully? 

A home preparing for Christmas smells wonderful. 
The sweet smell of cookies and cakes baking. Happy people are gathered around in 
festive moods. A home preparing for Chanukah smells of oil, potatoes and onions. The home, as always, is full of loud people all talking at once. 

Women have fun baking Christmas cookies. 
Women burn their eyes and cut their hands grating potatoes and onions for latkes on Chanukah. Another reminder of our suffering through the ages. 

Parents deliver to their children during Christmas. 
Jewish parents have no qualms about withholding a gift any of the eight nights. 

The players in the Christmas story have easy to pronounce names such as Mary, Joseph and Jesus. The players in the Chanukah story are Antiochus, Judah, Maccabee, and Matta whatever. No one can spell it or pronounce it. On the plus side, we can tell our friends anything and they believe we are wonderfully versed in our history. 

Many Christians believe in the virgin birth. 
Jews think, "Joseph, bubela. Snap out of it. Your woman is pregnant, you didn't sleep with her, and now you want to blame God. Here's the number of my shrink." 

In recent years, Christmas has become more and more commercialized. 
The same holds true for Chanukah, even though it is a minor holiday. It makes sense. How could we market a major holiday such as Yom Kippur? Forget about celebrating. Think observing. Come to synagogue, starve yourself for 27 hours, become one with your dehydrated soul, beat your chest, confess your sins, a guaranteed good time for you and your family. Tickets a mere $200 per person. 

 When I got on the scales there arose such a number! 
  When I walked to the store (less a walk than a lumber). 
  I'd remember the marvelous meals I'd prepared; 
  The gravies and sauces and beef nicely rared, 
  The wine or the egg creams, the bread and the cheese 
  And the way I'd never said, "No thank you, please."   As I dressed myself in my husband's old shirt 
  And prepared once again to do battle with dirt--- 
  I said to myself, as only I can, 
  You can't spend the winter disguised as a man!"   So--away with the last of the sour cream dip, 
  Get rid of all chocolate, each cracker and chip 
  Every last bit of food that I like must be banished 
  Till all the additional ounces have vanished.   I won't have a cookie--not even a lick.
  I'll want to chew only a long celery stick. 
  I won't have hot biscuits, or corn bread, or pie, 
  I'll munch on a carrot and quietly cry.   I'm hungry, I'm lonesome, and life is a bore--- 
  But isn't that what January is for? 
  Unable to giggle, no longer a riot. 
  Happy New Year to all and to all a good diet! 

 Have a Millenium Tov!!

"No!" the man replies immediately. "Teitelbaum."

He asks the Texan, "What is your last wish?"
The Texan  replies:  "I  want a 2 inch thick steak with all the trimmings, Cajun fries and a case of Bud."  The Chief motions to some of his tribesmen who immediately run into the jungle and come back with the steak, the fries and the beer. The Texan eats his meal and he is thrown in the pot. The Frenchman is asked: "What is your last wish?"
He replies: "I'd like a case of Dom Perignon and I'd also like a big plate of escargots cooked in the French manner."  The Chief motions to his tribesmen who immediately rush off into the jungle and bring back everything the Frenchman asked for.  He eats and drinks his fill, and he is then thrown in the pot. The Chief turns to the Israeli and asks, "And what is your wish?"
The Israeli  looks the Chief squarely in the eyes and replies: "I want you to  kick me in the behind as hard as you can."  The Chief is bewildered and asks the Israeli again, only to receive the same reply. "I want you to kick me in the behind as hard as you can."  The Chief shrugs his shoulders, asks the Israeli to turn around, and kicks him as hard as he can.  With that the Israeli pulls out a gun and kills the Chief and all of the other cannibals. The Texan  and  the  Frenchman get out of the pot, look at the Israeli and say: "If you had that gun why didn't you do anything sooner?"

The Israeli replies: "What? And risk being condemned by the UN, EU and the State Department for 'overreacting' to insufficient provocation?"

