See Liza run...

Well hey there everyone. I didn't mean to pull a runner yesterday, but life has been totally hectic with my parents here, unexpected deadlines at work and so on. We've been running around the country, hitting such spots as the Sanhedrin burial caves at Beit Shearim, the old city in Acco, the Neve Tzedek neighborhood and Jerusalem. I'll write a more extensive post with photos after they leave tomorrow and life has returned more or less to normal (it won't return to complete normalcy until the Little One has returned to pre-school next Sunday), but just wanted to mention a few of the highlights of their visit.

The Jerusalem Time Elevator. We went yesterday, and the effects were great! The seats move in accordance with what you're seeing on the screen, and it was brilliant. I did feel sorry for the couple that took the "walk of shame", though. Part way through the film, there was a pause and the lights came on, and the reason for the pause (announced, of course) was that someone in the moving seats wasn't feeling well, and had asked to move to the stationery seats (and no, it wasn't me!). We all sat and watched as a young couple made their way to the new seats quickly and silently, before the lights were dimmed once again and the movie restarted.

Manta Ray. My parents and I spent a fabulous day in Tel Aviv with Savta Dotty, whom they met when we were all in Florida in April. Savta Dotty took us to lunch at Manta Ray, making her a star forever in my parents' eyes. The food was divine. The dessert was unbelievable. Sitting at a table overlooking the Mediterranean, we chatted over the salads, laughed over the fish and seafood, drooled over the chocolate concoction with four spoons moving furiously between plates and mouths. The service was excellent, and we will definitely be going back. Lunch was followed by a stroll through Neve Tzedek, where we wandered around the grounds of the Suzanne Dellal Center, strolled in and out of the small galleries and shops scattered about the neighborhood (which is undergoing some serious gentrification these days), and even managed to acquire a beautiful necklace from the gallery of Ayala Bar, as Savta Dotty found herself an amazing pair of earrings.

The Sanhedrin burial caves. The contents of the caves were interesting to see, and given the fabulously cool temperatures underground, this place is the perfect outdoor summer excursion. From the caves, we went to lunch on Moshav Beit Shearim, and dined at a restaurant called "Ha'kdera Shel Noga" (Noga's Stew). To put it mildly, the food was simply outstanding, not to mention beautifully presented. The setting was gorgeous, the service was excellent, and don't forget to order the parfait for dessert.

Anyway, that's about all I have time for at the moment. Stay tuned for more details (and photos) later on in the week…

The Diplomatic Post - Where's my anonymous commenter?

To the well-spoken anonymous commenter who left the most recent anonymous comment regarding the "Diplomatic Post" magazine, please contact me offline ASAP using the email address I've given in the "Send me an email" link. My editor would very much like to publish your comment as a "Letter to the Editor" (as he indicated below your comment), but he cannot do so as long as you remain anonymous.

80s Music Video Sunday #35

While I've always enjoyed their music, for some reason, I never found myself mooning over Duran Duran the way that so many other females of my generation did back in the 80s. I suppose I liked their songs, but never felt the need to purchase their albums or buy tickets to their concerts. I wasn't drawn to them like I was drawn to so many other artists of the time, and I really can't put my finger on why that might be. Maybe I just found them to be too popular, and given that I was something of a loner, their music just didn't speak to me. Maybe they were just a bit too mainstream and too "pretty" for my tastes. Even today, while I certainly don't have a problem with their music, I can also admit that I don't really have any Duran Duran songs among my massive collection of 80s tunes (though I do have a bit of a soft spot for Simon LeBon, since discovering that he spent some time here on a kibbutz when he was younger).

That being said, though, there is one Duran Duran song that I've always really liked, and even went so far as to purchase the single. The sound, different from many of their other popular songs, really appealed to me, and still does. Enjoy!

(Sorry this post is so short – I'm totally swamped today and time is of the essence...)



