MY URBAN KVETCH

Urban Kvetch Time Machine: February 2, 2004

Five years ago, I began this blog. This was the opening post.

Welcome to My Urban Kvetch, a place for me to vent about the issues that clutter my brain as I live my so-called-freelance life in the Big City. I'm all about looking at my experience through the lens of humor, whenever it's possible. Usually, if the experience is bad, it's hard for me to see the funny in it until much later, but I usually come around eventually. I mean, after all, we are talking about someone (me) who was stuck in the subway during the August 14th Blackout, and managed to not completely lose it until she could breathe above-ground air again. That takes some strength of character, and some humor. I wrote my way through it--couldn't have survived without my little notebook. More than AMEX, I don't leave home without it. Pen and paper are an essential part of the NYC writer's wardrobe, even at its most minimum.

And though I've resisted long enough, I'm joining the blog generation. My hopes? That this space will provide me with a forum for fleshing out ideas, kicking around premises and developing essays that will ultimately yield publishable fruit. And making it public? Hoping to be discovered, of course...by a fan base or by editors who will make my dreams of a positive checkbook balance a reality.

Thanks to all of you for reading, commenting, telling your friends, tweeting, re-blogging, linking, and generally sticking around the last five years. Here's a sampler of some of my favorites (funny and serious from many of my blog-categories) in celebration. And stick around...there's lots more to come.

Choosing to Do the New (From "Nonsensical Ravings," October 2008)

"Welcome to Hollywoood...What's Your Dream?" (From "California Kvetchin'," December 2008)

Britney and Madonna: The Phonecalls (From "Madonnanthology," May 2005)

Intimacy Intermezzo (From "My NYC," December 2006)

Approaching Midnight, 9/11/2006 (From "My NYC," September 2006)

The Traveler's Prayer (From "Kvetch Across America," April 2005)

The Urban K Meets Tina Fey (From "Pop Culture," June 2005)

The "Return" (From "Israel," July 2008)

Adventures in Israeli Cuisine (From "Israel," June 2008)

My LimmudLA Sessions, Revealed

LimmudLA, an annual post-denominational, multi-generational conference exploring all facets of Jewish life and identity in which everyone has something to learn, and everyone has something to teach is being held February 13-16 in Costa Mesa, CA, and I'm involved with four sessions.

Reshaping the Jewish Future: A Look at Young Jewish Innovation Worldwide Jewish demography studies have focused on the dwindling birth rate. But beyond the numbers panic, Jewish innovation and creativity has seen unprecedented growth as a cohort of young Jews are changing the Jewish future through creative programs. Join representatives of the ROI Community (a global network of Jewish leaders in their 20s and 30s) for a discussion about community partnership with these new initiatives and a glimpse into how globalization may affect the Jewish people.

The Singles Scene: Jewish Dating in the Age of J-Date
Scott Perlo, Esther Kustanowitz, Suzannah Warlick
It has been said that all is fair in love and war, but is everything really fair in the pursuit of love? What are the "sins" of modern dating and matchmaking? How does the Internet affect how we connect with (and sometimes disparage) each other? What do Bible stories teach us about relationships? And how can we as Jews apply our ethical code and tradition to the process of matching ourselves and others? Our panelists explore ethical dating in the modern age.

'Jews' Line is it Anyway?: Basic Improv for Jews
Let's face it: we may be the people of the Book, but our history, while widely documented after the fact, is not pre-scripted. As a people, Jews have always improvised in daily life and our adaptability, intelligence and humor have helped us become an active part of comedy and popular culture. Join other beginning improvisers for basic improv icebreakers and some light cultural analysis of what makes these short-form improv games "Jewish."

Writing Workshop: Find Your Megillah There's a megillah inside every Jew, not just those named Ruth and Esther. Jews are natural storytellers because our faith is based in oral and then written history. But what makes a story worth telling and retelling, generation after generation? In this experimental writing workshop, visit some noteworthy texts from Jewish tradition and engage in free-writing exercises based on and inspired by those texts.

