Vol. VI Issue 7 WWW.MAIMONIDESPECTRUM.COM In This Issue: Ms. Pywell Wins Faculty Boxing Match ...page 0 Jeremy Fisher wins Nobel Prize for his jokes ...page 16 Maimo’s Foam Ceiling Finally Collapses ...page 32 Lost Traveler Found in Jacob Henry’s Locker ...page 70 Schockett vs. Stein- saltz: Fight to the Death ...page x NATY KATZ NAMED HEADMASTER Rabbi Stein signs new 10 year contract ...page 11 Student Council Fi- nally deliv- ers chocolate milk ...Page 3 Rabbi Huff figures out what his job is ...Page 7 February 2013/Adar 5773 Well, fellow students, I have seen the light. Yes, the time has come; I have decided to change my opinion on all my previous topics. I was undeniably, undoubtedly, unfathomably, and unabashedly wrong. But instead of simply recanting all of my previous articles in a snow- storm of self-pity, I will attempt to control the damage for you, the reader. Though my arti- cles have received generous and unwarranted attention in the past, which I oh-so-much de- tested and did not enjoy at all, I will attempt to rectify the issue with a series of rebuttals of my previous opinions. Let us begin, as every second wasted runs the risk of spreading my heretical former beliefs. Davening should remain mandatory. At great personal risk, I will now offer a couple of blistering arguments against my prior state- ment that “Davening Should be Optional.” First, the administration has convinced me that the collective buzz of mumbling emanating from the student body every morning serves to help my concentration. It is kind of like a four hundred person chorus being stung by bees, each one intent on improving my davening experience one hundred fold. I was just too deaf to hear it before. Furthermore, I have re- A recent announcement by Naty Katz has led all of Maimonides into a state of shock. The entire school let out a collective gasp when he made the declaration, “Effective immediately, Spectrum is to be censored!” Mr. Katz said that, after lengthy deliberation (approximately twen- ty seconds), the administration had decided to censor all of Spectrum. He declined to further explain his reasons. Spectrum, however, was able to obtain confidential infor- mation from its inside sources. An Assistant Principal, who wished to remain anonymous to protect his “exalted position” ex- plained what happened: “Naty called a meeting for an elite group of administrators—of whom I am the most elite—to discuss what we should do.” When pressed, the Change of Heart Why Write for Spectrum? By CHAIEL SCHAFFEL ‘15 Continued on page 4 Continued on page 3 Continued on page 7 By JACOB FINE ‘15 CENSORED By DAVEY SCHOENBERG ‘15 PURIM EDITION When I was first asked to write this article, I wanted to say no. I have nine classes a day, soccer, and then my homework to worry about. I thought I wouldn’t have enough time. But then I thought again; after all, young men and women like guys who write for Spectrum! I realized I could make some time for the people… The question is, why are men and women so en- grossed with guys who write for Spectrum? Are they compelled to the intelligence that it takes to get one’s work published in Spectrum? Or is it the fame that accompanies a controversial article? The latter seems to be very true. For instance, many upper class people now consider Chaiel Schaffel a stud because of his recent, famous article. “Not just any regular guy can write for Spectrum,” said a young lady who wishes to remain anonymous, “It takes a real man.” Frankly, these spry individuals dig the Spectrum swag. But you can’t just begin your career strutting about like an arrogant peacock, swag- ger takes time to ripen fully. In general, acquiring swag is a slow incremental process. First, one must talk the talk. Second, one must boldly put his name “out there”- he must draw attention unto his name. Spectrum is a great way to complete step two (notice I am on step two). After a man’s name is out there, people will start to notice him in the hallway, which brings him to step three: walking the walk. Once you
Transcript
Vol. VI Issue 7 WWW.MAIMONIDESPECTRUM.COM
In This Issue:
Ms. Pywell Wins Faculty Boxing Match
...page 0
Jeremy Fisher wins Nobel Prize for his jokes
...page 16
Maimo’s Foam Ceiling Finally Collapses
...page 32
Lost Traveler Found in Jacob Henry’s Locker
...page 70
Schockett vs. Stein-saltz: Fight to the Death
...page x
NATY KATZ NAMED HEADMASTER
Rabbi Stein signs new 10 year contract
...page 11
Student Council Fi-nally deliv-
ers chocolate milk
...Page 3
Rabbi Huff figures out
what his job is
...Page 7
February 2013/Adar 5773
Well, fellow students, I have seen the light. Yes, the time has come; I have decided to change my opinion on all my previous topics. I was undeniably, undoubtedly, unfathomably, and unabashedly wrong. But instead of simply recanting all of my previous articles in a snow-storm of self-pity, I will attempt to control the damage for you, the reader. Though my arti-cles have received generous and unwarranted attention in the past, which I oh-so-much de-tested and did not enjoy at all, I will attempt to rectify the issue with a series of rebuttals of my previous opinions. Let us begin, as every second wasted runs the risk of spreading my heretical former beliefs.
Davening should remain mandatory. At great personal risk, I will now offer a couple of blistering arguments against my prior state-ment that “Davening Should be Optional.” First, the administration has convinced me that the collective buzz of mumbling emanating from the student body every morning serves to help my concentration. It is kind of like a four hundred person chorus being stung by bees, each one intent on improving my davening experience one hundred fold. I was just too deaf to hear it before. Furthermore, I have re-
A recent announcement by Naty Katz has led all of Maimonides into a state of shock. The entire school let out a collective gasp when he made the declaration, “Effective immediately, Spectrum is to be censored!”
Mr. Katz said that, after lengthy deliberation (approximately twen-ty seconds), the administration had decided to censor all of Spectrum. He declined to further explain his reasons. Spectrum, however, was able to obtain confidential infor-mation from its inside sources.
An Assistant Principal, who wished to remain anonymous to protect his “exalted position” ex-plained what happened: “Naty called a meeting for an elite group of administrators—of whom I am the most elite—to discuss what we should do.” When pressed, the
Change of HeartWhy Write
for Spectrum?By CHAIEL SCHAFFEL ‘15
Continued on page 4
Continued on page 3
Continued on page 7
By JACOB FINE ‘15
CENSOREDBy DAVEY SCHOENBERG ‘15
PURIM EDITION
When I was first asked to write this article, I wanted to say no. I have nine classes a day, soccer, and then my homework to worry about. I thought I wouldn’t have enough time. But then I thought again; after all, young men and women like guys who write for Spectrum! I realized I could make some time for the people…
The question is, why are men and women so en-grossed with guys who write for Spectrum? Are they compelled to the intelligence that it takes to get one’s work published in Spectrum? Or is it the fame that accompanies a controversial article? The latter seems to be very true. For instance, many upper class people now consider Chaiel Schaffel a stud because of his recent, famous article.
“Not just any regular guy can write for Spectrum,” said a young lady who wishes to remain anonymous, “It takes a real man.” Frankly, these spry individuals dig the Spectrum swag. But you can’t just begin your career strutting about like an arrogant peacock, swag-ger takes time to ripen fully. In general, acquiring swag is a slow incremental process. First, one must talk the talk. Second, one must boldly put his name “out there”- he must draw attention unto his name. Spectrum is a great way to complete step two (notice I am on step two). After a man’s name is out there, people will start to notice him in the hallway, which brings him to step three: walking the walk. Once you
Spectrum, published monthly during the school year, is the official student newspaper of Maimonides School.
To contribute to Spectrum, speak to the Editors-in-Chief. You may send letters to the editors by email at spectrumstaff@ gmail.com.
Spectrum can also be found on the Internet at http://maimonidespectrum.com
February 2013/Adar 5773
Help Wanted: Science teachers Qualifications: Must be willing to not quit for at least one school year. That’s about it. We’re desperate. Anyone interested please contact Rabbi Stein. He’s jealous of Mr. Cohen’s retirement.
Dear readers,We are happy to tell you
that our articles were not plagiarized from Wikipedia this month. No, we finally decided that Wikipedia isn’t reliable enough. We have scrupulously checked the veracity of this month’s ar-ticles around three times, three more times than we usually do. Yes indeed, please rest assured that you are getting only the finest news.
This month’s issue was quite a production. We would like to especially thank our new Head of School, Mr. Naty Katz, for so graciously helping us to put our best foot forward.
Without him to lead the way, we might have accidentally broken the news too early that Chaiel Schaffel has been expelled. Oops, sorry Mr. Katz.
You may notice that Spec-trum is not as heavy as you might remember it being in the past. That is because we are a news source that is constantly breaking records. For example: this month, our censors cut a whopping fourteen articles. That’s right, fourteen. No matter how hard we tried, the ar-ticle about Leslie moving to Gann was just too much for the administration to handle. In an unexpected turn of events, all the senior
boys have switched to Gann. When asked why, one said, “I just heard a siren wailing. I couldn’t resist.”
We have heard com-plaints recently about our world news section. Appar-ently, no one is interested in month-old news, and would rather spend their time com-plaining about “how obvi-ous it is that a woman was accused of witchcraft and then killed in Papua New Guinea.” @Yoseph Ehren-kranz, @Etai Shuchatowitz, @Elisheva Rosen, @Ben Offen. Oh, wait, you haven’t heard about that? Maybe you should have spent your time reading instead of com-plaining. It just so happens
we cover news that even the British Broadcasting Cor-poration or the Wall Street Journal wouldn’t cover. We have correspondents in Spectrum bases from Nai-robi to the Kamchatka Pen-insula. Wait, what did you say Spectrum Weekly? We couldn’t hear you over the flushing of the urinals.
Finally, we’d like to thank our supreme ruler of the newspaper, Natan Pom-per. Yes, Mr. Katz, he gives you a run for your money.
Always,and BeniYoniJeremy
Elisha(Get it, reverse? Like
Purim. Venahaphoch Hu? Anything? Good thing your parents pay for a Jewish ed-ucation.)
Dear Editors in-Chief,It has been brought to my attention that
this newspaper has finally gone too far. It should once and for all be put to an end. Each and every issue is riddled with gram-mar mistakes, punctuation errors, and poor English. Trust me, I majored in the lan-guage. My opinion means more than your opinions because of that. It’s just the way things work. The truth is, I’ve only learned one thing in all my years of education. “I before E except after C on Mondays and Tuesdays and all throughout May.” What?
You also don’t know who Brian Regan is? Wow, you should be ashamed of yourself, your family, and your community (espe-cially Newtonians) for not caring enough about culture. So if there’s anyone out there who agrees with me (Sharonites), rise up and let’s destroy this rag they call Spec-trum.
Sincerely,Rabbi ABCDFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTU-
VWXYZ
Letter to the Editors
Chocolate milk - thestrongmove.word-press.comRabbi Huff - maimonides.orgChaiel Schaffel - Daniel SmitsNun - tumblr.comTissues - ryman.co.uk Mr D and Mr T - Daniel Smits“Maimo” basketball team - emergingchefs.com
SchoolAssistant Principal eventu-ally revealed the motivation behind the censoring. “We thought it would be fun,” he said. “I know I speak for all the teachers when I say that we truly enjoy seeing stu-dents work hard, only for us to render that hard work meaningless.” When asked whether he thought this was unfair to the students, the As-sistant Principal responded, “You’re unfair to the stu-dents.”
An anonymous General Studies Principal echoed these statements, but added, “We developed the taste of censoring, and now we love it. We were like a pit bull, latched on to a piece of meat. We were like a shark, our teeth sunk into the helpless fish. We were- well, you get the point.” The principal add-
ed that censoring the articles was “almost as fun as skirting students.”
