What I've been up to

1- I was in America for 3 terrific, whirlwind weeks. First, I stopped in Manhattan for 2 nights and did some shopping. Then I spent a night in Brooklyn with my parents and sister (who all had traveled in) and we went to my cousin's wedding, which was lots of fun. Then I spent a night at a nice hotel with my sister, just the two of us -- nice sister bonding time. We flew together to San Jose, where she lives, and I spent a week playing with my nephews. Then I spent a week in Cleveland with my parents. From Cleveland, I got a ride to Pittsburgh, where I went to the wedding of a former roommate. After the wedding, I got a ride as far as Elizabeth, New Jersey, where I spent the night before getting rides (2, in segments) to Teaneck to have breakfast with my buddy Judah. From Teaneck, it was back to Manhattan, where I hung out with a couple of friends and spent another night. Finally, back to Israel! Whew.

FYI, British Airways is a great airline. The service and comfort was akin to that on Swiss, but the kosher food was better, and on some of the planes you can start and stop your movies whenever you wanted. BA is my new favorite airline.

JetBlue sucks.

2- Working out almost every day. Feels good.

3- Writing, a little. Not as much as I should be. It's hard to get back into the groove.

4- Re-reading Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time series, which totals many thousands of pages. I'm in the middle of book four at the moment.

5- Trying to stay cool. We just got through a long heat wave. It was terrible. It was, as I emailed to many friends, TOO HOT TO LIVE.

6- Yesterday I went to the socioeconomically disadvantaged desert towns of Dimona and Yerucham to cover a story. I thought it would be TOO HOT and really depressing, but it wasn't too bad. I met lots of nice people and got out of the house (and got what I needed for the article I was working on). Thank God, it turned out that the people I needed to see were in air-conditioned buildings.

7- Watching my roommate do beadwork. Liza has a huge collection of little tiny beads, and just finished making a purse -- done up almost entirely out of beadwork -- for a friend of hers. Now she's making me a bracelet for my birthday, which is on August 18. Beadwork is something I don't know how to do, and wouldn't have patience for if I knew, so it's neat to see these beautiful things being made bit by itsy bit.

8- I recently learned to play Minesweeper, and within days had completed a game at Expert level. Now I have gone back to Intermediate and am trying to get ever-lower times. See number 3, above.

9- Trying to get back into blogging, see?