Times and room assignments will be revealed on site, so if you're going, make sure to look for me on the schedule and running around the conference. For more information about LimmudLA, see their website.

25 Things: The Facebook Meme Goes Blog

Oy. Another meme. This one found me on Facebook, and could have emerged as just another annoying game of internet "tag" among friends who would rather post a moment of introspection and navel-gazing than ask their friends real questions, face-to-face or at least person-to-person. If I hadn't found everyone else's responses to this one so interesting, I wouldn't have even considered it. Back in 2005, I rejected the invitation to do a "100 things about me" post on my blog (read all the "whys" here). But 25 is doable. I'll reveal what I want, and know it's not the totality of me, but things that I find relevant (or utterly irrelevant!) to the person I've become. It might even serve as an outline for that book I keep threatening to finish. Here are the official directions...

Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it's because I want to know more about you. [Or because I thought you'd enjoy this piece...but if I didn't tag you, feel free to do it anyway.]

1. I had (and ok, maybe still have) a possibly unhealthy relationship with John Hughes movies.
2. Our high school had a secret, underground, yeshiva prom.
3. I fell for a boy in sixth grade and liked him through high school - during that time, he talked to me a total of three times, but I was still convinced he'd ask me to our secret, underground, yeshiva prom. (For which I blame #1. And, a little bit, #2)
4. Watching "the Breakfast Club" in high school, I was convinced that the characters were getting high off of regular nicotine cigarettes.
5. I never wanted to live outside of New Jersey. New York? That was dangerous!
6. My first NY apartment was on the corner of 84th and Amsterdam. I only lived there until 1998, but my name is still on the buzzer (or was at the end of September 2008).
7. I know lyrics to the never-produced Christmas version of the "ToysRUs kid" song because I sang them on a demo, and also sang on the demo that sold the song and made the composer a lot of money. I made $18.
8. In an echo of #1, I think "When Harry Met Sally" was responsible for at least six years of warped relationship expectations.
9. I've been to Israel 14 times and haven't paid for a single trip.
10. I've pretty much never been anywhere else with the only exceptions being one trip to Club Med (Turks), another to San Juan, Puerto Rico and a family trip to Mexico when I was in fifth grade. I also "came out of Egypt" in time for Passover during the semester I spent in Israel, which thrilled my parents.
11. We have a family newsletter. Some of you may be familiar with it. And the rest of you will not be surprised by this. I fully expect my nephews and niece will assume editorial positions before they realize that not all families do this.
12. At current count, I have 3285 unread Gmail messages. Good thing I get unlimited space in my inbox, if not unlimited time in my life.
13. This blog, my first blog, http://myurbankvetch.com celebrates its 5th anniversary on Monday, February 2. JDatersAnonymous turns 5 on April 28. Blogging has transformed my life, enabling me to visit other cities in the US, meet great people, and set the stage for my recent relocation.
14. I have worked at two Jewish organizations that were severely affected by the Madoff situation. No, I am not the link.
15. I once worked at Yeshiva University and MTV in the same week.
16. I really do love working with the ROI Community, because I meet amazing people from many countries, and get a real introduction to Jewish innovation worldwide. For more, see http://roi120.com or come to my Jewish innovation session at LimmudLA (register: http://LimmudLA.org)
17. The ocean sometimes makes me cry.
18. In another life, I was definitely a comedy writer. And perhaps, also, in this one. And Entertainment Weekly missed the boat on me in terms of my devotion to pop culture (their loss: Beliefnet's Idol Chatter's gain). EW editors looking to make amends/reach out should skip directly to #25.
19. My great-great-grandfather, Yehoshua Stampfer was a founder of the Israeli city Petach Tikva.
20. I put a lot of my life online, but nowhere near all of it. That should give you an idea what goes on in my brain every day. It's like the audio equivalent of those "Magic Eye" pictures: you know there's an image in there, but you just have to filter out the other colors competing for your attention.
21. In the 1975 film, the part of drunk, pot-smoking night aide Turkle was played by Scatman Crothers. In [year deleted], the role was played by never-been-drunk, thinking-cigarettes-and-marijuana-are-the-same-thing Esther Kustanowitz (swilling flat cream soda out of a whiskey flask).
22. I have never tried cocaine or Ecstasy. Coffee? That's another story.
23. I moved to Los Angeles in October with two suitcases of my stuff. The rest is either at my parents' house in NJ (sorry about that, guys), or has been donated back to the universe.
24. I go through moments of extreme faith and conviction that there's a larger purpose, and others believing that life is random, fleeting, and only about personal meaning.
25. I am available for writing, editing, blogging about bizarre celebrity behavior, obsessing over popular culture, creative and elementary technology consulting, speaking engagements, blog and social media tutoring, hosting karaoke events, leading improv clinics, joining writing groups, and of course, weddings and bar mitzvahs.

