MY URBAN KVETCH

Kvetch Giveaway: Win a "Nice Jewish Guys" Calendar!

Recession special: PopJudaica (you can see their banner at right) has offered MyUrbanKvetch readers a chance to win the hottest gift of this Hanukkah season: the Nice Jewish Guys wall calendar!

How to enter: Visit this page at PopJudaica and answer the following question, leaving your comment below in the comments section:

Imagine you're an advertising agency assigned to promote the Nice Jewish Guys calendar. Who is the ideal celebrity pitch-person for this product? Why?

Best explanation/most creative answer wins. Judge(s) will deliberate over the weekend and announce a winner on Monday.

Decision of the judge(s) is final.

*(Want a free copy of the Mormon hunks calendar? You're on your own. Sorry folks.)

Which SuperJew Are You?

Are you ready to be a hero?? In this newest video from "Jewish Robot" William Levin, check out the team of SuperJews...then go to SuperJews.org to find out more and join a team for Hanukkah Color War, coming this holiday season to a Facebook page near you! Over the eight days of Chanukah, join a team in committing online acts of virtue...By taking part in the debut year of this international micro-activism event, you can win a coveted SuperJews Gold Medal for your Facebook profile while strengthening the Jewish world one click at a time. This campaign is being run by United Jewish Communities and the Jewish Federation system with an all-star team of partners including JTA, JESNA, JAFI, FJC, JDC and Hillel.

'Tis the Season

There are never any subscription costs here at MyUrbanKvetch, but once a year, I make my annual end-of-year appeal.

It's been a big year for me, what with spending all that time in Israel, moving out of my apartment in NY, and moving across the country to a new city...and so, if you were thinking that you might like to get me something this year for whatever reason, you can check out the following options.

Gift cards: Trader Joe's (available in stories in any denomination), Target, Gap/Old Navy, JetBlue -- to help me furnish my life in Los Angeles, and help defray the costs of trips back East.

Amazon WishList: Check out the sidebar...my wishlist is always here, telling you some of the things I'd like to be reading, so feel free to check it out.

And there's always the Tip Jar. (Also in the sidebar.)

But most of all, 'tis the season to say thanks to all my readers for visiting, for coming back, for sharing articles you've liked with your friends, and for participating in the discussion over the last few years...here's to future conversations.

Happy holidays!

"In Treatment" Gets Golden Globe Nods

Born in Israel, native Hebrew speaker "In Treatment" was imported successfully to Hollywood as an English-language HBO series, and is now being acknowledged by the Golden Globes with nominations for the series and for several of its actors.

Entertainment Weekly noted proudly that this was an example of TV riskiness paying off, a trend it hoped would continue despite rumors that the originality of the series might be tweaked for its second season.

But for me, a non-HBO subscriber with an affinity for Hebrew television, hopes that this importing trend continues. Why should TV just come from Hollywood? Let's branch out a bit and see some of that global economy stuff trickle into entertainment..."Serugim: UWS," anyone?

For the full list of GG nominees, see here.

In NYC: Two Nights Only...

Back from the West Coast, ever so briefly, for these two events. Feel free to join me (and friends) at either:

Tonight, Wednesday, December 10: ROI Happy Hour NYC:

Westside Tavern, 360 W. 23rd Street (between 8th and 9th Avenues), 6:30pm-?. Not for ROIers only. Come out to meet me and some of the members of the ever-expanding ROI Community.

Tomorrow night, Thursday, December 11: Sex & Relationships with Zeek Magazine: A literary take on the themes of love, romance and sexuality at the 92Y's new Tribeca branch, 200 Hudson Street, NYC. (Subway directions here.)

Joshua Henkin (author of New York Times Notable Book of 2007, Matrimony), Dan Friedman (Associate Editor of Zeek and Arts and Culture editor at the Forward), and Esther D. Kustanowitz (blogger, My Urban Kvetch and JDaters Anonymous) offer a literary take on the themes of love, romance, and sexuality. Find out what writers have to say about the role of marriage in modern families and societies, and the ways that relationships have changed in recent history. Get tickets here.

Hope to see you!

