February 20, 2015

Touro Synagogue

As you may know, my husband and I were fortunate enough to spend Mardi Gras week in New Orleans this year, in a kosher B&B on St. Charles St merely a block away from Touro Synagogue. We admired their parade viewing stands but until now had no idea these were provided for families with disabled children. After spending days on the parade route, I can appreciate how difficult/impossible it would be for them to attend. What a wonderful gift to the community. Shabbat Shalom.

Here's more about Touro's Mardi Gras tradition

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February 17, 2015

Laura Ingalls Wilder

When I travel on book tours, I prefer home hospitality rather than staying in a hotel. Hotels are lonely, they require me to leave at a specific time, and they don’t have kitchens stocked with all sorts of tasty snacks. The homes I stay at typically put me up in a guest bedroom that previously belonged to a child who has since left the nest. Often the child’s books are still there.

On my recent book tour in Florida, I spent the night in my host's daughter's bedroom where I saw “Little House on the Prairie” on the bookshelf. I loved Laura Ingalls Wilder’s semi-autobiographical historical novels when I was young, so I picked it up, started reading, and ended up finishing it. Reading one of my childhood favorites as an adult was so intriguing that I decided to re-read the entire "Little House" series. Amazingly, I think they stand up pretty well 50 years later.

However, I’ve recently learned that Wilder’s stories are a lot more fiction than autobiography, and that there appears to be a political slant behind them. Here are a couple of articles for those of you who want to know more, from the Boston Globe and Slate.com

Posted by maggie at 11:29 PM | Comments (1)

February 14, 2015

Leaving NOLA

I celebrated my 65th birthday Wednesday by flying back home to LA. It was wonderful playing tourist in New Orleans during Carnival season. Our B&B hosts provided such a bountiful breakfast, plus snacks at other hours, that we only needed to eat one meal a day outside. So we indulged by eating at some truly marvelous restaurants recommended by the local Hadassah ladies, including: Superior Seafood, Commanders Palace, Le Petite Grocery, Acme Oyster Bar, Café du Monde, and Gumbo Shop. The saying goes that Jews in New Orleans have 3 sets of dishes: meat, milk, and treif.

Besides attending three days of Mardi Gras parades, we did a great deal of walking, so much that I only gained one pound while away. We admired the stately Garden District and St. Charles St. mansions, traipsed through the narrow streets of the French Quarter, took in the view as we strolled the Riverwalk along the mighty Mississippi, and followed several trails through Audubon Park. At various times, we passed by the Touro Synagogue, Temple Sinai, and the JCC. We also visited the Voodoo Museum, Old Mint, National Jazz Preservation Park, Pharmacy Museum, and Louisiana State Museum at the Cabildo. The latter had a special exhibit celebrating the Bicentennial of the Battle of New Orleans with lots of special items on loan from the Smithsonian and other historic collections. In case you don’t remember the 1959 song, click on the video below.


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February 12, 2015

happy birthday Maggie

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

In honor of my 65th birthday

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February 09, 2015

New Orleans 1

After an exciting and grueling schedule of 20 speaking events in 17 days, my SE book trip is now complete. I’m now on vacation in lovely New Orleans, and have been since my husband flew in to join me on Friday. Our lovely kosher [dairy] B&B, Avenue Inn on St. Charles Ave, is right on the Uptown Mardis Gras parade route and we’ve been partying out there for the last 3 days, collecting an astonishing array of stuffed animals, plastic cups, light-up toys, and assorted other Mardis Gras chachkies. If you click on the link, you can see our room on the front on the far left.

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February 01, 2015

So Jewish Life article

Here are some excerpts from a fantastic article in Southern Jewish Life in advance to my speaking in Myrtle Beach, Charleston, Memphis and New Orleans in the coming week.

“The author of the successful Rashi’s Daughters trilogy, Anton set out to explore Talmudic times as the background for her next two books. She was surprised to find that it launched her into the little-known world of Jewish magic — a world that many find difficult to believe existed, though much of current Jewish practice has echoes of it…

“Anton did not invent any of the magic in the book. ‘The spells I used in the book are all authentic, they are either from the Talmud itself or magic manuals that come from that period. And the characters who cast the spells (in the book) are the ones who cast them in the Talmud.’ There was a wealth of material, and she figured, ‘Why should I make up stuff when I have the real thing?’”

To see the entire article, here is the link

Posted by maggie at 03:32 PM | Comments (0)