Israel Hotel Reviews

While planning my trip to Israel, I found TripAdvisor somewhat helpful in assessing possible lodging destinations. So I decided to contribute two reviews of my own on the Cinema Hotel in Tel Aviv and the Christ Church Guest House in…

Brainy Vegetarians

According to the Washington Post, kids with high IQs are more likely to become vegetarian than those with lower IQs. The article says: “Vegetarians were more likely to be female, of higher social class and better educated, but IQ was…

Meowing at Neighbor Isn’t Criminal Harassment

You may recall that I previously blogged on the story of the 14 year old boy who, with malice, meowed repeatedly (at least twice) at an elderly neighbor, which led to a criminal prosecution for harassment. At that time, I…

Free International Calls

I lived through the dot com era, so I’ve seen companies do a lot of ridiculous things to win customers. (My favorite dot com freebie was iResearch.com, which paid me $200 to write 20 stock tips of 25 words each)….

California Out-Migration Exceeds In-Migration

For many years, California has seen more in-migration instead of out-migration except in periods of economic downturn. But recently, California has seen net out-migration despite relatively good economic times. See the Mercury News story. There are a variety of possible…

SaveToby.com — the Final Chapter

You may recall that I’ve blogged several times about SaveToby, the site that threatened to kill and eat Toby the cute rabbit if people didn’t donate a total of $50,000. People went bonkers about the threat to a bunny (as…

“It’s Balmier in Buffalo”

Californians are wimps when it comes to weather. Low temperatures are dipping into the 30s at night (which is unseasonably cold), and this produces lead stories in the local paper that “It’s Balmier in Buffalo.” I’m still able to remember…

Beef with a Frank–Gershengorin v. Vienna Beef

Some observant Jews are suing Vienna Beef Hot Dog for extensively marketing that they are 100% beef (and, thus, acceptable for some Jews to eat, even if the hot dogs aren’t otherwise strictly kosher), even though allegedly the wholesale ingredients…

Bob’s Pumpkin Farm, Half Moon Bay

Half Moon Bay is our local pumpkin-picking capital. There are at least a dozen pumpkin farms in the area, most of them straddling Highway 92 as it heads west towards the ocean. These farms range from no-frills pick-your-own farmstands to…

Jacob Turns 4

Jacob turned four last week. After a birthday party at his school, where he got to wear a crown, we had a birthday party for him in our backyard–it was 70 degrees, sunny and beautiful. At Jacob’s request, Lisa made…