Finally, a Limudei Kodesh Principal explained the pro-cess. “We basically went around the room, seeing who could find a way to best an-noy all of our students. One teacher suggested we keep them from seeing their grades for an extra five minutes; another suggested we end school early. Someone sug-gested we plaster pictures of Rabbi Soskil, the most hand-some man in the school, all over the building. The teacher then trembled in fear when he realized that I- … that Rabbi Soskil was there. I’m not sure why he was afraid: it was a great idea, as Rabbi Soskil is quite good-looking. Unfor-tunately, Naty Katz vetoed it—he seems to do that a lot.
Anyway, he said he just had a great idea, which was that we should censor Spectrum, and that’s what happened.”
So what does this mean for our beloved school news-paper? Well, essentially it means that Spectrum will not be printed this month. There will be no black and white packet of papers in your mailbox. You will not be able to flip through pages of our issue: there will be no issue.
We understand you must feel despair over being bereft of your wonderful Spectrum. Sadly, we cannot help you.
At the end of interviewing the General Studies Princi-pal, Spectrum had one more question. Why wasn’t the weekly censored? She an-swered, “The weekly? They never put it up anyway.”
Continued from page 1
Spectrum Censored CompletelyAfter much deliberation, it was announced on Janu-
ary 22 that the school was expelling Chaiel Schaffel for “heresy in the first degree.” Naty Katz announced the decision at the end of mincha. Consequently, the majority of students did not learn about the decision until the next day when Chaiel did not show up to school. Even Rabbi Soskil knew nothing of the de-cision until Mr. Katz spoke. “I understand why he didn’t contact me,” explained Rabbi Soskil. “I just do whatever he tells me anyway.”
Chaiel got into trouble after he blatantly con-tradicted the school’s religious philosophy. The phi-losophy states that we must wash netilat yadayim four times on each hand. Chaiel published an impassioned article in the school’s official Weekly Toilet Paper that we should only wash three times on each hand. Yes, the Weekly Toilet Paper was actually put up that week. “Such disrespect for the our school’s hashkafa will not be tolerated at our school, and must be dealt with accordingly,” Mr. Katz said at the time.
That was back in October. Why the hiatus between publication and expulsion? After Spectrum investi-gated something for the first time ever, it found that the lull was due to Rabbi Huff. He was needed for the expulsion procedures, but Spectrum found that he was either too busy playing basketball or hand-ing out detentions. He finally had a free moment on January 22. “I feel that expelling students is the next logical step in my job. First detentions, then expul-sions. Maybe someday I’ll be able to fire teachers. Maybe I’ll fire Naty and take over as supreme ruler of Maimonides,” he cackled. The only faculty mem-ber disappointed in the process was Rabbi Cohn. “My father would have expelled Mr. Schaffel before that article went to print,” he gloomily commented.
After the article was published, many stu-dents started discussing the possible ramifications of washing three times on each hand. “I could not allow for students to formulate their own opinions. They need to blindly follow me and my hashkafa. I know what’s best for them. They do not,” Katz said. For that reason, Naty ordered Rabbi Soskil to recall all is-sues of the Weekly Toilet Paper from every bathroom. “Again, I just did what he told me,” explained Rabbi Soskil.
Reactions have been mixed since Schaffel’s expulsion. Mr. Rosenberg was quick to note that he would have no choice but to crop Chaiel out of the 10th grade class picture after the alleged heresy. Most people, though, did not understand the argument. “What’s the problem? I never wash netilat yadayim anyway,” just about every single high school student commented.
No student has spoken out about the expulsion, however. That is partly due to Mr. Katz’s proclama-tion after he expelled Schaffel. In a declaration that would make Kim Jong-un proud, Katz said, “If any-one speaks out, their punishment will be worse than expulsion. I will personally escort them to Maariv, every single day for an entire week. It will not be op-tional. I will not allow for any discord in my school. I expect each one of you to wholeheartedly agree with my decision, because I am always right.”
Chaiel Schaffel ExpelledBy YONI SCHOENBERG ‘13
To start the new year off right, Maimonides is imple-menting many changes. Per-haps most notable among the new plans is the fact that Maimonides is hiring a shad-chan, or a matchmaker. The school was actually original-ly founded with the position of shadchan in the adminis-tration. There also used to be a shadchan class dedicated to shiduchim, but this class was replaced by Beurei Hatfilla. Rabbi Soskil is working hard to make the shadchan class once again part of the cur-riculum. Rabbi Goldman has agreed to teach the class.
Spectrum interviewed some members of the ad-ministration about why they decided to go back to this old tradition. Mr. Naty Katz responded that the practice of utilizing shidduchim in order to start large Jewish families is a long-standing Jewish tradition that can be traced to ancient times. The school hopes that by hiring a shadchan, students will learn more about Jewish val-ues and their Jewish heritage. (Mr. Katz also replied, “It’s what the Rav wanted,” and obviously we do not need any
reason other than that.) Rab-bi Soskil remarked that the shadchan program is a great way for Maimonides students to connect with one another on an emotional level. Rabbi Huff believes that this pro-gram will help students have more kavanah during daven-ing, as students will be less likely to spend those forty-five minutes looking over the mechitza once the shadchan matches them with someone. Mrs. Boroschek, who previ-ously thought that she was fi-nally beginning to understand Judaism, responded, “Maybe girls will actually follow the dress code now that they’re automatically going to get a boyfriend.”
The rationale behind hir-ing the shadchan was to get a head start on the marriage process. “Not all kids go to Yeshiva University and Stern, where there’s no need for a shadchan because the shidduch shuttle does all the work,” Rabbi Huff informed Spectrum. “Maimonides de-cided that since, tragically, not all students choose to take this path, and many stu-dents are too busy with their work and don’t have time to
find their own shidduchim, we would do some of the work for them.”
There has been some op-position among the faculty, or at least a lack of enthusi-asm. When asked to com-ment about if he thought this was a good idea, all Rabbi Jaffe had to say was “Ask your local Modern-Orthodox rabbi. (AYLMOR.)” Rabbi Goldman is in favor of this program, though, and com-mented that if any of these shidduchim have ten children he will give them a gold star.
Students in the school have all had very different reactions to news that there would soon be a shadchan at Maimonides. Some students are very excited for this and cannot wait for the change to be implemented. As Aaron Marks ‘14 said, “This is a great opportunity for seniors who have been waiting a long time for their bashert (soul-mate).” Yair Wasserman even went so far as to comment, “I feel like this school is getting more shtark and I’m proud to call this place ‘Yeshivas Rambam’. I hope the shid-duchim will have two shom-rim on their trips to Dunkin
There have been massive changes at Maimo recently thanks to one particularly vocal tenth grader. As our school’s website informs you, the school is constant-ly working “To encour-age our students to strive for moral and spiritual excellence.” One specific student, Chaiel Schaffel, shares this goal, and he ex-pressed his opinion in his well-read articles in over three issues of Spectrum. So, after careful consider-ation, the administration decided to implement all
of Chaiel’s (and Yehudit Fox’s) ideas: relaxed atten-dance policies for davening and no grades for Limudei Kodesh classes.
The changes could not have been more drastic. With the school’s relaxed attitude toward attendance at davening, the absence of homework in all classes, and the Limudei Kodesh classes not being graded, Maimo students now find themselves with a good deal of free time. One ju-nior, Benny Strachman, complained to a friend, “I
don’t know what to do with myself. I think I need to take up a hobby.” Now that they don’t have any work to do after school, many Mai-mo students can now have a more active social life. This has led many to join even more extracurricular activities. Mikhael Smits, badminton extraordinaire, not only is now part of ev-ery club that Maimo offers, but even joined some of the activities at Brookline High. Some students have used their free time in dif-ferent and creative ways—
Massive Changes at Maimo Because of Tenth GraderBy BENI SNOW ‘14
After years of struggling with the dress code and the problems that it attracts, the Maimonides faculty has de-cided to implement much stricter rules and guidelines by which the girls—and boys—must abide. The Lim-udei Kodesh Department met last week to brainstorm new ideas and come up with a ra-tional solution.
Rabbi Soskil opened the discussions at said meeting by suggesting that the school start requiring all female stu-dents to wear either govern-ment-grade hazmat suits or the nun’s traditional tunic, scapular, and wimple. While discussing the pros and cons of each option, Rabbi Sos-kil noted that the hazmat suit will prevent any issue of shomer negiah, but may cause some students to die of heat stroke. While the nun’s attire provides modesty and agility, it may be construed as avodah zarah. He continued that the problems the school now faces with tznius could be considered as yaharag v’al yaavor (one should die before committing such a sin), and thus the hazmat suit would be the better option.
Mrs. Jaffe added her two cents, saying that the girls who dress immodestly sim-ply suffer from both a spiri-tual malady and a simple lack of self-confidence—things that she believes can be eas-ily remedied by a daily class
Faculty Debates Revamping Dress Code
By SHMUEL PERNICONE ‘14
alized that the welfare of the President, his family, Harry, Ron, Hermione, National Security, the Fate of the Free World, time, space, the universe, and the pursuit of happi-ness all hinge on whether I arrive to shul at 8:05 or 8:10 each morning.
Judaic Studies should be graded. I really feel bad about this one, guys. Woe is me, as I was re-grettably too blinded by my own pride to under-stand this fact. The thou-sandth of a point on my Talmud quiz is of the utmost importance to me. How else could I ever boost my GPA (and, therefore, my life) high enough to barely con-ceal a smug grin as I pa-rade around with my test scores? I see no other way! Besides, without this fraction of a grade, where would I be? Prob-ably sitting on some des-olate street corner, col-lecting spare change and bottle caps to pay for the treatment of my many incurable ailments.
Homework is useful. I retract my previous de-plorable statement that homework is “useless.” Statistical evidence? Feh! Homework gives
me a sense of camara-derie, a unique bond that I share with my fellow students who rejoice in the many hours of home-work they, too, receive. Also, the hallucinations I have begun to experi-ence as a result of sleep deprivation are quite in-teresting. In one, a Rabbi in overalls, who looked eerily similar to Akiva Gebler, showered me with candy while rain-bow monkeys danced the hora.
In conclusion, I would like to express my deep-est regret about any lockers torched, cars overturned, riots started, windows broken, build-ings leveled, witch-es burned, freshmen smacked, goats released, or other acts of mental or physical damage that came about as a result of my articles. I am tru-ly sorry, goat owners. I swear it was a mistake.
As a final note, I would like to add that I wrote this article completely and entirely of my own free will. The school cer-tainly and absolutely did not coerce me to write it on pain of exile to an in-hospitable foreign land.
Continued from page 1
Scratch That: Musings of a Former Writer
Chaiel Schaffel researching for his next controversial article.
A woman modeling Rabbi Soskil’s proposed dress code.
Continued on page 13
on “Tznius and Shidduchim.” At this point, Ms. Pywell re-
portedly burst into the room, shouting something about how this was all hamster-rubbish and that the girls in the school had a right to express them-selves. Mr. Borkow then es-corted her out of the building (no one really knows why he was there in the first place).
Rabbi Soskil steered the clamoring crowd back on topic by explaining that all this con-fusion could be avoided if the school had a uniform. Every teacher welcomed this idea (except Rabbi Goldman who said it would be impossible to find the perfect outfit, since only Hashem is perfect. Rabbi Huff objected as well because, as a student, he does not want to have to wear a uniform to
school). Nonetheless, sugges-tions were thrown about what would be the best uniform.
Rabbi Durani liked this idea, but he insisted that they pick Tzahal uniforms.
Mr. Borkow suggested bas-ketball jerseys (again, no one knew from where he came).
Rabbi Eleff, silent up un-til this point, asked quietly, “Do they come in black?” then shook his head, mum-bling something about how the school deserved a uniform but didn’t need one right now. “Though Ravens’ football jer-seys may not be such a bad idea ….”
