repentance rant...unclear how to spell repentence

This is it everyone, its the 10 days of repentance...a time when I really believe that everyone has at least a minute of introspective thought cross through their head. Sometimes it can be even more, depending on who u r. Whatever...thats for everyone's own personal stuff, not for now.

I'll tell you what I like about Rosh Hashana, and you can agree or disagree. First of all, I am hesitant to even write this, b/c I am afraid that it will be mis-conceived or taken to be a mocking of the Holiday. Thats the last thing I intend to do here; rather I intend to present an honest and possibly humourous approach to my personal experience with the High Holy Days. Hopefully, you all can relate to some of the stuff I say.

Lets start with one thing I dislike - the fact that the secular name is called "High Holy Days", which enables all these different organizations to put out pamphlets and posters w/ slogans like "Its time to get High---spiritually" or something to that effect. I view that as a real lame slogan, and its annoying that these people think I'll be more interested in going to their speeches b/c I can now try and associate them with marajuana. If the speech is about Teshuvah then tell me its a speech about that. And if its about smoking pot, then tell me its a speech about that. But dont mix them together and tell me I'm gonna get high when I go to a shiur.

But even more annoying then these type of slogans, is the raisans in the challah. Is everyone with me on this one??? Challah is such a great treat, especially now that they have breakaway, and you can pretend u are a rugged caveman and tear it apart piece by piece. And its an even more special tasty treat during this season, when we get to dip it in the honey. Its the second best tasting food-bite for bite- right behind a glazed krispy kreme donut. But its so terrible when this entire experience is ruined by the presence of raisens which are hidden throghout the challah. Raisens look like bugs, and I don't want to eat anything that resembles a bug. And b/c they like to hide deep in the challah, sometimes you don't even have warning that you are about to bite into one. That is the worst feeling ever...if you are enjoying your challah and then there is suddenly an ant-like raisen in your mouth, and you are forced to vomit at the table.

Enough negativity. One great thing about this time is the tiered system of forgiveness/new years wishes you get before the holiday. Now there are a few tiers here, so stay with me closely. Top tier is a personal meeting before the holiday, but this is difficult and uncommon, due to logistics and busy-ness before the holiday. Second tier is really solid - and its the phonecall. If someone calls you to say the wishes and forgiveness thing, it probably means they r very sincere about it. They know they will have to talk to you or your voicemail, and they are willing to do that. This means they cannot be generic and say the same thing to everyone, or else they will sound robotic and foolish. Third tier is the text message, and also deserves some credit...b/c its annoying to type out the message, b/c each button can either be capital, lower case, or a #, and sometimes u have to switch to make the sentence correct. A good way to assess the sincerity of the text message is a 3-prong test. Part 1- length: if its longer its probably more meaningful. Part 2- punctuation: did the person capitalize at the beginning of sentences, and use commas and periods. No dangling modifiers! I dont know what that means. Part 3- individuality- does the text message seem like its directed towards you, or could it be one general text message that the person sent out to everyone on their phone. hmm.. gets you thinking. Anyway, the last tier is the IM, but it still deserves credit, b/c it does mean the person is making an effort to say happy new year and beg for your forgiveness. But something has to be the last tier, and IM takes it.

I also like the tunes used in shul, and sometimes i sing them to myself at random points during the year. I mean like at 3 am on a saturday night or something.

Actually, now that i think about it, maybe the last tier is asking forgiveness on your blog: So if I have hurt or offended anyone by doing anything, I really apologize. I wish everyone a great year filled with only good. I'm choked up.

-[name redacted so that it stops appearing in google searches]