Rabbinical Reflection – Page 3

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #145 (3/11/2017): PURIM JOKES ANEW

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #145 (3/11/17): Purim Jokes Anew

click above to listen (audio only)

Aired March 11, 2017 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube: https://youtu.be/Zz9D1TbSKVE

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of March 11, 2017.

Happy Purim, everybody! It’s the one day of the year when the world is actually supposed to be crazy, rather than the accident we live in day to day. As such, it’s something of a tradition on this most happy holiday for me to eschew ranting, bitching, and beating various dead horses, and to just tell a couple of jokes, with a bissel of Talmudic commentary. Well, Talmudic-style commentary, since I’m too busy to actually read the friggin’ Talmud. (pause) Oh, as if you aren’t.

Anyhoo, we begin with a charming joke about infidelity. Murray the accountant has been lusting after his secretary for months. Finally, she gives in, they take the day off, go to a hotel, and spend hours boinking and shtupping, moaning and groaning, coming and going. They’re so exhausted, they even fall asleep. Suddenly, Murray wakes up, it’s 7:30 at night.

They start frantically dressing, and as they get out the door, Murray hands the girl his shoes and says, “Do me a favor. Take my shoes, go to the lawn, and rub them all over the grass and dirt. Do it!” She does. He says, “Great, don’t panic.” Drives her home and makes a beeline for his own house.

In he walks at 8:45, and boy, is his wife waiting for him. “Where have you been?” she screams in his face.

“Honey,” he says. “I’m not gonna lie to you. For the last ten hours, I’ve been in a hotel room with my hot secretary, and we’ve been having wild sex in every possible position. I’m sorry.”

Murray’s wife looks down at his shoes. Stares at them. Says, “You lying son of a bitch; you’ve been playing golf!”

Please note that this joke is not meant to be instructional or tried at home. It does remind us that marriage is a sacred institution, but even more sacred is the need for men to have their own corner of time and space. Doesn’t mean, chas v’chalil, they should be committing adultery—or certainly not childrenry. But an activity that is theirs and theirs alone. And ladies, remember, the good news is that for men of a certain age, golf is a helluva lot more manageable than an affair. For one thing, you can hold your shaft up for three hours without having a heart attack. For another, it’s more fun to pick up your balls from the green than to pick up your balls with tighter underpants. And finally, if you land in the wrong hole, you just get a drink at the bar instead of needing a penicillin shot.

Moving on. So last week, I’m visiting a big synagogue in Manhattan, and I have to use the bathroom. So I go downstairs, big men’s room; I try one stall, the door won’t open. So I try the next one, it’s fine, I go in, sit down.

I’m just getting settled, when a voice comes from the next cubicle. “Shalom! How are you doing?”

“Oy,” I think. But to be polite, I answer, “I’m fine, thank you very much.”

A couple seconds go by, the man says, “Well, what are you doing?”

What am I doing? I tell the guy, “I’m taking a poop! What the hell do you think I’m doing?”

Immediately, I hear the voice say: “Listen, Chaim, lemme call you back. I’ve got this schmuck in the other stall answering everything I say.”

Nu, so what do we learn from this joke? We learn that we can get so wrapped up in our own heads, we automatically assume everything around us revolves around us. The truth is, most of the time, the opposite is true. We are the moons orbiting the sun. The best we can do is not to collide with each other, fall in, and burn up. Put another way—since I mentioned poop—we’re just flies circling the manure. The best we can do is not collide, fall in, and come out smelling like Greeley, Colorado.

Okay, last one. Out of sheer curiosity, because he’s never been, Avi Cohen decides to visit a church. He goes in, unpacks his t’fillin bag, puts on a yarmulke and tallis, and sits. He figures, “I can pray my own prayers; I just like the atmosphere.”

However, when the priest starts the service, he sees Avi, and the first thing he says is, “Would all non-Christians kindly leave?”

Avi hears this, but he’s in the middle of the sh’ma and doesn’t move.

Again, the priest calls out, “I’m asking, please, would all non-Christians leave?”

Avi, in the middle of prayer, doesn’t acknowledge; doesn’t budge.

Finally, turning red, the priest barks out, “Will all Jews please leave my church!”

At this, Avi removes his kippah, his tallis, stuffs them away, leaps out of his chair, and marches towards the exit. On the way, he grabs a statue of Jesus and says, “Come boychick. They don’t want us here anymore.”

This is, of course, a reminder that in an era when Christians and Jews may wind up being pitted against each other over abortion, Palestinians, school prayer, thin-crust pizza vs. Chicago style. It’s good to remember we all need each other. Christians wouldn’t have a religion without us. And we wouldn’t have much traction in our current government if the goyim didn’t believe that Israel was necessary for endtimes. So, Jews, stop panicking. If anti-Semites are knocking over some headstones, if the alt-right is somehow making skinheads feel like they’ve got decent hair—it sucks, but don’t get sucked in. On this Purim holiday of 2017, celebrate what we can, and keep an eye on what we can’t.

Remember, too, that the president has a Jewish son-in-law and a converted Jewish daughter, and that the majority of our countrymen stand with us. Countrywomen, too. After all, what is a pussy hat if not a hamentaschen for the head?

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York. Purim Sameach!

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #145 (3/11/17): Purim Jokes Anew

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #144 (3/4/2017): PLAYBOY

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #144 (3/4/2017): Playboy

Aired March 4, 2017 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube: https://youtu.be/HhgXViF07kA

click above to listen (audio only)

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of March 5, 2017.

Remember New Coke? It was Coca Cola’s attempt to fix something that wasn’t broken. Take a formula that merrily rotted people’s teeth for years, change it for no particular reason, market the hell out of it, and watch customers start drinking Pepsi. The Coke folks realized their error, they reinstituted the classic recipe, and everything went back to normal levels of thirst quenching and obesity.

