Sunday, March 26, 2006

Geschollessen

That title means "wet" I think. But I digress.
There comes a time every year for us young Jews, a special season when our parents get to use us as beasts of burden. We call this time "Pesach", which means "Pass-over", because it means you get to spend the majority of the spring time packing boxes and passing dishes down the stairs to the basement until somebody trips and you lose all your fleishigs plates in a single go. You also get to clean the whole house, under beds and couches, those dark, nasty corners in the bathroom that you didn't even know existed because of all the wet moldy towels piled on top that no one ever threw down the laundry shoot. By now, me and my brother "larry" are old enough to carry huge piles of dishes and cardboard boxes weighing something like 300 lb, so our mom has taken advantage of this special season to redo the kitchen. It's pretty much the same, except we're doing it all a few weeks in advance. Right now I'm waiting for mom to get home so we can get started on the cutlery. Wish y'all luck with the pesach cleaning! I gotta go now shes coming home.

Sunday, March 05, 2006

And a Merry 'Chanuquanzmas' to you!

Actually it's Purim. Happy Purim everybody! I'm sure the many distant Yeshivas in every corner of the Jewish world are pulling incredible shtick right around now, some of which I will likely never hear about. As for us at WITZ, I think we've had our share. In fact, my brother (larry) and I have written a 'Grommen' about it for all of you to enjoy. For those who don't know, a Grommen is a mix of poetry and song that I think originates in Germany. It is sung, usually loudly in groups, each line going up, the next down, then crecsendo, then back down. It has a lot of nanana's between each line, more between each verse, follows a simple rhyming scheme, and the lines don't need to fit exactly, just mostly. Since this is a mostly non-offensive Grommen that i anyways intend to read at WITZ, I have included some (mispelled) names in it. Most of you won't get many of the jokes, but I'll try to help it along by leaving a breif explanation afterwards. Hey, WITZ is a small world you know. Here we go:

It's almost Purim time again,
The perfect time to make amends,
For all the crazy things we've done;
We did it just to have some fun!

This month was really full of shtick!
There were some things that made us sick;
Like yellow milk and a pile of muck-
But that wasn't shtick, it was only Chuck!

There were bodies floating in all the tubs;
Rabbi Waxman's office looked like a pub!
The Sformes Gym was really nice;
We even got cards for Mrs. Riice!

Old WITZ came back in the Pelts hall,
With beer cans lined from wall to wall.
The Monster Toilet was first rate-
But the new mens' warehouse made everyone late!

None of us know who chucked the vaccuum,
And of course we didn't flood the bathroom.
But if that made the budget tight,
Just wait untill the water fight!

Alright, so maybe we overdid it;
It drove us nuts and we admit it.
But while the craziness persists
We hope you enjoy this Purim at WITZ!

LINE BY LINE TRANSLITERATION (not brought to you by artscroll):
OK paragraph one needs no expounding. The yellow milk is to be taken literally, as is the description of Chuck "The Confiscation Man" as a "pile of muck". The bodies were jacketed manequiens (however you spell that) covered in koolaid, and the seniors put vodka bottles all over Rabbi Waxman's office.
Tape and a backboard transformed that little trash can outside the beismedrash that everyone tries to shoot for after washing for shachris into "the SFormes Gym". I actually still don't get it, but I think it's hilarious.
A table in the lounge was transformed into the "Solitaire only" table, a joke on Mrs. Riice, who, in legend, is a master player of solitaire from years of working in the WITZ main office.
A memorial coffin (one of Chuck's freezers) for old WITZ was set up in the entrance hall, complete with yearbooks and beer cans and Rabbi Waxman's old laptop from the eighties, which we weighed in at a level 42 pounds before smashing to pieces.
The monster toilet was in the Hanhallah bathroom and had a pair of very lifelike feet sticking out of it.
The "Men's warehouse" is a tradition every year- the seniors take everyone's hats and jackets before shachris and dump them in some side room where "you're sure to find the hat for you!" Everyone is always late to shachris.
A few months ago, some unknown person/persons chucked the schools vaccuum cleaner off the catwalk into the courtyard, destroying it. The school was going to charge my entire class $400 for it, and actually brought in policemen to fingerprint the vaccuum. The seniors put two manequin police men up in the courtyard, with a taped off crime scene, siren, and chalk outline on the sidewalk. Of the vaccuum.
All of the above took place on Rosh Chodesh Adar.
We did NOT flood the bathroom.
The weekend was party to one of the fiercest water fights WITZ has ever seen, which resulted in the entire school looking like hurricane katrina hit it. My room just barely survived.
Well, I guess that pretty much sums it up. I'll go ahead n' post this so all y'all can read it. Happy Purim!