If you or a friend are considering a kosher computer, you should know that there were some other changes, such as: I had to have two hard drives, one for fleyshedik business software and one for milchedik games.  Instead of getting a General Protection Fault error, my PC now gets Ferklempt. The Chanukah screen savers include Flying Dreidels.  My PC also shuts down automatically at sundown on Friday evenings.  My Start button has been replaced with a "Let's go, I'm not getting any younger" button.  The multimedia player has been renamed to "Nu, so play my music already!"  Internet Explorer has a spinning Star of David in the upper right corner.  I hear Hava Nagila during Startup.  Microsoft Office now includes: a little byte of this, and a little byte of that.  When running Scandisk, I am prompted with a "You want I should fix this?" message.  When my PC is working too hard, I occasionally hear a loud "Oy Gevalt!" I saw a monitor cleaning solution from Manischewitz that advertises that it gets rid of the "schmutz und drek" on your monitor.  After 20 minutes of no activity, my PC goes Schloffen.  Computer viruses can now be cured with some chicken soup with matzo balls.  Y2K problems have been eliminated, but the impending problem promises to cause major Tsoris.  I didn't get a mouse... I got a yad, which makes sense 'cause apparently I'm not allowed to touch the Scroll bar.  It didn't come with a screen saver, it came with an electronic mehitza, which kicks in whenever I access a feminist Web site.  When I open AOL, the announcement doesn't say "You've Got Mail". Instead, it says "You don't WRITE, you don't CALL!"  I don't have an Option button; instead, it says, "On The Other Hand..."  I don't get E-mail.... I get Eh-mail. I get all these letters which when I read them, I go "Eh, who cares?  When I press Delete or Trash I get a Dialogue Box which says "Listen, you never know, you might need this someday. So Cancel?"  When I click on Clean Up Windows, it tells me it doesn't DO windows. It also came with a Shabbos Goy Software Program which automatically turns the hard drive on after sundown,
scans the most recent files slowly and prints out during services.  For an additional $29.95 it's accompanied by a Cholent CD-ROM....that slowly surfs the Internet during Shabbos, amassing an assortment of Web sites which then sit in the Browser Cache of my hard drive and stew until after sundown Saturday. 

And finally, my computer always takes 45 minutes to Shut Down, unless I enter a special anti-separation anxiety command, "LOOK, I REALLY GOTTA GO. I PROMISE I'LL CALL." 

