I, too, was a GDI, in my case at Indiana University. But I wonder, did any of you watch that short-lived series called Greeks? I found it oddly moving, especially at the end, and despite the silliness, I thought the characters in it showed a lot of growth and coming to maturity. The only thing that truly bugged me -- and this really is silly -- is that the title was spelled out using the Greek capital Sigma as if it were an "E". My brain was doing the same kind of internal convulsions that it gets when I see an "R" turned backwards and all I can think of is "Ya". 

I'm near Modiin, but work in Jerusalem. Say when; I'd love to come if the schedule permits.

Misthiocracy: Thanks for the additional info, and (hurray!) a new word: frass.

Nanda Panjandrum: I'll try to write more often.

Aha! I didn't think of ants, but later in the afternoon, I did see quite a few of them near the remnants of the stools, and they may have been carpenter ants. But so tiny?? And so loud when they chew? Really, it sounded like One Giant Bug.

 One summer a few years ago, I counted no less than 15 types of ant running around my house and yard, from teeny-tiny red ones that could get into a sealed sugar jar, to large outdoor thingies that looked like they could lift about 30 times their own weight.

Termites seem less likely, since my house is basically a cement box built on top of a rocky hill about 50 meters from a Byzantine-era monastery with a wine press and an olive press. I always thought it was neat that the moshav kids had an 1800-year-old playhouse.

I'm now reading Max Hastings Inferno, after hearing an interview with him on Milt Rosenberg's program a few weeks ago. It is fascinating and a slightly different take on the experience of the war by ordinary people. I also enjoyed Hitlerland: American Eyewitnesses to the Nazi Rise to Power by Andrew Nagorski, which helps to understand the early enthusiasm for the charismatic Hitler. To understand how the noose tightened around Germany's Jews, I highly recommend Victor Klemperer's 2-volume diary. Among other things, it reveals much about how the war affected Germans economically. 

I wasn't sure at first if I would like Catherine Merridale's Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939-1945 but it turned out to be an excellent history, and a revealing look at the political element for the ordinary Russian soldier. She drew on Alexander Werth's Russia at War: 1941-1945, written by a journalist who reported on the war as it happened.

If you want more suggestions, get in touch, although given the Ricochet family, you may soon be overwhelmed with good suggestions.

As a Hoosier, I had at least heard of Wendell Willkie, but the most I have actually learned about him so far comes from Amity Shlaes' wonderful book, The Forgotten Man.  An intriguing figure who made many mistakes in his presidential campaign. Lots of lessons to learn from his history vis-a-vis FDR.

After my mother died, I lived for awhile with an aunt and uncle. Unlike my other relatives, this couple never had children, a great mystery to me. Decades later, my aunt was diagnosed with Huntington's Disease, became increasingly unable to communicate--she had been the great talker of the family--and died about 10 years later. I then learned that her father had been considered "crazy" and, not knowing then that he too had had Huntington's Disease, my aunt and uncle elected not to pass on "mental illness" to any possible children. It must have been a wrenching moral decision. There is now a test for the genetic factor indicating this horrid disease, but as far as I know, the only way to deal with it is to avoid having children.

I am very much opposed to abortion, but have to admit I've known of some grave family tragedies involving seriously ill children. I have also witnessed heroic virtue by families who cared for and loved without stint their severely disabled children.

To 10 cents: I bought my Kindle Fire last summer when I was in the States, so it's not the newer Fire HD, which (naturally) came out just after I bought mine for $200. I'm not sure what the battery life is, since I usually keep mine charged. Only once did I use it off and on for a whole day without re-charging. I think it was about 8 hours and still had at least 40% charge left.

One big plus that I had after it arrived was a month of Amazon Prime, so I was able to stream television shows, documentaries and quite a large selection of movies until I had to go home. That was great fun, and I was surprised at how well the video looked on the small screen. I only wish I could watch stuff here at home.

I have a Kindle Fire, used almost exclusively for book-reading. I can't load apps because to purchase them you need a U.S. credit card; I can't watch movies while outside the U.S. because Amazon can't stream them outside the U.S. With those exceptions, I am quite satisfied. Downloading new Kindle books is instant. So, for basic book-reading, it's great. E-mail and internet is also fine.

