Indian Ladder Farms

Well, I got to do one of my favorite fall activities today, apple picking! Mom and I headed out to Indian Ladder Farms (www.indianladderfarms.com) a local orchard out in Altamont. It was a little overcast but other than that, a very nice cool fall day. It wasn't to busy out in the orchard and we managed to easily fill a good size bag full of Empire and Macoun varieties. And while it was to busy and the store to buy their trademark cider donuts, we were able to buy a gallon of their fresh apple cider, which I am sure will be gone soon.

We'll be heading out for Kol Nidre services this evening at Beth Emeth. It will be nice to spend the evening there and hopefully see some familiar faces, but at the same time I will miss not being able to be in Duluth. Wishing everyone a gentle fast tomorrow, and an enjoyable break-fast.

A couple more pictures from the orchard after the break...

A few more pictures from apple picking...

Random Rambling...

So there is this new show on NBC called 'Kings' it's on Sunday nights.  Well my rabbi mentioned it to me so I started watching it, and boy is it great!  It's a level of writing and directing that you don't see much on TV these days.  But more interesting than that, is that it is truely a moden day re-telling of the King Saul / King David story.  If you get a chance to catch it I recommend it, or catch in on Hulu.com.Anyways, the show has gotten me interested in doing some research on the actual history and biblical telling of the story.  In my readings thus far I came across these commentary on leadership on the aish.com website:

With this critical mistake, Saul is finished.  He doesn't get a second chance.  God doesn't mess around when it comes to the King of Israel.

If this seems harsh, we must keep in mind the guiding principles of the relationship between God and the Jewish people.

1.   According to your level of knowledge is your level of responsibility.  The mistakes of people in positions of power have huge consequences.

2.   According to your level of responsibility is your level of accountability.  The greater you are, the bigger the impact of your decisions, therefore you must be held to an extremely high standard.

This struck me as pretty amazing, could you imagine if this kind of thinking was applied to our society today?  What we expect from our leaders is nothing like what was expected from our ancient rulers, and our guys get a lot more chances than Saul did!

Catch Up...

Well it's been a long start to this year.  Work has been good for me, but unfortunately we have lost many good people due to layoffs.  It seems like this economic depression is affecting everyone and everything quite a bit.  I hope it doesn't last too much longer, as the General Aviation industry seems to holding on by a thread right now.  The work on the jet is progressing along and we are having productive days, so that is good!As for outside of work I have been getting involved more with Temple and the community.  I enjoy the things that I am being exposed to and it is really giving me a lot to think about (in a good way!).

Winter is still in full force here, but as things will eventually start to thaw (or so I'm told) I think I will find myself considering Duluth more of a home and I look forward to continuing to build strong ties to the people in this community.

Saturday

Well, it's been a long 2 weeks here.  The High Holy Days are now over, my parents were in for a few days last weekend, and work has just been busy.  Not much new news here other than making it through my first Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur in Duluth.  It is such a nice community here, everyone at temple was very welcoming and I really felt like I was a part of the temple during services.I had written a brief commentary on a torah portion from 2 weeks ago that I thought I'd share with you if you have an interest. Here's a link to it:  Parashat Nitzavim. Google Docs is great for that kind of stuff. Makes it easy to share documents and whatnot.

Also, I got some pictures last weekend when the folks were in town.  We took a drive up the North Shore on Saturday and was just gorgeous.  Take a look at them on my web gallery here.

Well that's all for now, have a good one.