So who was the latest company to overthink its brand and screw the pooch? None other than Playboy magazine. In a stroke of madness—well, stroke may not be the best word—Playboy changed its whole ethos. Like so many magazines today, Playboy has felt the terrible pinch of the digital era. Circulation is down—and I don’t mean sales, I mean Playboy readers are so old, their bodies have no circulation. Meanwhile, along comes Maxim, also targeting the men’s-lifestyle market, and they eat away at Playboy’s potential younger audience. And unlike Playboy, Penthouse, Juggz, and my favorite, Barely Legal Anal Nurses, Maxim’s photo shoots are scanty but still clothed. The honchos at Playboy must have been scratching their heads, along with their crab lice, and wondering, “For years, men lied about reading us for the articles. Now there’s this other magazine with articles, and they’re proud to read it for the bikinis. What the what?”

So Playboy made the decision a year ago to eschew nudity. Think of it: Playboy without nudity. That’s like Auschwitz without Jews in it. This was the magazine that put a naked Marilyn Monroe in its first issue, the magazine that made stars of Dorothy Stratten, Anna Nicole Smith, and many others who died of natural causes; this was the magazine that served as ground zero for the sexual revolution, mainstream pornography, and the worldwide Kleenex shortage of 1967.

But times change, and for three decades now, Playboy has had to compete with digital magazines, cable TV and home video, changing popular tastes, and shifting cultural landscapes. It hasn’t helped that the visionary founder of Playboy, Hugh Hefner, is still alive. If he’d dropped dead years ago, he’d be extolled as an iconic, nostalgic reminder of America throwing off the shackles of the 1950s and embracing a world of new freedoms. But as a 90-year-old coot, Hef just makes people think of airbrushing, exploitation, and Bill Cosby honing his groping skills in the grotto. And what’s with those twins Hef was dating? How sexy is it to have two curvaceous, nymphomaniacal hotties give grampa a reacharound…just to change his ostomy bag.

But back to the nudity, or the removal thereof. When Ringling Brothers, responding to pressure from animal-rights groups, got rid of its elephants two years ago, what did that lead to? That’s right: the end of Ringling Brothers. When Playboy bid bye-bye to boobs and bushes…what happened? Actually, to be honest and surprising, sales went up a bit, especially for a younger demographic. And the magazine was able to be displayed more prominently on more newsstands. But it still wasn’t enough. Readers would look at Playboy, glance at the photos — instead of staring intently at them for several minutes — and then ask themselves, “Why am I still reading this?”

Cooper Hefner, the son of Hef and company COO since his sister stepped down in 2009, admitted putting ponchos over pussies was a mistake. In fact, “Nudity is Normal” is the motto on the cover of the March/April issue—an issue with mega-hot model Elizabeth Elam topless on the cover. Why, Playboy is even bringing back its party jokes, so all is right with the world. Who knows, maybe they’ll even bring back those cartoons with the wrinkly old, sex-crazed granny. I mean, she’s only 80 years older than Hef’s next girlfriend.

So welcome back old-fashioned Playboy. You’re still a dinosaur on the way to the amber yard, but at least along the way, you’ll help a few more teenage boys explore the wonders of gynecology. In a time when our government seems intent on yanking America back to the days of “Father Knows Best,” it’s heartening that once more, Playboy will leave it to beaver.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York. Show us your tits!

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #144 (3/5/17): Playboy

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #143 (1/8/2017): OBAMA AND THE U.N.

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #143 (1/8/17): Obama and the U.N.

Aired Jan. 7, 2017 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube: https://youtu.be/2EY_QSuKYss

click above to listen (audio only)

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of January 8, 2017.

Remember that old Billy Joel song, “Leave a Tender Moment Alone?” He was talking about how he couldn’t just enjoy a romantic interlude; he had to undercut the good feelings with a gripe or a joke. Of course, the joke was on him, since he chose Cutty Sark over Christie Brinkley. But the idea of not leaving well enough alone, of doing your best but then having the world remember your worst — that can be applied to our outgoing commander in chief, Barak Obama.

This is a man who took on a country that was in the toilet financially, emotionally, and seemingly irremediably. Eight years ago, you couldn’t pay the bills, you couldn’t get a job, you couldn’t sell a house, you couldn’t retire, you couldn’t visit New Orleans without scuba gear. Since President Obama has been in office, change has been slow, but to deny that an epic turn-around has occurred means that either you’re a retard or a Republican. On top of this, we killed Bin Laden, pointless laws about harmless crimes have been easing up, and faigelehs can marry whomever they want and, therefore, be as miserable as the rest of us. Through it all, Obama has maintained his poise, his cool, and his through-the-roof hipness quotient, kind of like yours truly.

And yet, mistakes were made. He rammed Obamacare up the American tush like a bad thermometer, giving people who never had health insurance coverage, but giving the rest of us a severe pain in the wallet. He completely screwed the pooch on managing the rise of ISIS, or ISIL, or Islamic Gee-Whiz, or whatever nickname the religion of peace is using these days.

But the most resistible piece de resistance of Obama’s legacy came right near the end. He and his minion, John Kerry, saw an opportunity to take a little dump on Israel. The United Nations, a toothless and brainless entity that has kept exactly zero wars from happening since its founding in 1945, voted last month to condemn Israel for settlement building. These houses, built on the West Bank and East Jerusalem, are controversial because the territory was annexed when Moses kicked Mohammed’s ass in the Six Day War. In other words, it’s been legitimate Israeli land for 50 years, but the Palestinians are still screaming for it like babies ripped from their mama’s boobies. And, of course, the greater Arab world agrees because any reason to hate Israel is fine by them. England agrees because they’re still pissed at Israel for pushing them off the sand. Other countries agree because anti-Semitism has proved a lot more durable than communism. But the United States, our friend and ally, has always stood with Eretz Yisroel against these bullies and bastards. Until December.

