Potter sent me a link to purchase the sheep in wolf's clothing. This reminded me that I've been wanting to get the holy hand-grenade, but it's a bit out of my price range. On the other hand, at U of C, I'm sure I can find plenty of arguments.
Update: For those of you wondering, the holy hand-grenade is not recommended (see the bottom of the page).
Shtick: September 2003 Archives
September 30, 2003
September 22, 2003
Mendy informs me of Shlock Rock's new album which is mostly of Broadway parodies. As always, some are clever, and others are painful. Two comments though. Though I can't prove it off of the web yet, I do remember Rechnitzer Rejects already doing a song called Get Me to the Shul on Time. (It began with the line "I'm getting maftir in the morning..."). I'm also noticing that he does a parody of Allan Sherman's "Hello Muddah." Been there, done that.
September 9, 2003
The previous two posts were technically before my smikha days. My first year in smikha was also one of the more auspicious years in YU's PR history. It started when YU removed stacks of the Commentator from Belfer Hall right before the annual open house. An embarrassed YU eventually compensated the Commie for the papers, but the fun didn't stop there.
The story hit the mainstream press with YU being the evil supressor of free speach. The New York Times reported the story, and coincidentally was itself removed from campus. R. Lamm was even disqualified from US News' ignominious Sheldon Award because "administrators are supposed to look the other way, not conduct the thefts themselves." Of course, YU couldn't do much about US News since they rely on them too much for their annual college rankings.
Censorship extented to Judaic Studies as well. Some of YU's Roshei Yeshiva criticized the new Bible journal Nachalah and several copies also turned up "missing" after the SOY Sefarim Sale (it turned out that the Nachalah staff was to blame - since no one came to pick up the unsold issues, facilities management removed them.) Finally, the integrity of SOY's prized publication "Beis Yitzhack" was compromised when two students dared to not only quote R. Saul Lieberman, but they actually treated him with respect.
With all this happening, we couldn't just let this go by. I never attempted a fake gemara before, but this was too good to pass up. Ben came by my aparment and we created Masechet Bava Commie. While many fake gemaras just tell a story as it might appear in the Talmud, we quoted and paraphrased actual gemaras, rashis, and tosafot, weaving the shtick with actual sources to the point where we should have included mekorot with the Purim issue.
September 9, 2003
This next one came almost by accident. I was fooling around with an image editing program and I noticed one of the filters - I think it was called "charcoal" - created a similar effect as the Les Misérables poster.
That year most of the CS majors were not fans of the MIS department. This was probably due to MIS' incompetence and stupidity.
After some more crude graphic work, I came up with:
The original plan was to have a completle musical, but we ran out of time and talent. So we just listed song titles, some of which made sense (Empty Chairs and Broken Cables) and others were supposed to be changed before we went to print (Lovely Ladies).
It turned out that we didn't need to write lyrics because people were making up words on their own. Go figure.
September 9, 2003
One of the perks of doing the web page for The Commentator was that I had more input than I should have had with the Purim issues. For example, my first year I got the purim issue titled The Ordinary Potato (the common tater). The second year the purim issue was called Commie Sutra. This was also my doing, the result of an offhanded comment to Yishai Fleisher on the subway.
Around this time, I was also co-Editor-In-Chief of Hamevaser. This didn't last terribly long. But, as I've done on other occasion, when I get too frustrated with something, I write a song parody. As you can imagine, the result is often strange or disturbing (and since I've learned to play guitar I can even do live performances). The following was one of my many collaborations with Ben Sandler and originally published in the Commie Sutra.
Hamevaser
In Tribute to Dennis Leary (Sorry - no midi link available)
I'm just a regular Joe, an above average Jew
I spent two years at Gush, then I came toYU
I like Buber, and Plato, and books about Kant
I say "existential" whenever I want
My logic is flawless, my intellect pure
I'm a philosophy major, in Rav Rosenswieg's shiur
But sometimes that just ain't enough
To keep a man like me interested
oh no
no way
uh uh
So I've gotta go out
and get a mag with an elitist pretense
yea yea,
yea yea,
yea yea
yea yea yea yea yea
They hang out with guys named J, E, P, D
They talk about gout with Rabbi Carmy.
HAMEVASER...
After one issue they fired Josh Yuter
Got Yehudit - 'cause Aton thinks she's cuter
HAMEVASER...
We try to find spouses in top Revel classes
I hear that the ladies go for guys in thick glasses
HAMEVASER...
What if Tradition won't publish this song?
What if I've strayed from the Rav's Weltanschauung?
Maybe they're right when they say that I'm wrong...
Naaaaaaa
The Rant:
You know what I'm gonna do?
I'm gonna go back to that Hesder Yeshiva on a hill
and get myself a big M-16... with no safety
and I'm gonna get a huge kippa sruga
and a Breuer Tanach and big black beard and
a big, smelly, cigarette and a degree from the Machon.
And then I'm gonna come back here and teach intro to Bible
and tell everyone who just came back from Yeshiva in Israel
that the Torah was written by monks in twelfth century Germany
and everything they know is wrong and that the Gemara is really an
allegory for wine and love poetry.
And there isn't a G-d damn thing anyone can do about it.
You know why? Because we've got the Rav. OK?
Harav HaGaon Joseph B. Soloveitchik.
And I was in his shiur for twenty years and I was his closest talmid
and I used to cook him breakfast and clip his coupons.
And the Agudas Yisrael and the Edah Chareidis and Neturei Karta
can have all the Gedolim they want and put me in cherem as many times
as they want, because We've got the Rav, OK?
The Rav isn't dead, he's just sleeping. And as soon as Dr. Brill
figures out how to revive him, he's coming back, and he's gonna be
pretty fed up with all you apikorsim. Imagine sleeping through minyan,
and mutiply that by fifteen million. He's gonna come back and smash Rav Kahn
back to Mongolia and make YU co-ed just like Maimonides, OK, and...
Hey! You really are elitist!
Yeah, well why don't you just SHUT UP and sing this song, OK???
HAMEVASER...
HAMEVASER...
H-A-M-E-V-A-S-E-R!
EVERYBODY!
H-A-M-E-V-A-S-E-R!
