March 29, 2012 | 9:39 am

Baseball and G-d

Posted by Julia Bendis

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I trust in G-d
I love my Country
And will respect its laws
I will play fair
And strive to win
But win or lose I will always do my best

This is the pledge the players chant before every Little League game, including my twelve-year-old son.  Not only do I cringe every single time I hear the use of “G-d” in any child’s activity, but it’s even more alarming when it is mandated and used at a children’s baseball game.  I realize that a prayer of some sort was invented and widely perused far before Tim Tebow could wipe his own tuchis, however what does G-d have to do with baseball, or sports in general?

This country is so obsessed with the power of a higher being, one might even say a power of a supernatural (but one would be called insane for using that word), that it’s not only acceptable to use G-d’s name in just about anything in life, but praise G-d for absolutely everything!  What does G-d have to do with sports, and better yet what is G-d doing in a Little League’s pledge?  Basically, what we are teaching our children is that as long as they pray to G-d before each of their games, a supernatural being way up high in the sky will look after you and make sure you win your games!  What a way to instil false hope into a bunch of teenage boys…  Forget teenage boys, they are chanting this so-called pledge at the five-year-old’s games!

All I can think about while the players are reciting this pledge is what about Atheists on the team?  What about if your family simple does not believe in G-d, or anything that comes with it?  What about those same players going home after a game and asking their parents why in the world we have to say that we “trust in G-d”, when in fact we DON’T trust in G-d, but only in ourselves?  Isn’t G-d a bit too preoccupied with more important issues of the world to be worried about some Little League’s baseball game?  From day one, we teach our children to believe in themselves and in their abilities as decent human beings, and to trust their gut when it comes to anything and everything in life.  And then we make them PRAY before school starts and their sports games?  Isn’t it enough that G-d’s name is already in every school as it is.

Parents, am I the only one that’s outraged over this?  Please, send me your feedback!

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February 29, 2012 | 10:11 pm

Proper etiquette for social media!

Posted by Julia Bendis

Prior to Twitter, and Mark Zuckerberg’s brilliant invention of Facebook (hopefully you can feel the sarcasm), or even texting on our phones, people used to have manners.  Not only manners, but some form of global etiquette when it came to dealing with others.  I truly believe that with each of the above mentioned inventions, we have become dumber, lazier, and completely ill-mannered when it comes to normal human behavior.

Gone are the days when people used to call each other to find out how the other is doing, but rather text, Tweet or my personal favorite… Facebook message posted directly to the person’s wall; so not only can that individual read it but so can everyone else learn that he/she is recovering from explosive diarrhea.  And not only that, but now the universal “Hello, how are you?” has completely vanished from the conversation!  We get right to the point: “You got the kids?”, “What’s for dinner?”, “Get milk!”  No hello’s, good-bye’s, nothing.  Just straight down to business.  It’s taking me a very long time to get used to this new way of communicating, and as one friend put it… “stop treating every text message as a letter, and get to the point.”  Its taking a long while for me, and until then everyone will continue to receive my every text, Tweet, or Facebook post that starts off as a formal letter to the Queen.

The other thing that people seem to unable to learn is that unless you like having enemies, you need to stop posting things like: “I can’t wait for my party later, cooking up some yummy stuff!”, and “Can’t wait to share my new drink recipe with everyone tonight! This will be the best party ever!”  Like, Oh My God we get it, you have five hundred friends and you are throwing the “best party ever” without actually inviting people from your Facebook; however unless you are ready to greet ALL of those five hundred friends at your door in a couple of hours, I’d refrain from posting crap like that.  Do people actually enjoy getting comments such as: “Hey, where is my invite?”  and ‘Why wasn’t I invited?”  Do you feel like shit yet?  How about now?  I feel you are getting there very slowly.  Where are people’s manners…  Or is it all just so they have something to boast and brag about; showcase their mad skills of throwing a party…

How about those idiots that call in sick at work, hacking up God-knows what into the phone all the while posting a picture of themselves on a surfboard to Twitter/Facebook?  Did you forget that your boss is one of your so-called-’friends’ on Facebook?  I guess so.  My list can go on and on.  People, please learn proper social media etiquette already.  Thank you.  Sincerely, Me.

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February 22, 2012 | 9:00 pm

From the mouths of the babes…

Posted by Julia Bendis

Somehow I’ve known all along that kids don’t stay kids for long (I know I’m a genius), but I didn’t expect to get ‘educated’ about various sexual subjects by a twelve-year-old boy.  More importantly… my twelve-year-old boy.  When this school year started, so did the questions, comments and many many talks about girls.  And recently he started to offer his version of what sex is, how and why it’s done.

