yay Sparky!!!!!!!!!!!!

and yay! vw for handling things well. Seriously, it means you weren't not getting what you needed.

We'll be at Chateau A. this Saturday with another friend.

Most excellent.

Out of respect for you as a human being and out of sure certainty that you could kick my ass, I will not mention my love of the name Zoom. But I want you to know that it will be a great sacrifice on my part.

And yeah, let's do a leash clinic soonish. Better now than when you are negotiating uneven sidewalks with a stroller, diaper bag and hot Starbuck's cup. It will make it easier on you and less of a wrench for the Sass if she's not adjusting to a new habit AND a squirmy, attention-sucking interloper.

squirmy, attention-sucking interloper

Now there's a name!

a squirmy, attention-sucking interloper.

You shouldn't call my husband names like that. Even if true.

hee!

Also a fair way to phrase it, Trudy.

Yours was a whole lot nicer. I often get to "I CAN'T BE NICE TO THIS IDIOT" all too quickly.

Next time I'll call you, Fred Pete.

I'm serious. Debetesse could use a break.

Also, the commenters seemed to be assuming that these were black-hat Orthodox. If there's only the one Orthodox family living in the building, then it's a fairly good chance they're not black-hat.

There seemed to be a pervading sense that unless they were black jews how would you POSSIBLY know they were Orthodox? Apparently, not only do New Yorkers not know their neighbors, we are as unaware of what a kippah, a mezuzzah, or a person CLIMBING STAIRS ON THE WEEKEND looks like.

Of course, the commentators also thought that no burgler would ever wear a disguise and that its DEEPLY paranoid to not let strangers into an apartment building.

Do those people live in the evil mirror-universe New York where there are no Jews?

You shouldn't call my husband names like that. Even if true.

Bahaha.

Do those people live in the evil mirror-universe New York where there are no Jews?

Dude, I live in Seattle, where there are very few people who are of the people, I'm not Jewish, and *I* could probably tell you which of my co-workers are secular, Reform, Conservative, or Orthodox. (Okay, so right now the latter is "Just that one guy who plays ping-pong sometimes." But still.)

The saddest part may be that the whole free-for-all obscured a legitimate question. Namely, "How can we reconcile my security needs with the religious requirements of my neighbor and his friends?"

I'm not sure there was ever a chance for that discussion to be the focus given the way the letter itself came about. I mean, would this even have been an issue without her "digust" for their lifestyle? Not the security issue, which is real, but the reason the writer couldn't just deal with it civilly in the first place.

How rational can comments be when you start from "how can I get over my abhorrence for these people crossing my path in the first place to swallow my disgust and speak to my neighbor? Or should I just have them evicted?"

Squeee! I almost missed my stop with the sparkysquee! Squee!