Rabbi Soskil assured us that they are making progress in the plan and should have a fi-nal strategy by the end of the second semester.
Maimonides’ pro-Israel status is very old, even older than some faculty. That may not last much longer. Dis-turbing recent news has been uncovered by the MIA (Maimonides Intelligence Agency) through social media that did not please the Maimonides govern-ment.
In order to understand the recent changes, one needs some back-ground information about Maimonides’s pro-Israel status. An-ti-religious Zionists who were attempting to cause the Modern-Orthodox community to go off the derech of the Torah decided that if they could convince the Modern-Orthodox community to become more pro-Israel than pro-Torah, they may have a chance at suc-ceeding. Unfortunate-ly, the plan seemed to work. When the Israeli government announced their plan to draft Bnei-Torah and Avreichim into the IDF, reducing the amount of Torah, the Modern-Orthodox community supported it. Shortly after this an-
nouncement to draft Bnei-Torah into the IDF, the Maimonides government met to discuss how to react to this. In the end, it decided that since this plan did not directly affect the Modern-Orthodox community, they would let it go. Maimonides therefore began to set aside 90 percent of tuition for donation to Israel.
A few months later, an administrator in Maimonides reported an incident to the presi-dent of Maimonides that shocked everyone in the government and was a turning point in its support for the State of Israel. As major supporters of the Zi-onist movement, Mai-monides dreamed that its students would set-tle in the land of Israel because it was all their rightful inheritance as good Jews. The alumni of the State of Mai-monides built a settle-ment in the West Bank to fulfill this dream. The settlers had planted fruit trees nearby and were farmers. Every-thing was going very well and peaceful until
a month ago when ev-erything changed. One Shabbos as many of the residents were taking a nice, leisure walk by the outskirts of the set-tlement, they were at-tacked by a mob of un-identified individuals. When they attempted to defend themselves, a unit of border police officers arrived and violently arrested the Jewish defenders with beatings. A security camera caught the in-cident and was released to the public on Motzei Shabbos.
After this incident, Maimonides’ govern-ment held another meeting to decide what action to take, if any. The business admin-istrators wanted to cut off funding to Israel and finally begin pay-ing off Maimonides’ debt. The Hebrew De-partment wanted to continue supporting Is-rael and take no action, and the faculty wanted the funding to be cut off so that they could finally start getting paid their salaries owed to them from a decade ago. The teachers, also, wanted to finally in-
stall air-conditioning in all the classrooms. In the end, it was de-cided by a majority that no more tuition money should go to the Israeli government. Instead, it was decided that the faculty and adminis-tration should finally get paid their salaries that were owed to them from a decade ago, and the classrooms could finally get working air-conditioning.
The United States and Israeli govern-ments decided to with-draw their ambassadors to Maimonides as a result. The MIA re-ported to Maimonides that as a result of the reduced funds, Israel was unable to supply the Gaza Strip with money, which caused fewer rockets to be shot at Israel. Also, the PA was going bankrupt as a result of the reduced funding from Israel. As a result, there have been fewer terror at-tacks on Israeli citizens due to the PA being unable to supply the terrorists with proper weaponry and training. Now for that promised air conditioning...
Maimonides Goes Anti-Israel
It is no secret that the ad-ministration has been re-markably generous with re-spect to its operating budget. This past year alone, the ad-ministration carried out two of the following three ma-jor renovations. It installed funnily-angled desks in the biology lab, painted the room-once-known-as-the-Elementary Reading Room purple, and installed an air hockey table in the senior lounge (formerly Mr. Dore and Mr. Fadlon’s office).
Evidently, the adminis-tration’s boundless munifi-cence has not gone unno-ticed. Said one student, “It’s so great to not worry about having proper utilities, ex-ceptional faculty, and man-ageable workloads now that the desks in the bio room are
so undeniably trendy. More pentagonal desks are obvi-ously the solution to any fu-ture problems.”
I would like to suggest an alternate use for the school’s surfeit budget. The admin-istration currently permits a weekly printing of the Not-Spectrum Weekly on yellow legal paper, even though the publication has no legal content. Nevertheless, the school diligently publishes the Weekly in places where it is most needed. Such places include restrooms, hallways, ceilings, janitorial closets and the backsides of slow-moving freshpeo-ple. Following an informal yet scientifically rigorous poll of the student body, the bathrooms are the clear hub of Not-Spectrum Week-
ly’s viewership. As a proud member its parent publica-tion, Spectrum, I would en-courage the esteemed “writ-ers” at the Not-Spectrum Weekly to adopt an earth-shaking initiative. For the sake of their audience, make their publication two-ply.
Consider the impact. Such change would produce an entirely new use for the Weekly. A more content and comfortable student body would have surely appreci-ate the reduced toilet paper cost. Said one frequenter of the cave, “a two-ply Not-Spectrum Weekly would mean the world to me. The sharp corners and wood chips in the current paper are uncomfortable and re-ally hurt the time-wasting cave-dwelling experience.
A thicker and softer Weekly would do wonders for me.”
The Weekly’s color is equally significant. Since Scott brand, the bath tis-sue rolls (read: toilet paper) company, stopped produc-ing colored toilet paper, white has been the de facto color of choice for students. The Weekly’s golden yellow would thus offer a well-re-ceived upgrade.
Consider also the indeli-ble image change that would ensue. Doubling the Week-ly’s ply count would vault it up to the highest echelons of activities at Maimonides, joining: Chess Club, Chidon HaTanach, Junior Junior Varsity soccer (formerly known as Varsity Tennis), and Student Council.
It is important to remem-
ber that this is an opinion piece and that there are those who disagree and have no respect for sanitary luxury. I encourage those two-ply doubters to proverbially wipe the slate clean and re-consider my proposition. To those of you who see the ob-vious efficacy of my propo-sition and the impending two-ply toilet paper revolu-tion, I invite you to join me. Pick up your number twos, (pencils of course,) and write to the administration. Start a petition. Organize a parade. Name a building in its honor. Plan a Toilet Paper Appreciation week. Whatever it takes, make the administration transform the Not-Spectrum Weekly into the comfortable commodity it was meant to be.
An Inside Look at Spectrum
By ELI COHN‘14
Continued on page 6
that we got your graduation wrong, it is Spec-trum’s way of gently telling you that you will stay back a year. Sometimes, while glancing at an article, the layout editors may notice gram-matical or other mistakes and try to fix them (Editors’ note: the editors are perfect and this has never happened) with their limited Adobe InDesign skill set. (Adobe InDesign is the pro-gram that the layout editors use, and it has very limited capabilities.)
An important tool in the layout editor’s tool-box is the continuation. The continuation allows for a long article, or one that was started on the front page, to continue onto another page. The line of text underneath an article that has a con-tinuation, and the line of text above an article that was continued, tell the reader where to look for the article’s continuation or where from it was continued. If the page number is incorrect, then that makes it hard for the readers to enjoy the superb diction of Spectrum’s writers, as the readers would not be able to find the beginning or end of the article.
A new feature of Spectrum layout is captions. Previously, there were pictures, but unless you read the article and thought about the picture, you would have no idea who or what was in the picture. This was confusing to readers. In gener-al, confusing a reader, whether in English class or in a newspaper, is not a good trait in a written work. The captions format is consistent, giving Spectrum a professional look.
Spectrum’s layout editors spend more than one week every month working to create well laid-out issues, and everyone should give them the recognition and rewards that the layout editors deserve. The layout editors’ home ad-dresses are located in the Maimonides directory. Gifts of any amount will be greatly appreciated.
f():(-#$aURUJune 2010Page 6 February 2013/Adar 5773
School
It was utterly astounding. Who would have ever pre-dicted that Maimo’s admin-istration would provide the student body with a wonder-ful array of different kinds of paper plates on which to warm their food! There are so many plates that, according to an anonymous 10th grad-er, “no one knows which one to choose!” Students spend countless hours on their in-ordinate amount homework they receive every night, and they look forward to eating their warm lunches to warm their cold bodies, frozen by the non-existent heating in the school.
Gann Academy, Maimo’s friendly rival, reportedly only has napkins on which to warm their students’ food. Maimo students can now laugh at the thought of hav-ing napkins instead of paper
plates. A student at Gann exclaimed, “I can’t believe we are paying all this money and we aren’t even given plates to warm our food on in the microwave! This is completely absurd and to-tally ridiculous.” Maimo already is the much better school—with its beautiful campus, amazing gym, and an actual parking lot—and the addition of paper plates is just one more way to prove Maimo’s superiority over Gann.
According to the Weekly Toilet Paper, the number of plates at Maimo is one of its strangest draw cards, rivaling only the Elite Pan-aboards located in vari-ous classrooms around the school. This wide choice of plates represents Maimo’s various types of students and its willingness to accept
By DEBBIE BASKIR ‘15
Maimo Finally Overtakes Gann With New Paper Plates
A Universal ConflictWhile conducting his daily comb-
through of Gann Academy’s website, Mr. Russel came upon quite explicit references to the Maimonides student handbook. In addition, the overview of Gann’s curriculum on the school’s website was suddenly modified and had very suspicious similarities to Maimonides’ program. Mr. Russel reacted quickly, sending out a memo to all of Maimonides staff. In an ur-gent late-night meeting last Saturday night, administrators and teachers voiced concerns about the new Gann problem. After the meeting—in which the attendees decided to hire a private investigator—Ms. Boroschek vowed to “beef ‘em up.”
During the meeting, Rabbi Cohn confessed to monitoring Gann’s con-versations “once in a while,” and he agreed to upgrade his system in order to receive a constant feed of Gann students’ conversations. He also wanted to make sure everyone understood that he was sacrificing his own classes for the sake of the school, as he was no longer going to hear a single word from Maimonides students: he wanted due credit and acknowledgment for his effort. On a side note, Rabbi Eleff has told Spec-trum that he is planning to fight “a severe battle” to attain Rabbi Cohn’s position. “It would be nice to teach a real class,” he noted.
Rabbi Goldman, however, is tak-ing a much more straightforward ap-proach to the dilemma. He says he will begin training his students for possible attacks staged by Gann stu-dents. He has developed a strategy in which each student takes his Talmud, Chumash, or Navi in his hand, runs up to the attackers and starts hitting them. This, he says, will confuse the “kind-hearted souls strewn off the right path.” In addition, Rabbi Gold-man is fitting his desk and suitcase with extra security in order to prevent his curriculum, which took him a de-cade to complete, from being stolen.
When asked about the situation, Rabbi Soskil said he did “not mind the Gann infiltration” and that he be-lieves this is for the “betterment of humanity.”
Although Ms. Z. believes that “ev-ery student is a citizen of the world-wide school system,” she will try to order as many books from the Gann library, in order to “prevent Gann students from furthering their educa-tion and enlightening their mind[s].”
Mr. Dore said that even though his analysis of history concludes that diplomacy is the answer to all of life’s issues, he is looking forward to “analyzing whether the Gann ad-ministration made the times, or if the times made the Gann administra-tion.” He also casually said that dur-
ing this historical time of turmoil, he has gained the opportunity to “read some essays.” Mr. Dore wanted to note that this interview was conduct-ed during one of his classes. He said he would leave for home right after talking with Ms. Boroschek for the tenth time about the events at hand. When asked if he had any advice for Maimonides students in this time of trouble, all he said was “Juxtapose.”
Although Dr. Steinsaltz was reluc-tant to join the battle at first, he says he has derived a mathematical equa-tion that figures out the odds of which school will win. At this stage, his cal-culations point to Maimo as the win-ner. As an additional measure, Dr. Steinsaltz says he will “crack down on misbehaving students” in order to ensure a learning environment that will ultimately outdo Gann’s aca-demic level.
