Two-bit prophecies around a hard-boiled egg

Warning: this post is full of aimless weekend rumblings caused by an innocent hard-boiled egg eaten as part of my breakfast.















One may ask, what a normal human being would consume a hard-boiled egg at breakfast? And one will be in his/her rights asking that perfectly legitimate question. A normal human should eat a happy-faced fried egg, sunny side up, with a runny yolk. And not before applying judicious quantities of salt, pepper or other peppy condiment according to his/her taste. And not just one egg, but two, or, better, three, all in that perfect sunny side up state of being.

But, as SWMBO rules, fried eggs sunny side up are to be eschewed as long as the bird flu runs high and mighty around the Middle East. Funny that - we, the Zionists, invented and unleashed on the world this curse (at least our cousins claim so), and now we cannot open our collective mouth without inhaling that cursed virus...

Anyway, this is not about Zionism. It is about prophecies that come true. And here I am proud (moderately, since it is all two-bit stuff) to mention that several months ago I have predicted that March will be the month when the malady gets to our area. The reasoning was simple: more than half of European birds migrate to and from the green hills of Africa via that row of rivers, valleys and whatnot that is called Syrian-African Fault (or the Great Rift Valley) and happens to cross Israel. Where it is known as Jordan river, Galilean Sea, Dead sea etc. It only makes sense that our chicken, turkeys and other poultry will catch the bird flu as soon as the migration starts. And here we are - up to our arses in dead poultry.

Being a born pessimist, I can add another two-bit prophecy. This will deal with the first person in Israel to get the bird flu. It will start with Gazan and Israeli smugglers, who could care less about all these fences and security surrounding Gaza. Greed knows no borders. The whole story will include a few cases of infected eggs smuggled from there, a typical Israeli family that, as usual, could care less about the health ministry warnings and a fried egg or two - sunny side up...
Well, let's move on to some more heart-warming matters. That boiled egg reminded me also that the Passover is close and that the egg has a direct relation to that most important holiday of ours. Here I must apologize to all my Israeli readers, that story I am going to tell is, most probably, very well known to all. But others may be less aware of it, and there must be a lesson in it. Somewhere, at least.

One of the items consumed during the Passover meal is a hard-boiled egg that is traditionally dipped into salt water. Whatever is the historic reason for this tradition, the more modern explanation goes like this: Moses did part the Red Sea waters for the tribe of Israel to march to the other shore. However, being Jewish (not an Israeli, no, but still...) he was carrying the gene of what is known today as "chaltura", which is a Russian word widely used in Israel to signify a shoddy job. As a result of Moses' chaltura, the waters parted only to leave a meter and some of the salty liquid, sufficient to reach a man's waist. And this is why...
















So here we are, back to the hard-boiled egg, and Happy Pesach/Passover to all!