Don’t get me wrong, I am very happy that he is talking about it at all and especially with me, however he seems to be not only extremely opinionated but also very confident in his understanding of sexual activities…  Today he announced that he understands why boys are always supposed to do nice things for girls, but you never see girls doing anything nice for the boys.  When I asked why that is he whispered: “Girls do nice things for the boys in the bedroom, Mom!”

Not only did I throw up in my mouth a little upon hearing this, I also decided that as much as I wanted to know where, how and who told him that, I probably should end the conversation instead…  Unfortunately for me, my son was not about to let it go as he continued to inform me that he is about to be a man (with his impending Bar Mitzvah coming up), and therefore has the right to talk about sex!  God help me.  So, I went ahead against my better judgement and asked where he heard that, to which he immediately replied: “My friend Michael!  He knows everything Mom”.

Oh well, when you got a friend like Michael… who needs proper sex education?

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February 2, 2012 | 3:25 pm

S**T Gentiles say to Jews…

Posted by Julia Bendis

After one of my hissy fits over yet another moronic comment by a non-Jew, I decided it was time to sit down and write out ALL of the idiotic things I’ve heard over the years.  So, strap on your seat-belts, lean back, relax and enjoy:

• I hope you don’t take this personally, but if I ever need a blood transfusion I won’t be able to accept yours since you have Jewish blood, and I don’t want that.


• I know you are Jewish and all that, but you still celebrate Jesus’ Birthday, right?  After all, he was Jewish.  Did you know that?


• Do all Jews have a lot of money?


• You must know a cheap nail salon being Jewish and all! (nail, hair, you name it).


• Are you only allowed to date Jewish men?


• I know you are Jewish and all that, but you still celebrate Easter, right?  After all, it was YOUR people that killed him.


• Oh I know a lot about Jewish people, the Old Testament really isn’t that different from the Bible.


• You are Jewish? How cute! My step-Father’s Uncle was Jewish. But then he became a Christian.


• You are Jewish? Oh well, that’s OK. My neighbor is Jewish, he is a lawyer. His name has something like Stein or Wein or Berg in it. Do you know him?


• I just love how you people are so good with money!


• I’m so sorry that you won’t be going to Heaven. But its not too late, you can still be saved if you just accept Jesus Christ as your Savior! (I don’t even know what that means).


• I know you are Jewish and all that, but do you want to come to Church with me? They won’t get mad that I brought a Jew, I promise. Christians are very accepting people, they don’t judge (yeah right).


• When I said Jewish people are cheap, I meant it in a good way.  You people are very good with money!


• Do all Jewish people have to learn to speak Hebrew?


• Why don’t Jewish people recruit, like the Christians? I’ve never seen a Jew asking a non-Jew to come to Temple with him, why is that? (because we don’t want or need you)


• Do all Jewish men make great husbands?  You know because they are so good with money, and you never have to worry about it…


• Your Father must be rich!


• You must know of great deals for everything!

I would love to hear some of yours, so I can add it to the list.

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January 3, 2012 | 12:56 pm

HOOTERS, children and me being the greatest parent that ever lived…

Posted by Julia Bendis

Yesterday was the last day of my children’s freedom, and incidentally the last day of my imprisonment.  As I counted down the dwindling hours of winter break, I was also counting down the hours till my head was going to stop throbbing and my voice would sound human again (oppose to a hissing, barking, and squealing-female version of a prison guard type of a voice).

So, I decided to reward my boys with a lunch at Red Robin (mainly because I had a coupon) to celebrate their last day of vacation!  Even though they didn’t seem to appreciate my goodwill and sarcasm about the whole thing, they still agreed to go.  What a tough life!  Poor little children being taken out to lunch after having endured two weeks of fancy shmancy activities, trips, restaurants and who could forget not one but eight nights of Hanukkah.  Next year, I already told them that they will be taking a little trip to Skid Row for the holidays; and later I will re-wrap their already played and forgotten toys for Hanukkah.

