mag
Heeb Issue #3 : Urban KvetchUrban Kvetch
Enid Doll, I ♥ Iraq, Soy Vey and more
Enid Doll
We have felt deep affection for Enid of Ghost World ever since she described the dweeby guys in her high school as extroverted, pseudo-bohemian losers. Reading along as Enid painfully discovers that she might not be smarter than everyone else after all brings back heart-wrenching high school memories. And now that the Jewish teen was played by Thora Birch in Terry Zwigoff’s film adaptation of Daniel Clowes’ graphic novel, they’ve made an Enid doll. A nearsighted doll with dark hair and retro style—rock on. This must be how black girls felt when they finally made the black Barbie.
GINA KAUFMANN
Rabbis in Kilts
What fun-loving Orthodox rabbi doesn’t want to frolic around in a skirt every once in a while? You’ve got to give it up for these free-balling, wild and crazy Scotsmen. Malted whiskey, bagpipes, Sean Connery and peeks at the rabbi’s package when he plays on the monkey bars. L’chaim!
SEMITIC ONE
I ♥ Iraq
Who says only New Yorkers should get love? These brilliant shirts say so much with so little. Brooklyn-based indie art shop Magic Propaganda Mill started making them last fall, and explains simply: “We’ve got no love for the corrupt regime that rules the Iraqi population. [But this] is for the Iraqi doctors, students, and street cleaners who stand to lose, yet again, when the U.S. flies its war machine through their nation and invokes more collateral damage on their cities.” They’re sure to be heralded by fashionistas as wartime chic, so if for no other reason than that, get yours now. Last year’s American flag gear is just so passé. (www.magicpropogandamill.com)
SCRIBE
The Sopranos
Italians are basically Jews with better food. Just ask my boyfriend’s extended family, who spends every birthday, anniversary and simcha sucking up marinara at Anthony and Mario’s checkered tablecloth in Jersey. So, of course, we love The Sopranos —funny, loving, angry, guilty, fucked-up about money and sex and success—but The Sopranos doesn’t love us back. What kind of representation do the Chosen People get in Sopranoland? There’s a fat-cat accountant/producer who made his money on the backs of hip-hop artists (Tony’s friend Hesh Rabkin); a neurotic psychiatrist (Dr. Melfi’s shrink, Dr. Kupferberg); a girlfriend-stealing politician on the take (Assemblyman Ron Zellman); and don’t forget a gang of truly venal black hats from the old neighborhood whose techniques of persuasion make the Family look like a bunch of choirboys. Why can’t we get some sexy, edgy Jewish stereotypes—a JAPpy undergraduate stripper, a heroin-dealing DJ—in there to offset all the whiny, greedy ones? Someone alert the ADL!
ANYA KAMENETZ
Soy Vay Chinese Marinade
The label quaintly reads: “Soy Vay began when a Jewish boy and a Chinese girl met and began talking about a common interest: fucking.” Actually, it reads “cooking.” It’s like Chinatown melted with the Lower East Side right in your mouth. It’s as Jewish as Chinese food on Christmas. Its fancy packaging uses Hebrew styling on English letters to spell out the name, so in English it reads “Soy Vay,” but in Hebrew it reads la-sa-ey-v-ay—total gibberish. But on seared tuna, let me tell you, it’s quite delicious.
LENNY BRUCE LEE
You Don’t Have to be Jewish
...to get heartburn from this record. Considering that Jackie Mason is currently on Broadway with his seventh one-man show, there’s no reason why this comedy relic from the last millennium boasting hackneyed sketches like “Divorce, Kosher Style” and “Secret Agent, James Bondstein” shouldn’t find an audience. But it instills a lot more oy than joy, and is primarily of interest as a pop culture curio. A series of quick comedy sketches written and produced by the admitted non-Jews Bob Booker and George Foster, it was so successful they produced a sequel, When You’re In Love The Whole World Is Jewish (a scary thought!) and both are available on one incredibly dense album. It’s worth a listen, but before you get started give thanks for Mel Brooks and make sure you have your Alka-Seltzer on hand.
RAVEN SNOOK
Ready-Made
Here’s a fun remodeling project: 1. Take Ready-Made magazine, the young nesters’ guide to alterna-crafts. 2. Now retool the name for a rag that’s entirely about creating things that aren’t already made. 3. Wring out the writers’ list and apply at least a couple of writers who aren’t Caucasians, for Chrissakes. 4. Vigorously jostle the magazine cover until you have entirely removed all the blasé, cool, nerd models. Et voilà: 2002’s second-tastiest magazine launch by an entrepreneurial Jewess. That wasn’t so hard, now was it, Shoshanna Berger?
