Leap Month

Amazingly, one of the best descriptions I've found of the Hebrew calendar comes from Microsoft's .NET Framework documentation. The month names are even given in Hebrew characters (and real characters, too, not images). If only anything else in that massive reference were anywhere near as useful.

You did know that the Hebrew calendar has a leap month 7 out of every 19 years, didn't you? Apparently, the length of the year was calculated with great precision using lunar eclipses, and the unusual calendar thus derived is extremely accurate. Or so says my uncle, though he also claims that I was born on February 29th. But better that than the first of אדר ב.

Jews Scream for Ice Cream

My dad's collection of ice cream sheet music includes the following dialect for “I Scream – You Scream – We All Scream for ICE CREAM”:

I scream, you scream, ve all scream for Ice Cream, RAH RAH RAH
Ve're not caring if it smells from herring, SHA SHA SHA
It's malicious – in big dishes
Ve like it covered with – gefillte fishes
Iceberg, Lindberg, and Goldberg and Ginsberg, Ice Cream COHN!

Not particulary politically correct, I suppose, but funny, and we're allowed to make fun of our own heritage, right? I have to say, however, that despite my willingness to eat fish from a jar, I hope never to be served ice cream topped with gefillte fish. One right after the other, maybe, but not together.