February 6, 2024

Joseph Zitt's [as if in dreams] 2024-02-05

Hi. I'm Joseph Zitt. I moved from the US to Israel in 2017. This is my newsletter about more-or-less daily life in my city in the shadow of war. You can select these links to subscribe or unsubscribe. There are more links at the bottom. You can also read this email online here. Here we go...

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I wake up to WhatsApp messages about the weather. The newspaper tells us that as of yesterday, it had rained for 14 days straight. It's the first time that that's happened in thirty years. And it's raining again today.¹

The news says that there has been disproportionately heavy rain in Sodom, at the southwestern end of the Dead Sea. Make of that what you will. Anyone turned to salt will probably dissolve quickly.

The neighbors next door have completely dug up their yard. I don't know what it's going to become. Right now, it's a lake.

AP Video shows people suffering in the rain across the border.² The supposed government there hasn't prioritized infrastructure for anyone but themselves. Xinhua has more stories and images of people trying to cope there.³

I see a message from a coworker on the office WhatsApp channel. He had been walking from the train station but has ducked into the mall. He's not venturing out until the rain stops. Another worker announces that he'll drive over and pick him up. Fortunately, both the office and the mall have underground parking.

I had been thinking of going over to the mall after work to pick up a new water bottle. I think I'll wait. I'm eager to head home quickly, anyway, to watch last night's Grammy Awards. It sounds like it was a great show.

I walk to work when the rain lets up for a bit. When I step into the office kitchen, a coworker hands me a chocolate bar. He's celebrating his 43rd anniversary of coming to this country. He nudges me to take more, one of each kind, from the bag. I do.

On the kitchen counter, I see a container of the orange cherry tomatoes that I like. When I get closer, I realize that they are really kumquats, possibly from someone's tree. Even better. I pop one in my mouth, whole. The skin is so thin that there's no point in peeling them.

When I get to my cube, I put the candy bars on my desk. After a few minutes, I put them in a drawer. On my desk, they're too distracting.

I hear a coworker announce definitively: "Culture is culture. War is war. Health is health." I have no idea as to the context.

My family tells me that the rabbi's WhatsApp message yesterday wasn't about religious education, but about direct help for evacuees and families of fighters. His group does a lot of different things. They have helped my family when they have faced crises.

Google Translate had garbled the message. Strangely, when I run the same text through it today, the result is clearer. I have no idea whether it learns new things or changes its guesses when tried again. I see that a language learning group for immigrants here is leading a Zoom class on "Why Not to Use Google Translate." Yeah.

In an interview in London, one of the creators of the popular TV show Fauda (which I've never seen) says that they considered a story line for last season in which terrorists breached the fence at the border and attacked a kibbutz. It was discarded. Everyone agreed that it could never happen.⁴

They're writing the next season now. Previous plans had to be scrapped:

“What we had written became totally irrelevant and so we are reinventing the show just as, in some ways, Israel will need to be reinvented; we need a new IDF, a new government, a new Prime Minister because Israel is going to be need to be rebuilt.”

Also in London, an event supporting our country was scheduled for a large theater yesterday. It had to be moved. After workers at the theater were doxxed and received threatening email, they refused to work the event.⁵ (Their contracts allow them to decline work on Sundays.) The event took place at another venue. Perhaps out of caution, the article doesn't identify the new venue.

Prices at our supermarkets are going up again.⁶ The oligarchs and conglomerates are giving the usual excuses, many of which aren't related to the war. People who study these things say that they're only raising prices because they can. Capitalists gonna capitalize.

Meanwhile, 62% of people here say that the war has damaged their incomes.⁷ The families of reservists and evacuees have been hit especially hard. I suspect that the people making the executive decisions to raise prices aren't affected much.

The fighting may affect the price of meat and other stuff derived from livestock soon. We get some of it from Australia.⁸ A ship carrying thousands of sheep and cattle from there couldn't go through the Red Sea due to the Houthi attacks. It turned back.

The animals have now been on board the ship for a month. It would take another month to send them around Africa to get here without facing the missiles again. Officials are concerned for the health of the animals. Some have been taken off the ship back in Australia. Since any disembarking animals have to be quarantined, getting all of them off would also take a while.

I get off work at the usual time and head home to watch the Grammys. The rain holds off until I get home.

I see the usual hedgehog run across the path as I pass my landlords' porch. I realize that I only ever see it run from the south side of the path to the north. I never see it go the other way. Maybe hedgehogs have figured out the secrets of teleportation, but can only use it from north to south. Further investigation will be required.

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Here’s an archive of past newsletters.

You can find me via email, Bluesky, Mastodon, Facebook, and, just out of inertia, X/Twitter. There's more about me and my books, music, and films at josephzitt.com.

The newsletter’s official mailing address is 304 S. Jones Blvd #3567, Las Vegas NV 89107. (I’m in Israel, but if physical mail comes to me at that Las Vegas address, it’ll get scanned and emailed. I don’t expect that to happen much. If you want to send me physical mail, ask me for a real address.)

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L'hitraot.