A question still hangs in the air: why and how did this crisis start, and how will it end? While thinking about this question during his class (as there obviously were no students there to teach), Dr. Halpern realized that there is a gene that spurs conflict and brings competitiveness in people to a very high level. He believes that the situation began because over fifty percent of the Gann administration has this gene. So how can we blame them?
Continued from page 5Layout
By JARED KRAAY ‘14
As a reader of Spectrum, you may or may not have noticed that it is laid out in a professional and sensible fashion. For example, the three layout editors, Caleb Ja-coby ‘15, Natan Pomper ‘13, and I, strive to put whole articles on the same page without continuing a few words on another page. We also put lines between articles so it is clear which words belong to which article.
Laying out Spectrum is like solving a difficult puzzle, try-ing to fit everything into a cer-tain amount of space—sometimes with fillers, sometimes without. Luckily, the words always fit on the page, and there is consistency throughout the paper. All articles are justified, which means that the end of each line in the column is in the same place.
Another job that layout editors have is putting the bylines—the author’s name and graduation year—at the top of each article. We pride ourselves on never mak-ing spelling mistakes or writing down the wrong graduation year in the bylines. Making that sort of mistake would be embarrass-ing to the whole Spectrum staff, as it would imply that Spectrum can make mistakes. In reality, Spec-trum is infallible. If it does appear
Maimo and Gann’s rivalry has lasted years. The underlying issue has always been: who has better eating utensils?
By JOSHUA EIBELMAN ‘16
many opinions. Just like every plate is accepted into the collection, so too is ev-ery comment, opinion, and question allowed at Maimo. Any student who has ever written for Spectrum can at-test to this.
It has been said that Mai-mo tuition prices will be increasing by 10% for the upcoming 2013-2014 school year. Although this may be causing a major upset to the parents, we can be comforted in the knowledge that some of that money will likely be spent towards an even larger
range of plates, cups, and cutlery. Who knows, maybe we will even have enough money to rid ourselves of the asbestos lining our ceilings. This idea might be a little too far-fetched, though, so calm down, boys and girls.
Maimonides is a second home to students, through-out their schooling. Stu-dents do, after all, spend around the same number of hours at school as they do at home—during the week. Maimo provides them with instant hot water, comfort-able chairs in the shul, and
even surprise jam-sessions with Rabbi Huff when they least expect to get a break from the rigorous curricu-lum with which they deal every day. The newly ac-quired range of plates is a reason to love Maimo even more. Having the plates gives them one more rea-son to join the chaos of the microwave lines. A student cannot have a Maimo ex-perience without the ex-citement of the microwave lines, which are filled with pushing, popcorn-burning, and maybe even a little humming. Now this expe-rience is topped off with a new great feature: warming up that delicious food in that always-being-cut line with a beautiful paper plate!
necessarily reflect the opinions of Spectrum or the editing staff.
Why Write?Conitnued from page 1
Walking through the hall-ways on an average school day leaves one with a lasting impression of Maimonides’ atmosphere: students and teachers do not care enough about grades. The lack of concern for grades reflects the exceedingly casual mind-set students have towards college and their future. One unnamed senior men-tioned that, “Grades were never a concern throughout the whole four years of high school.” Recently, a sopho-more told noted, “I didn’t realize that all [my] classes were not pass-fail.”
There are two underlying problems at the root of our school’s dangerous char-acter (other than posting pseudo-journalism in bath-room stalls), both pertain-ing to the way the teachers and administration handle the curriculum and its work-load. First, teachers do not assign enough homework to give their students an un-derstanding of their GPA’s importance. In fact, 74% of juniors, currently in the most
important full academic year of high school, thought that GPA stood for the weekly “Good Person Award.” They assumed Rabbi Soskil gave this GPA award to the person best exemplifying the trait most admired by students- modesty in dress. A lack of schoolwork outside the classroom extends the dead-ly “senioritis” syndrome to all high school students, not just the seniors who, at any normal school, would only fall to this disease after their second semester senior year. The absence of home-work also carries the jovial atmosphere students have at home, relaxing in their seemingly endless free time, to the confines of the class-room. In class, students are frequently hyperactive due to their excessive hours of sleep. The worst example of the too-much-sleep phenom-enon is the junior class, who, on average, get a ridiculous 12.3 hours of sleep per night. This problem can easily be fixed: to begin restructuring the character of our school,
teachers can and must assign more homework.
The lack of competition and therefore the nonex-istent drive to excel is the other major problem that plagues our nonchalant and casual school. The solution requires several new poli-cies to be implemented by the administration. Some of the changes are rather simple. For example, the administration needs to re-quire Wednesday attendance across the board, even to the seniors. After speaking to several seniors, I came to the conclusion that some enter-tain the notion that kindness, giving back to the commu-nity, and personal growth are of equal importance to grades. Chief Copy Editor Mikhael Smits ‘13 proved the point. “Grades? Col-lege? Come again? I don’t think I’ve even said those words since I was born, in 2001, of course.” Such in-fectious ideas are extremely dangerous to our school and must be repressed through hard work.
The thought that “everyone is in it together to help others learn,” as ex-pressed by one freshman, contributes to the lack of competition in our school and, thus, prevents students from motivating themselves to work hard. Unfortunately, 93% of all the high school students agree with the above quotation. The other 7% were too busy turning on Netflix’s Instant Watch to answer the question. From now on, the administration must increase the pressure of competition to make sure everyone pushes harder aca-demically. Students should have their GPAs printed on a runner’s tag. Their general studies GPA will be pinned to the front of their shirt and their Judaic studies GPA on the back. Failure to do so should be a direct violation of dress code. The GPAs, in-stead of being posted at the end of every quarter, should now be posted at the end of every day, so each stu-dent’s GPA tag is accurate up to seven decimal places
when they walk in the next morning. Ms. Borochek will greet students at the front door with a bar code scan-ner and clipboard. To fur-ther motivate students, those with higher GPAs should be awarded more privileges. For example, those with the highest GPAs should be allowed to pick up their Chinese food first and gain access to the kitchen. And of course, those with lower GPAs should be punished by having to do Mr. D pushups. In order to motivate lazy stu-dents, teachers must no lon-ger refer to their students by first name but rather by the first four digits of their GPA followed by their projected college possibilities.
The above sugges-tions are but a small col-lection of the policies Mai-monides needs to implement to make sure the student body lends sufficient mind to grades. I hope through the adoption of such sug-gestions we can continue to have faith in our school’s academic future.
Chronic Laziness at MaimonidesBy JARED KRAAY ‘14
As we are now at that time of the year between winter colds and spring allergies, there is one thing that ev-eryone should have access to: tissues. As many of you would agree, your nose is
one of the most important organs in your body. To keep our noses in tiptop shape, we must use the finest facial tis-sues the industry has to of-fer. My personal favorite, Puffs, has really helped me
The Tissue IssueBy SARAH POMERANZ ‘15
Continued on page 13
Besides the dress code, the lack of sufficient heat and, certain classes, tissues are every Maimo student’s greatest nightmare.
through some of my worst colds. CVS also has some top notch nasal wipes. The tissues that Maimonides has been providing, however, are completely unacceptable. I find it crazy that we have tolerated this issue so long. Other than complaints in the classroom, no one has truly
taken a stand. Therefore, I plan to lead a campaign, with the slogan, “Put not one, but two nostrils forward.”
I believe the reason the administration has not act-ed in regard to the situation yet is that they do not real-ize the many effects tissues have on the student body.
talk the talk and walk the walk, you know you have serious swag.
The aforementioned steps have a cumula-tive effect. Once you gain swag from writ-ing for Spectrum the first time, your articles will gain importance and readership. A writer’s ultimate goal is to have his name on the front page of Spectrum. This goal is very hard to achieve. It requires days upon days perfecting the language of the article and gaining swagger. However, as front-page writers will tell you, the result is worth the hard work. If you get your article on the front page, you will get attention like never before.
One must not take advantage of this at-tention. One must handle it with care. You might assume that since you gained atten-tion and popularity from one article, you can slack off and not write any more for the rest of the year. But if you really want to retain your admirers, you need to write on a constant basis. These young masters and mistresses relish large doses of quality jour-nalism and if you don’t supply them with that, you will lose the spotlight very quickly.
The youths go crazy for the writers but they also are wild for Spectrum editorial hierarchy. Recent statistics show guys who write articles and are members of the Spec-trum board have a lot of influence within the Maimonides student body. Take a look at Jeremy Fisher—editor in chief in Spec-trum industries and he and Gabriella Cohen
often discuss politics in the library. Then, Elisha Jacobs another editor in chief—he just so happens to be accompanying Miss Hanau around campus. And then there’s Yoni Schoenberg— he needs a bio-lab part-ner! So the chiefs really got it good, but as you will see, it’s not just them who are the lucky ones. Let’s visit Mihkael Smits for a better look in this matter—he is copy edi-tor and would you look at that, he and Julia Wiener often play frisbee in the courtyard. Coincidence? I think not! If you become a member of Spectrum inc., your chances of peer interest will skyrocket. But remember no matter where you go, you gotta keep on writing!
You may be wondering if writing for The Weekly Briefing has the same effects as writ-ing for Spectrum. Doing so is obviously not as beneficial to your popularity as writing for Spectrum. The reason is quite simple: young esteemed people don’t want to read boys’ poop books. The Weekly Briefing is posted in the school’s bathrooms. When one reads The Weekly Briefing, they are most likely doing their business. This greatly di-minishes the appeal of The Weekly Briefing. Smart people would rather read the works of great intellectuals, whose work is good enough to be published in a setting other than a bathroom.
In conclusion, write for Spectrum! To the general reading public: You have not heard that last of me.
f():(-#$aURUJune 2010Page 8 February 2013/Adar 5773
Opinion Editors’ note: These articles do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of Spectrum or the editing staff.
Now that President Obama has been inaugu-rated for a second term, the election season is officially over. This season was the first in my life in which I felt I was truly confident and in-formed politically. As such, I developed strong ideas. On a broad scale, the prob-lems plaguing the United States at this point, similar to those confronting other nations, include poverty, crime, foreign threats, and the remains of a recession. While President Obama has dealt fairly well with some of these issues, his policies and implementations thereof have left much to be desired. As the electoral season came and went, I began to believe strongly that the only way this nation would truly suc-ceed is under a strong leader. Now, the matter is clear to me: Mr. D’Agnelli is Ameri-ca’s only hope.
Mr. D. has shown, throughout his career, that he would he would easily make a fantastic POTUS. Starting his Maimonides tenure in the 1970s, Mr. D. has never let his popu-lace down. He has success-
fully managed gym class, coached students, and en-sured physical health at the school for over thirty years. While serving for more than two terms as President of the United States is not, in the strictest sense of the word, legal, Mr. D would provide such steadfast leadership to our nation that this limita-tion would most likely be overturned.
Besides the endurance that Mr. D would surely show as President, his histo-ry and his slogans testify to the fact that he would have the answers to all major po-litical, economic, and social problems that the United States faces. “Na-na-na-na-na” would be D’Agnelli’s message to terrorists and criminals, whom Mr. D.’s swag would overpoweringly frighten. Terror and crime would virtually cease, as none of the perpetrators of such atrocities would dare to face the Mr. D’s punish-ment of a lifelong pushup sentence. Mr. D’Agnelli’s economic policy would be very effective, if border-ing on socialist: Dag would bring a swift end to econom-
ic inequality by pointing his right hand over his left, above his head, proclaim-ing that the “one percent’s” salaries are “too high” and demanding a redistribution of wealth. Of course, Mr. D would end the war on drugs with that same phrase. D would easily dominate the international political field, telling oppressive govern-ments, “You’re outta there,” and he would also give prac-tical advice to impoverished world populations with his timelessly relevant slogan, “Eat your Wheaties!”