My one BIG complaint is that the micro cable connector does not fit firmly in its socket, and has to be propped up so that it connects in order to re-charge. I tried a new cable, but this is apparently a design flaw with the socket, and there is nothing to be done about it. The annoyance, had I known about it before purchasing, would have been a deal-breaker.

Perhaps the DHS has been buying up scads of ammo just to create the lack of supply? Or maybe it's just a temporary situation because of the demand; I certainly hope it's the latter.

I spent many happy hours as a teen helping my father reload ammo. Great fun. He had been a Tech Sgt in Ordnance in WWII, so experimenting with different powders was his favorite hobby. We spent most weekends at the range. I think he wanted a boy to hang out with, and my two brothers were too young at that time. I never did become a good shot, alas, but I sure love nice hunting rifles.

13 is actually a very good number. If you use the Hebrew method of giving numerical values to the letters of the alphabet (gematria), then the word "ahavah" (love, in Hebrew), adds up to 13 (aleph=1; heh=5; bet=2; heh=5). What's more, a popular teaching given over at weddings relates that when two people love each other we get 2 x ahavah = 26. The four-letter name of God has the numerical value of 26, so it follows that when two people love each other, the spirit of God rests on them.

Away with anti-13 superstition! Let there be lots of love in the world!

My mother died when I was just turning 4. She had out-of-control diabetes, and had gone blind. My relatives tell me that sometimes I acted as her guide. She spent her last week in the hospital, where I was not allowed to visit, but my aunt and uncle held me up in front of the hospital and told me to wave to her; I couldn't see pick her out in the bank of windows, but no doubt she waved to me.

A few days later, her casket was displayed in my grandmother's farmhouse parlor; and my aunt took me into that room, drew a chair up to the casket that I could stand on, and explained that my mother had died - I don't know what she actually said - but she added that I could come into the room whenever I wanted to and be with her. I also went to the funeral, a small country gathering in southern Indiana in 1952. I felt part of all the proceedings, and death was never a secret from me.

It's too bad that karma is so often understood as merely some cosmic system of tit-for-tat. Buddhist teaching shows that it's much more complex than that, and only an enlightened being on the level of the Buddhas could tell what an individual's karmic inheritance actually was or is. For the rest of us, the main Buddhist emphasis is on developing compassion for all living beings (and acting in our daily lives with compassion), and disciplining ourselves to avoid greed, anger, and hatred, the three major poisons of spiritual growth.

Thanks to everyone for the thoughtful comments.

I agree, I agree!!! I listen to Milt in the wee early hours using Tune In on my ipad here in Israel. Hopefully, if WGN closes the program, they will still have the podcasts available. Milt has been on for about forty years, but I can't imagine him actually wanting to retire.

What is WGN thinking of!!!

UN controlling Jerusalem as an "international city"?

Are you kidding?!! There is a reason Israelis like to point out that the UN headquarters in Jerusalem is located on the "Hill of Evil Council" (according to legend, the site where Judas met the priests to negotiate Christ's betrayal).

In any event, even UN or another body's control of the city would never work. Islamists could never accept such a thing. Because Muslims controlled the city at points in its history, the city has become "consecrated" to Islam; any non-Muslim control of land that was formerly Muslim is considered a defilement. This applies not merely to "holy places" but to any type of land  -- mulk, miri, waqf, or "dead land" (I forget the Turkish term for that). The same concept applies equally to Spain and other conquered areas.

The main problem with Jerusalem is that the hated and demonized Jews claim it as their capital, which is considered an insult to Muslims everywhere.

Short of the arrival of the messiah, there is NO solution to Jerusalem.

The composer of the music, Adam (he wrote music for the ballet Giselle), was actually Jewish. Hence, the archbishop of Paris (IIRC) banned the song from churches despite its immediate popularity. (Bach, by the way, was also banned according to pre-Vatican II church regulations, as he was a Protestant). Thank heavens, Vatican II realized what a waste these tedious prejudices were -- but then we ended up anyway with the execrable selections often heard at mass nowadays.  (Little My is just now memorizing the words to Panis Angelicum -- sillly songs are not my only musical interest! -- after listening to recordings by Luciano Pavarotti and another by The Priests; the music was written by Gluck, if I remember correctly. Wow. Just wow!)