A restful Shabbat

So, yesterday we were invited to Shabbat lunch by a friend of mine, Andy Boltax, whom I haven't seen for, oh, 25 years or so. He and I worked on the Daily Northwestern together and he was always extremely nice to me; maybe because we're from the same part of the country (he was raised in Connecticut) and he was very disappointed when I decided not to seek the editor-in-chief's position (I was an African Studies minor and I needed to improve my overall GPA, plus I thought the position of off-campus bureau chief was better suited for me).

Andy reached out to be via Facebook. It turns out he has been living in the area since around 1997. He was raised a largely secular Jew and now has become quite religious and keeps strictly kosher. So, no way I could bring over a homemade babka. (sigh). He and his wife are both journalists -- she works on the website of AARP magazine and he owns his own company that advises news organizations on content management -- and they both work. They have four daughters, aged 17 to 10, but only Chana joined us. She's 13 and Rachel immediately took to her and her friend, Sheer, who joined us later in the meal.

It was one of the best kosher meals I have EVER had in my life -- even the cholent, which I have terrible memories of from the Chabad House in Portland -- and I helped myself to just about everything. Even Drew and Rachel found things to eat, although Rachel's portion was mostly the homemade challah, and we had a great time sitting around and catching up on two decades' worth of news. Andy read a d'var Torah portion about the futility of worrying, which was especially timely for me, and we ended up staying for 4 1/2 hours, even though Andy had to leave toward the end for closing prayers. We all agreed we'd had a great time and we had to do it again. I pledged to smoke a brisket for them at their house, as long as they provided the kosher smoker and I supplied the ingredients.

Then we went home and had a decidedly non-kosher evening of pepperoni pizza and cupcakes from our favorite bakery in Shirlington. We watched an Angelina Ballernia series of episodes with Rachel and then Drew and I watched a creepy but great movie called "Side Effects." Awesome day.