It's the Little Things That Make a Difference

Shalom, chaverim! Elul and I are still freezing our tokhes' off here in Nahariya, waiting for our lift to arrive with all our quilts. Most of the apartment repairs have been made, but getting the wobbly toilet bowl secured to the floor has been more problematic and so we have dubbed it the "Rocky Bal-bowla." We are hoping this last try, which Elul made today, will finally do the trick.

We are gradually paying less and less "newbie tax" by learning where the same items can be bought more cheaply at different shops. The best price for Elul's preferred "spicy Mexican" potato chips, for example, can be found at a kind of indoor-outdoor market near the train station; whereas Israeli peanut butter is cheapest at the grocery store down the road, and the best prices for nuts and candy are in a little store two blocks away. As we are both unable to digest gluten, we've also been fortunate enough to find a wonderful shop that features gluten-free items, with a selection that is even better than at Whole Paycheck--er, Whole Foods. They even have the unusual ingredients needed for gluten-free baking, like sorghum flour, xanthan gum, and tapioca flour, so once my cookbooks arrive I can start baking some of our favorite sweets again.Yippee!

However, it has gradually dawned on us that we are just too impatient to wait for our lift to come. We have thus succumbed to our inability to delay gratification, and have purchased a few more items, even though we know duplicates will arrive with the lift. But these items are a little different than our usual Wal-Mart and Family Dollar purchases we made back in Florida. For example, check out this fancy dish scrubber!

Zebra print dish scrubbers--you know you want one!

Or how about these clothespins?

These pins make my delicates flying in the breeze even more attractive!

I used to keep my umbrella in the closet, but no more!

Actually, this is supposed to hold a bottle of wine, but at the time of the photo we had none. The situation has now been remedied, and the figurine is much happier embracing a bottle of Merlot.

And who knew there was an alternative to ice cube trays? I've only ever seen the old metal ones my grandmother had, and the plastic ones I grew up with. But those clever Israelis, they came up with ice cube bags!

As a bubble-wrap-popping fanatic, Elul LOVES these frosty globules of joy!

As we were standing in the grocery store, gawping at the box of "Ice Cube Bags," trying to figure out how they worked, I couldn't help think of that old "Saturday Night Live" sketch with Steve Martin and Bill Murray. So without further ado, I give you, courtesy of YouTube, "What The Hell Is That?"

Including the off-syncing of voice and image, this video sums up most of my experience of Israel thus far! As usual, if the photos or the video link isn't showing up on your screen, go directly to the blog's site at www.movingtonahariya.blogspot.com .