Card Ya

Thought this was novel in the store. 

They have a digital calendar with the date from 21 years ago.

It says:

To Purchase Tobacco Products You Must Have Been Born On Or Before This Date.

 Thank you for showing you I.D.

Ah, easy to match the DOB on the I.D. presented to the date on the calendar.  

Nothing to calculate, no mistakes. 

They raised the age for smoking (cigarettes and vaping) in Maryland to 21 on October 1, so it’s the same requirement as for drinking alcohol.

Luckily for me (even though I’m over 21), I don’t really do either–definitely not the smoking, and the drinking limited primarily to the Kiddush prayer on Shabbat. 😉

(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

@Mazel Tov Bethesda (Hyatt Regency)

Choosing Good Over Vice

Please see my new article in The Times of Israel, called “Choosing Good Over Vice.”

But yet, if everyone would just act out on each other based on their unbridled wants and desires, oy vey what a truly terrible world that would be…From uncontrolled desires for food, drugs, alcohol, gambling, honor, money, power, sex, and more–it seems like everyone has their little secret fetish. Whether it’s coming from their head, their heart, or down below…the key questions is how much can they control themselves.

However, inside us, our soul, like the Ten Commandments in the Holy Ark, guide us so that we aren’t just animals chasing game or tail, but are human beings trying to become angels.

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Wine Makes Me Smile

What a great labeling of this bottle of wine. 

Just a big simple smiley face on it!

After I saw this bottle in the store, I just had to take a picture and also look this up on the internet. 

It’s part of the “SMILE” wine campaign from Lindeman’s Wines.

Apparently each limited edition bottle reminds you of something that we have to smile about: “family get-togethers,” “discovering new places,” and “randoms acts of kindness.”

Wow, I love this idea.  

Wine makes you smile, but so do these wonderful things in life. 

And it’s not just showing/associating the product with something positive (like beer and soda commercials always do), but it’s making the product itself smile at you!

I think this is a really smart marketing campaign.

Also, the cute smiley face on the bottle would make this the life of the party. 

Great job Lindemans–I’m smiling. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Excuses We Make

So on the way to the airport, I am talking with the Uber driver. 

“There is such a discrepancy between the rich and the poor here,” I say.

“Yeah,” she says, “When I drive and stop at the lights, there are many poor people that come up to the car looking for a handout.”

She continues, “I usually have a few dollars here” pointing to the little cubby hole under the parking break. 

“But my friends make fun of me saying, they [the panhandlers] are just going to go out and buy a beer!”

Excuse #1 not to give poor people–they’ll misuse our charity and buy alcohol, drugs, or prostitutes. 

The driver says, “But so what…if I were in their shoes, I’d buy a beer too.”

I’m thinking, hey this is nice…she’s fighting the bad inclination and her friends pressure and still wants to give–this is great!

Sure enough, we stop at a red light, and a really poor man starts walking up to the window to ask for help.

This person is dressed in dirty battered rags of an undershirt, and has sores on their arms and body.

The driver says, “Yeah, if I gave him, he’d probably just switch his shirt inside out later [as if the other side would be magically less dirty and ripped] and go home to his Rolls Royce!”

Wow, when excuse #1 doesn’t hold…

Excuse #2–the poor people are just faking it…really they aren’t poor, but rather they are fantastically rich and trying to pocket some more money for free.

It’s like the evil inclination sitting on one shoulder telling us “don’t give,”  even as the good inclination is sitting over our other shoulder beseeching us to have mercy and “give, give, give.”

In this case, the evil inclination won out. 

I reached for my wallet and wanted to open my window, but honestly this person looked scary–dirty and maybe sick–I was afraid of this person. 

I hope G-d forgives me, because I feel it wasn’t my evil inclination making excuses, but this time it was genuine for me. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Wild Advertising Art

I took this photo of an ad for Milagro Tequila on the side of a tour bus in Washington, D.C.

Milagro (“Miracle”) is a company that prides itself on it’s collaboration with artists to create cool murals to advertise it’s liquor. 

Tequila is made from the sweet, fruity, blue agave plant from northwest Mexico, hence the writing over the mural saying, “Agave Expressionism.”

It must be challenging to look out the windows of this tour bus covered in this very blue mural and messaging. 

Why is this ad effective? 

First, it is intense and exciting–the vibrant colors, the big mask with the bulging eyes, and the skulls with the green leafy stuff growing out of the head. 

Second, it really is a work of art, and you wouldn’t expect to see this on a regular tour bus shlepping around town. 

Third, the cultural contrast between the Mexican artistic expressionism and the rest of the comparatively humdrum city life is standout. 

Fourth, after a long hard day at work, people are tired, thirsty, and ready for some fun–so this is a welcome message.

Overall, this has the creativity and connection with the people to hit the mark–pretty neat. 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

The Kardashian Ball-Busters

So despite the immense beauty, fame, and fortune associated with the Kardashian women…if you are a man, you may want to stay far far far away. 

It seems like in the end, nothing good ever turns out for the Kardashian men–who BTW are often ballplayers and even Olympic athletes. 

