Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Happy 5/12 Birthday

Today Yakira is 5 months old. Time has flown by and has been pretty cool watching her grow up and develop.

Hard for us to notice them all but everyday she is doing something different, adding something else to her bag of tricks.

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It is amazing how quickly the wheels of the media turn. Last week, these two guys were randoms auditioning on American Idol. This week they are special guest interviewers for the Jimmy Kimmel Show down in Miami at Super Bowl XLI Media Day. You get the sense the media are desperate for another William Hung but something like that is never going to happen again. Lightning like that only strikes once.

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Hard Stuff

Yakira has started on her first real food. A couple of times a day we complement her feeding with this rice cereal which fills her up and more importantly sees her sleep through the night.

Apart from that, not much else is going on. We have been watching a number of movies in order to familarise ourselves with all of the nominations. We watched Happy Feet which was ok as well as the Pursuit of Happyness which was quite good.

Mrs Co Il's foot is slowly on the mend. Really no other news besides that.

Sunday, January 28, 2007

Splish Splash





Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Days Like This

The last 24 hours have been pretty crazy - makes me feel somewhat what Jack Bauer may feel minus the bloodshed. Additionally his daughter is incredibly annoying.

Let's take it from the top:

Mrs Dot Co Dot Il injured her foot and it has a hairline fracture rendering her immobile.

I took today and will take tomorrow off to look after her and Yakira but this morning woke up with some stomach bug and spent most of the morning being up close and personal with the toilet.

Took Yakira to Tipat Halav and she had a vaccination and was pretty brave and courageous. I, on the other hand, almost passed out.

Dropped her up and then took the cab to Yad Sarah to pick up a pair of crutches.

Given all this haven't had much time to dissect and analyse the Oscar Nominations so just a few quick points:

*So Dreamgirls didn't get the Best Picture nod - would it have won anyway? Doubt it.

*Leo gets nominated for the wrong movie but think Best Actor will go to Forest Whitaker.

*Helen Mirren for Best Actress. Saw Little Children recently and Jack Dawson would be thrilled to see how Rose turned out.

*Meryl Streep gets nominated again?!?!?!

*Speaking of which how many Kate/Leo/Titantic references are there going to be?

*Best Supporting Actor and Actress are wide open. Will be very surprised if Eddie gets up.

*And if Abigail Breslin gets up, things are going to get very very ugly between her and Dakota Fanning. Fanning owns that cute little girl role.

*How exactly does Borat get nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay?

*Favorite for Best Song is clearly Henry Krieger. He has three of the five nominations.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Peer-Less

So in the end she went down and possibly should have even won the match but she played out of her skin and can be extremely proud of that.

Serena Williams is no pushover and has won more majors (seven) than any other active female player.

So obviously she had a huge edge in experience over Peer and it ultimately was the difference between teh two. But for Peer to get as close as she did means she is not that far away. If she continues as she has been doing, she should be Top 10 by the end of the year.

She can take more from this loss than she could from any win and that could hold her in good stead for the rest of her career. Now she is off to Tokyo for a pretty big tournament. Will be interesting to see how she regroups from this loss.

PS: Oscar nominations come out later today. Expect Little Miss Sunshine and the Departed to do quite well. As for the acting categories, it has been such a weak year that don't be surprised if Rob Schneider and Pamela Anderson twins get nominated. It may not be that easy to tell the difference between the Oscars and the Razzies.

PPS: Originally I wrote the Olsen twins and then replaced it with Pamela Anderson without deleting the word twins. But think it's fine the way it worked out.

Monday, January 22, 2007

Peer to Peer

Good news from Melbourne for Israeli sports fans - Shahar Peer is in the quarter-finals of the Australian Open.

The 19 year old came into the tournament as the 16th seed as has done well, only losing one set of the nine she has played.

Blocking her path to the final four is Serena Williams who will provide stiff opposition for the teenager. If she wins, it will be the greatest of her career by some way.

I've been following her career quite closely since she won the junior girls title at the Australian Open three years ago.

Since then her climb through the ranking has been steady - first entering the top 100, then the top 50 and now the top 20. Against the elite players like Kim Clijsters, Justine Henin-Hardene and Martina Hingis she struggles and is quite lucky that most of them are coming to the end of their careers.

This is why the match against Williams is so important. It's a litmus test to see if she right up there with the best or if there still is a gap between her and the top players.

All of Peer's hard work has set her up nicely. She will be seeded for most of the tournaments she plays in and get through to the pointy end of most tournaments she'll play in without too much difficulty.

