By Josh Gondelman — 22 Sep 2025

#150. Rosh Hashanah and You

Now THAT'S what I call a celebration.

Just a quick reminder up to that I'd love for you to subscribe to the newsletter if you've been enjoying it! A paid subscription especially helps keep the whole operation running, but anything's great! Thanks for considering!

Hi everyone,

It's been a weird week! Since you last heard from me, I took a tasting tour some of the north shore's finest roast beef sandwiches for Boston's WGBH station. More on that in a few weeks. I will say that I ate a nearly lethal amount of rare roast beef. I did also describe the sandwich from Kelly's, which transported me back to visiting my grandparents on Revere Beach as a teenager, as a "Proust Beef" but I would not be surprised if that gets cut from the finished segment.

Early on in my relationship with Maris, I remember mentioning to her offhand how there are no roast beef and seafood restaurants in New York. Like, little sandwich shops where you can get an onion roll full of roast beef but also a big basket of clam strips. Maris replied (reasonably, having not grown up on the north shore of Massachusetts) that "roast beef and seafood" is not a genre of restaurant that she'd ever heard of. I will be happy to (in a few weeks) have definitive proof for the world that it IS a kind of restaurant that exists!

Anyway! I ate a bunch of sandwiches, saw PUP/Jeff Rosenstock/Ekko Astral again (still the best), and came home to Brooklyn, where after one normal day and one day of being sluggish and slow-witted even by my standards, I tested positive for covid and absconded to our little office/spare room where I've been since Wednesday night (with the exception of masked trips to the kitchen and bathroom and to walk Maggie). I got on Paxlovid basically right away, so I haven't felt too gnarly, but it has been tricky being in a little room where I can't force anyone (wife, dog, friends, audiences) to pay attention to me. And I was crushed to miss a live Wait Wait recording in St. Louis (I'll be back on the show soon!) and TRIPLE CRUSHED to miss my friends Julia and Max getting married. Congratulations Julia and Max! I love you and am so happy for you both!!!

I'd been masking in big crowds and on trains, as I have been for the last five and a half years, but I'd been a little more lax otherwise, and it bit me in the butt right before I was scheduled to get a booster! This morning I'm feeling good and was hopeful that I'd test negative, but sadly there's still a pale pink positive line so I'm isolating today too.

BIG shouts out to the many people and things that made the last five days much more pleasant in my Clutter Palace (our home office, which I have made into a little chaos nest)...

Maris, a hero, for picking up meds and Gatorade and also for bringing home a different species of cookie basically every time she left the apartment and for taking care of all our normal life stuff while I was hidden away.
Amy Silverberg's novel First Time, Long Time which I loved!!! Amy is a great comedian and a great writer. I enjoyed this interview with other friend of the newsletter Maddie Connors where Amy explains that she wrote every chapter like its own little short story. But (SORRY TO DEFY YOUR SELF-REFLECTION, AMY) it still feels like a novel as well! There are just so many little moments of insight and observation where the reader can catch their breath, like save points in a video game.
Mattie Lubchansky's graphic novel Simplicity which I also loved. Mattie is so funny and righteous, and I love her imagination for horrible near future dystopia. Great stuff. Not for kids, unless you are ready to have the talk with your children about fighting fascism and how sometimes a guy has sex with a tree. In that case, maybe this is a beautiful instructional manual.
The wicked big half chocolate/half almond croissant that Lindsey brought me for sustenance.

Big croissant topped with almond slivers and confectioners sugar. — Between this and the roast beef sandwiches, I've been living wild.

The pho and sautéed broccoli (separate dishes) I ordered more than once from 5 Spice in Park Slope for ACTUAL sustenance.
The back half of Taskmaster Series 14. Great cast! Great tasks!
The New York Liberty for their valiant effort in round one of the WNBA playoffs. We'll get 'em next year!
Fisk on Netflix, recommended by friend of the newsletter Alison Leiby and starring friend of the newsletter Aaron Chen!
Also, as I'd mentioned before, I have been doing a little work with my friends at Going Down with Ella Yurman, an extremely queer Gen Z- led late night style show that airs on YouTube. This month's episode was hosted by head writer Reid Pope while Ella was away! Reid did such a good job as guest host!

I look forward to returning the the wider world soon. Assuming a continued recovery, Wednesday night I'm opening for my friend Gary Gulman (maybe the best comedian?!) at Union Hall and then popping over to UCB for my friend Chris Gethard's extremely fun variety show! On Saturday I'm performing the title role (Trevor) in my friends' live pilot reading for The Chronicles of Trevor at Caveat!

Then, on October 3rd, Leiby and I are putting on another Sup, Bro? at Union Hall! We've already got Amy Silverberg (remember, from before?), Brittany Carney, and Julia Shiplett on the lineup! More special guests still to be announced! We are expecting news about our pitch before then, so come see whether we are drunk (exuberant) or drunk (devastated). At least we did our pitching during the worst week for American comedy since Lenny Bruce died! We'll always have that! (Speaking of which, I've been mouthing off in the press, which I hope does not ruin my prospects for future employment, but I'd feel like a real wimp being quiet right now.) So, let's all keep our fingers crossed, shall we?

PEP TALK FOR ROSH HASHANAH

Same image from above. — They call it Rosh Hashanah because you will RUSH to dip those apples into that honey. (Joke works better out loud.)

A quick disambiguation up top: This is a pep talk on the occasion of Rosh Hashanah, not one directed towards the holiday itself.

Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year according to the lunar calendar, starts tonight. Along with Yom Kippur (the day of atonement), it's one of the high holidays of the Jewish faith. I've written about it in the newsletter before in part because I like to engage with and appreciate religious tradition when I'm not in synagogue-attending mode (and, to be honest, I am often not in that mode even when I am not recovering from covid).