Kris’s husbands:

– Robert Kardashian (1st husband) – divorced in 1991 after Kris’s affair and lavish lifestyle spending, remained close friends, and died of esophageal cancer in 2003.

– Bruce Jenner (2nd husband) – divorced in 2014, and revealed “excruciatingly painful” transgender crisis and transformation to Caitlyn Jenner. 

Kim’s husbands: 

– Damon Thomas (1st husband) – Messy divorce in 2004.

– Chris Humphries (2nd husband) – Filed for divorce after 1 year, 7 months and divorce completed in 2013.

– Kanye West (3rd husband) – Marriage issues and divorce rumors abound from frustration over Kim’s weight gain to the two sleeping apart. 

Chloe’s husband:

Lamar Odom (1st husband) – Signed divorce paper in 2015, and now in coma after drug overdose in brothel. 

Kourtney’s partner: 

– Scott Disick (Ex partner) – Broke up in 2015 and continues struggling with drugs and alcohol addiction.

What about brother, Rob Kardashian?

– He too is struggling with a weight problem and depression, and is estranged from his family. 

Anyway, it all starts with Kris Jenner, the controlling family matriarch who has been said to be “testy, demanding, manipulative,” and generally narcissistic.  

And how about the Kardashian daughters–who are they as people?–as they air their freewheeling “have it all” lifestyles on the show, Keeping Up With The Kardashians?

Even though they call it a reality show, maybe the real reality–like for most of humankind–is not so “all that” and glamorous after all? 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Wine Bottle Extraordinaire

I took this photo of one of the amazing wine bottles at an event last evening at Magen David Synagogue. 

Apparently, a very talented lady in there makes these special bottles. 

Unfortunately with the lighting, this picture does not near do them justice for how exquisite they looked. 

They were in different colors of lacing, with beautiful beads, hamsas, and other decorations, as well as pictures of our honored sages, and their names in hebrew over the photos. 

I asked facetiously one lady who was taking home a bottle whether she was going to drink it all that evening, and she pulled the bottle close to her and leaning in to me said, “This is going in my display case!”

And that truly is where these belong…they are amazing.

The wonderful lady that painstakingly makes these gave how many of them charitably so they could be auctioned for benefit of the synagogue. 

Aside from a wonderful soul, this person is very talented and should seriously start a business with these because they are awesome! 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Whiskey Pie

So I picked up a Powerball ticket this week…hard to resist with a jackpot of $360 million!

The store that sells the lottery tickets sells liquor.

I see these 3 bottles side-by-side.

And it’s for whiskey.

The whiskey has cherry, pecan, or apple pie flavored liquor.

The ladies pictured on the bottles are sitting on the different pies. 

And this “Pie-oneering” whiskey is called Piehole!

70% proof, and makes for quite some table talk. 

Not surprisingly, they never has this at the kiddush in shule on Shabbat! 😉

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

Addictions R Us

I was having an really interesting conversation with a friend–okay, and it got a little deep.

He said something fascinating to me–which is that everyone is addicted to something.

Think about it–some are addicted to the hard stuff…drugs, alcohol, smoking.

Others are addicted to sex, work, shopping, exercise, even religion.

In modern times, there are new addictions to technology, gaming, and social media.

My friend is smart and we discussed or alluded to a number of reasons for the addictive nature of all people.

1) Meaning – Many people have a tough time dealing with the seemingly meaningless, mortal nature of their lives. Without a strong purpose and meaning, we can sort of float through every day looking for some anchor, stability, or rhythm. Addictions, for better or worse, can provide that habit or repetition compulsion. While not very meaningful itself, these addictions help people forget–temporarily, during their high or while they are being kept busy–that they are perhaps lost amidst it all.

2) Pain – Everyone has pain–emotional, physical, mental–these cause stress on people and their ability to deal or cope can be stretched thin, and they turn to some sort of addiction as a “crutch” to help them get through the day. It reminds me of a very crude song that I overheard years ago, called “F*ck the pain away” (excuse the language here, please). Anyway, simply replace the first word, with “work, shop, drink, and so on and poof, you have opiates (i.e. pain relief) for the masses.

3) Fear – People are afraid–afraid of living, afraid of dying–and addictions take us away from having the time to stop, think, and have to deal with our fears. If every minute, I am running around doing a million things–then I don’t have the time to shut it all down and out, and deal with what’s really going on inside. In fact, some people credit the Holy Sabbath day, as being beneficial to us to just stopping all that daily stuff at least for one day a week!

We are all human, and there is no one who is immune to looking for meaning, avoiding pain, and dealing with their fears.

The question is do we just throw ourselves into something to keep going or do we take more of a Buddhist approach, accept that life is suffering and try to raise ourselves above it through healthy balance, contemplative meditation, compassion and thinking about others, doing good deeds, and so on.

Keeping busy is good too–but going through life in a drug or otherwise induced fugue is not–then we’ve lost ourselves, which is maybe the point for our crazy world where addictions abound and we are all too happy to dive right in. 😉

(Source Photo: here with attribution to Miles Cave)