I visited the University Club for a Manhattan Institute luncheon yesterday. (No lunch for me, of course, although the waiters were apologetic. As one of my tablemates put it, the University Club is about as un-kosher as it gets. Ah, the yarmulke...)
The occasion was a talk by James Piereson about his new book. I'd actually wanted to get it since it came out, but I held out until this luncheon, and sure enough, I got it cheap, and personally autographed. It looks like a really great book, and I look forward to reading it. Mr. Piereson is a nice guy- I spoke to him a bit after it was over about another president, based on my reading of another recent, and very good, book.
Anyway, although I've been in the Club before, I've never seen it in the light of day and for such an amount of time. It's really quite a building, and I wish I would have been able to wander around a bit (if such things are allowed). Based on their website, it doesn't even look likely that they give tours or anything. Ah well, another time. Perhaps then I'll be able to ask if the title of this post really is, as some Googling seems to suggest, a Club toast.
Two random thoughts:
-Why is it even assumed that declaring something to be genocide or not is any chazerishe business of a government? Come on, that's what historians are for. I really don't see how Congress enters into it. European governments with sick official speech codes and jail time, sure. But in the U.S.?
-I had a really bad case of Treppenwitz the other day. A woman came up to me at the bus stop and asked if I could tell her where she could find a rabbi. We spoke for a bit, and I gave her some directions, apologizing that that isn't such an easy thing. (They don't tend to sit around synagogue after prayers, which tend to be early in the morning.) Anyway, I hope she found one- it was only much later, though, that I remembered that the actual office of the Vaad Harabonim of Queens (the local rabbinical board) was right around the corner. Ah well.
Anyway. Come Sunday I am off to Israel through the holiday season. Perhaps I can blog from there- I have some items I still haven't gotten around to, and I'm sure there'll be things to post about the trip as well- but whether or not I do, best wishes for a K'tiva V'Chatima Tova and a Chag Sameach to all!