Save a Prayer
Duran Duran

You saw me standing by the wall, corner of a main street
And the lights are flashing on your window sill
All alone ain't much fun, so you're looking for the thrill
And you know just what it takes and where to go

Don't save a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after
No, don't say a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after

Feel the breeze deep on the inside, look you down into the well
If you can, you'll see the world in all his fire
Take a chance (like all dreamers can't find another way)
You don't have to dream it all, just live a day

Don't say a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after
No, don't say a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after
Save it 'til the morning after, save it till the morning after

Pretty looking road, I try to hold the rising floods that fill my skin
Don't ask me why I'll keep my promise, I'll melt the ice
And you wanted to dance so I asked you to dance
But fear is in your soul
Some people call it a one night stand
But we can call it paradise

Don't say a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after
No, don't say a prayer for me now, save it 'til the morning after
Save it 'til the morning after
Save it 'til the morning after
Save it 'til the morning after
Save it 'til the morning after

Save a prayer 'til the morning after

Keeping Busy, Helping Others

Life is hectic hectic hectic these days. While trying to meet my deadlines for the next edition of the Diplomatic Post, I've also been blogging over at Israelity, getting work done at the day job, trying to clean up the house in prior to my parents' arrival last Thursday afternoon and fighting off a stomach virus. I was supposed to attend what promised to be an interesting meeting last Wednesday, but my stomach wasn't having any of it, and it looks like I'll have to play catch-up by picking the brains of those friends whose health was clearer in better shape than mine.

I've also gotten myself marginally involved in another project of interest. As those of you who read this blog are probably aware, the journey to bring the Little One into the world was not a journey of smooth sailing. There were problems every step of the way, and more than our fair share of tragedies. After we lost our first son, I made a promise to myself that whenever I could draw on my experiences to help others, I would do so. For me, doing so would mean that everything we had been through had not been completely in vain. Several months ago, I was contacted by Angie Boss, co-author of a book called "Living with PCOS". She and her co-author, Evelina Sterling (herself the author of a book about egg donation), were in the process of writing a new book about funding fertility treatments. Angie had come across my blog, liked what she'd read, and wondered if I would be interested in sharing different aspects of my story for her book. I was happy to help, and am pleased to have the opportunity to take part in a project that will help other women who are going through experiences similar to mine. After coming to an agreement with regard to certain technical aspects of my contribution, I sent Angie several pages that I'd written, and in subsequent correspondence, she asked if I would mind posting the text to below to my blog. I periodically receive similar requests, and those most are turned down as a matter of my own personal policy, I was happy to acquiesce to Angie's request. Take a moment to read it. If you or someone you know can help, please do so. Most of the people I know who have gone through fertility treatments of one kind or another have always been hungry for information on all aspects of the subject, including myself. I read anything I could get my hands on (especially personal stories), so the more information that's out there, the better.

The Request...

"We are currently co-authoring a new book to be published by Simon &Schuster next fall called "Funding Fertility—How to Bring Home a Baby without Breaking the Bank." In this book, we address many of the barriers associated with paying for the high costs related to infertility treatments and adoption. This includes the "sticker shock" that we all get when we find out how much everything is going to cost, how to make cost-effective decisions (i.e., finding cheaper medication options, selecting certain clinics, undergoing certain procedures, considering "special deals") without sacrificing quality of care, actually having to come up with the money without completing going broke, dealing with insurance companies and the lack of coverage, and much, much more.

WE NEED YOUR HELP!!! We are currently compiling stories from people struggling with infertility (or considering adoption)—either currently, in the past, or in the future—to include in our book. These stories can highlight the good, the bad, or the ugly in terms of having to come up with the money to pay for your treatments and/or adoption. Through this book, we hope to shed more light on this nearly completely fee-for-service (and not covered by insurance!) side of medicine so we can allow more of the 10 million people out there experiencing infertility access to the ability to have a baby that they so desperately want without having to suffer financially. Having a baby should be a basic human right available to everyone, not a commodity in which some people make a lot of money! Please help us change the current system for the better by sharing your stories and experiences.

You can remain anonymous and all correspondence will be treated with utmost confidentiality. PLEASE SEND ALL STORIES, EXPERIENCES, AND QUESTIONS TO FUNDINGFERTILITY@YAHOO.COM.

Thanks so much for your help!

Evelina Sterling and Angie Boss"

80s Music Video Sunday #34

I don't even remember his name anymore, but for a while, he was one of my pen pals. Back in the 70s and 80s, it was very much the in thing in certain crowds to have pen pals, whose names you received via a variety of organizations created especially to facilitate such cross-cultural connections. I filled out the forms, stating my interests and hobbies with care, and was shortly rewarded by my efforts with letters from boys my age (don't ask why they didn't present me with female pen pals – I have no idea!) who lived in Israel and Egypt. In this pre-Internet era, we exchanged letters for a while, but given the inherent difficulties of filling pieces of paper with handwritten words, carefully folding the pages so they'd fit in the envelope, addressing said envelope and determining the proper amount of postage needed, these pen friendships, while well-intentioned, did not last for too long.