"Pass the Candle" Now Online

Here it is, the latest from Michelle Citrin and William Levin (ROI Grantees '08), just in time for Hanukkah! Will and Michelle created this video with an international team of contributors, many of them who they met through ROI (including Jewster's Aryeh Goldsmith). How many ROIers do you spy passing the candle? The video was produced with some additional support from JTA and the Jewish Channel. For a behind-the-scenes look, check out Michelle's MySpace blog. [reprinted with my own permission from the ROI website]

I Know Who You Are...Sort Of...

I've been doing some studying of my statistics lately for this site and have discovered some interesting things...for instance, this month people came to MyUrbanKvetch looking for "must-have iphone applications," "mimi rogers scientology" and "michelle citrin," not to mention the old favorite, "marzipan rugelach." People also sought out "have you met ted."

Most of y'all are using either Internet Explorer or Firefox. The rest of you are using something else, obviously, with Chrome coming in last.

The site saw 3,601 visits from 72 countries (with the US, Israel, UK, Canada and Australia in the top five spots).

Top ten cities for visitors were New York, Givatayim, Brooklyn, West Hollywood, London, San Francisco, Oakland, Beverly Hills, Long Island City and Toronto. Congrats, top ten cities...but you've got a tough job ahead of you...some cities are gaining on you and front-runners are emerging (I'm looking at you, #12 Chicago and #18 Jerusalem!)

Who are you, where are you from, and how did you get here?

"Light 'Em Up" - Birthright Israel's New Hanukkah Video

Hanukkah's Must-Have iPhone App...

If you've got an iPhone, you take delight in applications that help you identify music excerpts and allow you to play games by tilting the device and rolling digital balls into digital holes. You use your iPhone religiously, but do you really use it RELIGIOUSLY?

Now, with the new application iMenorah, you have the chance to enlist your favorite gadget in observance of Hanukkah....

Among the features of the program are the ability to light candles with the touch of your finger, beautiful graphics and animation, blessings sung in Hebrew, the right number of candles are shown during each day of Hanukkah, and the candles melt over time. The app costs $1.99 and is available on iTunes.

According to the product's website, a portion of the proceeds from iMenorah will be donated to a San Francisco Jewish charity, beneficiary to be chosen based on local needs. Details will be posted to the app's website.

The Week in Brief Non-Jewish (and Some Jewish) News

Lots of little bits of news, easily digestible even for those of you with gastrointestinal issues. (No lactose contained therein, but these news bytes may have been produced in a facility that also processes nuts. I guess you'll be the judge of that.)

Annual Most Powerful Women in Hollywood list again leaves me out. Oprah? Is she in Hollywood? Wasn't my living there for two weeks while I looked for an apartment enough? Sorry Angelina Jolie -- you can't be #1 on every list (you're at #24 on this one). Regular My Urban Kvetch search result Tina Fey comes in at #50, behind Tyra Banks, but ahead of Grey's Anatomy creator Shonda Rimes and Miley Cyrus, who should be on the "Not a Girl (Not Yet a Woman)" list instead.  Glenn Close -- who made bunny-boiling look justifiable, and who brought some additional cache to The Shield before heading whole-hog into Damages -- as an honoree, ok, that's fair.

Speaking of Glenn Close, the heiress she portrayed in "Reversal of Fortune" opposite Jeremy Irons, Sunny von Bulow, died after a 28-year coma. Husband still claimed she was "only resting."

Speaking of "only resting," Monty Python invades the internet with a YouTube channel featuring great-quality clips from their archives, movies, and allows fans to create mashups etc. Check it all out at Pythonline. (via NYT)

Speaking of online life, the Baltimore Jewish Times notes that Jewish orgs are beginning to embrace 2.0 technology and attitude...probably just in time for Web 3.0...

And speaking of Jews online (and this is the last "speaking of," I promise!), if you read about the Forward 50 and wondered what your fellow Jews were thinking, you'll want to be reassured that there are at least 50 opinions of who should and shouldn't be on the list. I'd like to call your particular attention to this statement, which has to be my favorite comment I've ever seen on a Jewish website:

"You guys make me sick. In future, when people ask me “Why doesn’t Mashiach come”, I will send them this article."

Read other Forward readers' responses here, and then check out the four "pundits" who wrote about this over at the JTA.