(*Note – in my humble opinion, this post contains spoilers but I find that the film is pretty predictable anyway. Nevertheless, do not read if you still wish to be ’surprised’ when you see the film).

Well after all the hype, Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland has been released, and pretty much canned. While it is tempting to pick this film apart piece, by piece, I don’t feel it deserves the effort in that it can just join the ranks of any other mediocre movie I have seen lately (of which the pile keeps growing). To be fair, it has been pretty cool that the last two movies I have seen have been in 3-D. Perhaps this is the start of a new trend…something that can draw folks away from their downloaded films and DVD/Blue-Ray collections. So until i-Tunes figures out how to stream in 3-D, you at least have that aspect of entertainment there when you make the effort (and incur the expense) of going to a theatre.

So anyway, back to this movie. Basically, Alice is all grown up now, and has come to a period in her life where her whimsical dreams and notions are being encouraged to be put aside. After all, she needs to hone herself for marriage and to become a Victorian-era socialite. However, Alice comes to demonstrate (although it seems to be a long, anti-climatic journey) that sometimes it takes crazy ideas and notions to help you determine your own strength and your true character. Of course the difference between Alice and the rest of us (well most of us) is that we do not have a colorful cast of characters to hold our hand through this process like Alice did.

In spite of having full knowledge that her rompings in Wonderland were her dream, Alice was very reluctant to seize the opportunity of the moment. In fact, she was very apathetic, never fighting or taking any initiative along the way. Well, at least until the Mad Hatter ended up taking the fall for her. Even then, she seemed pleased enough with mediocrity. Eventually her friends were safe, but Wonderland was still ruled by the sucky Red Queen. Oh well, so not her problem. She even asked the White Queen why she could not fight her own battles. My oh my. It was frustrating to watch Alice’s wishy-washiness on the screen. But how she behaved in Wonderland is a bit too similar to how many of us act in our daily lives.

• and on Yahoo's main page… http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100228/ap_on_re_us/us_snow911_death #horrible #
• Cranky, stressed, all that jazz…. #
• Man, Mondays are lame as hell… #MondaysSuck #
• RT @huffingtonpost Microsoft's Ad In Poland Photoshops Black Man, But Keeps Asian Man, White Woman http://bit.ly/11VPch #
• Holy Potholes Batman (on Bethel Church Rd.) #snomgpgh #
• http://tinyurl.com/yk8336k (via @blackvoices) – Yes! The Boondocks return! #
• I favorited a YouTube video — MaNishtana: Jewloween http://youtu.be/ehgkBldSbQ0?a #
• The proof is in the pudding! How Your Race Affects The Messages You Get « OkCupid http://okcupid.com/z/2v #racism #
• @hsabomilner I also got 6 hours – but I really need 8! But anyway, B"H! in reply to hsabomilner #
• My awesome Uncle put up my canopy bed – I feel like a princess! Time to get some pillows! #
• @hsabomilner LOL you are my hero! I can barely do that and I have no kids! in reply to hsabomilner #
• Good morning Tweeple! 1/2 day in the office today – I am loving it! Whoo-hoo! #
• Why is there traffic right now? #wth #
• At the UJF… #
• I really need people to get a clue…. #
• Wow, it is weird to see someone you know on JDate; but even weirder when their picture looks nothing like them! #JDate #weird #
• Wow – props to the photographer who took this pic! http://www.jdate.com/Photo2100/2009/12/18/10/151903109.jpg?siteID=103 #
• The sun is shining! #Imlovingit #
• The inefficiency where I work in mind-boggling. #Ineedabeer #
• 53 hours after requesting approval from a dept., it cycled around the world only to come back to that dept. and have them approve. #BS #
• Another sunny day! #Imlovinit #
• Girl Scouts sighted outside of World of Values in White Oak. Girl Scout cookies secured. Misson accomplished! #

OMG how I loved this show and life in the late 1980s/early 1990s in general (don’t get me started on In Living Color!). Although I was several years away from college, watching A Different World  had me absolutely convinced that I would be a collegiate one day. That show sent a clear message that college was where you “found yourself”; where you were pulled out of the comfort zone of your hometown and familiar surroundings and confronted with the larger world (and all of its topsy-turvey perils).