Of course, no Presidential candidate is a serious option without an impressive run-ning mate. This is where Mr. T. comes in. Yes, the ultimate duo. “D and T, the choice for me” would naturally arise as the primary campaign slo-gan, catching people’s at-tention throughout America. Mr Teichmann would be the perfect Vice President in a D’Agnelli administration for a few reasons. First, he is an ideal equalizer for Mr. D’s potentially oppressive tyranny. Let’s face it: Mr. T is the chillest guy any of us know. He would never make
Mr. D for PresidentBy DANIEL SCHWARTZ ‘14
Admit it, guys- school is boring. No matter how you put it, and no matter what classes you are in, you are constantly bored. Even on the rare days when you walk into the class to find those monsters that teachers call "TV sets" standing at the front of the room, your mind helplessly wanders off. Mai-monides has desperately tried to fix this issue through renovations of the rooms (adding smart boards and computers, drawing graf-fiti on the desks, etc.) and "working" on the different education departments that make up the school’s cur-riculum.
Consulting with a professional entertainment doctor, who for an unclear reason demanded he remain anonymous, I learned of the proper solution to this press-
ing issue. To prevent the uprising epidemic known to the higher scientific field as Absolutiom Boredus, the school must give its students some fun. In fact, Mai-monides has a legal obliga-tion in the state of Massachu-setts to allow children to use the device called Robustus Dormus. At first skeptical, I did more research (press power button, then log in, then Google Chrome, then Wikipedia thumbnail, then type in Robustus Dormus) on this modern device and found its true origin. It was created by John Scurlock, a tennis-playing mechani-cal engineer with a knack for physics, in Shreveport, Louisiana in 1959.
In other words, Maimonides needs bouncy houses. Per the Massachu-setts Law (903.01 A), the
school has ranked an all-new low on the boring scale, with a devastating 2.5 on the bH scale. It is now legally obligated to have at least one "bouncy house" on the school grounds, with the moon bounce having an area of at least twenty square feet and having enough pressure as to ensure a 40% increase in enjoyment in the student subjects.
Many critics have argued that using such devices to raise the level of focus and happiness in subjects direct-ly prevents students from exercising their ability to live boring and dull lives. Enacted in 2009, shortly after President Obama was elected, the newly rendered 28th amendment, “grant[s] dullness to school children’s lives, nationally.” They ar-gue that these moon bounces
are an abomination as, in one of the phases of their test-ing, scientists used animals to ensure that each bouncy house ensures the maximum funliness. This is not animal abuse in the strictest sense, but is dangerously close, ap-parently.
Other groups have claimed that bouncy cas-tles are not even the most cost efficient and effective method to ensure the proper learning experience of any students. To break down the arguments to a more basic level, Dr. Doom allowed a rare interview. “Anything for Spectrum,” he said. You may recognize him from his cameos in television such as Dr. Oz, Oprah, and most fa-mously, The Evil Lair with The Moleman. He backs up the Moon Bounce solution with a few words of wisdom:
“To make the argument eas-ier to understand, kids do not have fun in school and are generally bored. On the other hand, science has nev-er identified a scenario in which a subject was ‘bored’ in a Bouncy Castle or Moon Bounce.” The solution to the boredom epidemic is right in front of our eyes!
All of the accumu-lated, scientific evidence proves that without pre-installed moon-bounces, no school will ever live up to the title of “interesting.” Without the brilliance of brand new bouncy houses, students will continue to mindlessly zombie their way around the hallways and never know what it is like to enjoy school.
By DANIEL SMITS ‘16Our Only Hope
rash decisions and would greatly increase the popu-larity of American politics. On the other hand, Mr. Tei-chmann would not be afraid to take necessary violent ac-tion against dangerous coun-tries, putting his knack for explosives to good use. Mr. Teichmann would attract the friendship of Germany and other European nations, which would certainly make up for the fact that Mr. T. is not actually an American citizen.
The United States is not in dire straits, but it faces many issues that can only be un-dertaken successfully by a strong Mr. D.-Mr. T. admin-istration. Most of you, high school students reading this article, will be eighteen by the time the next Presidential election rolls around. If you care about your country, it is your responsibility to vote for the candidates that will truly form a more perfect Union. Vote D and T 2016!
The dynamic duo: Mr. T. (left) and Mr. D. (right).
made a blockbuster move that will completely change the team. Celtics coach Doc Rivers and president of bas-ketball operations Danny Ainge have agreed to fire all the players. “We just haven’t seen the quality of play that we expected,” says a frustrated Ainge. “We de-cided to get rid of every player and start with a fresh roster.” Surprisingly, the or-ganization quickly ran into a problem—they did not
have any more players.Ainge and Rivers trav-
eled all over the country holding tryouts to search for new players for the Celt-ics. Desperate, Ainge called Mr. Borkow of Maimonides School to ask whether the Varsity or Junior Varsity basketball teams could play. “Varsity and Junior Varsity are not available, but you can have the Middle School team,” Coach extraordinaire Borkow responded. Ainge thanked Mr. Borkow and
expressed his relief in find-ing a team, especially one endorsed by Mr. Borkow. Danny Ainge offered Mr. Borkow a position as offi-cial team free-throw shoot-ing coach, but B-Kow re-fused, saying that he would have to work too far from home. Apparently, the TD Garden is a good distance from Maimonides School.
What Ainge and Riv-ers did not know, however, was that the middle school M-Cats would not play on
In somewhat surprising news, just five months af-ter the blockbuster trade that brought all-star center Dwight Howard to the Los Angeles Lakers, Howard was traded again, this time to the Boston Celtics. In this deal, the Celt-ics acquired Howard, and the Lakers acquired center Jason Collins and the rights to com-mentator Brian Scalabrine.
Legendary Laker Kobe Bryant was the driving force behind this shocking trade. Bryant, a notorious ball-hog, released a statement saying, “Dwight was just shooting way too much, attempting an insane 10.7 shots per game! Without him here, I could shoot 10.7 more shots every game.” As a part of this trade, Collins’ contract will be sig-nificantly restructured. His salary will be reduced from 854,389 dollars a year to four dollars and fifty cents, though he will also receive premium season tickets for the Los An-geles Sparks, a local WNBA
team, as well as a special training session with Sparks icon, Lisa Leslie. Addition-ally, a clause will be inserted into Collins’ restructured con-tract called the “if you shoot the basketball Kobe will kick you out of the country” clause. This clause contains the following stipulation: if Collins shoots the basketball in a game he is automatically waived and sent to Canada to play for the national basket-ball league of Canada.
The other piece the Lakers acquired, Brian Scalabrine, has agreed to be a commen-tator for every game for the Lakers. Scalabrine tweeted moments after the trade was announced, “I’m prepared to take over broadcasting for the Lakers, unless of course they need some magic on the court from the white mamba.” Sca-labrine finished his tweet with the now ubiquitous #mamba-sunite.
Even with the inclusion of the a-list commentator Sca-
By NOAH AVIGAN ‘16
By SAM HENRY ‘15
Maimo Middle School Basketball Goes Professional
Bye Bye Dwight
labrine, this still seems like an odd time to trade Howard, who had just been named to his 7th all-star game. Another rea-son for this trade was the fact that, with Howard around, head coach Mike D’Antoni did not feel safe in his job. Howard has been getting coaches fired
ever since he got his 2nd grade coach, who was also his music teacher, fired. In the NBA, Howard got former Laker Coach Mike Brown and former Or-lando Magic Coach Stan van Gundy fired. This had D’Antoni shaking in his boots. He became terrified that he would lose his job
too. Therefore, D’Antoni turned the tables on the all-star center, and he and Bryant persuaded Lakers management to get rid of the trouble-making How-ard. It will be interesting to see if this blockbuster trade can help either of the two teams—or help improve their slow starts.
Shabbos. The Boston Celt-ics were forced to forfeit all of their games on Friday night and Saturday after-noon. “[The team’s refusal to play on Shabbos] was really tough at the begin-ning,” said Rivers, “but we soon realized that it didn’t matter. In fact, the team was so successful that their scheduling difficulties did not matter.” Doc was quite right; the team won every game they played for the rest of the season.
Many criticize the young team for not earning their wins. They have proved wrong the old saying, “you can’t teach height,” as each Shabbos that they do not play, they come to practice the next day a foot taller. “It’s a miracle! Charlie Kramer is almost 10 feet tall!” exclaimed Ainge. The players call it a God-given gift, while other players in the league are more criti-cal. Sasha Pavlovic, All-star shooting guard for the Portland Trailblazers, said,
“The Celtics’ turnaround has been astounding. They claim that it is because they keep the Sabbath, but I believe that they are tak-ing performance enhanc-ing drugs.” Other players around the NBA believe the middle school basketball team when they say that their increase in height is a reward from God for keep-ing Shabbos. “I saw what was happening with this team and I thought to my-self, ‘why don’t I try that?’ So I started doing this Shab-bos thing,” remarked Mi-ami Heat forward LeBron James. LeBron has report-edly seen no results. His local Rabbi tells him this is because he has the wrong intentions. The new and improved Celtics are now 25-4, with all of their loss-es coming from forfeits on Shabbos.
The Maimonides Middle school basketball team in their new jerseys.
Dwight Howard (12) fighting through temporary blindness in his short-lived career on the Lakers.
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SportsJoey’s Gigantic World of Sports
The Boston Red Sox are coming off two consecutive disappointing seasons, but do not panic. There is hope. The Red Sox had a great offseason, started by the obsession with and subsequent hiring of ex-pitching coach John Farrell. Because the Red Sox where so successful when Farrell was originally in Boston, the Sox’s excellent general manager Larry Lucchino as well as “powerful” general manager Ben Cher-rington thought it would be a great idea to bring Farrell back, this time as manager-in-chief.
The front office also made great moves in free agency. The team’s executives had a clear strategy of signing mediocre play-ers, delaying completion of these signings, and specifically targeting injured players. As we will see, the team followed this strategy meticulously. Firstly, though the team had about 200 million dollars to use on free agents, they wisely did not sign the best player in free agency in Josh Hamilton and let him go to an AL rival with whom they will be battling for a playoff spot. In fact, this was a great move because the Sox saved money to sign talented players like Jonny Gomes and a healthy Mike Napoli. The Red Sox tactic to acquire a team full of “locker room guys” who do not perform well on the field but keep the team together was Lucchino’s main goal over the offsea-son and he accomplished this goal with dis-tinction.
Another positive for the Sox this year is that last season’s trades will now pay off.
By getting rid of Adrian Gonzalez, the Red Sox now do not have a half decent first baseman, leading to an open competition at spring training. This competition will be great for the team because it will spark some competitive energy and resolution on a team that lacked those crucial qualities last year. Who knows? Maybe Youk will want in on the action.
Let us now revisit the Sox’s best trade from last offseason—the deal that sent Josh Reddick, who had a career year and was one of the best outfielders in the MLB last year, to the Oakland Athletics. In return, they got Andrew Bailey who was a very re-liable closer for all of his 18 games. This trade will surely now pay off for the Red Sox because Bailey will become a set up man for Joel Hanrahan and every great team needs a reliable set up man.
This upcominh season is looking bright for the Red Sox and a World Series tro-phy should not be too far off. There is no team in the MLB that can match this team’s character, pitching, and especially front of-fice decision-making. I predict that the Sox will finish the season with a 161-1 record; the lone loss will come in the Sox season finale. Bobby V will be brought back as honorary manager and before the National Anthem begins, will have gotten himself and the starting pitching rotation ejected from the game of baseball for life. Look-ing forward to seeing Red Sox Nation rise up, yet again.
