First A Latkes Eating Contest & Now, Dreidel Spinning Competition

The competitors hunch over the tables, cracking fingers and stretching their wrists. It's the first night of Hanukkah, and only one person can take home the crystal dreidel-shaped trophy. The Major League Dreidel championship is on.

The legends of the game arrive early at a bar on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. With nicknames like Debbie Does Dreidel and Jewbacca, this is no longer a sport for children.

Pamela "Pamskee" Goldman, last year's champion, comes in with a target painted on her spinning wrist. Everyone wants to beat her world record spin last year: 17.8 seconds.

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Okay, So It Isn't "Dreidel, Dreidel"

Save the Temple Game

Jewish Dominance, Sort Of

Residents: Menorah Dwarfs Christmas Tree

Long Beach, NY Residents didn't want to have themselves a merry little Christmas tree. They wanted a big one.

When city officials planted a 7-foot-tall Christmas tree next to a 20-foot-tall menorah in the plaza in front of City Hall, some residents barked. They telephoned City Hall, wrote letters and testified at a public hearing that the tiny tree in the shadow of the huge Hanukkah symbol was an insult to Christians.

"What's up with the giant menorah and the Charlie Brown Christmas tree?" resident Rick Hoffman asked.

City Manager Edwin Eaton said he had looked far and wide -- all the way to Canada -- for a bigger tree but couldn't find one.

"This year is going to be kind of a 'bah, humbug,' Christmas," Eaton had said.

But on Wednesday the city of about 35,000 residents 25 miles southeast of midtown Manhattan found a tree to match the 20-foot menorah: a 20-foot blue spruce.

The old tree, a Bacheri spruce, was pruned of its lights, dug up, and taken to a mall.

A lighting ceremony for the new tree is scheduled for Friday.

What does OrthoMom have to say?

From Cairo to Bensonhurst

Nice Chanukah story.

Here.

This Year's Chanukah Miracle

Plane hits U.S. synagogue; pilot dies, no one hurt inside temple

A small plane crashed into the side of a synagogue in Augusta, Georgia, killing the pilot, witnesses said.

About a dozen people were inside Congregation Children of Israel's Walton Way Temple cooking a meal on Wednesday night, the second day of Hanukkah, but no one was injured, Rabbi Robert Klensin said.

"It's very sad for the pilot who was killed and his family, but it is also a blessing no one else was hurt," said Klensin, who was not at the temple during the crash.

Lite Up A Chanukah Candle

Here

In Honor of Channukah

I've always considered Chanukah to be the Holiday of the Temple Mount. And, with the situation today, we really do need a day to focus on the Temple Mount. True, there's Jerusalem Day but everyone looks towards the Western Wall. They don't look up.

And if Judah the Maccabee were alive today, I'm sure he'd have some very strong opinions on the subject.

So, the best this blog can do is show you some pictures from over a century ago:-