can you guess who our neighbor is?

next door

a shot out the window at work...can you guess?

If not, check out the link to the best website ever!

forget us...who's that guy??

me and linds

i thought this was a great picture of me and my roommate, lindsay...until i saw this guy! that's the best hair cut i've seen in years! they call williamsburg...the hip, up and coming neighborhood in brooklyn. now i know why... wow!

hipster chic

osh kosh girls

these are my co-workers. we were all out celebrating another co-worker's 30th. it's as if they are straight off the pages of Nylon magazine. i love this picture!

knitting cafe

point

on a lunch break...

yes that's a man!

millions of pictures!!

new camera!

I finally broke down. all those extra hours of freelance finally payed off. millions of pictures to come (still not giving up on my slr thought).

today made for the most interesting camera buying experience...b&h photo is run entirely by an hasidic jewish team. I mean payos, yarmulkes, beards, the whole nine yards! right smack dab in the center of manhattan. it was like a wierd movie.

They live closely in the same communites. one community is in Brooklyn, so i often share a train with a handful of them on my way to work. it's those payos that get me though...so here's to interesting but useless information (at least for us Christians anyway...)


The haircut are authentically Jewish and based on the Torah. The payos (sidecurls) and beard are worn in obedience to this commandment in the Torah (Bible): You shall not round the corners of your heads, nor mar the edges of your beards. (Leviticus 19:27) The "corners of the head" are the area above the ears. "Not rounding" them means not shaving the hair there, or cutting it very short. Together, both the curls and the untrimmed beard are a symbol of obedience to the laws of God. Many Hasidic men also cut the rest of the hair very short. This is not really required, but is more comfortable under a hat. Also, some Hasidim see the entire haircut -- very short hair with beard and payos -- as part of the "uniform" of their group.

The minimum length for payos (pronounced PAY-us) is long enough that you can grab a hair and bend it towards its own root -- which comes out to be just about to the middle of the ear. But there are other opinions also, and many Hasidim wear them longer. Some men curl them carefully and let them hang conspicuously in front of the ears, while others tuck them behind the ears or up under their yarmulke (skullcap.) Again, this is a matter of style and, in some cases, personal preference.

A Hasidic boy begins wearing payos at age three. Before that, his hair is not cut at all, and is allowed to grow long. On his third birthday, there is a special ceremony where the hair is cut short except for the sidecurls. At this time, he also receives his first set of tzitzit (a four-cornered garment with special tassels, see next Q below). He is now no longer a baby, but a child, which is a different category with more responsibility. The hair-cutting ceremony is usually followed by a happy celebration for his family and friends.

just thought you might want to know :)

new finds

the best new soundtrack!

most songs are great (love the heartbreakers and buckingham. who is my morning jaket?
...check out the trailer and the album on i-tunes.

cold roses

my roommate

Linds

for those of y0u who have asked about my roommate, here she is...wearing a wedding vail she found in the bathroom. one of her friends got married last weekend.

considering i have never lived with anyone else (except my family) and she shared a house with 10 girls last year, we are off to a great start. i think we are really blessed. i cant imagine a better introduction to sharing a bathroom. along with basic life lessons, she has also been an encouragment spiritualy. she has great things to say and heplful books to borrow. as kdny would say "she fears God and keeps his commandments"...and shares the buttons :) *

we went to see over the rhine tonight. as always they were amazing. it's kinda funny how nyc can make even the most solid midwesterners a little bit rock n' roll. Karin was decked out!! i guess i'm just used to little brother's - aka tshirt and jeans.

*y'all can ask him what that means when you wish him a happy birthday today (he's the big 30!)

somebody... please comment!

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