See, the left-wing liberals don’t like Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, because he cares more about the safety and security of his nation than playing diplomatic blind man’s bluff. And he says, “Why the hell should we stop building settlements on our own soil until we actually make a deal—God forbid—to give the land back?” If you’re gonna sell your house when you’re 80 years old, does that mean you can’t put in a new bathroom when you’re 58?

Like every American president, Obama wanted to be the one who made lasting peace in the Middle East. He yearned to be the great statesman who solved the Israeli-Palestinian problem. How do presidents do this? By asking Israel to suffer. Give up this, give up that, and maybe the Arabs will promise to leave you in peace. Give away land you won fair and square in 1948 and 1967 and 1973, and maybe the Palis will cease lobbing scud missiles at you. Maybe.

What do the Arabs have to give up? Ummm.. ummm.. oh yeah.. they must make the terribly difficult sacrifice of admitting that Israel exists. Oh, the poor dears. Even John Kerry, in his misguided, hot-headed speech after the UN vote, reminded the Arabs that if they want Israel to come back to the negotiating table, they have to call it “Israel” and not “that smudgy place next to Egypt on the map.” But shamefully, Kerry and Obama made the United States abstain from the UN condemnation vote, rather than veto it. It was Barry’s last dig at Benjy. His way of saying, “You won’t obey me? Fine, I’ll tell mommy, and you’ll get in trouble.” Netanyahu, hearing this, stuck his tongue out and replied, “Nyah-nyah, neener-neener. So you’re the big peacemaker with Muslims? Do they know that in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, Afghanistan, Yemen? Pick a country; there’s a genocide. But Israel is the bad guy for constructing houses and universities on its own terra firma.”

I have long said that when it comes to Jews and Palestinians, I am in favor of a two-state solution: the Jewish state of Israel, and an Arab state — in Lebanon, or Libya, or Lichtenstein or Mexico, or the North friggin’ Pole — anywhere except on the tiny sliver of real estate set aside for a Jewish homeland. To demand as a condition of peace that Israel chop itself up and bestow its backyard on its worst enemy is unfair, unsafe, and untenable. Suppose a fly is buzzing on a windowsill, and there’s a cobweb in the corner. Suppose the fly surrenders half its rightful window to the spider? How long you think that fly has before he’s an entrée in Charlotte’s web?

Now, America gives a lot of money to Israel and has throughout Obama’s term in office. The President has stood with Israel on other issues, and, in the main, relations remain beautifully strong and important. With Donald Trump coming into the White House, complete with an Orthodox Jewish son-in-law and a converted Jewish daughter, ties between the two nations are likely to get even cuddlier. So it’s just a disappointment that a mere month before he sneaks his last cigarette behind the oval office, Obama chose to snub the only democracy in the Middle East, and the only true friend America has anywhere in that part of the world — all in the name of appearances and the pie-in-the-sky lie of the two-state solution.

You know, the Democrats thought they had a two-state solution for the last election: New York and California. We all saw how that worked out.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York.

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #143 (1/8/17) – Obama & the U.N.

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #142 (12/25/2016): 2016 Farewell

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #142 (12/25/16): 2016 Farewell

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Aired Dec. 24, 2016 on Dave’s Gone By. (Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8jqtTX1GJE)

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of December 25, 2016.

Events of the past few months notwithstanding, it is not yet the apocalypse. However, we do have a stunning occurrence coming upon us: as we speak, Chanukah and Christmas have arrived at exactly the same time. I have spoken before, some would say at unconscionable length, about not conflating the two holidays. They come from two very different, irreconcilable religions. I don’t begrudge my Christian brethren and sistren, but don’t put a Jewish star on top of a Christmas tree and expect me to feel grateful.

In fact, the only thing I feel gratitude for these days is that 2016 is coming to a merciful end. I don’t need to tell you what a long, meshuggenah trip it’s been. Or maybe I do, in verse form.

`Tis the first night of Chanukah
From Tampa to Tulsa

The candles are burning
Just like my ulcer

The dreidels are spinning
The latkes are frying

The Muslims are killing
The people are dying

The year has been tough
That couldn’t be clearer

So Twenty-Sixteen
Here’s your rear-view mirror

The campaign for president took a dark journey
As Democrat dummies picked Hil and screwed Bernie

Huckabee, Kasich, Rubio, Paul
The louder they got, the harder they’d fall

Jindal and Christie, Carson and Cruz
But then Donald Trump bubbled up from the ooze

He battered Ms. Clinton for being a female
She stumbled and fumbled and mishandled email

Trump lied and insulted and mocked with each Tweet
But then he fell in with the party elite

And lo and behold, as he, alone, expected
The con-artist clown is the guy we elected

If that’s not enough to make us all retch
There’s plenty more reasons about which to kvetch

There’s Brexit and Brussels and murder in Mosul
While Syria looks like a garbage disposal

All across Europe, security sucks
Who’s teaching these young Arab men to drive trucks?

The Istanbul bomber ignited our fears
Another putz shot up a club full of queers

Mosquitoes with zika came in for the kill
While lyin’ Ryan Lochte shamed us in Brazil

Hurricane Matthew brought death and disaster
A wild Turkish cop shot the Russian ambass’dor

An EgyptAir plane crashed into the sea
And North Carolina won’t let trannies pee

All over the world, ISIS steps up attacks
While our police fire at black people’s backs

If that’s not enough to make you all wince
2016 took Bowie and Prince

Gene Wilder, George Martin, and Elie Wiesel
Scalia and Castro — well, they went to hell

So long, Leonard Cohen
Farewell, Harper Lee

Goodbye, Abe Vigoda . . . finally

We lost Garry Shandling, who wasn’t a sick man
We lost Alan Thicke, and Alan Rickman

Muhammad Ali is no longer standing
And hero John Glenn came in for a landing

Merle Haggard, Ed Albee, and Zsa Zsa Gabor
And Fyvush and Blowfly and too many more

But okay, let’s admit the pipeline was stalled
The Cubs and the Indians played ball in the fall

The stock market zoomed to new heights every day
And Hamilton swept all the Tonys away

Manatees moved from endangered to threatened
And a new subway line was built in Manhetten.

