אַ ניקל פֿאַר זיי, אַ ניקל פֿאַר מיר

[sovay]

Apparently I can no longer re-toast myself a signature half pastrami, half corned beef sandwich from Mamaleh's without spending the rest of the evening singing the same-named hit from a 1917 American Yiddish musical. The Folksbiene never seems to have revived it and if the rest of the score was as catchy, they really should. (I am charmed that the composer clearly found the nickel conceit tempting enough to revisit in a later show, but that line quoted about the First Lady, didn't I just ask the twentieth century to stay where we left it?)

At the other end of the musical spectrum, spatch maintains it is not American-normal to be able to sing the Holst setting of "In the Bleak Midwinter," which until last night I had assumed was just such seasonal wallpaper that I had absorbed it by unavoidable dint of Christmas—it's one of the carols I can't remember learning, unlike others which have identifiable vectors in generally movies, madrigals, or folk LPs. Opinions?

Thanks to lunisolar snapback, Hanukkah like every other holiday this year seems to have sprung up out of nowhere, but we managed to get hold of candles last night and tomorrow will engage in the mitzvah of last-minute cleaning the menorah.

P.S. I fell down a slight rabbit hole of Bruce Adler and now feel I have spent an evening at a Yiddish vaudeville house on the Lower East Side circa 1926.

Comments

[genarti]

We always did the flaming pudding too! And hard sauce, which as a child I detested, but I hadn't yet learned to enjoy the taste of alcohol. In our case it was as a conscious import from a Scottish friend, who came over sometime before Christmas to help make the pudding, and my father's liberal hand with the brandy had to be curtailed after one year had a memorable incident with a splash of flame and my grandmother's napkin. (All parties were unharmed, except maybe the napkin.) I don't think it's super common in this country, admittedly, but I do think it's one of those things that's fun enough that once you've done it once you're inclined to keep the tradition. Why not have some festive extra fire in midwinter if you've got the excuse?

[sovay]

We always did the flaming pudding too! And hard sauce, which as a child I detested, but I hadn't yet learned to enjoy the taste of alcohol. In our case it was as a conscious import from a Scottish friend, who came over sometime before Christmas to help make the pudding, and my father's liberal hand with the brandy had to be curtailed after one year had a memorable incident with a splash of flame and my grandmother's napkin. (All parties were unharmed, except maybe the napkin.)

Oh, neat! See above as to the origins of my family's, which I had to ask my mother about. We've never flamed anything but the pudding, but the pudding itself did try to kindle one year.

Why not have some festive extra fire in midwinter if you've got the excuse?

Exactly!