Hillman College was a place where you had people from all different backgrounds (yes, the cast was primarily African-American, but they were still diverse) living together and learning from each other. They came in with preconceptions and they left with only the shards of those preconceptions. College life presented by A Different World was far from one-dimensional and a walk in the park. You had characters that were struggling with money, characters who were losing their virginity, characters who were being confronted with discrimination and career frustrations. Yet you could see that all this was incredibly good for them…as it would be incredibly good for me (one day).

Earlier this afternoon I went to a Lunch & Learn produced by the Pittsburgh UJF that had Rabbi Alyssa Stanton as a guest speaker. While she was not a spellbinding orator, she came across as a sincere, insightful, compassionate and intelligent soul. She spoke a lot about the importance of all Jews coming together and understanding that we are a singular unit in spite of our diversity. We should not judge others. Although she only spoke for 30 minutes, she gave many antedotes as to why this is important. Very little of that time was spent speaking about herself and her own personal history.

The standard protocol at these type of events is to have a question & answer period after the speaker is finished. This is when my feelings of inspiration were shot down to be replaced with astonishment and mild disgust. The 1st question after such a wonderful talk about compassion and unity was an incredibly bone-headed one. A woman asked her if she knew So-And-So, who was a Black Jew that lived in Harlem. After going into detail about this random person’s background, she mused out loud, “Oh you probably know this person…for sure.”  No, she probably doesn’t heifer! (I’m screaming this in my mind). Rabbi Stanton answered (in a much nicer way), “Actually I do not know every Black Jew out there…”. Ok, on to the next one. Someone asked, “Is your daughter also Jewish?” (????). Seriously? Next question. “Can we hear your story…we (???) are just soooo interested in it.”….”You must of given up so much…(???)”….”I/We admire you…(???)”….”Why did you want to become Jewish?”

ARRGGHHHHH!!!!!!!

People. You are so lame. Do you even HEAR yourselves when you speak? Rabbi Stanton said (like 3 times), “There is no one reason why I converted or became a rabbi. Life is a journey and many things occurred that brought me here today. As with all of you…”

I get this same crap. Why do people (born Jews specifically) think that I am somehow different than any other human being? If a Jew were to go off and become a Catholic, would you be posing the same questions to them? And/or would you tolerate Catholics posing the same questions to them? People erroneously think that converts gave up so much, or have such a hard time becoming Jews. No, deciding to become and living Jewishly is the easy part. The hard part is living like a frickin’ alien in a community that is suppossed to be your family!

Yes, I will restate it: Judaism is not the problem; people (i.e. ‘you’) are the problem. In fact the Torah says specifically, not to oppress and stress-out gerim. But what do you do…time and time again? We are people…dammit…not animals in a zoo with a sign on a pedestal that gives a synopsis of our species (although it may be simpler at times if we DID have that!).

Unfortunately this problem is multiplied 250% for non-white converts to Judaism. No matter how much we excel as Jews, the community will not let us shake the “Magical Negro” label. It’s like “Wow…how is it that you [Black person] know how to ____?” I really feel that if Alyssa Stanton were a white man, she would be more respected for her philosophies and her skills as a Jewish lay leader and as a Rabbi. And not just be “a Black Woman who becaome a Jew”.

Sorry if I sound frustrated…I am. I wish people would at least make an attempt to put aside their own desire to satisfy their curiosity and hide their ignorant notions. Or perhaps I just expect too much. Smh.

*Edit* – the one redeeming factor here is that I was sitting with a bunch of younger 20-30-somethings at this events. Many were snickering, moaning, or rolling their eyes at all these ignorant questions. It gives me some hope!

{Sigh} I am just basking in the glow of my new, supra-awesome Mac Mini. Although, I must admit, we got off to a rough start at first. I guess I should rewind a bit, and get my expectations in check.

I have wanted to be a Mac owner for a while. Of course, Macs were always out of my price range and seemed to have a very cultish following. But Windoze is just inferior…no doubts about that. So I embraced Linux. But I noticed that quite a few Linux users (not naming any names) later defected to the Macintosh side.

When the Mac Mini came out, with it’s sub $1K price, I thought I would be one of the first in line to pick one up. To be fair, I made the proper plans. But I just couldn’t figure out how to make it happen. I already had a dual boot on my AMD-based computer…did I really need a third OS? The display I had, but no mouse and keyboard (for Mac). It just all seemed too involved.