Happy Yom Kippur to members of the tribe out there. I hope your day was spent in peaceful prayer and your night spent stuffing your face with delicious food.

With Rex out of town, the kids and I spent the day at a friend's house that I've known since summer of second grade. (We made aprons together. Predictably, I haven't used one since.) 

She has three kids, and it's always like stepping back in time at her place. There's the garden, the compost pile, the little Halloween decorations.

She has a black cauldron near the door. Each day her kids put their excited little hands into it. Sometimes they pull out treats like tiny pencils or candy corn. Other times she puts in jello for the "eewy gross" factor. I think I've convinced her to put worms in there tomorrow.

Sadly, when I put my hand in there, neither Eric Bana's phone number nor a hundred dollar gas card fell into my palm. There's always tomorrow.
My kids managed to score a cool pencil and a Halloween coloring book. Those brats get everything.

Tonight we had a "break fast" dinner at my next door neighbor's home from childhood. I've known her since I was six. Now, close to forty, I still call her family members by their formal names: Aunt L, Uncle N and Grandma. My kids ate their brisket, held hands through a traditional Hebrew prayer, didn't bounce the brussel sprouts off the china (didn't eat them either), and managed to not push over the twelve foot high green glass artwork in their dining room. I was proud.

What I'm not proud of was an email I received from Stink's sweet kindergarten teacher today asking if he was sick since he was missing from school. Huh? Turns out today was NOT a holiday from school. I have got to get my act together. I was doing so well up until now. (bam bam bam... head hitting desk. ow... moving on..)

I have also got to figure out how to work everyone's Google readers so that the right website is reflected. MN was kind enough to shoot me an email with advice, so be patient. Or at least relieved. You have a few days of respite before I start infiltrating your boxes with spam of the Zoloft kind.

Until Monday, Happy New Year, Happy Economy (God willing) and a lovely weekend off to you!

PS: Stella will be posting again soon. Stay tuned.

* Photo of a shofar - a horn that is blown at the end of High Holiday services. I was thinking of calling the title of this post "A real blow job" but that seems a bit sacrilegious. I also figure I'd look a bit more classy if I put that in small print.

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