After being seated along with the many other Moms who had the same exact idea, I tried making conversation in between Atari’s Breakout and NimbleBit’s Tiny Tower; yes they are over Angry Birds and Plants vs. Zombies or whatever the hell their names are.  Let me tell you, it requires some serious mad skills to be able to carry on a conversation with your Mother while building a whole condominium at the same time, and don’t get me started on those pesty little people walking around needing something every ten minutes, the alarm on Tiny Tower is the most annoying thing I’ve ever heard in my life, right next to a child crying and whining at the table next to me while I’m trying to enjoy an ‘Adults Only’ dinner.  Why is it that its perfectly alright for the child to throw a fit in a public place, but it is NOT alright for me to come over to it and smack it on the head?  My theory is if the child’s parent isn’t going to do anything about it, that clearly means they want other adults to do something about their annoying child’s behavior.  You with me on this?  Good, moving on.  Oh wait, one more thing before moving on…  As my Father likes to say quite often, “When I was a little boy in Lithuania (FYI, we lived in Latvia, but that’s not the point) if a child ever talked or cried in public, any adult was allowed to come up and shut that bastard up!  End of story.”  Alright, so I added the last part from myself but you get the point here.

Somehow I managed to get my kids’ little eyes away from their iPods long enough to have a five-minute dialogue about our adventures in Florida back in the day.  Specifically, my oldest wanted to know why I took him to a ‘HOOTERS’ restaurant in Orlando one day.  His words: “Mom, I just don’t understand.  I was only like 7 or 8 at the time!  Why would you think it was appropriate for me to see girls in very short shorts and boobs everywhere serving me food?  If I wanted to see that, I’d stay at home and look at you.”  First of all let’s get something straight, I’ve never in my whole life worn short shorts or shorts of any kind.  My idea of shorts are pants that come up to my calf, I believe they are called ‘Mom shorts’ a.k.a. Capris.  Second of all, I have never until that day been to a Hooters restaurant, nor have I heard much about it.  Sure I’ve heard the name, but didn’t know what it was about.  Believe me, as soon as we walked in I realized it was not your typical place to eat.  Maybe we stayed because I was curious, and maybe it was because we were both starving and the other closest restaurant was not close by.  After explaining such to my twelve-year-old, he seemed pretty satisfied with the answer and immediately after went back to destroying aliens, or building a house for them, not quite sure which one.  After a minute, he looked up and added this interesting fact: “It’s OK Mom, I am not mad at you.  Turns out most of my friends have been to Hooters with their Dads anyway, so it wasn’t just me that was put through that torture.  And to tell the truth, I like girls now so its OK.  Let me know if you’d like to go there again.”  Oh thanks son, make me feel like the worst parent ever, then reward me with that little announcement…

My six-year-old caught wind of ‘boob talk’ and decided to chime in, specifically wanting to know where there’s such a place with girls in short shorts and boobs everywhere, and more importantly why I’ve never taken HIM there?  Oye, how can one brother be so different from the other?  One is all about the rules and structure, and the other only wants to have a good time.  Boy I sure hope the older one doesn’t find out about my new tattoos, there is a lecture I’d like to avoid.  Last time it only lasted a week, who knows how long this one will take…  I plan on keeping a shirt on whenever taking him to the pool, beach and anywhere else that requires a swimsuit.  Stay tuned for that conversation, I am planning on recording it…

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December 23, 2011 | 12:47 pm

Holiday Card Etiquette

Posted by Julia Bendis

When you receive your first holiday card, you realize that you’re officially in the holiday season, or as I like to call it, “The Holiday card nightmare”.  As we enter the holidays, we also enter the awkward holiday greeting card etiquette.  The other day a long-time friend asked me if I get offended when people send me “Merry Christmas” cards, instead of the obvious Hanukkah cards.  Well - I replied, do you like getting “Happy Hanukkah” cards instead of “Merry Christmas” cards?  No need for explanation here…

If you don’t know someone well, I understand the general “Merry Christmas” statement, but if you know that person is anything but a Christian, why not order an extra set of plain “Happy Holiday” cards?  My friend’s reaction was, so am I supposed to order separate Hanukkah cards even though I don’t celebrate it?  No, I like getting the ones with Merry Christmas crossed out and Happy Hanukkah hand-written on them, right next to the baby Jesus and folk chanting: Our savior has been born, let’s rejoice!  But Happy Hanukkah anyway, you sad, sad Jew who’s missing out on all the saving and rejoicing that’s about to go on in here!