If I were to spend a few days rummaging through my old keepsakes (all conveniently boxed when my parents moved house just under two years ago), I might find the old letters and photos, reminding me of long-forgotten facts and nuggets of information shared by my pen friends in Egypt and Israel, at a time when I was too young to know about global issues and conflicts, and wished only to make friends with people in far away lands (apparently, some things never change!). Though it's probably been around 25 years since these connections were made, there is one detail that I still remember – the boy from Israel was really into a band called Dire Straits.

I've always enjoyed their music, not least of which because Mark Knopfler wrote the score for one of my all-time favorite movies, "The Princess Bride". Given that today is Mr. Knopfler's 58th birthday, it seems only fitting that today's 80s Music Video Sunday entry feature this incredible band. And, as opposed to last week's entry that featured the first video ever shown on MTV in the US, today's video was the first video ever shown on MTV Europe, on August 1st, 1987. Clearly, Europe wanted their MTV...

The song "Money for Nothing" is shrouded in controversy. Written by Knopfler from the point of view of a blue-collar worker watching MTV, the lyrics were criticized as being anti-gay, sexist and racist, and the entire second verse was often edited out due to both its content and the overall length of the song in its complete version. This edited version later appeared on a Dire Straits compilation album. In some instances, the word "faggot" was apparently replaced by "mother". While I was rather naive when the song was released in 1985, today I'm more than a little surprised that the public was so accepting of lyrics that make me somewhat uneasy.



Money for Nothing
Dire Straits

I want my
I want my MTV

Now look at them yo-yos that's the way you do it
You play the guitar on the MTV
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Money for nothin' and chicks for free
Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Lemme tell ya them guys ain't dumb
Maybe get a blister on your little finger
Maybe get a blister on your thumb

We gotta install microwave ovens
Custom kitchen deliveries
We gotta move these refrigerators
We gotta move these colour tvs

See the little faggot with the earring and the makeup
Yeah buddy that's his own hair
That little faggot got his own jet airplane
That little faggot hes a millionaire

We gotta install microwave ovesns
Custom kitchens deliveries
We gotta move these refrigerators
We gotta move these colour tvs

I shoulda learned to play the guitar
I shoulda learned to play them drums
Look at that mama, she got it stickin' in the camera
Man we could have some fun
And he's up there, what's that? hawaiian noises?
Bangin on the bongoes like a chimpanzee
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Get your money for nothin' get your chicks for free

We gotta install microwave ovens
Custom kitchen deliveries
We gotta move these refrigerators
We gotta move these colour tvs, lord

Now that ain't workin' that's the way you do it
You play the guitar on the mtv
That ain't workin' that's the way you do it
Money for nothin' and your chicks for free
Money for nothin' and chicks for free

I want my
I want my MTV

Toot toot toot - there goes my horn

On July 31st, those of you who acquired the print version of the Jerusalem Post may have received a copy of a brand new magazine – The Diplomatic Post. As a writer, I happen to think it's rather interesting when something new hits the newsstands, and indeed, I enjoy hearing about all of the wildly different publications that are out there, allowing me to muse over the various (and often unusual) target audiences, as well as the potential writing opportunities available.

Even more exciting than hearing about the birth of a new publication is actually taking an active role in the process, and no one was happier (not to mention more surprised) than I to receive a phone call in early May from the editor of a certain, yet-to-be-named-at-the-time magazine, several months after I'd sent in my initial writing sample (and promptly forgot having done so). One planning meeting later, and I suddenly found myself responsible for two monthly columns in the newly branded Diplomatic Post, both involving commentary on current events and political issues, which must come as a huge shock, given how infrequently I tackle such topics here...

Since becoming a writer for this mag, I've managed to get myself on all sorts of fascinating mailing lists, and have even started receiving telephone calls from local embassies asking to confirm my contact information. I've discovered that saying "my editor" takes the same amount of getting used to as saying "my husband", and I haven't decided whether or not I can actually call myself a journalist, or if I'm simply a writer, or maybe a columnist. I feel rather silly referring to myself as a journalist when spending time with my friends who really are journalists and have been for years, but on the other hand, it sounds infinitely more exciting than telling people that I'm a technical writer (though, in all honesty, most things do sound more exciting than that...). Telling people that I'm "a writer" allows them to think that I'm far more interesting than I actually am, and hey – we all want to be perceived as being interesting, don't we?