So though it was harsh, absurdist, and mean
Shalom to the year 2016

The lesson it taught us with every new curse:
As bad as things are, they’re bound to get worse.

Happy American Rosh Hashanah everyone! See you in 5778!
This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York. Shanah Tolerable.

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #142 (12/25/16): 2016 Farewell

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #141 (11/6/2016): ELECTILE DYSFUNCTION

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #141 (11/6/16): Electile Dysfunction

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Aired Nov. 5, 2016 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cX5zCpfhuk&feature=youtu.be

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of November 6, 2016.

Well, my friends, this is it. In three days, we drag ourselves to the local junior high school, sign our names in a guest book, hold our collective noses, and pull the lever to choose which nightmare we wish to endure for the next four years.

On one side, we have Hillary Clinton: experienced, resilient, hardworking, honest as the day is long. At the South Pole. If you ask this woman, “what color is the sky?”, her answer’s gonna be, “Well, depending on the time of day and the light refracting away from various planets, we could be somewhere in the azure-like spectrum. But until I’ve done more research, I have to reserve comment on that.” Hillary Clinton gets a memo with a giant “C” on it for “Classified,” and she thinks the “C” stands for, “Come, put this on your home computer — where you haven’t updated Norton Utilities in three years.”

And two-faced? This woman has more faces than Mount Rushmore in a hall of mirrors. She tells rich fatcats she’s for open borders, but then she tells middle-class Democrats she’s for protecting trade. She bashes her opponent as a sexist pig but persecutes any woman who humped her husband. Which is a full-time job, by the way. Hillary promises to get tough on America’s enemies, but when was Secretary of State, the Middle East turned into Terrorist Disneyland. Heck, Hillary Clinton wouldn’t even be the nominee if Debbie Wasserman Schultz and her party apparatchiks didn’t treat Bernie Sanders like a naughty puppy who was soiling the carpet by lifting his leg to the far left.

For all his faults, people still love Hillary’s husband, Bill. He’s got the twinkle, he’s got the polish; he’s got another box of cigars at the ready. But that popular love just doesn’t transfer to Mrs. Clinton, who’s been in the political game too long to ever be a real person again. Even people who don’t dislike her understand that if she’s elected, the country will stay the same. The economy will still grow at a pace that makes photosynthesis look like the Indy 500. ObamaCare will put more people in hospitals . . . with heart attacks after they see their premiums. And America will still lag behind the rest of the world in everything except obesity and unwatchable cable TV channels.

And yet, of the two candidates running for the two major political parties, Hillary Clinton is the better choice. I know that’s like saying a bowl of chocolate-covered horse radish is preferable to a dish of month-old sheep vomit, but if you had to pick, you go with the maror over the moron. No question, Donald Trump is a wildly successful businessman. He’s successful, and he’s wild. I like that he has balls, but then again, what else do you shoot with a loose cannon?

Now, I don’t hold against Donald Trump that he’s gone bankrupt a couple of times. It takes a savvy entrepreneur to pick yourself up, dust yourself up, pay your creditors two cents on the dollar, and start all over again. And I don’t mind that he hasn’t paid any taxes since the Hoover administration. If I could find a legal way not to pay sales tax every time I bought a pastrami sandwich, I’d be owning Trump Hotel. Which would be especially ironic since neither of us owns it. For all his building development, Donald Trump does not own most of the buildings he has his name on. But I don’t hold that against him, either. After all, if my last name were Parkinson, would I want my name on a disease?

What I do begrudge The Donald are his deals with the devil. When The Orange One first announced his candidacy, his whole shpiel was about being an outsider. He wasn’t a lifelong politician and therefore took no money and owed no favors. That’s tremendously appealing, especially when you’re also plain-speaking, pro-Israel, and promising to play by your own rules. Had Mr. Trump gone with a third party or created his own party—and I don’t mean the kind of party where he offers a supermodel $10,000 to polish his cornerstone—I mean Ross Perot-ing it. Saying “shtup you” to the Pelosis and the Paul Ryans, because he could. Between his bank account and grass-roots support among the kind of white people who think Canadians are as exotic as foreigners should be allowed to get, Donald Trump could have funded a truly “outside” campaign.

Instead, he gets in bed with the elephants. The same people who gave us eight years of George W. Bush, not to mention Fox News, Richard Nixon, Sarah Palin, Strom Thurmond, and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. So the Republicans think they can corral Trump, Trump thinks he can streamroll the G.O.P., and I think they should both go down in flames. Trump wants to build a wall to keep out Mexicans? Who’s gonna pick my etrogs for Sukkos? He’s gonna give tax credits to the ultra-wealthy so their money will trickle down? Wanna bet it trickles down into their yachts, their jewelry, their private islands . . . Trump wants to pick Supreme Court justices who will protect the Constitution. The Constitution doesn’t need protecting; it just needs an annotated edition with color pictures, a worksheet, and an interactive website. Actually, the Torah could use that, too. I’ll have to tell that to God next time we talk.