Red Sox Expertly RebuiltBy JOSEPH SOLOMONT ‘14
Well, who else saw this coming? In an epic battle of in-credible quarterbacks, regular season MVP Mark Sanchez defeated second team All-Pro Tony Romo in a 42-39 double overtime win in Super Bowl XLVII and was named co-MVP along with his coach of the year winner Rex Ryan. Coming off an astonishing season, in which he broke the single sea-son records for rushing and passing yards as well as touch-downs, Mark Sanchez led the Jets downfield with seven min-utes left in overtime. With three minutes left and the New Orleans crowd chanting ‘J-E-T-S Jets Jets Jets,’ kicker Nick Folk kicked a 32-yard field goal to clinch the game.
Before the season, no one could have possibly predicted that Mark Sanchez would lead his team to a Super Bowl win. Coach Rex Ryan was criticized for sticking with his quarter-back. Rex and Mark, however, knew that this was Sanchez’s season. After moving Tim Tebow to running back, Rex be-lieved that Mark would be able to thrive. “We just knew that Timmy would be the right running back that would be able to play the kind of physical style of play we like,” said Sanchez, “And Tim excelled in this role.” After his first game at his new position Tebow remarked, “They were thinking of trad-ing me after last year’s disaster, but I guess God had other plans and the Jets decided to keep me. Playing a hybrid run-ning back slash quarterback position really helped me thrive. This year was really great for the franchise. I love God.” Af-ter running for 1,400 yards and passing for 600, it looks like Tebow has finally found a spot in which he can thrive.
Back to Sanchez. His performance this year was the great-est-single season the NFL has ever seen. Now, this doesn’t mean he is a Hall of Fame quarterback, but as Bill Belichick said after losing to the Jets in the AFC championship, “He’s
Emergence of SanchezBy MOSHE SALTZMAN ‘16
The Washington Wizards have greatly surprised spectators with their phenomenal level of play. Without elite point guard John Wall, they had four wins and twenty-five losses, a shockingly hot start for the squad. Offensively, the Washington Wizards aver-age 91 points per game, ranking thirty out of a possible thirty teams in points scored per game. Their highest scorer is Jordan Crawford, one of the greatest players in NBA history, who is currently averaging sixteen points a game. All the NBA fans out there should certainly go purchase Jor-dan Crawford jerseys before his retirement in twelve years, given his prominence on the dangerous Wizards. For several rea-sons, including lack of gunfights in the team locker room, the Washington Wizards have looked better than ever and look like a force that will challenge less elite teams for the NBA championship.
Before the 2012-2013 season started, John Wall, the team’s best player suffered a stress injury in his left knee, causing him to miss the first twenty-nine games of the season. The season prior he was averaging
eight assists per game, but the backup point guard, A.J. Price was only averaging about one and a half assists per game in his lim-ited time off the bench. As an organization, the Wizards were scared that without John Wall as a facilitator, their season record would be catastrophic and their playoff chances slim. However, it seems like just the opposite happened. The Wizards amaz-ingly lost their first twelve games, putting them in contention with the Lebron James-led Heat for best in the Eastern Conference.
Famed sportswriter Bill Simmons noted on his website Grantland that this Wizards team has almost as much chemistry as the famous 2009-2010 team and its renowned team-wide card games on charter flights. With this chemistry, the Wizards will look far ahead to the playoffs and NBA finals. As of now the Wizards are ranked second to last in the league-wide standings at 11 wins and 31 losses. However, they are only 17.5 games out of first place. If the Wiz-ards continue playing like they are now, they are sure to lock up a playoff spot and then some.
By TZVI FEINBERG ‘16Gee Wiz(ards)
definitely a QB I would want on my team.” But the question remains: how has such a criticized quar-
terback over the past three years evolved into one of the game’s best? “I think it’s just a level of maturity that he’s reached,” said NFL analyst Dan Marino, “And it’s not just him, it’s been many QBs this year, like Tony Romo. During this season, Mark has just been so poised on and off the field, acting like a leader, and playing at the top of his game.”
Now, after an incredible season, where does Sanchez go? Will he continue at the top of his game or recede back to his previous low levels of quarterbacking? “I think it’s finally time for Mark,” said head coach Rex Ryan. “I think it’s a new era for him, for us and for the NFL. You see, we are now entering a new era of QBs, and we feel Sanchez is leading that. It was only a matter of time before Mark would find the right schemes, players, and mindset. After taking such harsh criticism for the past few years, I think he’s learned how to really ignore it and progress as a player. To be honest, I just won the Super Bowl and I don’t care about the past.” Neither does Sanchez.
Editors’ Note: The Editors greatly recommend searching, “Mark Sanchez flinch lol” on Youtube.com. If the article did not do it for you, this surely will.
Sanchez, now recognized for more than his resting abilities.
recently began to bring itself up to speed with the online world. Its first efforts, how-ever, have been far from successful. Chinese citizens have over the years devel-oped a coded language to bypass the heavy censor-ship of the government. For example, the Commu-nist Party’s Department of Propaganda is referred to as the Orwellian “Minis-try of Truth,” or zhenlibu. The Chinese government recently attempted to crack down on this informal criti-cism. In the process, though, it blocked many innocent websites—including some of its own sites. The govern-ment quickly restored the downed websites after the fiasco came to light, and it is considering alternative ways to crack down on the coded
protests. One of the most disrup-
tive censorship efforts in-volved the word guiguo, which means “your [honor-able] state.” Long a formal way for people from differ-ent countries to say “your country,” guiguo began being used by online dissi-dents to imply that the Com-munist Party government is “yours,” as in belonging to the rulers, not “ours.” In an effort to control the use of this term, the government inadvertently brought down many government websites containing official docu-ments and treaties.
Dissidents have also started using the word hex-ie, meaning river-crab. In Chinese folklore, the river-crab is seen as a bully. The word is also a homonym for “harmony;” retired Presi-
dent Hu Jintao emphasized a hexie shehui or “harmo-nious society” extensively in his speeches. When dis-sidents are censored by the government, they might say that they have been “river-crabbed,” or “harmonized” into silence. The regime at-tempted to stamp out this turn of phrase, too, but the backlash from the fishing in-dustry and the government’s own Ministry of Environ-mental Protection quickly put an end to their efforts.
The Chinese government was successful in cracking down on some of the dissi-dents’ coded language. For example, the regime cen-sored the word pimin, or “fart people,” without any unintended side effects. Pi-min stems from a notori-ous incident that occurred in 2009. Lin Jiaxiang, a
Party official, was eating at a seafood restaurant, and he asked an eleven-year-old girl to show him to the bathroom. When he tried to grab her, she fled to her fa-ther, who confronted Mr. Lin. He responded, “I was sent here by the Ministry of Transportation! My rank is the same as your mayor’s! I did grab her neck and so what? You people are farts to me! You wanna take me on? You wanna test what I can do to you?” A record-ing of the incident went vi-ral on the Internet, and many dissidents took on the term “fart people” as an expres-sion of pride for the people at the receiving end of the government’s abuses. The government had no trouble censoring “fart people,” as the term is not used outside of dissident circles.
An online interview with one protester from before the recent crackdown dem-onstrates the trouble many in China have to go through to communicate freely. “I hope your efforts to expose the river-crabbing activi-ties of the Heavenly Dy-nasty and its Ministry of Truth lead to actual changes in how we fart people are treated,” he said. The word “government” is considered sensitive, and tianchao, or “Heavenly Dynasty,” is of-ten used instead for its impli-cation that the government is far from modern. Now that the government has cracked down on the use of such terms as “fart people,” online dissidents in China will have to find new ways to bypass the censorship and make themselves heard.
Shockingly, right be-fore President Obama was sworn into office, Mitt Romney declared war on America. Romney, with the backing of Utah, wants to create an inde-pendent Mormon country in Utah and Colorado. He claims that the U.S. gov-ernment’s huge debt will cause a large recession, so he wants to create his own country that has no debt and where everyone is Mormon. Romney has already chosen a couple of generals to lead the war, including Mormon football player Manti Te’o and Te’o’s girlfriend. Te’o said in a statement that he became very close with Mitt Romney online, and when Romney said that he is dying, Manti Te’o wanted to fulfill Rom-ney’s dream of becoming president—before Rom-ney’s death.
Mitt Romney said that the main reason he is starting his own country is that he wants a coun-try without the burden of huge debt. Romney also
By JORDAN COHEN ‘16
By BARAM SOSIS ‘14
Chinese Censors Overstep Their Reach
Mitt Romney Declares Civil WarI thought the world
was not supposed to end. Who really cares about the Aztecs, any-way? Oh, sorry. The Mayans.
But apparently, something happened. A zombie apocalypse. The sun exploded. A meteor hit Earth with-out warning. We col-lided with the planet Nibiru. All at the same time. It was fairly awk-ward. How did the sci-entists not see that one coming?
It’s December 22, and I am the only one who is able to say “I survived Doomsday.” The world as we know it has officially ended.
I wonder whether any Ford trucks made it through. I don’t think the manufacturers were thinking about an apocalypse when they came up with “built to last.”
Life after the end has begun. I will not have to hope, “this is
the yar,” yet again, and then watch the Red Sox collapse and miss the playoffs. Again. There will be no more pray-ing that the Celtics get one more shot at Num-ber 18 before Kevin Garnett retires for good. No more rolling eyes at congressmen who just can’t seem to comprehend the word “compromise.” I will not have to spend a month cleaning out be-fore Pesach. (I seem to spend more time pre-paring for the holiday than actually celebrat-ing it.)
There will not be any snow to shovel this year. In fact, there will never again be a snow day. Or a cold day. Or another hurricane day, for that matter.
I will not have to ask why college matters so much—or why teach-ers insist on giving us enough homework to last a lifetime, due tomorrow. There will
December 21 2012By HANNAH STANHILL ‘15
Continued on page 12
thinks that America’s government system does not work, and he pointed out that the government system is so ineffective, al-most no laws are ever passed—which led America to go over the fiscal cliff. Mitt Romney has proposed a government system in which there is one sole dictator who rules for four years. If the dictator does not agree to step down immedi-ately the dictator will be fired and/or killed, whichever seems more fun.
Many people are very worried about the possibility of a huge loss of life stemming from the upcoming war. When Romney was asked why he is going to wage war—even though many Americans could die—he responded that he did not care about 47 % of Americans. Romney has also said that he would be will-ing to avoid war if he were allowed to make his Mormon country in areas of Utah and Colorado. Mr. Rom-ney plans to name his
Known as the “Modern Robert E. Lee,“ Romney is pictured above during his secession announcement.
Continued on page 13
country Bain Capito-lina.
President Obama said in a statement that America will use its full force to crush the rebellion, with a heavy emphasis on using drones against civilians. Obama went through with his inaugural cer-emony, despite the inevitable civil war. America has already started pulling troops from Afghanistan to combat the growing threat back home. Mr. Romney has the
f():(-#$aURUJune 2010Page 12 February 2013/Adar 5773
WorldEarly Sunday morning,
government officials in North Korea released a video that finally resolved the 68-year-old conflict between North Korea and South Korea. The lead-er of North Korea, Kim Jong-un, made the shock-ing revelation that it is a lifelong dream of his to become a hip-hop dancer. Released on the territory’s digital cable network, the people of North Korea sat in shock, ramen spill-ing out of their mouths at what they were hearing. “It’s true,” he admitted. “Ever since I was a wee little Korean, playing with my Lego machine guns and Lenin figurines, I’ve aspired to be a hip-hop dancer. All those pops and locks and jerks…and oh my! The scuba hop! I just found it irresistibly ap-pealing! Not to mention those funky costumes!” He also mentioned that due to his attraction to hip-hop, he would be re-signing from the position of North Korean dictator.