But I digress... The magazine. Unfortunately, The Diplomatic Post isn't available online at this point, though I'm hoping that will change so that I won't have to grab another six copies at the next editorial meeting (to be fair, only one is for us – one copy goes to my parents, another one goes to NRG, and three went to another friend on-staff who wasn't able to make the last meeting). The next edition should hit local newsstands on the 31st of August, and I can be found writing Headliners and the Page Before Last.

So all in all, it hasn't been a bad summer as far as freelance writing goes. I'm finally getting paid for my efforts, and the added pocket change (which is really all that it amounts to) from this gig and another gig have allowed me to upgrade to the 16-shekel grande-sized latte. Toot toot toot – there goes my horn again!

80s Music Video Sunday #33

While growing up, my family always seemed to be a bit behind in the technology game. In our house, phrases like "Now in living color", or "Now in technicolor" meant nothing, as we were the last family on the block to get a color television (and don't even get me started on the lack of a remote control). We were also the last family to get cable television (remember the cable box that sat on top of your television, with a different button for each channel?). Needless to say, this "lethal" combination didn't make us terribly popular when it came to just hanging out and watching television, especially as in our area of Upstate New York, not having cable meant living with three network channels, PBS, and one local channel, which eventually turned into FOX.

In the same way that my younger brother blames his fondness for sugar cereals on the fact that we never had them at home while growing up (we could only have the personal serving-sized boxes on visits to the grandparents, resulting in daily battles as we reserved each box days in advance – "I want the Sugar Pops!" "No! I called it yesterday!" "Mom!"), it wouldn't surprise me to discover that the lack of color and cable in our youth resulted in him today being the proud owner of a seriously high-tech television with a huge screen and several hundred television stations, many of which are in Spanish, due to the fact that he lives in South Florida. And, while I do not share his penchant for sugar cereals (I'm a "Special K" girl), it would not be an understatement to say that I'm wowed by his TV setup (and especially impressed by the fact that my seven year-old niece knows how to configure her own TiVo settings).

Not having cable in the early 80s had its drawbacks, especially for kids our age. We were forced to look elsewhere for our television needs, and missed out on various pop culture phenomena. On August 1st, 1981, when all of our friends suddenly started talking about how they "wanted their MTV", it took us a while until we finally discovered what we'd been missing. We were part of the original MTV generation, and our idols included the newly-coined VJs – Nina Blackwood, JJ Jackson, Mark Goodman, Alan Hunter, and Martha Quinn. Now, of course, MTV has changed and expanded dramatically over the years, with a veritable plethora of MTV networks around the world, with different formats on both the genre level and the regional level, and to be honest, I don't even know what channel it's on anymore (we get MTV Europe as part of our basic cable package). Over the years, I transitioned from being an MTV watcher to being a VH1 watcher, and these days, I don't watch the music channels at all, with one of the underlying reasons being that I simply can't bear the fact that at some point, most of my favorites tunes suddenly fell under the genres of either classics/oldies or adult contemporary (shudder).

In any event, today's 80s Music Video Sunday commemorates that August day 26 years ago when a brand new television network entered our lives and changed the world of music forever. And it all started with this song by The Buggles, which, though technically ineligible for 80s Music Video Sunday because it was released in 1979, receives honorary 80s status because of the defining role it played in one of the most pivotal events of the 1980s as the first video ever played on MTV.



Video Killed the Radio Star
The Buggles

I heard you on the wireless back in '52
Lying awake intend at tuning in on you
If I was young it didn't stop you coming through

(Oh, oh)

They took the credit for your second symphony
Rewritten by machine and new technology
And now I understand the problems you can see

(Oh, oh)
I met your children
(Oh, oh) What did you tell them?

Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
Pictures came and broke your heart

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

And now we meet in an abandoned studio
We hear the playback and it seems so long ago
And you remember the jingles used to go

(Oh, oh) You were the first one
(Oh, oh) You were the last one

Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
In my mind and in my car
We can't rewind we've gone to far

Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh
Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh

Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
In my mind and in my car
We can't rewind we've gone to far

Pictures came and broke your heart
Put the blame on VTR

You are a radio star
You are a radio star

Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star

Video killed the radio star (You are a radio star)
Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star (You are a radio star)
Video killed the radio star

Video killed the radio star (You are a radio star)
Video killed the radio star
Video killed the radio star (You are a radio star)
Video killed the radio star