Captain America

Hey ya'all. How was your Rosh Hashana?

Mine was...interesting.

The family I went to was being visited by all their children along with their sons-in-law and toddler grandchildren. I was the only non-relative. Which was fine.
What was not fine was that 87% of conversations for three days revolved around nappies and prams and what can-you-believe-how-adorable-they-are thing the babies did.

If there's anything I learned this holiday it's that I am not equipped to talk to people about their babies. The one line I use to respond to stuff usually halts whatever the proud parent is about to say next. Examples:

Parent: Oh, Yitzy was so silly yesterday, we told him that the new baby will be born soon and he ran to the crib to see if the baby was there!
Me: Yeah...babies are dumb.

Parent: It was so hard to get Sarah to take her bath! So I said 'Ok Sari! If you won't take a bath then mummy will take one instead!' So she started saying 'no! no! no! and got in the bath.
Me: Yeah...babies are easy to manipulate.

There were moments I tried to keep my mouth shut, like when they started in on America. One woman there started talking about Hershey's and how it's disgusting and poor quality and no one should ever buy it. I was keeping quiet until someone said 'Oh no, I think you're making Aviva upset!'
I looked down to see that I had been clutching my fork with my jaw severely locked.
I put down the fork and smoothed out the table cloth.

"Oh ha ha ha...no, I'm not upset..." Milton Hershey is an American icon!
"....I didn't invent the company or anything..." He created his empire from NOTHING!
"...We're all entitled to our opinions..." Nestle is the one who made it worse! I'd like to see you create a chocolate BILLION DOLLAR ORGANIZATION from scratch!

At one point during the holiday, the grandmother sat down with me for a chat, which was nice. Until she started telling me a story about how she had a very successful friend who decided to move to America and she told her friend 'Why would you leave London? Don't go to America!' but she did...and married a very successful man...who eventually lost his fortune and stabbed her to death. I think the moral was 'Don't Move to America, You Will Get Stabbed'
Her "Why did he have to stab her? He could've just divorced her!"
Me "No...I agree...I would much rather be divorced than um, stabbed"

So, even though it was a very nice Chag...I was a little happy to be back in my apartment with my American roommates where I spent the rest of the night eating copious amounts of pasta and watching TV. American-style.

Today I went to the zoo in Regents Park which was amazing because:
1. It's BEAUTIFUL there, a lot of room, sunny out, not very crowded.
2. The 'Penguin Beach' lets you get super up close and personal with the penguins. I had
missed the penguin show but I'll def be there next time at 11:30am for feeding. Maybe tomorrow.

Hope you had a lovely holiday as well.
Cheers!

Ps. Don't forget to donate to my JNF fund. Seriously, donate ONE dollar anonymously and I will love you inappropriate amounts.