Due to the nature of such a vacancy, North Korea and South Korea have no choice but to re-
combine to fill North Ko-rea’s void for a dictator. Said a teary eyed citizen, “We’re sad to see you go, ol’ buddy. It’s been a real pleasure living under your communist regime.” The air was somber and bittersweet that day. No-body knew what to do, yet as one person walking around the neighborhood put it, “We are glad he is fulfilling his dreams. We want what is best for him, after all.” Then, North Korea faced the obvi-ous question. What does Kim Jong-un plan to do with his time, now that he was no longer occupying the role of North Korean leader? A reporter asked him this question as he stepped out of the govern-ment building. Jong-un, with a half-smile on his face, he said, “Take a trip to the land of the free. Try out some dance classes. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even get a gig on Dancing with the Stars.”
As that bittersweet feeling pervaded the city blocks, no one expected what was to happen next. The beats of Gangnam style echoed through the
Venezuela recently an-nounced that Cuban doc-tors had succeeded in clon-ing President Hugo Chavez. Chavez has been experienc-ing medical problems for years, and many have specu-lated that he has non-curable cancer. The Venezuelan government has been keep-ing most information about his illness quiet. Chavez has been undergoing treatment in Cuba, and was too ill to attend his own inaugura-tion last month. By clon-ing Chavez, the Venezuelan government hopes to avert disaster if he were to die in office.
Chavez has been in office for around fourteen years, having been reelected in 2012 for another six-year term. This is despite the fact that the Venezuelan econ-omy is highly unstable and
there are frequent shortages of basic goods. For example, last Christmas, bottlenecks at ports caused Christmas trees from Canada to arrive weeks late, and when they did, they were highly over-priced. Chavez has managed to hold on to power with his efforts to assist the poor and his charisma. “I don’t know what we would do without Chavez,” said Ciudadano Preocupado, a concerned citizen. “He’s done so much for us.” Preocupado said, however, that he is confident the clone can take Chavez’s place.
China, while expressing surprise at the advanced state of Cuban medical tech-nology, applauded the pro-cedure for ensuring stability. “We are glad that Venezuela has found a way to prevent the instability that could
have resulted from such a traumatic change in leader-ship,” a government official said. “We are engaging in discussions with Cuba about exhuming and cloning our Great Leader, Mao.” In the U.S., many congressmen have expressed concerns about the cloning. Despite this, a petition has been sent to the White House to pres-sure Cuba into opening its borders, signed mostly by medical researchers and mil-lionaires in need of heirs or a source of replacement or-gans.
The U.S. may not have much to worry about, though, as the procedure does not seem to have been a complete success. The cloning procedure created a child genetically identi-cal to Chavez, but he still needs to grow up. Although
the clone, named Chavez Jr., is still young, leaked video footage showed him saying that he does not “care about politics.” Trabajador Estatal, a Venezuelan government official, said that he hopes this is only an example of “teenage rebellion.” Chavez, upon hearing about the in-cident, reportedly said that he would “teach that punk a lesson,” before collapsing onto his hospital bed. Many in the U.S., however, have said that this is a demonstra-tion that one’s behavior is not determined by genetics alone. “This will reignite the old debate over nature ver-sus nurture,” said Dr. Dore This will likely not be the only moral question to be raised if this cloning tech-nology becomes more wide-spread; for example, do we really need more lawyers?
Looking forwards, Venezuela said that it plans to put Chavez Jr. through college and some United Socialist Party of Venezu-ela training before installing him as the Vice President until Chavez dies. The cur-rent Vice President, Nico-lás Maduro, had previously been designated as Chavez’s successor. When Chavez Jr. grows up, Maduro will be retired from his post as Vice President, but he has said that he will not foster any hard feelings towards Chavez Jr. “It is crucial for the country that Chavez Jr. becomes the next leader af-ter Chavez.”
Editors’ note: Information for this article was taken from the New York Times and/or completely made up.
By BARAM SOSIS ‘14
By TALIA BESSLER ‘15Kim Jong-un Dances Gangnam Style
Venezuela Averts Disaster by Cloning Chavez
be no more wondering why Apple is an-nouncing yet another iPhone two months after it released the latest version, or why no one has invented a cure for the common cold yet.
No more long lines for the microwaves at Maimo. No more petitions to actually have nice tissues lying around. Sandpaper really isn’t a good replacement when the whole school has the same cold, Mr. Alge. And no more requests to turn on the heat in the building when it actually starts get-ting cold out, as opposed to when winter officially begins.
No more going the long way around when Ms. Z closes the library 15 minutes before class ends. No more peering at Mr. Schockett’s list of all his past students, trying to discern any recognizable names. What size font is it now? Size 2?
On the other hand, I will never get to see the Maimonides Mock Trial team repeat their state championship. I will never see the Varsity Boys’ Soccer team wearing ties to school on days they have games, and I will never again see the Varsity Boys’ Basketball team try to steal that tradition. There will not be any more Gann-Maimo games for Maimo to dominate, and there will not be any more wrestling team for the whole school to make fun of.
I will never get to eat latkes along with my turkey on Thanksgiving. I will never find out whether someone currently at-tending high school will get to live during three centuries.
The end of the world made sure all of that will not ever happen.
Continued from page 11
Mayan Apocalypseresident’s ears, creating a veritable buzz. What was that infectious sound? Where was it coming from? Heads were turn-ing, and confused voices were gasping, until one person pointed a finger and yelled, “It’s Kim Jong-un!” Kim Jong-un then lifted a megaphone up to his mouth. He turned to the assistant next to him, who was holding a gigantic boom-box, and yelled “Hit it!” He moved his arms one way and his legs another, his outfit closely resem-bling the likes of Elvis Presley. He was dancing Gangnam Style! “Come on everybody! Join in! Boogie with me!” Pretty soon, everyone in that
whole town was groov-ing along to Kim Jong-un as he busted a move. It was quite a sight to witness. After the occa-sion, an especially giddy citizen recalled “Yeah, they were dancing and singing and moving to the grooving. And just when it happened, some-body turned around and shouted, ‘Play that funky music white boy! Play that funky music right! Play that funky music white boy! Lay down the boogie, and play that funky music till you die!’ I don’t know what was up with him. He must have had a little bit too much to drink.”
Kim Jong-un (left) danced Gangham Style for so long, half his face transformed into that of Psy.
such as the many students that have been seen hanging out for long periods of time with Guedalia Blank and his friends.
Despite the massive changes Chaiel’s ideas have caused, the changes have not affected everybody. In the words of Ben Matz ‘14 “I never went to class in the first place.”
Limudei Kodesh not being graded has had a positive impact on the quality of learning that is going on. According to Shira Krinsky ‘14, “It’s great! I can now take all of my Jewish classes as seriously as I take BH!”
However, not all of Chaiel’s changes have had such a dramatic effect. When asked how he feels that davening is no
longer mandatory, one senior said “Dav-ening used to be mandatory?” A key part in Chaiel’s argument to make davening optional was that davening would be better if the people who just talk all the time aren’t there, a prophecy that seems to have come true. Junior and gabbai-in-training David Glass said, “I hear a lot fewer people talking in davening now that no one’s there.”
So what other changes are in store for Maimo? Should the administration abolish dress code? Should boys be al-lowed to wear kilts to class? Maybe they should, but that being said, I’ll still wear pants tomorrow.
Continued from page 11
Romney’s War
Continued from page 4Instrumental Sophomore
Continued from page 3Make me a Match
Donuts.” One senior said, “I can’t wait for my shidduch; now I can have someone to go with to Gala.” Some students, though, including many in the Sephardi commu-nity, are not as excited. Ben Almekies commented, “I don’t see the reason for a shadchan. I already have five proposals, but I guess this idea could save me some camels.” David Solooki remarked plainly, “I don’t need a shadchan. I already have eight wives.”
Some students were confused when questioned about the change. Shira Krin-sky ‘14 answered, “My dad already sold me for three goats, so I don’t understand what the point of hiring a shadchan is.” Benny Strachman ‘14 remarked, “I thought everybody was already married, because I’ve never seen anyone keeping shomer negia.”
The mixed feelings in the high school have been echoed by the middle school-ers. One eighth grade boy remarked that he is excited, provided that the shadchan “gets him something he wants.” Nir So-looki stated that he is for this idea because “it will enrich the students’ hearts.” Un-like his brother, he only has three wives. One sixth grader responded to Spectrum’s queries about whether he is excited for a shadchan with, “I don’t need one. I al-ready have a girlfriend. I even hugged her once.”
Whether or not this program will be successful remains to be seen, but Spectrum is just hopeful that it will help to solve the proliferation of intergrade re-lationships, or at least the ones that span three grades.
In the spirit of Purim, Billy would like you to draw a clown nose and a rainbow afro on him.
One of these effects is simple- the notori-ous school tissues irritate our noses. This is not just a nuisance, but rather a serious threat to our well being. Never have I seen a tissue brand that I recognized on school premises. With box colors changing from brown to green to current color blue(!), the administration has been trying to trick stu-dents into thinking that there are new tis-sues in our hallways. Science proves that bad quality tissues are the leading cause of Nostrilitis, which is not treatable and kills 100% of its victims. Dr. Shnoz, an expert on nose infirmities stated in a press release that, “There are no vaccines for Nostrilitis and the awareness of the disease is very low.”
Comfortable tissues will also help bring new students into our school. I often hear visitors make remarks about the many classrooms that lack Kleenex all togeth-er. The administration could prove that it cared if it provided students with good tis-sues. Students, however, are not the only ones who suffer from the tissue issue. Teachers have been forced to spend their own money and time to buy high-quality tissues and bring them into school. The sum of elementary, middle, and upper-school teachers’ tissue costs may equal up to $300 per week. Other teachers hide tis-
sues in their desks, forced to live with the constant fear of someone stealing them.
There are those who have come to love the famous school tissues. To these folk, the tissues remind them of the best aspects of Maimo: ditching davening, taking tests, and wearing tzizit. Sophomore Kayla Shatz expressed her love for the tissues. “I think that [the tissues] are very soothing to the nose.” Are we going to let students like Shatz hold us back from fighting this in-justice? Though I understand that we have become accustomed to and even nostalgic towards scraping our noses with sandpa-per, I am confident that we will quickly reap the benefits of a finer facial tissue.
I hope 2013 is the year that Maimonides School will get better facial tissues. Un-der the new reign of Rabbi Soskil, we can make a change that will better our com-munity as a whole. I have made it my New Year’s resolution (secular and religious) to show all of you of the urgency of our situ-ation. God gave us these noses; let us take good care of them.
Editors’ note: The editors unequivocal-ly agree with this opinion and the article does reflect Spectrum’s view on the topic.
backing of the state police of Utah, and he has hired thousands of mercenar-ies with millions of dollars out of his pocket. Most of the mercenaries are com-ing from some of America’s longtime enemies, China and Russia. American troops have already started moving toward the border of Utah, and Obama supporters have reportedly fled the state. All sporting events have been stalled, and many people fear that this year that there will be no Super Bowl, if the war spills as far as Louisi-ana, where the Super Bowl is being played.
Many foreign countries have voiced support for America. There are reports
that France, England, Is-rael, and Germany will send ground troops to help America’s cause against Mr. Romney. No countries have voiced support for Mr. Rom-ney, but there are reports that China and Russia will support Mitt Romney. Ev-eryone in America is hold-ing their breath and praying for the war to end quickly and peacefully. There is no doubt, however, that the upcoming war will change American history forever.
Editors’ note: Information for this article was taken from jordancohenisamazing.com, the website of the Co-hen Times, and Wikipedia’s page on the American Civil War.
