Jewish Musings, Monday, February 5, 2024

[peachymom1]

What’s on your mind — how to make kugel? This week’s Torah reading? Life goals? Prayer? We are all engaged in weight loss/weight maintenance journeys and we are all Jewish or at least interested in Judaism. We like to eat, we like to discuss. It is our goal here to provide each other support on our journeys, to share experiences, to call on our rich cultural heritage and texts, and to help each other grow spiritually.

Some of us take weekly turns starting the thread:

Frieda (hopefully)?
Holly
Lee
Louise
Lynne
Peachy

And for those of you that stop by to read this thread without posting — you are welcome to, but you are also welcome to chime in. Don’t be shy!

[peachymom1]

Good morning! It’s been raining hard since yesterday, with flash flood warnings. Thank you all for your kind support yesterday. Today I’m turning my attention to something happier – my son’s wedding. He finally picked a song for us to dance to: “You Are the Sunshine of my Life.” I love Stevie Wonder and think he made a great choice. His fiancee’s dad is too shy to dance, so the bride will dance with her mom instead, to “The Way You Look Tonight” (Michael Buble’s version, not Frank Sinatra’s). Yay!

Speaking of the wedding, DS33 and his fiancée are very eco-conscious, and they sent out lovely electronic wedding invitations via email instead of paper ones via the U.S. post. At first it seemed jarring, but bffs’ DD did the same thing a few years ago, and it seems to be becoming more common. What do you think?

I’ve also been thinking about how much less paper we use in general. When I was first hired at my job 20+ years ago, we printed everything and kept all kinds of paper copies of things in files, binders and cabinets, and we paid for off-site storage for things we had to keep for certain amounts of time. We also used to tape receipts to sheets of paper and fax them to accounting, along with expense report summaries. We don’t do any of that anymore – everything is electronic. My department went paperless long before the pandemic, and it’s a good thing we did, or I never would have been able to transition so easily to working completely remotely. I still use notepads for things I prefer to see on paper, but not for much. Hardly anyone ever asks me to order them office supplies; nobody uses staplers, tape dispensers, scissors, letter openers, or even pens or pencils. The most common item I buy for new hires is a wrist rest to use with their laptop, or sometimes spiral notebooks and yellow highlighters, but that’s about it.

At home, we get a lot of junk mail, and when we open it, we tear out anything with our names on it to shred, and put everything else into bags for recycling. It’s DS33’s job to take out both the trash and the recycling to their respective bins downstairs. This would have been unheard-of when I was a kid. I remember back in the 90s, a coworker was shot down for suggesting that we recycle our paper, but when I was hired for this job in 2003, recycle bins were at every desk, and we emptied them into the shredding bins when they got full.

What’s your experience and what are your comments and observations about going paperless, or at least reducing paper usage whenever possible?

[brgmsn]

I was shocked when I got my first paperless invitation, but it makes sense. No matter how beautiful they are, they get recycled. Or maybe you have 1 framed as a gift or to keep, but that's it.Paperless is so much smarter. Also putting everything online--responses, websites, and also not wrapping gifts. That was a surprise at my cousin's shower. No gift wrapping please. They displayed them all and that endless wrapping and oohing and ah-ing over them was taken out of the picture. I loved it.
When I look at how much we spent on printing and invites and stamps for all our bnai mitzvot and weddings....it's shocking.

[gazelle18]

I agree. The first time I got an electronic invite, I was not a fan. Then I realized how much more efficient it is, and so much less wasteful .
I remember years ago, being terribly unhappy when our local newspaper announced it was going completely online. There was a huge local protest, so the newspaper backed off, and still prints a small paper. I was so resistant to all of this, but once I started reading the news online, I quickly became a fan.

I will always remember with fondness the beautifully printed invitations to certain milestone events in my life. But I have to accept the fact that this is becoming more and more a thing of the past.

[lee058]

Good morning everybody. Hope you are all well and SAFE! Please pray for Israel.

Re today's topic: Call me old-fashioned, but I still think invitations should be printed. As for office supplies, I have plenty of them and use them every day, except my stapler. That is only an occasional thing.

I use my computer everyday though; couldn't manage without it.

Have a peaceful day, Lee

PS:  HOLLY if you see this, I tried to answer you about the 11th, but (speaking of computers!) couldn't get my computer to acknowledge that I had replied that anytime was fine with me, including your suggestion of 1:30PM Eastern.

[louise]

I'm with all of you - at first it was kind of shocking to get evites to things but I'm completely used to it now and it really is very effiicient. The last wedding one I got included stories and pictures about the couple and all kinds of information. Actually very nice! I used to rely on the synagogue newspaper for Mishloach Manot orders - long since gone. All on line now and works just fine and in less time to boot!

[hollygail]

I was unable to get here yesterday. My feeling is similar to those expressed by everyone on yesterday's thread. Once upon a time, a cousin (with whom I had been VERY close during childhood) accused me of something (having to do with positions after her mother's death) so egregious that I simply (well, I think it was simple) cut her out of my life. Nuff said...

I totally understand the ecological reasons for going paperless. However, there are things I still want on paper. I know there's a calendar (or maybe it's called a calendar app?) on my phone, but I want to see a black and white paper calendar. I create a spreadsheet each week to map out my commitments (and proposed commitments). I use it as my guide for what I'm going to be doing each day. I couldn't live without it. I print it (on the printer next to the computer) and hand write any changes all week long. I keep track of who I'm tutoring when, and which classes I've registered for, and when I'm teaching, when I'm walking with the women at the local lake, and ... and... (you get the picture).

lee058, Lee, I'm also behind on checking my email, so if your response came, I'll respond to it so you'll know it did. In the meantime, thank you for responding on today's thread!