Anyhoo, Donald Trump says, “What have you got to lose?” Everything stinks; maybe I’ll stink less. Of course, the last guy who said that was Ralph Nader, and we all saw how well that turned out. So for what it’s worth, I endorse Hillary Clinton for President in 2016. It is not a ringing endorsement. In fact, it’s more of a thudding endorsement. But look at the alternatives: the Trumpster fire? The Libertarian guy who thinks Aleppo is a tiger with spots? The independent party run by a dude named “Joe Exotic?” Look him up. He’s got eight rings in his ear, a Fu Manchu moustache, and a mustard-yellow leisure suit that should be kept 1,000 feet from any building and detonated. Or the guy from the Legal Marijuana Now Party — because, of course, the most urgent problem facing our nation today is finding a place to get your mellow on with some sweet bud? Or the guy from the Nutrition Party, whose sole claim to fame is inventing the Muscle Maker Grill? I mean, I like George Foreman, but I wouldn’t want him negotiating with North Korea. Except about barbecue, and even then, kimchi would be a dealbreaker because who the hell wants to eat that? Seriously.

So we come to the long-awaited end of this contentious, obnoxious, unfathomable election cycle in America. A cycle that had one candidate call a war hero a coward and another whose every private email makes the New York Times bestseller list. Meanwhile, the rich get richer, the bridges are crumbling, the schools are stupid, the terrorists are multiplying, and Steven Tyler is making country music. We’re in big trouble. But vote anyway because if we’ve gotta choose between an egotist with a messiah complex or a liar who understands complexity, I’ll take the one who isn’t relentlessly battling crucifixion. Let’s face it…what Rabbi wouldn’t?

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York. Vote early, vote often, try the veal.

(c) 2016 TotalTheater. All rights reserved.
https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/2016/11/06/non-fiction-essay-humorous-rabbi-sol-solomons-rabbinical-reflection-141-11-6-16-electile-dysfunction/

Dave’s Gone By Skit: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #140 (6/12/2016): TONY AWARDS 2016

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #140 (6/12/16): Tony Awards 2016

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Aired June 11, 2016 on Dave’s Gone By. YouTube link: https://youtu.be/RghaoMma4aU

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of June 12, 2016.

Lovers of the theater — and by that I mean geeks, shut-ins, homosexuals, and the desperate — rejoice! The time has come once again to celebrate Broadway — the talent and creativity that bring a bissel fun and sanity to this increasingly meshuggenah world. Huzzah for the Tony Awards.

Now, it is hard to deny that Broadway has become a playground for the rich, a parcel of real estate increasingly off limits to working people who just crave two hours of tits, tunes and tears. But remember: many places offer discount tickets and two-fers — trust me on this, I know from bargains. And even if those prices are beyond your purse, for three hours this Sunday night, you can sit in front of the TV and watch the dazzle of 42nd Street unfurl before your glazed, lower-middle-class eyeballs.

You can’t get into Hamilton? Alexander Hamilton couldn’t get into Hamilton. But Sunday, June 12th, you get a digital front-row seat to the cast of Hamilton doing a song . . . and then winning every Tony Award known to man. Actually, they won’t, they can’t. They have 16 nominations — a record! — but they have multiple nominees in some categories, and not every race is a shoo-in. So Mel Brooks’s The Producers will likely remain the all-time Tony Award winner. Ah, if only I’d bought 112 shares of that show. Quel dommage. But there are other reasons to watch the Tony Awards either in person at the Beacon Theater or on CBS, whose viewership is so old, they should be nicknamed The Yahrzeit Network.

Seriously, though, what I love to do most of all this time of year is look through the Tony nominations and find the Jews. There’s generally a batch of them, this being theater and all, and it’s a point of pride when my people are being recognized for their brilliance — and for briefly escaping Equity’s 95 percent unemployment rate.

First and foremost, let us exult that Fiddler on the Roof is back, and this time, they have a Jew playing Tevye! He’s Tony-nominated Danny Burstein, who starts off as a modern guy who comes onstage reading the stories of Sholem Aleichem. Then he takes the jacket off and turns into Tevye the milkman. This has confused some matinee audiences. I guess when you get to a certain age, it can be hard to make the mental leap of: no jacket, 1910 Russian village; yes jacket, 2016 Sears men’s department. How these audiences survive Tom Stoppard is beyond me.

By the way, in the lead-actor category, Danny Burstein is up against Zachary Levi for She Loves Me. Now, this truly is confusing because Levi has a Jewish name, but he’s a gentile. Worse, in recent interviews, the Welsh actor said he was turned down for parts in Hollywood movies because he looked too Jewish. Levi said, quote, “I guess they were looking for more of a corn-fed, white boy look. My family is from Indiana, come on!” I feel for you, Danny. It’s like that time I auditioned for the Carolina Chocolate Drops. I nailed it; sang like an angel. But did they call? Did they write? Not a word. And don’t even get me started on how I tried to get into the Celtic Women. Actually, I almost got into one, but she found out I was married.

Anyhoo, moving on to other Tony categories . . . where the hell are my people? Where are the Cohens and the Rothsteins and the Schiowitzes and the Bermans? This year gives us names like Brooks and Nyong’o and Pigott-Smith and the erotic-sounding Sengbloh. Don’t get me wrong; I’m all for diversity. But it’s not so diverse if Jews are virtually absent.

Thank God, thanks to Hamilton, we do have a featured actor in a musical: Daveed Diggs. Yes, he’s a schvartz, but his parents gave him the Hebrew name for David because he’s half schvartz and half-Jewish. So I’d let him marry half my daughter. And speaking of halvsies, hooray for Sophie Okonedo, the celebrated British actress who already won a Tony for A Raisin in the Sun two seasons ago. Yes, she looks black, but there’s cholent under the chitlins! Okonedo’s mom is a Jewish Pilates teacher, and her parents were emigrants from Eastern Europe who spoke Yiddish! As Wikipedia notes, Okonedo’s father took a powder, and her single mom raised her in unavoidable poverty, but, says the actress, “We always had books.” If that isn’t Jewish, I don’t know what is. Well, a synagogue is Jewish; that kind of is. And Hebrew. And mezuzahs, but you know what I’m saying.