Which of the following do you think would best improve
the atmosphere of the library during lunch period?
A. A Kosher McDonalds
B. A Kosher Starbucks
C. A Kosher Subway
D. A Kosher Dunkin Donuts
By Eli Portman
look at the girl, her eyes glaring
at him from under dark lashes.
“Miguel, we’ve discussed this!
The girl said, the annoyance and
urgency in her voice unmasked.
“You’ve told me why you need
this job! Tell me the story again.”
“I just think we should wait a
while, Cassandra. I’ll come back in
a week or so.” Miguel replied, still
staring at the blue building, his eyes
drifting to the door where two men
stood guard. They each held a rifle.
Cassandra shook her head. “Tell
me the story.”
The boy closed his eyes. He still
saw the officers’ large guns resting
on their shoulders. He sighed and
opened his heavy eyes. “Can we sit?”
Miguel led his friend to a nearby
bench. “You want the whole story?”
Cassandra nodded. “Remind
yourself why you wanted this.”
Miguel exhaled slowly and then
began to speak. “About a week be-
fore my mother’s death, I overheard
her speak to my father. They were in
the kitchen; it was past my bedtime.
I was coming down to tell them I
couldn’t sleep, but I stopped on the
stairs. I didn’t want to interrupt. My
mom was upset. At first I couldn’t
hear what she was saying; she was
whispering frantically. But I listened
closely, and eventually I heard.
“She told my dad that she had re-
ceived a letter. I don’t know what it
said; I don’t think my father ever did
either. She just said it was threaten-
ing, and that we had to move soon.
She was going to withdraw the
money. My dad refused. He said that
he couldn’t leave; he had his own
business and had finally established
himself as a reliable storekeeper.”
“Then he wanted to see the let-
ter. My mom shook her head, say-
ing that she had sent it back to the
post office without a return address.
Just then, my parents started walk-
ing toward the stairs, so I had to
rush up to bed before they saw me.
That was the last thing I heard.”
Miguel now stared at the Chil-
ean flag hanging out a window.
The wind rustled through it, mak-
ing the red, white, and blue dance
wildly against the blue building.
“And so why do you want the
job at the post office?” Cassandra
prompted.
“I remember reading somewhere
that all letters like that are archived
in the office. I want to find it. I want
to know who should be in jail instead
of my father for killing my mother.”
1. Use a steamer to steam the potatoes on high heat for 15-17 minutes. They should be tender
in about twenty minutes. Once you are able to easily insert a fork, remove the potatoes from
the steamer and let them cool for at least ten minutes.
2. Peel the potato skins. Then mash the potatoes in a large mixing bowl (I recommend using a
tuna mixer for this).
3. Combine the other ingredients. Beat the sugar, margarine, soymilk, egg, pineapple and co-
conut, vanilla, and spices in with the potatoes. Mix VERY well. If you don’t, you will be sorry.
Take my word for it.
4. Pour into a greased pan and, if you’d like, drizzle the top with honey. Bake for 45 minutes at
350oF.
5. Serve warm or cool. Enjoy!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Hey Food Fans!This month, every newspaper I’ve seen (thus far) has published many turkey recipes in prepa-
ration for Turkey Day. But as everyone knows, Thanksgiving meals are never complete with-
out pie. Below is one of my favorite pie recipes. I like it because it is versatile – it can be used
for the Thanksgiving main course, desert, or for any Shabbat meal. Plus, it will not fail you: it
will come out of the oven with the same consistency each time—I promise. But most impor-
tantly, this pie has a wonderful tang which will keep your guests wondering, “Where on earth
did that flavor come from?” Luckily, you’ll know that it came from pineapple and coconut!
Crustless Sweet Potato Pie
Culinary CornerBy Sarah Robinson
3-4 medium sweet potatoes
! C sugar
" C pareve margarine at room temperature
# C creamy soymilk
1 large egg
3 teaspoons pineapple juice
2 teaspoons coconut flavoring or coconut milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
A dash of cinnamon
A dash of nutmeg
A dash of ginger (optional)
Honey (optional)
Fly on the Wall
By Sarah Jane Ricklan
Part IV
Naval building in Valparaiso, Chile
Spectrum Page 8 November 2009
Arts & Entertainment
In theater, they say that the show
must go on. The residents of Valparaiso
felt as though they were actors in a cruel,
sadistic performance, and so for them,
too, the show went on. The sun rose the
next morning and each person awoke and
prepared for the day. As the sun climbed
higher in the sky, the downtown area of
the city filled with people. They were
tired and afraid, but they went to work.
They did not speak with the same en-
thusiasm as they had the day before, but
they greeted each other. They walked in
hurt footsteps, as if each of them had been
shot, but they walked. Time doesn’t stop
on a stage, and it didn’t stop for them.
As the busy streets quieted, two teen-
agers walked together. The boy, tall and
strapping, had an air of uncertainty about
him. The girl, slight and bewitching,
looked confident. They walked side by
side, but they neither looked at each other
nor spoke to one another. It was not until
they reached the enormous colonial na-
val headquarters building, a block away
from their destination, that they stopped.
The boy looked up at the intricate
white latticework, as delicate as a spi-
der web, and broke the silence. “I’m
having second thoughts.” He did not
Which of the following do you think would best improve
the atmosphere of the library during lunch period?
A. A Kosher McDonalds
B. A Kosher Starbucks
C. A Kosher Subway
D. A Kosher Dunkin Donuts
By Eli Portman
look at the girl, her eyes glaring
at him from under dark lashes.
“Miguel, we’ve discussed this!
The girl said, the annoyance and
urgency in her voice unmasked.
“You’ve told me why you need
this job! Tell me the story again.”
“I just think we should wait a
while, Cassandra. I’ll come back in
a week or so.” Miguel replied, still
staring at the blue building, his eyes
drifting to the door where two men
stood guard. They each held a rifle.
Cassandra shook her head. “Tell
me the story.”
The boy closed his eyes. He still
saw the officers’ large guns resting
on their shoulders. He sighed and
opened his heavy eyes. “Can we sit?”
Miguel led his friend to a nearby
bench. “You want the whole story?”
Cassandra nodded. “Remind
yourself why you wanted this.”
Miguel exhaled slowly and then
began to speak. “About a week be-
fore my mother’s death, I overheard
her speak to my father. They were in
the kitchen; it was past my bedtime.
I was coming down to tell them I
couldn’t sleep, but I stopped on the
stairs. I didn’t want to interrupt. My
mom was upset. At first I couldn’t
hear what she was saying; she was
whispering frantically. But I listened
closely, and eventually I heard.
“She told my dad that she had re-
ceived a letter. I don’t know what it
said; I don’t think my father ever did
either. She just said it was threaten-
ing, and that we had to move soon.
She was going to withdraw the
money. My dad refused. He said that
he couldn’t leave; he had his own
business and had finally established
himself as a reliable storekeeper.”
“Then he wanted to see the let-
ter. My mom shook her head, say-
ing that she had sent it back to the
post office without a return address.
Just then, my parents started walk-
ing toward the stairs, so I had to
rush up to bed before they saw me.
That was the last thing I heard.”
Miguel now stared at the Chil-
ean flag hanging out a window.
The wind rustled through it, mak-
ing the red, white, and blue dance
wildly against the blue building.
“And so why do you want the
job at the post office?” Cassandra
prompted.
“I remember reading somewhere
that all letters like that are archived
in the office. I want to find it. I want
to know who should be in jail instead
of my father for killing my mother.”
1. Use a steamer to steam the potatoes on high heat for 15-17 minutes. They should be tender
in about twenty minutes. Once you are able to easily insert a fork, remove the potatoes from
the steamer and let them cool for at least ten minutes.
2. Peel the potato skins. Then mash the potatoes in a large mixing bowl (I recommend using a
tuna mixer for this).
3. Combine the other ingredients. Beat the sugar, margarine, soymilk, egg, pineapple and co-
conut, vanilla, and spices in with the potatoes. Mix VERY well. If you don’t, you will be sorry.
Take my word for it.
4. Pour into a greased pan and, if you’d like, drizzle the top with honey. Bake for 45 minutes at
350oF.
5. Serve warm or cool. Enjoy!
Happy Thanksgiving!
Hey Food Fans!This month, every newspaper I’ve seen (thus far) has published many turkey recipes in prepa-
ration for Turkey Day. But as everyone knows, Thanksgiving meals are never complete with-
out pie. Below is one of my favorite pie recipes. I like it because it is versatile – it can be used
for the Thanksgiving main course, desert, or for any Shabbat meal. Plus, it will not fail you: it
will come out of the oven with the same consistency each time—I promise. But most impor-
tantly, this pie has a wonderful tang which will keep your guests wondering, “Where on earth
did that flavor come from?” Luckily, you’ll know that it came from pineapple and coconut!
Crustless Sweet Potato Pie
Culinary CornerBy Sarah Robinson
3-4 medium sweet potatoes
! C sugar
" C pareve margarine at room temperature
# C creamy soymilk
1 large egg
3 teaspoons pineapple juice
2 teaspoons coconut flavoring or coconut milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
A dash of cinnamon
A dash of nutmeg
A dash of ginger (optional)
Honey (optional)
Fly on the Wall
By Sarah Jane Ricklan
Part IV
Naval building in Valparaiso, Chile
The Culinary Corner
February 2013/Adar 5773
1. I knew a woman who owned a taser, man was she stunning!
2. There was a big paddle sale at the boat store. It was quite an oar deal.
3. Why did the capacitor kiss the diode? He just couldn't resistor.
4. Sleeping comes so naturally to me, I could do it with my eyes closed.
5. The patron saint of poverty is St. Nickeless.
6. The store keeps calling me to come back and buy more bedroom furni-ture, but all I really wanted was one night stand.
7. I'm not a big fan of archery. It has too many drawbacks.
8. Don't trust people that do acupuncture, they're back stabbers.
9. If towels could tell jokes they would probably have a dry sense of hu-mor.
10. Lightning sometimes shocks people because it just doesn't know how to conduct itself.
11. If you lose your hearing, is it ear replaceable?
12. John Deere's manure spreader is the only equipment the company won't stand behind.
13. My job at the concrete plant seems to get harder and harder.
14. A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.
15. The frustrated cannibal threw up his hands.
16. I could not pull out of my parking space, so I used my back up plan.
17. Deafness is getting to be quite a problem for me lately. I never thought I'd hear myself say that.
18. I finally got rid of that nasty electrical charge I've been carrying. I'm
ex-static!
19. A noun and a verb were dating but they broke up because the noun was too possessive.
20. I didn't have the faintest idea as to why I passed out.
21. The Dyslexic person always thought he was a great driver. He always got the notes saying “Fine Parking.”
22. A man walked into the doctors, he said, “I've hurt my arm in several places.” The doctor said, “Well don't go to any of them any more.”
Happy Purim!!!!!!
Jeremy’s JokesBy JEREMY FISHER ‘13
Hey Everyone!It’s that time of year again! Punxsutawney Phil didn’t see his shadow, so
spring is right around the corner. So it’s basically April. And April showers bring May flowers (what do may flowers bring? Pilgrims!). We thought it would therefore be appropriate to provide our dear readers with a recipe for a delicious mud pie.
Ingredients:DirtWaterA few small stonesA pinch of cinnamon (optional)
Instructions:Add water to dirt.Mix in the stones one at a time.Add cinnamon if you want an especially delicious mud pie.Mix with hands for three minutes, making sure you get as much mud on
your body as humanly possible.Throw at your friend/enemy
Note: For an especially hard hit, bake in the oven for 10 minutes prior to launch.
Second Note: Don’t actually throw mud at people. It’s mean.Third Note: Happy Purim!