We (and by we, I mean the Jews) get that unless you live in Israel, are in the minority in this country and throughout the world, however that does not mean that all Gentiles have to completely ignore the fact that there are millions of people that don’t celebrate Christmas.  Anywhere you go its an automatic “Merry Christmas” greeting; from grocery stores to workplaces.  Do we (the Jews) go around saying “Happy Hanukkah” to strangers and store workers?  Can you imagine checking out at the local supermarket and just as you are about to leave announce: Happy Hanukkah to you and your family, may the spirit of Hanukkah light up your Menorah!  Actually, I have done that last week to a store clerk, just so I could beat her before the usual “Merry Christmas”.  You know the reaction I received?  A blank stare followed by an awkward “I am not Jewish” statement.  Doesn’t feel so good, store clerk, does it? Didn’t think so.

My parents on the other hand take a very different approach to all of this; they just accept and deal with it.  That’s their advice to me as well, just deal with it like all the Jews have dealt with it for thousands of years.  Then they proceed to remind me how we used to “deal” with it back home in Russia: walk home fast during the holidays, making sure that the Menorah you have wrapped in newspaper is tucked far enough into your coat that it doesn’t resemble anything “Jewish”, if anyone asks what you have under there simply reply with a “Oh, this?  It’s just a dead chicken I was able to find at the store on Minskaya and Leningradskaya street.  You might want to hurry, I heard they were about to run out of them!”  Then you proceed to distract the gentile with something as you reposition the Menorah and walk briskly towards home.  Usually the whole ‘they-are-selling-chickens’ routine gets people distracted enough to make them forget they might be talking to a Jew, since chicken was comparable to a diamond in those days.  Another way how the Jews have been so-called dealing with it, mainly in the former Soviet Union is to pretend they are not Jewish or have ever been one.  It’s a very common practice, which many families still participate in to this day…  Our family however did not, only for the simple fact that there was no getting around ‘looking Jewish’ as my Father put it.

As much as I appreciate my parents input on how to deal with the holidays, they very well know I am not the one to ‘just deal’ with anything.  My approach is more of a head-on-attack kind of way, which usually means pissing off a lot of neighbors, friends, strangers and parents in the schools that my kids belong to…  People seem to forget that World War 2 started because people chose to ignore, and deal with the way things were changing in Europe.  Even the Jews went along with what they were told to do by the Nazis, only because they were afraid to rock the boat, and in a way they didn’t want to think that something so awful would ever be allowed to happen to them.  But it did happen, and in a way because people ‘just went along’ with every change that was happening.  That’s part of the reason I refuse to go along with this whole ‘do as you are told, say Merry Christmas and blend in’ routine.  Sorry, but if you send me a Christmas card with baby Jesus on it, you bet I am sending back a Hanukkah card that may say something like this:

” Happy Hannukkah, let’s celebrate our people’s battle from oppression and genocide, after the Greek-Syrians destroyed our Temple for the second time, massacring thousands of Jews, desecrating the city’s holy Second Temple by erecting an altar to Zeus and sacrificing pigs within its sacred walls, making the Jewish people pray to the Greek Gods and outlawing Judaism.  But thanks to Judah Macabbee and his brave army of twelve little Jews (all proudly under 5 feet 4 inches), who drove the Greek army (of 1,000 mind you) and finally rebuild the Temple. Let’s celebrate the many failed attempts of trying to wipe out the whole species of Jews - 5772 years later, somehow we are still here!  Happy Hanukkah!  We are still here, Biatches!  Not going anywhere, so stop trying!” 

Well, maybe I’d leave out the ‘biatches’ part, but either way you get the point.  So, to quote Adam Sandler: drink your ginatonica, and smoke your marijuanica, and have a happy, happy Hanukkah!

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December 7, 2011 | 3:10 pm

Millionaire Matchmaker Patti Stanger does it again… Disappoint that is…

Posted by Julia Bendis

I got a big bone to pick with Patti Stanger, a giant one in fact.  After defending her loud, crude and obnoxious practice standards, I was a bit disappointed watching Bravo’s “Reunion” the other night.  By now everyone knows how Patti likes to generalize and stereotype everything from Jewish men being better with money than family life, to gay men not being able to commit.  In fact, she delivered those ridiculous misconceptions all in the same sentence…

As much negative publicity that she’s already received for those comments, she is about to get a little more from her comments on the “Reunion” show, all from me!  Somewhere during the at-times extremely slow 2-hour show, when asked by Andy Cohen how her assistants Dustin and Rachel get away with dressing the way they dress, piercings, tattoos, different hair colors and Mohawks; Patti announced that: “matchmaking is like 1 in a million can do this job.  There’s only like 15 of us in the United States, and the bottom line is they know how to do this, THAT works for them”, meaning their looks and wardrobe doesn’t interfere with their skills of matching people.

