Rant #3,918: The Jewish Cowboy (?)

As regular readers of this Blog know, I have great memories of my childhood.

Since we are in the Passover/Easter season, lots of memories cross my mind, and lots of things I remember have to do with my childhood in Rochdale Village, Queens, New York.

It was a wondrous place in those early days of the development--1964 to 1971--and I went from a little kid to a teenager while my family and I lived there.

And among the fondest memories I have about my old community is that we lived in a two-bedroom apartment, and that I had to share my bedroom with my sister.

We had a schizophrenic bedroom, to say the least.

On my side of the room, I had all my comic books, and pictures of all of my sports heroes were plastered on the walls around my room.

My sister had her David Cassidy pictures all over her room, amidst her Barbie dolls and all things else related to being a young girl in the late 1960s to early 1970s.

The room was divided by our own "Berlin Wall"--a set of blinds smack dab in the middle of the room--and we managed in that arrangement until July 1971, when we moved to Long Island.

How does that tie in to Passover?

Read on, in an edited blog entry originally published in #2,518 on February 4, 2020:

"But sometimes, my sister would come over to my side of the room, and we would listen to records together, mainly the 45s either my mother or I, or later my sister, would buy from the local Mays department store, or perhaps the Kress store in the local mall.

But this one particular record that we used to listen to, well, we got it from our local supermarket.

In 1966 I think it was, Manischewitz Wine--one of the biggest kosher wine and food producers in the United States--put out a promotional record for Passover called "Manischewitz Presents The Jewish Cowboy, Harold Stern from Centerville, Texas." It was a one-sided promotional record that you received when you purchased your Manischewitz matzohs for Passover.

Being a good mother, our mom got her Manischewitz matzohs, and the record became part of our collection, and a record we regularly listened to when we got together to listen to our singles.

Talk about "Twilight Zone" ... this record was it! It featured Harold Stern, a young Jewish Texan, talking about his life as a Jew in Texas. There is plenty of music on the disk, but not produced by Stern, who only introduces his friend, Avram, to us.

Stern does this in his heavy Texas drawl, and Avram goes on to sing not just Jewish songs, but Italian ones too.

It is a laugh a minute riot, between the drawl and the music, and my sister and I used to listen to this record all the time, and laugh and laugh and laugh some more. It became our own personal classic, amid all the other 45s we played by acts like Bobby Sherman, the Partridge Family, the Beatles and the Monkees.

Anyway, we must have literally played that record to death, as when we moved to Long Island in 1971, it was lost, and it pretty much faded from our memory Heck, on Long Island, we had our own separate bedrooms, and growing up now pretty quickly, Harold Stern and Avram simply did not fit in.

[Note: To cut a long story short, the record did not survive the move, it was lost, but I have since added it to my collection, and I even bought my sister her own copy.]

Memories are really made of this, and "Manischewitz Presents The Jewish Cowboy, Harold Stern from Centerville, Texas," is one of those things that do not leave you once you have heard it. It stays with you forever.

If you want to hear this record in its "Twilight Zone" mentality, it is on YouTube at https://youtu.be/cWNSOCrrtvg.

"Heck, there's nothing that unusual about being a Jewish cowboy," Harold Stern says on the record, and you know what?

With more than 60 years of hindsight to back him up, he's right."

Happy Passover, Happy Easter, have a great weekend, and I will speak to you again on Monday.

This "Jewish Cowboy" who grew up in Queens can guarantee that!

Rant #3,917: Celebration

Last night was the first night of Passover, a holiday that represents freedom for the Jews from the Egyptians eons ago.

I love this holiday.

It is my favorite holiday of the year, right up there with Thanksgiving, because it is a holiday that celebrates the family.

It is not a holiday to give gifts, other than giving the gift of yourself at the Passover seder.

It is a time to reflect, and to celebrate the joys of our Jewish family.

The holiday has changed for me personally over the years.

The most drastic change is that my parents are not around to celebrate the holiday, but I know that they are present in spirit.

And with my recent health woes, the holiday represents a time when I can just forget about everything--even for just a few hours--as we celebrate this holiday.

One thing that hasn't changed for me--and I dare say, will never change--is the importance of food during this eight-day celebration.

