Twins: The Experiment

I am happy to present Twins: The Experiment, a new cartoon I produced for NCSY Summer Programs.

I composed original music for this toon, as well as all illustration, animation, and voiceover.

Currently mirrored at NCSY.org

Creased Comics

From the Creased Comics archives. I just discovered Brad Neely's work, great stuff!

Man, if God told me to sacrifice my son I'd tell him to FUCK OFF.

Her name is Lola

Mazel Tov! to my sister Sandy and her husband Todd, who had a baby girl, Lola Faye, on Februray 17, 2006. This makes me a first time uncle, too. Sandy and Todd met on JDate, so I guess some good can come out of that site after all.

Lola is named in the memory of our maternal grandparents, survivors Leizer and Pola Sztajnwurcel.

Check out the announcement cartoon I made for them, before they make me take it down, hehe.

Where in the World?

The Jewish Student Union have posted a cartoon I produced for them a few weeks ago, titled "Where in the World?" It is the story of a boy, unsure of what he should do for lunch, when all his options are so unappealing. Lucky for him, JSU is there to help!

All aspects of production, including illustration, animation, music, voiceover, and story, were done by the Jewish Robot.

The cartoon is being mirrored at JSU.com.

Meet Real Members

Like any other day, I started my morning by sifting through a cascade of e-mail spam, trying to get to the good stuff. And just when I had achieved a steady DELETE DELETE DELETE clip, the following e-mail, with Subject "Explicit satisfaction for your-person?" caught my eye:


Nothing too unusual about this solicitation for "18 MILLION ACTIVE MEMBERS REAL SEX NO COMMITMENT", I thought. Except for the photo of Girl #3, buttercore, age 22.

She looked familiar, like someone I'd like to meet. In fact, she looked like a girl I had tried to contact on JDate. So I blew the dust off my stagnant account, pulled up my Favorites Hot List, and lo and behold, there she was, VPCuteJew!


Going back to December, when I had written a brief lamentation about how the girls on JDate never reply to my corny one-liners, one of my lines was for this girl:

To the "Vice President with Looks"

I typically only date Presidents but I would be willing to lower the bar and make an exception here.

Apparently some folks were familiar with this gal's profile. One anonymous bloke commented:

I am not Jdating (yet), but I did take a look and saw the "VP with looks" you mentioned... I think I am in love. She deserves a better line than the one you sent her.

Well, does she deserve better? I think someone is up to some funny business here, and I suspect it is a non-paying member having a little fun with us lonely Jewish boys.

Years ago my buddy Jason became absorbed in a conspiracy theory, believing that JDate posted fake photos of non-existent members, just to lure people into signing up for an account. After several angry e-mails to JDate, he quit the service. And ended up meeting his wife-to-be the old fashioned way: at a party.

I used to think he was wrong, but now I'm curious. Take a look at the photo above of VPCuteJew in red. Notice the Copyright © Picture This Photography watermark on bottom. Makes me wonder if her photos were all ripped from a stock photography set. Or is it TheBestGirlsForYou.com who are to blame? (Go to http://bianco.thebestgirlsforyou.com/donna/ ... see if the ad is still there)

Either way, I think the only way we'll get to the bottom of this is if VPCuteJew contacts me immediately.

Beyond the Book

Young Yoshie and pops Chaim Fruchter performing at Makor
Tonight I had the pleasure of attending the CD release party for father-son duo, Chaim and Yoshie Fruchter, who, together with their band, performed songs from their new album, Beyond the Book: A Musical Journey into the Subconscious of Our Ancestors, at the Makor Café in Manhattan.

In Yoshie's words:

This album is compiled of tunes that we wrote from the perspective of different characters in the Bible, in first person. So Adam writes a song lamenting his expulsion from the Garden of Eden, Sarah sings her excitement at the promised birth of Isaac, even in her old age.

The music was inspiring and fresh, ranging from folksy to full-on rock, and Yoshie and his father sure can sing in harmony! I highly recommend checking out Yoshie's music online, and coming to see him next time he performs.

Yoshie admits he is addicted to tuning
Yoshie and me (the short one)

Scenes from Home

Peter G. Svarzbein and his work, B'nai Zion No. 1
Last Thursday, February 2, my friend, Mimi C. invited me to join her at Plan B, where Heeb staffer and photographer Peter G. Svarzbein was exhibiting his photo collection, titled Scenes from Home. Among the collection were a series of photos of old-school and new-school Jews from B'nai Zion, the synagogue in Svarzbein's hometown of El Paso, Texas.

NB: More info to follow as soon as I hear back from Peter