Month: May 2002

Stahm, A Journal Entry

By Evan — — Miscellany

Adiv informs me that Hebrew has a few more words that English is missing:

“stahm”
For no good reason. Usage:

  • “Why didn’t you call before you came over?” “Stahm.”
  • “Did you have a reason to be hanging out at the mall?” “Stahm, I wanted to look.”

“davka”
1. Just to spite you (very often fate being the one who spites you) 2. As a matter of fact
3. Even if you didn’t think it was so. Usage:

  • “I can’t believe you bought that shirt!” “Davka, I thought you would like it.”
  • “Son, why did you pour the ink into my shampoo?” “Davka.”
  • “I’ve been all over the city looking for a copy of this book. I’ve called 30 different stores
    and davka now, when I find it, I discover my credit card is maxed out.”

So mere days after my petulance about the Space Shuttle, NASA
announces that its Space
Launch Initiative (the next-generation shuttle) has reached its first milestone review.
Currently there are three candidates. Some of designs include:

  • reduction in payload cost from $10,000/lb to $1,000/lb
  • more reusable booster rocket system
  • increased safety: catastrophic failure reduced from 1 in 500 to 1 in 10,000
  • possible pilotless operation
  • ability to achieve high Earth orbit with secondary booster system

So that certainly obviates many of my objections. The project should finish in 2012, just
when the current Shuttle fleet has to go into retirement. Only ten years away…

Finally, I’m heading off to my college reunion this weekend. Nancy has been making fun
of me for going to a “5 year” reunion, but as it turns out, I. Don’t. Care. I’ll also be seeing
Eric & Susan, and Jessica & Ashley. So all in all, the weekend is shaping up to be
a lot of fun (even though I will have to pretend it’s not, just to get under Brian’s skin).

Titchadesh

By Evan — — Culture

So I’ve given up on my PC. This weekend I broke down and bought a Mac — a 933 MHz tower. Perhaps this was an irresponsible purchase… but I am very, very happy, and I think that makes everything all right.

People have had varying reactions to the news. Nancy was very excited. Pat and Sam were excited too, although they were somewhat nonplussed by the fact that Heroes IV wouldn’t run on the Mac. And Nancy and Mike’s friend Jonathan grinned and said, “Ah, still loyal to the end, eh?” No, damnit! Not “still loyal”! I’ve actually switched teams! (Ummm… wait, that didn’t come out right…)

As for my brother-in-law Adiv (a longtime Mac user), he informs me:

In Hebrew, we have a special phrase used on an occasion such as this. Most Israelis would say, “Titchadesh!” Which means, roughly, “Enjoy your new thing/acquisition/haircut/whatever.”

Amazing — all those millions of words in English, but it’s Hebrew that actually has the perfect word for this kind of situation. “Congratulations”, “I’m very happy for you”, and so on are all too overblown for something like a new computer. Maybe a house. Definitely a marriage or birth of a child. But not something as petty as this. Anyway, Adiv also managed to find the closest English equivalent: “Cool!” So thank you, Adiv — much appreciated.

One nice thing about the Mac is that it came with a DVD drive, which I have never had before. Coincidentally, I even had some DVDs this weekend — Nancy had let someone borrow the 1st and 2nd season of Sex and the City, and I was playing errand boy at the moment. So I figured, why not test out the DVD player? Big mistake. I watched pretty much the whole thing in a weekend.

The thing is, even though I know intellectually that Sex and the City bears as much relation to modern urban life as Leave it to Beaver did to 1950s suburban life, it was still quite a lot to absorb in such a short period of time. Basically, I came away thinking that I was unattractive, poor, badly dressed, not going to exciting parties, not eating at good restaurants, not accomplishing anything in my career, and not sleeping with enough drop-dead gorgeous women. But of course, I shouldn’t let this bother me. After all, only the last five on the list are true.