Playing hookie at the deepest hypersaline lake in the world

Took the kids out of school and went to the Dead Sea today. Here's what I learned from wikipedia about the Dead Sea. There are no macroscopic organisms living there; It's dead. And its a lake. Hence the name.
We went to the national park at Einot Tsukim. I saw two beautiful birds there, neither I can identify with confidence but one was a little green guy travelling with a buddy who was shy to let me get near. I think it was a little green bee eater (none other than the shrakrak gamadi) and a white-throated kingfisher (again I wouldn't put money on it). I'm pretty sure it was some kind of kingfisher but it was big, bigger than the 25 cm my guidebook gives the Shaldag Hazeh Lavan. I read in an etymological dictionary that the great hebrew poet Haim Nachman Bialik gave the shaldag its name, just made it up from two hebrew words but it didn't give a reference. In another piece of funny hebrew trivia, the car rental guy today asked me for my "hozeh." Hozeh means prophecy in Biblical Hebrew. Sure, I said and I told him that Israel was going to be lead by a generation of corrupt fools and would continue to be at war with its neighbours until the Jewish people resolved to treat one another and the stranger in their midst with greater kindness. He just held out his hand and said "Okay but give me your hozeh," and that's when I remembered that hozeh in modern hebrew means contract. I actually learned that from Dudu Busi. In his book he tells a story about one South Tel Aviv bad guy taking out a hozeh on another one. Bialik -- who named the shaldag -- said he hoped that in Israel one day there would be Jewish prostitutes and Jewish gangsters, all the normal features of a nation. He has his wish.

I mentioned the Mamilla Cemetery in a previous post. I have started an online petition asking the Simon Wiesenthal Center to stop digging at Mamilla Cemetery. If you are interested in reading it you can check it out at A True Monument to Tolerance Petition.

Finally, I have to say I never thought I'd see the day when Canada's turbulent and arcane politics made Israel's look tame and easy to understand, but its happened. A party leader who resigned but refuses to leave, who may end up being prime minister in a jurryrigged coalition, it could be ripped from HaAretz. Stephane Dion should consider coming here if he ever actually does leave the liberals. He'd be right at home. I know one thing that the looming constitutional crisis has given me; I am going to start proroguing random stuff left and right just to celebrate my Canadian-ness.
This blog post is formally prorogued, by order of his excellency, the right honourable Ornotholgist Plenipotentiary.