I simply love all the foods, especially matzoh, the unleavened bread that Jews had to settle for as they hurriedly escaped Egypt and made their way to freedom.

I can eat a whole box of matzoh myself, and it just tastes so good with tuna fish, TempTee cream cheese, butter, gefilte fish, even hot dogs.

It goes with everything, as I will, once again, try to stay on the menu of Kosher For Passover foods, as I always do.

And that means Kosher For Passover Coca-Cola--using real sugar--and Kosher For Passover UBet Syrup--also using the real thing, and not corn syrup, which is not kosher.

Sure, the foods are heavy during this celebration, but let me tell you, it is worth it.

During Passover, we as Jews celebrate our freedom from oppressors, and we can sit on pillows and be kings--and queens--during this celebration.

I love the seders, I love getting together with our family, I just love the whole kit and kaboodle having to do with Passover.

I am a huge bread eater, but it isn't really that difficult to give it all up for a few days.

It's matzoh, matzoh, matzoh during this holiday, and I really don't mind it.

And yes, I finally found chocolate matzoh, so that is another delicacy that I am looking forward to eating during this great holiday.

To get serious about the whole thing, the rising tide of anti-Semitism is appalling.

The coming of Passover signifies that we, as Jews, remain strong in the face of any adversity, including against those that seek to demean our religion.

When we recite the Four Questions during this holiday--"Why Is This Night Different From All Other Nights"--we are not only seeking the answers to these questions, we are seeking truth, and strength, derived from our beliefs and our religion.

We just have to look around our seder gatherings, and we see that strength generated by succeeding generations of our family.

They will carry on that strength, and hopefully, they will become the patriarchs and matriarchs of our Jewish families when my generation is long gone, just like we carried the torch from my own parents and grandparents.

I wish everyone a joyous Passover--

And if you get "matzoh stomach," it soon will pass.

Rant #3,916: You Better, You Bet

Just to get in another health message to you ...

I am feeling a bit better than earlier in the week, actually drove my car--the first time in a week--and did some errands, but I am still not myself, and probably won't be for a while.

My stamina and my energy are low, but yesterday, I also did more than two hours of work on top of everything, so I guess I have earned the right to be a bit worn down.

And Happy Passover to those who follow this great holiday.

It is a holiday where we can all be kings--or queens--as we participate in the holiday feast, and recite the Four Questions about "why this night is different from other nights."

Onto other things ...

As you probably know--whether you want to or not--March Madness is in full swing, and college basketball is revving up its season finale, where it will crown its champion.

I detest college athletics at this point in my life, because they are not amateur anymore, sort of a real minor leagues for primarily football and basketball.

On top of the scholarships the players get, they are being paid, their likenesses are worth money, and the coverage by the media is as if these kids are playing major league sports, which they are not.

And then you have the incessant betting that surrounds these sports and these college-age (18-22) athletes, and it is very unnerving.

And again, the media just goes with this, with even members of the media themselves making and breaking their own brackets, and proudly proclaiming so on the air and in the other media.

This is just plain wrong, but heck, we had a President who got into this while he was in office--President Obama--so if he can do it, anyone can.

The problem with that is that it has gotten to the point that we are truly opening ourselves up to a lot of future problems when kids, themselves, are getting into the betting game, and one story that came out this past week has bothered me to no end--

Probably no one else was bothered, but I was, for sure.

I am sure you heard about this story, because it was broadcast ad nauseum across TV and in the newspapers, but to me, something isn't right here.

The media gave great coverage to this kid who, not knowing what he was doing, chose the exact winners through the earliest rounds of the women's basketball tournament, beating incredible odds.

The media laughed about it, made this kid into some kind of hero, and also, in passing, mentioned that he was an eighth grader, just 14 years of age.

Like I said, that part of the story was mentioned in passing.

A 14 year old betting, making up a bracket?

How did the media find out about this?

Obviously, he created his bracket on one of those now legal betting services, and it probably came out from there, because it was so unusual.

But again, the kid is 14 years old.

He isn't even in high school yet.

Don't these gambling services prohibit minors from participating in their betting business?

Yet the media reported on this to put smiles on our faces, again, since it was so unusual.

Heck, the Associated Press and the NCAA reported on it, so the kid just didn't scratch this out on a piece of scrap paper--

He had to do it somewhere "official" and "legal" where it could be seen.