As usual, 25 things seems like too short a list, and I've spent way more time on this than I should have today. If you want more, there's lots online every day at various websites. So check them out, people. Those blogs aren't going to read themselves. Thanks for your support.
Http://myurbankvetch.com
http://jdatersanonymous.com
http://estherk.com
http://blog.beliefnet.com
http://roi120.com
http://jewlicious.com

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!

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?

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.

Rumors of My Retirement Are Greatly Exaggerated: East Coast Events in December

I know. It's nearly been a week since my last post. Have done so much -- finding an apartment, trolling for furniture on Craigslist and in thrift stores, trying to find an allen wrench so I can assemble my bed, going to the LimmudLA Healing Havdalah, checking out Jewish authors at the Celebration of Jewish Books, and of course, writing lots for Idol Chatter -- that it's been near-impossible to get it all down. But posts are coming...

In the interim, allow me to announce that I'm planning an East Coast trip for December -- mostly so I can experience the cold, dank winter-ridden East Coast and then return to generous sunshine with a mild chill in the air (better take a sweater if you go out). But here's the real reason for my return:

"Sex and Relationships in the 21st Century with Zeek Magazine"
Thu, Dec 11, 2008, 7:00pm
Location: 92YTribeca, 200 Hudson Street
Venue: 92YTribeca Lecture Hall
Code: T-MM5LC07-01
Price: $12.00

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.

Both Josh and Dan are very smart and entertaining individuals. And they're both married (not to each other). So I have a sense I'll be the Lorax for single people again. It would be great to see my NY posse in attendance at this hip venue, and if enough of y'all want to, I could probably be convinced to go for drinks or sushi downtown somewhere. So tell your friends, and I hope to see you there!

And yes, I am available for other NY gigs, and will be traveling to the DC area as well as Miami on this journey, so book now...myurbankvetch@gmail.com.

Esther's Idol Chatter: September

A 90210 actress is a priest, Madonna, Miley, McCartney, PostSecret-style repentance, Jewels of Elul, Jedi University, two news roundups, Stephen Baldwin "promoting" Gossip Girl, and viral videos for a new year. That's what you've missed over in Idol Chatter this month. Check out a list of my September posts here.

Choosing to Do the New

"You look happy, like you're breathing easier."

"You're so skinny! You look great!"

"You've got some great color in your face."

There's something within me that's changed. The scale will gleefully deny its involvement, and thanks to copious amounts of sunblock and obsessive hat-wearing in the Holy Land, the reality is that my face is no more or less rosy than it was when I left in May. But still, there are reasons a person can look different.

Because certain decisions have been made, for example. Because I'm learning to deal differently with difficult issues that come up instead of letting them fester. Because opportunities have popped up that make me realize I have an abundance of riches to choose from. Because family is supportive and providing new opportunities to celebrate. Because people seek my input on things I care about. Because I'm part of the conversation, because I can contribute skills to the projects and people who are rising up meet the Jewish future. Because change is imminent, and scary, and exciting.

Looking back, I think the whole quest-for-change-thing started when I chose a new phone last year. I could have gone with silver--it was what I'm used to, and goes with everything, it's unobtrusive and functional, and really, why go with something flashy when you can go with something classic? But that day, I gave into a whim, and purchased an orange phone, embracing a flash of whimsical color in a monochrome life.

