Random musings collected over the first few no-Internet days of the festival...
American money is going to require me to redo my wallet habits. Small change over here really is small change! In Australia, I would frequently be carrying around more than A$10 in pocket change; one- and two-dollar coins made that rather easy. Fifty-cent coins helped, but they were proportionately larger.
Here...your coins are good for nothing other than rounding off the bill when you pay at the cashier. So...I'm going to have to look into getting a slimmer billfold and coinpouch instead of my current (trending towards shabby) wallet.
The tax system over here is...GAH! Really, really bloody-
*reins himself in* Sorry about that. But it's getting to be so complex (at least procedure-wise) that it's ridiculous. Right at the moment I'm beginning to use the IRS's online classroom for small businesses...I'm hoping and praying that'll show me how to go from a W-4 to how much tax actually has to be taken out.
I've pretty much figured out the components of the federal taxes (income, SS, Medicaid). The State taxes I still have *no* idea about whatsoever, and the exact amount of income tax (and how much of that the standard deduction allows me to remove) I'm likewise clueless about.
*sighs*
Hopefully I'll figure it out. Without resorting to a CPA.
*offers up a heartfelt prayer*
Social security card still hasn't come. Probably due to the Easter holidays...or just my own impatience. It's only been a week.
Passover is producing the predictable effect on my insides.
[side note]
Chabad, on Passover, use nearly nothing mass-produced other than wine, salt and Matzah - and we don't use anything we can't peel, either. So there's a lot of cooking-from-scratch done, but it makes it a really good time to get chemicals and stuff out of your system, do a thorough detox.
BUT.
Matzah and a lot of the foods we eat are very, very hard on the belly. Stomaches are known to bubble and squeak more than usual at this time of year.
[/side note]
So I'm bubbling and squeaking. Not too much, over the last day, but more than usual.
(And today, I haven't had any Matzah yet. I did a lot of biking - roughly two hours worth - due to a sudden emergency in the local hospital. A Jewish woman who'd been in intensive care suddenly worsened, and the Rabbi was out of the area. So I biked back from the mall as fast as I could (30 mins, shaved to 25), and then biked to the hospital (30 mins each way) to say psalms at her bedside.
As a result, didn't really eat until 4pm.)
Baruch HaShem, I’ve begun settling in. I’ve now been here in the US more than a week - and a busy week indeed its been. So far I’ve got transport (a small bike, but it goes), a cell phone (I pay for the service) and DSL at the office all organized. The Chabad office is B”H shaping up nicely thanks to plenty of elbow grease. If you want to call me, drop me a line on e-mail and I’ll give you the number for my cell.
Tuesday: There was, unfortunately, a funeral in the community. The good side is, it was in New York City, so I got to daven shachris at the Ohel and later Minchah in 770. I got a few other things done in Crown Heights while I was there.
Wednesday: In lack of a washing machine, I visited the local Laundromat. They were quite up on local technology; every machine (except the Coke and snack machines) ran off a card with a chip in it. Pay five or ten bucks, get a card you can use and then recharge at will. Unfortunately, I’d only brought part of my washing (I have two pairs of new pants that I need to wash separately) and so found out the hard way that if one of those big industrial driers isn’t loaded properly, the washing just ends up stuck against the side while it spins and doesn’t dry properly.
I also made a pile of calls to phone book companies and the IRS (US tax agency…does someone know a nasty acronym for IRS?) for phone books and tax publications. The sooner they arrive, the sooner I can figure out how I’m supposed to sort out the payroll.
Thursday: I biked on down to Social Security and put in my application; in two weeks, I should actually be able to begin doing things! Legally, that is.
I also biked to two local shopping areas – one close, where I stopped at a dollar shop (yes, here they actually charge only a dollar for things! But then…they add sales tax on top of it, so it’s really $1.08) for a really assorted mix of stuff and checked out prices on some bits and bobs we’ll need for the office later.
The other shopping area was a good half-hour-plus on bike away, not counting all the stops I made (two service stations, hoping for free air and the local library to check my e-mail). I checked out a few things they had in that area, mainly Barnes and Nobles and Shop-Rite, before coming back with a loaded backpack of food supplies.
This trip drove home a few realizations I’d begun to make.
1) New York State’s roads are in shocking condition. I mean…really, really bad. Patches and divots and little access thingys that’re sticking up or are in a hole…even with decent shock absorbers (in a car, I mean) it makes for a rather rough ride. With me on a bike, I almost got thrown once when I hit one of those little recessed access things by surprise and there were a lot of really rough spots.
2) This part of New York is definitely not designed with bikes or even walking in mind. There are no bike lanes whatsoever. None. Nada. In more than a couple of areas, there aren’t even any sidewalks! And as for getting around on foot – well, the major shopping area I went to has no easy foot or bike access to Shop-Rite, at the least. I found a way around afterwards, but in general? Kingston, NY seems to assume that you have a car for transport.
3) This is New York (or perhaps America). There’s no such thing as free – not even air for your tyres. Fifty cents you pay just for three minutes of air at most gas stations around here.
4) Barnes and Nobles stores are big. I’d forgotten how big – and the local one is small by comparison. I could walk in there in the morning and walk out late that evening (and it’s open from like 8am-11pm, so that’s a long time). Heck, I could get lost in there!
Friday: Went in really early to a bris (circumcision) in Monsey at a relative of the shliach’s. (B”H, I’m really getting around!) I’d forgotten that Rabbi Boruch Lesches, formerly of Sydney, was the Rav there! So I ran into him at the bris, along with the father of the local shliach – Rabbi Shia Hecht.
I went in to try and open a bank account at a little, friendly local bank. I’d called beforehand to ask if they could do it even though I didn’t yet have a Social Security card. And they were rather friendly; they had a coffee-blend sampler machine there for waiting customers to try, so I filled up a cup before going over to the desk. A good thing, too, because after 45 minutes, several phone calls to the Legal section and no little discussion with the manager of the branch, it was concluded that they didn’t have any way to actually do it without a Social Security number (amid profuse apologies, of course). By which time I’d finished the coffee, so instead…I just walked across the road to the other bank and cashed my paycheck instead. But it’s a nice bank, so I’ll be back.
The DSL package and service showed up later on the day. I was in the process of installing it when a call came in – that a second relative of the community had passed away, had just arrived in the city and would need shemirah (guarding) over Shabbos - and could I just drop everything and get ready right now so the son could go check into a hotel? And drop everything I did.
That’s all for now! Have a Kosher and Freliche Pesach!
Pesach (Passover) is fast approaching, so I've recently picked up a few amusing little tidbits to share.
Firstly:
American Comedy Network Presents: Matzo Man
Secondly (and this one may only make sense if you've seen matzah before):
A blind man is sitting on a park bench. A Rabbi sits down next to him, munching on a piece of matzoh. Taking pity on the blind man, he breaks off a piece and gives it to the blind man. Several minutes later, the blind man turns to the Rabbi and asks, "Who wrote this nonsense?!"