But doesn't this actually send out the wrong message?

Why is a middle school kid betting to begin with?

What service did he use to circumvent all the rules and be able to make his bracket?

Even if it wasn't on a service, why is a kid not even in high school making up a betting bracket at all?

Are his parents are so proud of him, since they are raising a bettor, rather than a scholar, in their midst?

The kid's bracket has since been broken, but he did something that even experienced bettors four and five times his age don't do.

But aren't we encouraging betting by minors by celebrating this kid's good fortune?

It just rubbed me the wrong way.

If you see all of those commercials on TV for legal betting, you have to squint to see it, but they all have disclaimers at the bottom of the screen about the dangers of betting.

If we applaud this kid, aren't we opening up a real Pandora's Box of underage kids betting, and becoming habitual bettors, which is a gambling addiction?

If I was reporting on this story, I would ask the kid and his parents the questions I asked earlier about his participation in an area that he really shouldn't be involved with.

But in our society today, we think that betting on the NCAA tournament is a big nothing, a fun thing to do, something that connects us with college athletics, an area that most people don't really care about unless it involves their own money.

Rather than applaud this kid, we should ask ourselves whether this kid really deserves our applause--

Or does he actually deserves our pity for what he is getting into at 14 years of age.

Maybe I am old fashioned, but if I was this kid's parent, I don't think I would be too happy that he was spending his spare time making brackets like this.

Probably the only good thing about this is that he has had his 15 minutes of fame, and maybe he can move onto something more constructive for a middle schooler to be doing to bide his time.

Betting should not be in his personal lexicon of things to be doing as he eases into high school.

But the media loves all this, thinks it is great, so what do I know?

I know what is right, and what is wrong, and this is just so wrong that it defies my understanding of why the media jumped on this like they did.

But then again, I know exactly why they did, and quite honestly, in 2026, it really doesn't surprise me one bet ... err ... bit.

Rant #3,915: Little Willy

Yesterday, I had that procedure done, and now, if I feel up to it, I can move on with my life--

Until the next hurdle comes my way, on my birthday.

I have been through the colonoscopy procedure before, and let me tell you, if you haven't ever had one, the prep is far worse than the procedure itself.

So when I have this thing on April 28, it will be a good day.

April 27, however, won't be one of the best days of my life, as the prep really will knock out the day--and other things--for me.

I just think it is almost funny that I am having that procedure done on my birthday, but it won't be the first time I gifted myself with health on my special day.

Way back in 2007, on my 50th birthday, I had my gall bladder removed.

It just worked out that way that time, as I went into the hospital on April 27 with severe stomach pains, and the hospital said all I had was a bad stomach ache. 

However, I told them numerous times that this wasn't just a bad stomach ache, that this was something more, but they insisted--

Until I told them that I had Gilbert's Syndrome, a relatively minor liver disease where the liver does not fully process billirubin, that you can live with your entire life and not feel it.

A previous doctor years earlier told me I had it, and it simply came to mind when they wanted to get me out of there as quickly as they could.

Lo and behold, I went for some more tests, and they literally told me that my gall bladder had to come out.

I went into surgery on April 28, they removed it, but in the middle of the surgery--and I was told this when I awoke from the anesthesia--that they now listed me as an unruly patient, because I supposedly woke up smack dab in the middle of surgery, started pulling things out of me, and said I was done--

And it took six male nurses to hold me down.

I had the surgery, was home on the morning of April 29, and that was that with that.

Kind of strange, but true.

So if I have to basically forfeit a day of my life to find out what is going on in my colon, then so be it.

And I also have the other stent in me which needs to come out, and it will be removed prior to the colonoscopy.

But at least for now, onto other things ...

And don't get me started on "No Kings Day."

Just don't.

Rant #3,914: Climb Ev'ry Mountain

I am slowly but surely getting back to my normal self.

As you read this, I am having removed one of the stents that was put in during the kidney surgery.

I have another one in there, but the doctor wants to keep that one in for the time being.

So, really, I have moved past the first of many hurdles until my health is where it should be.

I have a lot more things to do medically before I can reach that goal, but at least square one is over and done with.

This past Friday, kind of all of a sudden, I felt that I had energy again--four days after the initial surgery.

