Rotem Gear attended a party to celebrate the publishing of the book Cool Jew: The Ultimate Guide for Every Member of the Tribe during Book Expo weekend here in L.A. Here’s author and lovely uber-cool-jew Lisa Alcalay Klug showing off the spanky new cover and wearing a Rotem Gear retro Vegas-inspired shirt “Lucky One-Eight” t-shirt. (For those who don’t know, 18 means “life” and is good mojo.) By the way, this is not the shirt that will be in the book.

Lisa read excerpts from the book, including how to make egg creams and Mani-martinis, demonstrated by wacky actress Barbara Heller.

Check out that pict! Mani and Absolute .. seems almost heretical … a shanda, a boosha. And maybe charpa thrown in to boot. But really it’s a sort of screwdriver that looks like a tequila sunrise, and it’s all in fun and … well, get the book and make one and you’ll see :D.

The book will become available on September 1st, just in time for Rosh Hashana! But you can pre-order the book on Amazon.

Cool Jew: The Ultimate Guide for Every Member of the Tribe

From reviews:

Cool Jew covers everything Hebraic from womb to tomb, finally putting an end to Christmas tree envy. Short essays, lists, instructional guides, photographs, and original illustrations celebrate Jewish cultural pride with love, enthusiasm, and irreverence.

Entries ranging from “Heebonics for the Yiddish Impaired” to “Self-Help for the Christmas Carole Intolerant” provide the long-awaited Jewish response to that WASP manual of the ’80s, The Preppy Handbook.

We adore sushi but let’s face it, not everyone is a fan of raw fishies and vinegary rice. Still it’s hard not to admire the art that goes into crafting the bite-sized dishes. For those who love to look but not taste, there’s an alternative — chocolate sushi!

Personally speaking, when we see maguro or ikura our synapses are already registering “fish-wasabi-shoyu” but there’s no denying the exquisite skill that goes into these chocolates, and perhaps once we made the neurological switch all would be well. (If anyone wants to send a test package, we’ll let you know how that goes .)

Looks like the real thing, but the tuna is strawberry chocolate with hazelnut, the shrimp is creamy almond, and the egg is lemon-flavored with meringue filling and chocolate “nori. The rice is crispy rice “cookie.”

Courtesy of our friends at Lil Penguin Shop .

Put this under the “Now we’ve seen everything” category … Jones Soda has 2 special issue holiday packs of their soda — one for Christmas and one for Chanukah.

Each set comes with four different sodas. The Chanukah flavers incude: Latke Soda, Apple Sauce Soda, Chocolate Coins Soda and Jelly Doughnut Soda. The Christmas flavors include Christmas Ham Soda, Christmas Tree Soda, Egg Nog Soda and Sugar Plum Soda.

Interestingly, the Christmas sodas, including the ham-flavored one, are kosher. We could see egg nog soda being good but have no desire to try ham soda and it has nothing to do with dietary laws. Not so sure about latke soda either. Could peppermint stick soda have been so hard? Still, we love weirdness! (Last year they had turkey and gravy -flavored soda!)
A portion of sales go to charity $12.99 each, including dreidel or stocking stuffer.
Thanks for the tip to JGoode!

Technorati Tags: chanukah gifts, chanukah soda, jones soda, christmas soda

We admit it — we’re Mac-heads. And one of our favorite resources is SmallDog.com. Not only are they knowledgable and authorized Apple dealers, but you’ve got to love a company whose employees bring their dogs to work, regardless of size, *and* you get small (toy) dogs in every order they ship out.

Beyond all that likeability, though, is their commitment to “striving to reduce the environmental footprint of running our business, including the environmental impact of the electronic products we sell and service.”

Last Saturday, the day before Earth Day, Small Dog Electronics offered free ewaste recycling at their South Burlington, Vermont store. They collected well over 35 tons of old electronic junk that might have simply been tossed in to the landfill, where toxic elements such as lead and mercury would leak into the ground. This junk will be parted out and ultimately ground down. The powders will be elementally separated, recycled, and reused in new gear.

According to the EPA, 2.5 million tons of electronic waste, or “ewaste” is generated every year, including iPods, cell phones, printers, monitors, and especially computers. More than 60 million computers are buried in landfills around America, containing elements such as lead, mercury, and arsenic. Unfortunately, only 10% of this waste is ever recycled.

SmallDog has recycled over 65 tons (!) of electronic waste since the program began.

See? It’s not just the toy dogs we like
(Source: SmallDog’s TechTails Newsletter)

Have an old computer that still has life in it? Consider putting it up for adoption at your local freecycle.

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Today’s Eco-Reco:

We love the one-of-a kind glass baubles — pendants, bracelets, rings and buttons — that Sprout Studio creates with reclaimed, found imagery. There’s something magical about the clear glass — maybe it reminds us of sea glass, or maybe it’s the unique image in each one, like a crystal ball image of a moment frozen in time. Our advice is, if you see something you love, grab it, because once it disappears, it won’t be be back!

We can’t wait to try this coffee, because it sounds yummy: “a sweet, nutty coffee from Uganda with notes of pecan and nutmeg, grown by an amazing and unique cooperative.”

It’s from Mirembe Kawomera (mir´em bay cow o mare´a) which means “delicious peace” in the Ugandan language Luganda. It is the name of a Ugandan cooperative of Jewish, Muslim, and Christian coffee farmers.

This remarkable cooperative was founded in 2004, when JJ Keki, an Abayudaya Jew, traveled on foot, knocking on each of his neighbor’s doors, asking Jews, Muslims, and Christians to put aside their differences and join him to create an extraordinary partnership.

Mirembe Kawomera Coffee is Fair Trade Certified, guaranteeing the farmers a fair price for their coffee and supporting the 558 family farmers of the Mirembe Kawomera Cooperative, and $1 from the sale of every package donated to the Mirembe Kawomera Cooperative to support their community-based projects.

This very special coffee can be purchased via the Thanksgiving Coffee Co., who specializes in organic and fair trade coffee.

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Today’s Eco-Reco:

MoonDropClothiers offers an eclectic assortment of recycled, organic, and fair trade goods from various artists, from jewelry and clothing, to incense, shoes, skincare and home decor. This week they are having a sale on all totes and market bags to help you break that nasty “paper or plastic?” habit. The Fair Trade African Recycled Plastic Bracelets (below) really caught our eye.

Technorati Tags: coffee, fair trade, uganda, cooperative, delicious peace, moondrop clothies, recycled clothing, hemp clothing, africa