The wonderful lesson that we take from Daveed Diggs and Sophie Okonedo is that we can integrate, we can intermarry but not lose the spark of Yiddishkeit. We will no longer look the same or sound the same. And we will probably have better hair. But Jewish upbringing, connection, and belief need not go by the wayside, even if our people are far away from Bayside.

And so, on Tony night, when Lin-Manuel Miranda is giving his 32nd speech about inclusion, please remember that we are not as excluded as it might first appear. Just look at the best-musical nominees: Hamilton, School of Rock, Shuffle Along, Waitress, and Bright Star. Hamilton deals with money, which Jews are always worried about; School of Rock concerns education, which is sacred to us; Shuffle Along is what every Jew over 70 does, and Waitress is what we all holler in a restaurant. As for Steve Martin and Edie Brickell’s Bright Star, who’s to say it isn’t six-pointed?

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York. On with the Tony show!

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #140 (6/12/16): TONY AWARDS 2016

Dave’s Gone By #561 (6/11/2016): THE 12TH ANNUAL TOTALTHEATER TONY SPECIAL

Click above to listen to the episode (audio only).

Here is the 561st episode of the long-running radio show/podcast, Dave’s Gone By, which aired on UNC Radio, June 11, 2016. Info: davesgoneby.com.

Host: Dave Lefkowitz

Guests: lyricist Glenn Slater (School of Rock), Dave’s wife Joyce, critics Joe Dziemianowicz (NY Daily News), Elisabeth Vincentelli (NY Post), Jeff Myhre (NY Theater Guide), Ed Rubin (Artes), Charles Gross (Two on the Aisle), Leslie (Hoban) Blake (Two on the Aisle), Eva Heinemann (Hi! Drama), Jeff Myhre (NY Theater Guide), Simon Saltzman (Outer Critics Circle), Ellis Nassour (TotalTheater).

Featuring: A look at the 2015-2016 Broadway season and Tony Award nominees with interviews (including Tony-nominated lyricist Glenn Slater), trivia, showtunes, Broadway Timeline, a giveaway, and Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection on the Tonys.

00:00:01 DAVE GOES IN w/ Joyce
00:18:30 LAST YEAR’S WINNERS
00:25:30 SEASON STATS
00:28:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 1
00:37:00 GUEST: Eva Heinemann
00:49:30 GUEST: Jeff Myhre
00:58:30 Sponsors
01:00:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 2
01:10:00 TRIVIA, Part 1
01:18:30 GUEST: Simon Saltzman
01:30:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 3
01:43:30 GUEST: Elisabeth Vincentelli
02:01:00 Sponsors
02:08:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 4
02:26:00 GUEST: Joe Dziemianowicz
02:40:00 GIVEAWAY
02:46:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 5
03:01:30 TRIVIA, Part 2
03:10:30 GUEST: Glenn Slater
03:51:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 6
04:12:00 GUEST: Leslie (Hoban) Blake
04:28:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 7
04:37:00 RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #140 – The 2016 Tony Awards
04:44:00 Sponsors
04:47:30 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 8
05:01:30 GUEST: Ellis Nassour
05:13:30 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 9
05:30:30 GUEST: Charles Gross
05:53:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 10
06:12:00 TRIVIA, Part 3
06:17:00 BROADWAY TIMELINE, Part 11
06:35:00 Thank Yous
06:40:30 GUEST: Ed Rubin
07:01:00 DAVE GOES OUT

June 11, 2016 Playlist: “Ring of Keys” (00:21:30; Fun Home 2015 Broadway cast). “I Still Believe” (00:35:00; Amazing Grace 2015 Broadway cast w/ Erin Mackey). “Alexander Hamilton” (01:01:30; Hamilton 2016 Broadway cast). “The Mirror-Blue Night” (01:41:30; Spring Awakening 2006 Broadway cast). “Star Tar” (02:23:30; Dames at Sea 1969 London cast). “Mega-Mix” (02:55:30; On Your Feet 2016 Broadway cast). “Here at Horace Green” (03:11:00), “Where Did the Rock Go” (03:27:00) & “Stick it to the Man” (03:44:30; School of Rock 2016 Broadway cast). “Ishi Kara Ishi” (03:54:00; Allegiance 2015 Broadway cast w/ George Takei & Lea Salonga). “Miss Celie’s Pants” (04:10:00; The Color Purple 2016 Broadway cast w/ Cynthia Erivo). “Do You Love Me” (04:31:30; Fiddler on the Roof 2016 Broadway cast w/ Danny Burstein & Jessica Hecht). “Promotional Reel” (04:58:00; Disaster 2016 Broadway cast). “Ice Cream” (05:19:00; She Loves Me 1963 Broadway cast w/ Barbara Cook). “Sun is Gonna Shine Again ” (05:27:30; Steve Martin & Edie Brickell). “Everything Changes” (06:08:30; Waitress 2016 Broadway cast w/ Jessie Mueller). “Everlasting” (06:22:00; Tuck Everlasting 2016 Broadway cast w/ Sarah Charles Lewis). “I’m Cravin’ for That Kind of Love” (06:31:00; Shuffle Along w/ Eubie Blake & Noble Sissle). “Sun is Gonna Shine Again” (07:09:30; Bright Star 2016 Broadway cast w/ Carmen Cusack).

Dave’s Gone By Skit: RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #135 (1/17/2016): David Bowie

click above to listen (audio file)

click above to listen (audio only)

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #135 (1/17/2016): David Bowie

Aired Jan. 16, 2016 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_goP2CmBVI

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of January 17th, 2016.

