Almost Eden

If you are an unhappy receipient of a sudden rush of RSS feeds from this blog dating back to last July, please accept my apology - I had no idea of the consequences of upgrading the blog software! After weeks of prompting by my blog admin panel I fin… more »

My husband pointed out today that I have neglected to report here that our 8-year-old son has begun his own blog - Aliyah: Tagging Along. It all started during the summer break as tensions built over our move from Ma'ale Adumim to Ra'anana... Yisrael mis… more »

We upgraded the b2evolution blog software on our server today and for some reason, unknown to us, doing so caused the RSS and Atom feeds to send fresh copies of every article we've ever posted here! Please accept our apologies for the duplicates in your e-mail box. more »

People often ask Michael and I what type of work we do - or enjoy doing - and then seem sorry they asked. How does that saying go? "Ask an engineer what time it is and he'll tell you how to build a watch." The truth is that we are troubleshooters sharing an area of expertise known today as Process Improvement. In the old days we were called "Efficiency Experts", "Total Quality Improvement Consultants", "Change Managers", and various derogatory terms by incompetent or lazy people who lost their jobs as a result of our research and recommendations. Comparable to mercenaries or hired gun fighters, we are engaged to execute the difficult missions. The underlying nature of the Process Improvement Specialist is objective analysis. We’re there to propose, and sometimes are even allowed to implement, the solutions. Throughout our careers we have run into "excuse" walls erected by political, incompetent or lazy people in an effort to provide themselves with job security. You know the type... more »

Please accept my apologies if you are a subscriber who received dozens of e-mails from this blog yesterday! I was performing maintenance and forgot to turn off the RSS feed function that sends you an e-mail every time a new post is published or an old one is edited/commented on. I'll try to be more careful in the future more »

To make Blog navigation a little more user-friendly, I have created this Table of Contents in chronological order (publishing date) for your convenience. It is accessable from every page using the top tab navigation. You may also use the tools in the right column to Search on specific words/phrases, and view Archives, Categories, Comments and a list of the most Recent posts. more »

To the amazement of many, Blogs are more than thoughts and words, they are technical animals! Thursday morning (August 21st) after handing out cards highlighting my blog address at the NBN First International Jewish Bloggers Convention the night before, I logged into my blog to tell you all about the wonderful time I had and the blog was gone! After a frantic live chat with tech support and several hours of trouble shooting at their end, Almost Eden was live again! I hope you'll forgive the down time and visit the Almost Eden blog again soon. more »

Ulpan means studio, but in Israel it refers to intensive Hebrew language instruction - a crash course for new immigrants. For people who can live off of the sal klita, this course runs for 5 days a week/5 hours a day / for 5 months - approximately 500 ho… more »

A Tallit(Sephardic pronunciation)/Tallis (Askenazi pronunciation) is a prayer shawl worn by men in the Orthodox community (and women in the Conservative and Reform communities). See this Wikipedia entry for more details. Tefillin/Phylacteries are a pa… more »

The third Shabbat meal. Eaten between Mincha (afternoon prayers) and Ma'ariv (evening prayers). more »