As I get older, I appreciate the idea of an additional New Year Per Year more and more. It's another chance to refocus, rededicate, and reframe your feelings toward the year, yourself, your loved ones, your work. All the things you might want to hit RESET on. A second New Year is a second chance to Make It Through This Year If It Kills Me. It's another bite of the apple (with honey), and who doesn't need a second chance at something this time of year?

It's been such a bad news time lately. And Rosh Hashanah's appearance on the calendar is a helpful reminder that as long as we're hitting the ground, we might as well hit the ground running. Not to mention, if we can take the cartridge of our life out of the console and blow on it in September, we can do it anytime. Make up any excuse you want like when my friend's older brother used to turn off the Super Nintendo if he was losing because "the game [was] cheating." You can realign your goals in April at the beginning of spring. Or fuck it, scrap your whole plan for the year as early as February or as late as December if you want.

My favorite part of the period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur is the imperative to make amends with anyone you've wronged in the past year. And while I don't think I've slighted too many people (by that I mean I've kept my quiet shit talking game locked down), I could be showing up for people more. I think a lot of us can. "Us" meaning anyone who's not already maxed out on energy or time or money or emotional bandwidth we can afford to spend. When we're short on one (or even at a deficit that needs replenishing) we may have something else to give. Life's a real Take A Penny, Leave A Penny dish like that. Although on account of inflation, we should probably bump those trays up to a dollar each way. What are we accomplishing with a penny's worth of mutual aid in 2025?

What I really mean to say is: If I'm not for myself who will be? If I'm only for myself what am I? I am going to make it through this year if it kills me, and this year starts when I say it does.

PEP TALK FOR A READER

I did some light editing of this request because there was a short preamble and also a little compliment to me that I feel weird sharing, like: "Look, people enjoy this newsletter, I swear!"

I moved five months ago and I still haven’t properly set up the kitchen so the basic dishes and silverware have a home that is just where I shoved them while unpacking the first day and everything else is still in boxes, even though I want to feel settled! Most of the trouble is not wanting to make decisions but there are also some practical problems like I am too short for some of the shelves and pot lids are weird?! and I own too many small bowls but not enough large bowls.
- Seeking Cabinet Positions

Last week I replied to a pep talk request from someone who dragging their feet on a task that was becoming progressively more annoying. In my response I touted both the virtues of procrastination and my own skill at putting things off. And while I stand by both prongs of my answer, I will say, this week's question made my eyes go full-moon wide with horror and admiration. Five months and the kitchen supplies are still in cardboard boxes??? This is an unbelievable commitment to remaining noncommittal.

Reader, you have shocked me to my core, and I have a nearly unbeatable track record for not making a house a home. I lived in my first New York City apartment for over three years and never put art up on the walls. (I did have art. If you count movie posters as art. But it never made it off the floor.) My last year there, I slept on an unmade bed with my body contorted around a pile of clean-ish laundry most of the time. I will not replace a pillow until it's both flat as a manilla folder (I prefer it that way) but also the color of a manilla folder (I know! I know!).

But here is something I've learned over the years (largely from my wife's example and instruction). It's nice when things are nice. You don't have to splurge on fancy ceramic dishes if you don't have the money or the interest. But you can probably shell out for a little countertop organizer or a step stool. And I know you're mired waist deep in indecision about how to organize your cookware, but please let me offer this perspective: Leaving all your stuff in cardboard boxes IS a decision. It's not some magical cosmic waiting room. It's just annoying to you and looks bad to anyone else. By extension, any other decision you make will be the right one in comparison to your current system. And if you don't end up liking it, you can reshuffle the deck again. You can even return your cups and plethora of little bowls to your emotional support cardboard box if you really want to, which you will not. Nobody would choose to live like this unless they are starting off by living like this.

I am–as you probably guessed–terrible at organizing. But what I've gotten better at is knowing if there's an affordable product that will alleviate the burden of my own sloppiness. Sometimes that's ordering more coat hangers when I have used up all the coat hangers I have. Did you know you can just do that? You don't have to start layering coats one on top of another like you're making a puffy fake person to leave under your covers so your parents don't realize you've snuck out of the house? You can get a spare deodorant or phone charger so you always have one on hand. You don't have to wait until the old one has worn down to a sharp plastic grid or has ceased to function.

And, more importantly than that, you can just do the thing! I bet this task you've been dreading for nearly half a year could be squared away between breakfast and lunch. You just have to decide that it's worth putting off a couple of hours of reading or hiking or scrolling your phone. In this case, the timeline has added psychic weight to the task, but no practical complications. It will remain relatively annoying but not especially difficult, like opening a pile of mail that accrued over a vacation. You can do this. More than that, you'll be delighted and kind of embarrassed by how much you could have done this all along.

PICK-ME-UP SONG OF THE WEEK:
Clarence Carter - "Soul Deep"

Last week I spent a decent chunk of time last week zipping around the greater Boston area in my mom's new car. I passed the time popping between their satellite radio presets (Phish, Dave Matthews Band, The Grateful Dead, Broadway Hits!) and settling most often on the Tom Petty station. The Clarence Carter version of "Soul Deep" came up, and I rewound it three times (which you can do with satellite radio, I learned). Originally it was a Box Tops song, but this version is better! It's one of those songs that I can't tell if it was intended to be extremely horny or if these were just the words people used back when they made it. Ultimately: Who cares? It's a good song, whether it's horny on purpose or by accident. Thanks for this one, mom's car radio! And thanks to my mom for loaning me her car for a couple of days!