It is time to say a sad Shalom to David Bowie, the super-talented singer, songwriter, rock star, and icon who died of liver cancer on January 10th. Most musicians find one persona in a career and stick with it: Joe Smith sings country, Edna Whatever does dance pop, Mordecai Ben David does . . . whatever he does. But David Bowie changed his look, his style, his sound more times than I change my underwear. Well, maybe that’s not the best example, since I’m kind of lazy in the laundry department, but you know what I mean. He started with twee British pop tunes like “Come and Buy My Toys” and “Love You `Til Tuesday,” songs that weren’t meant to last even until Monday. But they pointed the way towards freaky folk and post-Apollo weirdness and “Space Oddity,” the story of a man who gets completely lost in space and never comes back—like Gary Busey.

Wearing dresses and cavorting in transgender weirdness, Bowie pushed the conventions of behavior and attire—which could only mean one thing: he was destined for rock and roll. He created Ziggy Stardust, a rock idol with a comet-like trajectory and really, really tight pants. Suddenly, just going onstage and playing songs wasn’t enough anymore. You needed costumes and makeup and pyrotechnics and huge hydraulics. Long before Grizabella rose to cat heaven and Bono started singing from a claw, Bowie was ascending on a cherry picker and cavorting with glass spiders.

And when all that got too weird and dangerous, Bowie changed again. He became a Thin White Duke, white because he was basically covered head to foot with cocaine powder. But the music remained: “Rebel Rebel,” “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” “Young Americans”—soul music for white people. And believe me, we needed it, because up till then, the closest we got to soul music was Donovan. But even Bowie’s “plastic soul” was the real thing—so real that James Brown stole Carlos Alomar’s riff from “Fame”—not the other way around. They even asked James Brown about it, and he said, quote, “(series of grunts).”

But seriously, Bowie eased off the drugs just a little to save his sanity and then moved on to yet another incarnation: krautrock. He and Brian Eno found themselves in Berlin mixing electronic music and hard rock in a delightful way that could only come out of a country that murdered 40 million people. Bowie would never reach those musical peaks again, and indeed, his most commercially popular years were filled with dance-club pop and sometimes desperate attempts to stay trendy by incorporating that 1980s sound that we all loved so much. (Insert sarcastic facial expression here.)

Did he stay there, though? Of course not. He was David Bowie. He returned to arty, experimental, and often difficult music and stayed there for another two decades. He may not have gotten on the radio with songs like “Slip Away,” “Never Get Old,” and “Fall Dog Bombs the Moon,” but anyone with iTunes and ears can find them and hear their worth.

After that, for awhile, David Bowie laid low (no album-title pun intended). He pushed his back catalogue and old concerts and didn’t tour because of a heart condition. But then two years ago, he jumped once more into creativity, secretly recording new tracks with old colleagues. He put out “The Next Day” in 2013, then started working on an off-Broadway show, then released another album on his birthday this year. We all now know the reason for this 18-month burst of activity, and it may be the biggest Bowie takeaway of all. He knew his days were literally numbered. He knew the liver he was punishing 40 years ago was coming back like Rocky for a knockout. He knew he had so much more to do and so little time. So he did it. He pushed himself because any day, he would fall to earth.

Most of us, thank God, don’t have such a diagnosis hanging over our heads. Except we do. Who knows when HaShem will send a drunk driver careening towards us on the highway? Or a Muslim with a backpack? Or a mutated cell that will turn prostates into pancakes and ovaries into rotten eggs? Every day we’re still alive is a challenge to make that day count. To bring something new into the world that wasn’t there the day before.

Maybe it’s a poem. A painting. A table. A scarf. A youtube video of your pet doing something adorable. Okay, maybe the world doesn’t need more of that, but the impetus to strike while our irons are still hot is, perhaps, the greatest function of our human DNA.

Go figure it took a space alien, diamond dog, and spider from Mars to remind us. Thank you, David Bowie. You were a musical hero for a lot more than just one day.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York.

Dave’s Gone By Skit: RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #132 (12/12/2015): HANUKKAH HAIKU

click above to listen (audio file)

click above to listen (audio only)

Rabbinical Reflection #132: Hanukkah Haiku

aired Dec. 12, 2015 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube clip: https://youtu.be/6AxN-ZfHRak

Shalom, Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of December 12, 2015.

With everything going on in the world – the craziness, the killing, chaos in the GOP, E. coli at Chipotle—which is really confusing because how the hell are you supposed to differentiate noro-virus diarrhea from regular Chipotle diarrhea? Such distinctions are lost on me. But what we must not lose this mid-December is the arrival of Chanukah. Eight days of happiness and food and gratitude, and a reminder that every Jewish holiday isn’t about fasting and wishing you could afford maid service.

Sometimes we win. Sometimes the enemy who is trying to destroy us, or weaken our faith, gets a shank in the ribs. We did it to Egypt in a thousand BC, we did it to the Greeks—who bent over and took it—and one day we’ll do it to ISIS and ISIL and Al Qaeda and Boko Haram, and maybe the first guy who said, “Hey, it’s Halloween soon. Let’s put pumpkin spice in everything. Lattes, pancakes, donuts, beef wellington—doesn’t matter. Pumpkin spice is the new oxygen.” We need to get him.

Anyhoo, Chanukah commemorates a small band of Jews who would not succumb to the hellish Hellenic hellions who tried to hinder our Hebrew historicity. The second temple in Jerusalem was recaptured from the Greeks, re-consecrated as a synagogue, and retrofitted for Wi-Fi. And when the Hashmonaim were cleaning the temple, and making it minty fresh, they had only a drop of oil with which to light the holy candelabra, the menorah. And yet that oil burned day and night for eight straight days. The electric bill must have been horrendous, but the point is: miracles do happen. They happened then, they happen now. It’s a miracle that a computer can digitally print working human organs. It’s a miracle you can stare at a hole in the ground in a city block, come back six months later, and it’s an office building. It’s an astounding miracle that someone like me is on the radio.