I think it began that moment, when I identified that there was a pattern of sameness that was comforting, but unexciting and unstimulating. It was easy, because maintaining the status quo always is easier than choosing something unusual or unknown. There's this double-edged sword called inertia that traps us all: items and people in motion stay in motion, and those at rest remain sedentary. So, I'm choosing to overcome intertia of the second definition in favor of the first; choosing to change toward a new trajectory.

Predictably, people want to know what I'm going there FOR. "Why Los Angeles?" "What's the new job?" "Are you pitching a screenplay?" There is no new job. I'm in the fortunate position to have steady clients, for whom the work happens over the phone and the internet--which I can do from anywhere. And as for the "why L.A.?" question, my basic answer is "why not?"  The weather's better, it's a big city with a big, young creative Jewish population, and thanks to an immense social network, I have some people there I know well, and others I'd like to know better. I will miss my family, who are all East Coasters, but I'll visit, and it's a great comfort to know that I won't be lonely in Los Angeles, a statement I can make solely because technology has so enabled me.

As for the industry, I won't say it's not an attractor. If someone invites me to the Emmys or Oscars, it's not like I'm going to say no. And I appreciate the confidence of my friends, that I have what it takes creatively to create and pitch a screenplay. There are definitely creative things (Groundlings and UCBT, you're on notice) that I'd like to do while I'm in LA. But I'm not under any delusions that my simple act of moving across the country will yield some sort of industry-related opportunity, especially since I have friends who have been plugging away toward Hollywood careers for years with little or no success. I know it's a tough business, and it's not my primary goal to fight and scratch my way in. But my being there allows me to be present on the fringes of a world that I've long wondered about. (Maybe it's time to test that Jews in Hollywood thing.)

And then there's the other thing. Writing about NYC Jewish singles for nearly five years had me Bradshaw-wondering if the issues were local, indigenous to large cities with large Jewish populations, or nationwide. In exploring Jewish single life, perhaps for a book that seems to be perpetually in proposal stage, I think a wider scope of experience might serve my personal needs and my propel my professional purpose. I spent several months in Jerusalem, and became fixated on Srugim, the TV show about Orthodox Jewish singles. The issues were the same as on the Upper West Side, but with an Israeli accent. Are the issues the same in Los Angeles, but with a "dude..." fixed on the end of every sentence? Or does the industry's premium on beauty and youth invade the dating scene, creating impossible standards with a distinctly West Coast flavor?

It's time to embrace change, and hope that inertia, my social network, and the California sunshine do the rest. I'm choosing to do the new. And I'm excited to see what happens next.

Reshet Bet Semi-Bilingual Radio Kvetch Trilogy

Last week I was interviewed on Reshet Bet (Israel Channel Two radio) by Yigal Ravid, on the show Yoman Haboker (Morning Diary). And because the links aren't available online, the interview has been sent to me in three parts, creating a trilogy destined to be as legendary as those of classic cinema...

The embedded audio's not working yet, because I'm working with MP2 files. Anyone who can shed some light on how to do this gets major mitzvah points. (Check back for links shortly, and in the meantime, allow me to tempt you with chapter summaries...)

Episode One: The Hebrew Menace...in which I wake up at 6:45 and get quizzed in a language that isn't my native tongue. "Umm," is soon to become a national catchphrase, trust me.

Episode Two: Bloglectric Boogaloo...in which the radio interviewer confuses me by reading directly from my blog, and I say weird things like "I love Subliminal, and the Tact Family and Coolooloosh." And I begin to describe what I do for a living, sort of and manage to mention ROI briefly (the explanation of which is actually continued in the next clip). 

Episode Three: The Search For Kvetch, in which I repeat my apparent catchphrase "הזדמנות מיוחדת" (a special opportunity) about four thousand times, spell "My Urban Kvetch," and say that the worst thing about being in Israel is the humidity. Oh yes, I did.

Plus, I learn how to say female blogger in Hebrew: יומנאית רשת -- don't say you never learned anything at MyUrbanKvetch.

Enjoy, and I'll post links as soon as I can. Shabbat shalom from Jerusalem...