The Burning Bush: Final Chapter

From my mother re: the very bad plant and I promise this will be the last of my meanderings about the evil plant.

"Your imagination/memory mixed two stories of botanical menace. Now
that I think about it, you were exposed to a lot of herbicidal
depravity in your youth Here in the Pacific Northwest we struggle
with controlling both hogweed and scotch broom. See
http://www.efn.org/~ipmpa/Noxbroom.html for the scotch broom
shooting it's seed . I did spend a quiet August afternoon by the
Fraser in the middle of an exploding the broom seed patch.
Impressive."

So clearly what we are dealing with here in the Holy Land is Titanic Hogbroom, the evil step-sister or primal ancestor or the mother of all exploding, poisonous plants.

In other news, I survived my first experience driving in Israel. More Israelis have been killed in traffic accidents than in war or terrorist attacks. We rented a car and drove to Netanya. It was great and the boys had to be surgically removed from the water at the end of each day. It was bath water temperature, and really clear, not like Canadian beaches where you hear the yelps of flash frozen bathers like seagulls. Benjy's Hebrew will soon outstrip mine. Lev is evenhandedly resistant to Arabic and Hebrew, though he knows the word for apple in Hebrew.

Finally, as Rosh Hashanah is approaching and for those of you who enjoy Magic: the Gathering a guy named Alex has put together some mock cards on a biblical theme. They are very good. Over and out.