JAIME WOLF
Lifegem
From the creepily named “living memorial” industry, a Lifegem is a diamond created from the carbon ashes of your cremated loved one, available in assorted colors. I can hear it already—women crowing from Scarsdale to Boca: “Can’t we do something about those pesky burial laws? Dig up grandma, kill your uncle; there’s a tennis bracelet waiting to happen!” And for the ecologically inspired, try Eternal Reefs, which creates cremation-concrete mixtures in which a marine habitat can evolve. My family is already planning to become the Great Barrier of the Bronx. (www.lifegem.com; www.eternalreefs.com)
MICHELLE ZIMMER
We have felt deep affection for Enid of Ghost World ever since she described the dweeby guys in her high school as extroverted, pseudo-bohemian losers. Reading along as Enid painfully discovers that she might not be smarter than everyone else after all brings back heart-wrenching high school memories. And now that the Jewish teen was played by Thora Birch in Terry Zwigoff’s film adaptation of Daniel Clowes’ graphic novel, they’ve made an Enid doll. A nearsighted doll with dark hair and retro style—rock on. This must be how black girls felt when they finally made the black Barbie.
GINA KAUFMANN
Rabbis in Kilts
What fun-loving Orthodox rabbi doesn’t want to frolic around in a skirt every once in a while? You’ve got to give it up for these free-balling, wild and crazy Scotsmen. Malted whiskey, bagpipes, Sean Connery and peeks at the rabbi’s package when he plays on the monkey bars. L’chaim!
SEMITIC ONE
I ♥ Iraq
Who says only New Yorkers should get love? These brilliant shirts say so much with so little. Brooklyn-based indie art shop Magic Propaganda Mill started making them last fall, and explains simply: “We’ve got no love for the corrupt regime that rules the Iraqi population. [But this] is for the Iraqi doctors, students, and street cleaners who stand to lose, yet again, when the U.S. flies its war machine through their nation and invokes more collateral damage on their cities.” They’re sure to be heralded by fashionistas as wartime chic, so if for no other reason than that, get yours now. Last year’s American flag gear is just so passé. (www.magicpropogandamill.com)
SCRIBE
The Sopranos
Italians are basically Jews with better food. Just ask my boyfriend’s extended family, who spends every birthday, anniversary and simcha sucking up marinara at Anthony and Mario’s checkered tablecloth in Jersey. So, of course, we love The Sopranos —funny, loving, angry, guilty, fucked-up about money and sex and success—but The Sopranos doesn’t love us back. What kind of representation do the Chosen People get in Sopranoland? There’s a fat-cat accountant/producer who made his money on the backs of hip-hop artists (Tony’s friend Hesh Rabkin); a neurotic psychiatrist (Dr. Melfi’s shrink, Dr. Kupferberg); a girlfriend-stealing politician on the take (Assemblyman Ron Zellman); and don’t forget a gang of truly venal black hats from the old neighborhood whose techniques of persuasion make the Family look like a bunch of choirboys. Why can’t we get some sexy, edgy Jewish stereotypes—a JAPpy undergraduate stripper, a heroin-dealing DJ—in there to offset all the whiny, greedy ones? Someone alert the ADL!
ANYA KAMENETZ
Soy Vay Chinese Marinade
The label quaintly reads: “Soy Vay began when a Jewish boy and a Chinese girl met and began talking about a common interest: fucking.” Actually, it reads “cooking.” It’s like Chinatown melted with the Lower East Side right in your mouth. It’s as Jewish as Chinese food on Christmas. Its fancy packaging uses Hebrew styling on English letters to spell out the name, so in English it reads “Soy Vay,” but in Hebrew it reads la-sa-ey-v-ay—total gibberish. But on seared tuna, let me tell you, it’s quite delicious.
LENNY BRUCE LEE
You Don’t Have to be Jewish
...to get heartburn from this record. Considering that Jackie Mason is currently on Broadway with his seventh one-man show, there’s no reason why this comedy relic from the last millennium boasting hackneyed sketches like “Divorce, Kosher Style” and “Secret Agent, James Bondstein” shouldn’t find an audience. But it instills a lot more oy than joy, and is primarily of interest as a pop culture curio. A series of quick comedy sketches written and produced by the admitted non-Jews Bob Booker and George Foster, it was so successful they produced a sequel, When You’re In Love The Whole World Is Jewish (a scary thought!) and both are available on one incredibly dense album. It’s worth a listen, but before you get started give thanks for Mel Brooks and make sure you have your Alka-Seltzer on hand.
RAVEN SNOOK
Ready-Made
Here’s a fun remodeling project: 1. Take Ready-Made magazine, the young nesters’ guide to alterna-crafts. 2. Now retool the name for a rag that’s entirely about creating things that aren’t already made. 3. Wring out the writers’ list and apply at least a couple of writers who aren’t Caucasians, for Chrissakes. 4. Vigorously jostle the magazine cover until you have entirely removed all the blasé, cool, nerd models. Et voilà: 2002’s second-tastiest magazine launch by an entrepreneurial Jewess. That wasn’t so hard, now was it, Shoshanna Berger?
JAIME WOLF
Lifegem
From the creepily named “living memorial” industry, a Lifegem is a diamond created from the carbon ashes of your cremated loved one, available in assorted colors. I can hear it already—women crowing from Scarsdale to Boca: “Can’t we do something about those pesky burial laws? Dig up grandma, kill your uncle; there’s a tennis bracelet waiting to happen!” And for the ecologically inspired, try Eternal Reefs, which creates cremation-concrete mixtures in which a marine habitat can evolve. My family is already planning to become the Great Barrier of the Bronx. (www.lifegem.com; www.eternalreefs.com)
MICHELLE ZIMMER
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