So let us delight with our family, our friends—all the people we barely tolerate for fear of loneliness—and cheer the miraculous holiday of Chanukah. To do so, I have written a few short poems celebrating the Festival of Lights in haiku form. Haiku is a Japanese poetry style that is perfectly marvelous because it’s so short. As soon as you get started, you’re finished. Like a teenage boy on prom night. Your entire thought process must fit into a mere 17 syllables, which proves the Japanese not only invented haiku but twitter.

I pray that you enjoy these holiday poems from me, Rabbi Sol. Chanukah Chaikus:

Eight candles burning
On my shaky menorah.
Shit! Call 9-1-1.

Headline: Polish Jews
Suffer Third-Degree Burns When
Bobbing for Latkes

Judah Maccabee
And sons beat the Greek army
Yay for terrorists!

Happy holidays, my friends, and may all your dreidel spins come up hay. I’d say gimel, but why press your luck? This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches, in Great Neck, New York.

NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #132 (12/12/2015): HANUKKAH HAIKU

Dave’s Gone By Skit: RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #120 (3/29/2015): Bibi’s Back

click above to listen (audio file)

Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #121 (3/29/2015): Bibi’s Back

aired March 28, 2015 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube clip: http://youtu.be/t7yMCkes6B8

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of March 29, 2015.

Much to many people’s surprise, Benjamin Netanyahu was elected for a third term as the Prime Minister of Israel. Everyone assumed Labor would win. Everybody thought Netanyahu’s hard-line, status-quo policies were on the way out, and peaceniks were on the way in. Well, pre-April fool! Or technically, Adar fool, since it’s the Jewish calendar we’re dealing with.

But let’s be clear: for all Israel’s weariness of war, and for all the country’s gratitude to the United States for support, for money, for defense, for money, for money, for money . . . Israeli voters nevertheless sent a strong message and a mandate. The safety and security of Eretz Yisroel comes before everything else. It comes before friendship, before negotiations, before swallowing the latest Palestinian PR. They said to Netanyahu: “Give us strong borders and a promise that you won’t sell our country down the river—Jordan or Nile—and we’ll vote for you again.” He did, and they did.

Therefore, much to the chagrin of President Barak Oblivia, Bibi is back. And the shocking part is: he did it, not by kowtowing to the left, not by lying about the potential for peace with our sworn enemies, but by facing facts. The Arabs hate us, they won’t even recognize Israel on their maps or GPS systems, and any chance they get, they’d gladly send the Jews on a blind date with Robert Durst.

In his campaigning, Bibi went so far as to say that on his watch, there would never be a Palestinian state, which is harsh to hear even for a die-hard Zionist like yours truly. I’ve always said, I have no objection to a Palestinian state . . . in Algeria, in Curacao, maybe somewhere north of Omsk. The two-state solution, however, just seems like a disaster on the drawing board: unsafe, untenable, and you know it would just turn Jerusalem into a ping-pong ball. Filled with explosives.

Still, you’re not allowed to say that. If you’re a diplomat or a head of state, you’re supposed to make believe there’s always room for negotiation, that the Arabs really will lay down their arms and be all neighborly-like. Because, hey, they’ve been such good citizens in Yemen, Tunisia, Iraq, Syria, Libya – fill in the name of a country; the Muslims have probably terrorized it.

Our President won’t admit that, of course. It’s like he’s living in the movie “Candyman.” If you say the name “Moslem” five times to a camera lens, the bad guys’ evil will be unleashed. But here’s news, Mr. Pres, the bad genies are already out of the bottle, and if there’s one country on earth that knows not to trust the Bedouins, it’s their Semitic brethren.

Now, for the sake of diplomacy, Benjy Netanyahu has already gone back on his pre-election speechifying. He says he didn’t really mean there was no solution, that he’s always willing to schmooze with Abbas, and we should take his posturing with a grain of hummus. He’s a politician. He says what he has to to get what he wants. Once he’s got it, then he can be more truthful. Not completely truthful, but a percentage.

Meanwhile, the President, who has been going through an otherwise impressive stretch of lame-duck vigor, is pitching a hissy fit over Bibi’s bonanza. Obama wants to be the next Jimmy Carter, brokering the all-but-impossible peace deal that will cement his legacy for the ages. But lemme tell you, Barack, if you’re listening, which I know you are: with Israel and Egypt, Jimmy Carter did an amazing, impossible, fantastic thing. No one can take that away from him. But if you ask anybody about the legacy of James Earl Carter, 39th President, the response will be: hostages, oil shortage, inflation, Cold War, losing the Panama Canal, and a general American bad mood. In other word, that peanut-brained peanut farmer had as much business ruling the free world as Bill Cosby would have running a rape crisis center. So if Obama thinks he’s got anything to gain by twisting Israel’s arm into a phony truce with terrorists, he’s in for a rude awakening.

And yes, it was rude of Netanyahu to visit America and gab with Republicans when the White House all but begged him not to. But I repeat: maybe, just maybe, Bibi knows whereof he speaks when he cautions that trusting Iran to scrap its nuclear program is like trusting Bill Cosby to run a rape crisis center. I know, I already used that joke, but I’m hungry, and I want to finish this stupid essay and get to my brisket.

Folks in Washington are saying that relations between Israel and the United States are nearly at an all-time low. But I think—or at least, I hope—that’s overstating the case. Deep down, both American parties are very committed to Israel and realize how strategically important it is to the West, as well as its moral right to exist in a post-Holocaustal world. If Obama wants to rattle his saber—and you know, those people are blessed with long sabers—it could be the same kind of bluff and bluster Netanyahu was using to win his election. What actually goes on behind the scenes . . . that’s for statesmen to know and Aaron Sorkin to fabricate.

So I hope this is all just smoke and mishegoss, and that the Democrats—especially their presumptive 2016 candidat-ess—remember that what’s good for Auntie Israel is what’s most prudent for Uncle Sam. Or, put another way, don’t throw the Bibi out with the bathwater.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches in Great Neck, New York.

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