I honestly don't know why I felt that way, although I think it had to do with the fact that on that day, I finally had an appetite and ate three square meals for the first time all week.

I even snacked a little bit, and I guess it all made me feel better.

The previous day, I did three hours of work, and let me tell you, when you have little in your stomach and you do work, it completely saps your strength, and after I did all of that, I felt like I could barely make it to my bedroom.

But I got through that, and now on to the next mountain I have to climb.

I am still on a lot of medication, but once I can get off all of that, I feel I will be somewhat back to normal--

Until the next hurdle I have to scale, at the end of April, when I have a colonoscopy, which I am dreading, based on the possibilities described in my recent catscan.

But I will beat that too.

I have too much going for me not to.

I have a wonderful family--

I have two weddings coming up in the fall--my daughter's nuptials and my nephew's celebration--

And then there is Passover, coming by the middle of this week, which is probably my favorite Jewish holiday, with all the foods and family gatherings and stuff like that.

I need to be healthy for all of this, and well into the future too.

I am not a religious person, but I have prayed to God to get me through this--

And I hope that God has listened to my pleas.

But whatever the case, I need to get better, and at the hands of some very competent doctors and surgeons, I know that it will take a while, but I will get to where I want to be.

This past weekend, we had my wife's two brothers and their wives over to the apartment, which lifted my spirits.

My wife's youngest brother and his wife are moving to Georgia to be closer to their son, who is now living and working in that state--my nephew who is getting married--so it was kind of a bon voyage party--

And it was good to see them off, and I know they will enjoy their new surroundings.

At sunset on April 1, Passover begins, and my family will have the first seder at my sister's house, and that is always a fun occasion.

And I have work, which keeps me going. 

So right now, I am down, but I am certainly not out, and again, I might not post every day here in the coming weeks, but I will do the best I can to do so.

Writing, at least to me, is the BEST medicine, so once I get done with these pills I am taking, maybe writing will be the only medicine I need to really get back on the horse and really get better.

The future awaits, and I am all locked in and ready to blast off.

Up--

Up--

AND AWAY!

Rant #3,913: Get Back

I guess that each day, I seem to get better.

On Thursday, I pushed myself and caught up with everything I had to do for work--about three hours of editing and writing--and i have to say, I was pooped after doing all of this in one fell swoop.

Health-wise, I reached another milestone that I won't get into too deeply here, but I did it, finally.

I am still on a variety of medicine, so I am absolutely not myself right now.

But I am feeling better, but not goid enough to go back to my old ways.

Baseball is back, so I am getting into that, but my concentration is a bit off, so it is a bit of a chore to watch a three-hour game.

My family has been top-notch with me during this period, so thank God I have them.

And friends--both newer ones and people i have known forever--have been incredible.

I heard from some people I hadn't heard from in 50 years or even more than that!

Incredible!

Just to sum it up, I am in for the long haul with all of this, and it won't be easy to get back to where I should be.

Like i recently said, I will be in and out of the Blog for the immediate future--

But writing is the best medicine fir me, so I might be here more than I think i will be.

So have a good weekend, and I will speak to you again ...

But I just don't know when.

Rant #3,912: Hunky Dory

I have been through Step 1 of hell.

And then, I went through Step 2.

There are more steps to come.

My kidneys were messed up, and I didn't know it.

I had two stones--one in each kidney--and if they stayed in there any longer, I might have lost the use of my kidneys.

This, of course, could lead to dialysis and other problems.

So they had to come out.

Now.

One major stone was left in--it could not be removed, and in time, i might be able to pass it or it can be removed in a non-surgical procedure.

So as you read this, I am a bit of a mess.

I won't go into detail, but it is better that I stay at home for at least a couple of days.

Again, I knew nothing, felt nothing, but everything came up in a catscan.

I have passed a few stones before, and the one or two times I had a problem, it went away immediately once the stones came out.

Not this time.

And over the next month, I have to have tests fir my lung and my colon and my eye, so I am far from out of the woods yet.

But the first mountain has been scaled.

I have a good family, so they will get me through this.

I might be in and out of here for the next few weeks, but I will try to post things here and there for probably the foreseeable future.

So please bear with me.

I am overwhelmed, overloaded, but not defeated.

I can handle it.

Thanks for the good wishes.