Really Patti?  Only fifteen people in the whole United States can do what you do?  Maybe there are only two of you so-called “Matchmakers” that get money thrown at them by Television executives because it makes for good ratings, but I along with thousands of real-world Matchmakers of the world would like you to take that sentence back and issue us an apology.  You talk a lot about your Mother and Grandmother making matches back in the day…  Do you think you are the only one who comes from a long line of Matchmakers in the world?  What do you think all those Jewish Grandmothers did in the Russian villages hundreds of years ago, when they walked around and put single men and women together for a jug of milk?  That wasn’t real matchmaking, right?  Who do you think brought the craft of matchmaking over to the streets of Brooklyn and other parts of U.S., in order for your Grandmother to learn how to do, and eventually for you to rake in the big bucks in? (Even though you absolutely have no skills at)

Not to toot my own horn, but… toot, toot; I’d like to think I’m a damn good matchmaker having done it since high school, without any formal training such as yourself, and not having an official “long line of matchmakers” in my family.  And unlike you, I’ve actually had most of my couples go on to have long relationships(fyi, that means they actually speak to one another after the first date and go on to the second date), weddings and in some cases children.  Sure I am not raking in the millions that you are, and my payment system is a bit different from yours, in that I get paid in hugs, flowers and sometimes chocolates; but the relationships are more real than the ones you and Bravo producers seem to “create”.

I won’t even go into your “Success Rate” as you proudly announced at the beginning of every show!  Thank God they took that statement out, finally.  Only took a couple years for the smart folks at Bravo to realize that when only 1 out of 10 couples actually move on past the first date, that’s not a 99% success rate; that’s a 10% success rate.  Geniuses…

I can’t argue that Patti’s Millionaire Matchmaker show isn’t good Television; it most certainly is and part of why I can’t seem to just change the channel…  However, when a Television personality keeps throwing stereotypes and generalizations about everyone out there, claiming success in a business that she clearly sucks very much at, are the smart folk of United States of America going to continue watching it?  Probably not, and I say that with 99% confidence.

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November 15, 2011 | 10:40 am

The Russian way of educating children.

Posted by Julia Bendis

A distant memory came to mind the other day.  Back in Russia, well technically it was in Riga, Latvia my parents decided to get my brother and I English lessons in the anticipation of our future move to the United States.  This was about a year before we actually immigrated, so we thought it would give us plenty of time to learn the language…  On top of private tutoring, we also had English lessons in school, however as we found out later it was a total waste of time.  Not only was I NOT learning how to speak English, but it was confusing the hell out of me to have to go between Latvian language and English.  Since Latvian was the main language of this former Soviet Republic, those children whose first language was Russian had to learn it in school.  On top of learning Latvian, which by the way has a Latin alphabet where Russian is Cyrillic (more confusion there), going back and forth between English and Latvian made all the pronunciations that much harder. 

Take this Latvian word as an example: Piens.  In Latvian it means milk, and you would pronounce it just like its spelled: Pii-E-N-S, however in English you would pronounce the same word either: Pie-N-SA, or P-NSA.  See the confusion?  Also according to my English teacher at school, I was never going to speak English because I was absolutely awful at it.  Hmm, well… not much I can say here except for wishing I’d remembered her name so I could send her a very sweet letter, all in English.  Unfortunately, I do not. 
I vaguely remember forcing myself into her classroom every day, only to hear her monotonously berate the students about their lack of brain cells when it came to English.  It was definitely a very effective way to encourage students to apply themselves harder.  Now that I look back at all my teachers in Russia, it was almost THE protocol of how they were SUPPOSE to teach: berate, abuse, humiliate.  And it never failed; every chance they got to make fun of you, they took it!  Somehow it was supposed to make us better students, which at the time I didn’t understand or care for and it only made all of us more apprehensive and stressed.  The strange thing about all of that is somehow it worked!  Not only did I learn how to speak English, but obviously to write and read as well… 

Maybe this whole verbal abuse is not such a bad thing for children.  What I mean is, take a look at most Russians, they are for the most part accomplished, well-read, ambitious, and educated individuals.  Sure they are not the most balanced, calm, mild-tempered, soft-spoken, shy, aggressive-less people in the world, but who needs that?  That’s why they are one of the most feared people in the world.  And when you got that going for you, who needs to be chemically balanced? 

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