They All Went to Shul to Hear Rabbi Schulweis 
Who Told Them "It's Important to Treat Everyone Nice." 
And After The Service, They Each Took Their Tallis 
And Ran to Tables For Cookies And Challahs. But There Was One Among Them, Though He Was Born Yiddish, 
Who Didn't Like Candles or Challah or Kiddish. 
In Fact, Shabbat Made Him So Angry And Blue-ish, 
You'd Hardly Have Guessed That He Was Born Jewish. Since His Bar Mitvah, He Grew Not an Inch. 
He Was Tiny, And Hairy, And They Called Him, The Grinch. 
He Lived on a Mountaintop Far Above Town 
On Each Shabbat Evening He'd Say With a Frown: What's The Big Deal, With Their Candles And Baruchas, 
To Me, The Whole Things Is a Pain in The Tuchas. 
I Don't Feel Any Different From Friday Till Sunday. 
I Don't Need Your Shabbat--give Me Any Old Monday! I'll Show Them, I'll Show Them, I'll Steal Their Shabbat! 
I'll Take All The Wine And All The Candles They've Got!" 
So He Set About Building a Shabbat-stealing Machine. 
It Was Nuclear Powered, it Was Noisy And Mean. He Built The Wolrd's First Shabbat Candle Blower-outer 
That Blew out the Candles with Ucky Green Powder. 
Then One Friday Night, While They Welcomed Shabbat, 
The Grinch Saw His Chance to Hatch His Mean Plot. While They All Sat in a Shul, So Polished and Clean, 
The Grinch from His Mountaintop Brought down His Machine 
While the Cantor Sang Prayers and the Rabbi Told Fables, 
The Grinch Came down Chimneys to Attack Shabbat Tables. As the Jews in the Shul Davened Louder and Louder 
The Grinch, He Reved up His Shabbat Candle Blower-outer. 
He Snuffed All Their Candles, He Stole All Their Challas, 
He Dumped Kiddush Wine over All Tables Set So Gala. There Was No One to Stop Him; They Were All Still in Shul 
As He Poured Their Chicken Soup Right into the Pool. 
He Ate All Their Kugel, He Ate up Their Herring 
He Ate All Their Desserts Without Even Sharing! That Grinch He Stole Shabbat from All Their Mishpochas, 
From Such Terrible Things Some Type People Get Nachas. 
He Ruined Their Shabbos, He Didn't Think Twice 
He Even Stole Shabbos from Rabbi Schulweis. The Grinch Stole the Shabbos from Jewville's Fine Jews 
He Went up All Their Streets and down Avenues 
Until He Finally Arrived at the Road by the Crevice 
The Very Last Street Where They Drink Manischevitz At the End of the Block Lived Little Suzie Le'jew 
Who Couldn't Make it to Shul, She Was Home with the Flu. 
Of All Jewville's Jews, Little Suzie Was Smartest, 
She Studied the Longest, She Studied the Hardest. She Knew Kiddush and Motzee and Birkat by Heart 
She Knew Shema and Amida and the in Between Parts. Now this Little Suzie Slept Snug in Her Bed 
While Canldes and Challah Danced in Her Head. 
When All of a Sudden, She Heard Such a Clatter 
And in Through Her Window, Came the Grinch on a Ladder. Now Suzie in Darkness, She Just Couldn't See 
" Who Is this Visitor? Who Could it Be?" 
She Thought Maybe Zaide Had Forgotten His Key 
Or Perhaps Cousin Herschel Had Dropped in for Tea. So She Jumped out of Bed, Gave a Kiss and a Hug 
She Whispered, "Good Shabbos" into His Very Hairy Mug. 
Now the Grinch Didn't Know What Hit Him That Night 
Since All He Would Meet Ran Away in Great Fright. This Was the First Shabbos Kiss He Had Ever Got 
Since He Was a Kid Back in Rabbi Jay's Tot Shabbat. 
At That Very Moment His Heart Started to Beat 
He Left Warm and Tingly from His Head to His Feet. Out of His Eyes Came Flowing the Tears 
From All the Hugs That He'd Missed All These Years. 
" I've Done Something Awful," the Grinch Started to Cry 
" I've Done Something Awful and I Don't Know Why." "We Believe in Teshuva," Suzie Wisely Explained 
We Believe That Your Ways Can Always Be Changed!" 
" But What Can I Do to Earn Love in Your Eyes? 
What Can I Do to Apologize?" "The Jews of Our Town Are Forgiving and True 
The Jews of Our Town Will Learn to Love You 
But First You must Show Your Words Come from Your Heart 
Clean up Your Mess, That's a Real Good Start!" "Put Back the Candles and Put Back the Challas 
Put Back the Kiddush Wine, Put Back the Tallis! 
But Hurry Up, Mr. Grinch, It's Time to Be Nervous 
'Cause Here Come the Jews Home from the Service!" The Grinch Moved Fast like a Mighty Tornado 
The Grinch He Moved Faster than Even Sigfredo. 
He Put Back Their Candles He Put Back Their Challas 
He Put Back the Kiddush Wine He Cleaned up the Tallis. He Set All the Tables with Gleaming White Dishes 
He Filled All Their Plates with Brisket and Knishes. 
So the Jews of Old Jewville Came Home Singing Songs 
And They Never Found out There Was Anything Wrong. The Grinch Did Tshuva and Changed All His Ways 
He Learned to Love Shabbos All of His Days. 
All of His Meanness and Anger and Stink 
He Got Rid of All, So He Needed No Shrink. Instead He Had Suzie His Wise Little Teacher 
Who Taught Him That Inside the Heart of Each Creature 
Is God's Special Light 'Cause in God's Image We're Made 
And So There's No Reason to Ever Be Afraid. The Grinch Loved the Torah So Much That One Day 
He Signed up to Be a Rabbi up at the U.J. 
And So My Dear Friends this Shabbos, Let's Not Miss 
Turn Around to Someone, Give a Hug and a Kiss. Suzie Has Taught Us That Even a Grinch 
With Enough Hugs and Kisses Can Turn into a Prince!

Jim North (jenorth2nd@hotmail.com)

The water recedes and the boy is no longer there. He simply vanished. She holds her hands to the sky, screams and cries, "Lord, how could you? Have I not been a wonderful mother and grandmother? Have I not given to Bnai Brith and Haddasah? Have I not tried my very best to live a life that you would be proud of?"  A few minutes later another huge wave appears out of nowhere and crashes on the beach. As the water recedes, the boy is standing there, smiling, splashing around as if nothing had ever happened.  A loud voice booms from the sky, "Okay, okay, I have returned your grandson. 
Are you satisfied?" 

She responds, "He had a hat."

The first says: "Oy, my son has it so hard. He is locked away in maximum security, he never even speaks to anyone or sees the light of day. He has no exercise and he lives a horrible life." The second says: "Well, my son is in minimum security. He exercises every day, he spends time in the prison library, takes some classes, and writes home each week.

"Oy," says the first woman, "You must get such naches from your son." 

They should have a Jewish express line: "Look, I'm a Jew, it's not a gift.
It's just paper towels."