Nice to see she has vocal support from all the Israelis in Melbourne. They shouldn't be too prominent though. The Department of Immigration watches the telecast too.

Sunday, January 21, 2007

Blame It On The Rain

Absolutely bucketing down in Jerusalem today. As soon as Shabbat finished last night it started pouring and the rain and the wind hasn't stopped since.

Was a lovely Shabbat. We had friends of ours stay over which was nice. We also had some blogging friends over which was lovely.

On Friday stopped to Emek and once again went to buy a few things at Super Moshava. Funny how a few things there can total more than the rest of your Shabbat shopping.

This tiny little foothold has become a veritable goldmine and as hard as you try not to go back, you find yourself being drawn in by some sort of tractor beam.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Holding Your Head High


Monday, January 15, 2007

Lucky Number Six

Busy time in TV/Movie land with many series such as 24 and American Idol returning while other shows such as Lost, Guy Penis and Grey's Anatomy come back from their winter hiatus. Also Golden Globes are tonight and Oscar nominations are announced next week. So it's all happening.

As I mentioned yesterday, I saw The Departed over the weekend and for those of you who haven't seen it I would highly recommend it. It is actually a direct rip-off of a Japanese movie involving the Japanese police and the triads which I would love to see, to see how it compares although I'm sure that the Japanese version would be far superior.

I would think Martin Scorsese would have to be an absolute certainty to win the Oscar for Best Director - his first win in six tries. Not only would it be his third nomination in five years but if he didn't win he would join Clarence Brown as having the most ever Best Director nominations without ever having won.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

End of an Era

Very sad weekend for a lot of people with the closing of Sugarhill. It was a bar in town which was owned by friends of ours. It opened in the summer of 2005 and quickly became the local hang-out. Literally, everyone did know your name there.

Mrs Co.Il who used to waitress there, went for the big bash last night, while Yakira and I watched The Departed.

Apart from that was a nice weekend. Went out to friends for nice Friday night dinner. Then friends of our just moved in nearby which is really nice. Will be great to have them so close. Started playing this game with them called Settlers which looks quite interesting.

Thursday, January 11, 2007

City of God

Went to the Kottel yesterday for the first time in some time and noticed two things.

The amount of beggars there has expanded exponentially. As you enter, you see a row of them lined up shaking their hands. While you're davening you are swamped by guys. It's impossible to know who is genuine and who is looking to buy a hamburger for lunch.

They renovated the bit on the left side of the male section and it looks incredible. Female readers may not know this but on the men's side you can keep walking inwards. They've cleaned it up and it looks amazing. Saw a plaque thanking Lily Safra for her contribution. Googled her and its quite a story. Check it out....

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

More Photos

Snowsuit Yakira
Asleep Yakira
Awake Yakira

Wonderwall

Been here two years and you can count on two hands the number of times I've been to the Kottel.

Pretty miserable.

Have the chance to go today so going.

And due to popular demand will be posting more pics of YM later.........

Monday, January 08, 2007

Photo Evidence

Sunday, January 07, 2007

Rain Man

Wet, cold and windy weekend.

So didn't venture much out of the house.

Wedding was nice. Then had the convenience of going to straight to our room.

Yakira was just pipped by the bride of being the best dressed person at the wedding.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

Valley Girls

Last night Emek was buzzing.

For a regular Wednesday night it was as packed as you could imagine with every man and his seminary girl there.

Didn't have time to walk up and down and take a census because we had reservations at Olive. Thought maybe we would go the night without seeing anyone we know inside the restaurant but in the second room was friendly face which kept the streak intact.

Tonight we have Craig's wedding. Now I know it's only been three and a bit days, but right here and now, you could already have your social event of the year (With apologies of course to the Jerusalem Winter Ball)

I have already gone on at length about weddings in a past post so won't do that here.

The folks are actually in town and are coming to the wedding as well. For a treat they decided that all of us could stay at the hotel tonight. That's always fun.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

Two Thumbs Up

Here in Israel, one of the movie channel's is showing a selection of features from recent Sundance Festivals.

Last night, we watched Murderball which is all about wheelchair rugby.

Each of the characters is worth their own movie. To hear their story about how they came to be in a wheelchair and then looking at how they are dealing with life, given their circumstances.

Wheelchair rugby just isn't a game to them - it gives their life meaning and significance.

If you can see it, do because its an excellent film and one that will change your perspective on life.

Monday, January 01, 2007

Happy New Year

What a great New Year's Eve last night.

Went to be at around 11pm and woke up at 7.

Then had a work breakfast this morning at Cup of Joe, which is where Mulan used to be.
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