🕎🍷 Happy Chrismukkah!🍷🕎 🎅🦌🎄☃️

🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️It's time for the Cosmopolitan Globalist's Jewish Christmas Lollapalooza, only more so!🌟🕯️🕯️🕯️🕯️🎁🍷🎁

0:2:22 Paris time

Kittens

You asked for them, you got ‘em:

I put up the net you see below because when they were littler, I was sincerely worried they’d high-speed race one another right off the edge of their cat gym on the wall and brain themselves. But I succeeded only in accidentally building an even more fun way for them to brain themselves.

At least it’s not so far to fall. That net has saved them from going splat on more than one occasion.

Two bros sharing a mouse.

We do this whenever I brush my teeth. It never gets old.

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00:45 Paris time

Contest!

The first reader to compose a villanelle in honor of Chrismukkah at the Cosmopolitan Globalist gets a year’s free subscription.

The rules:

1. Both themes must be represented: Chrismukkah and the Cosmopolitan Globalist.

2. You must follow the rules of the form faultlessly:

   1. Five stanzas of three lines each, followed by a final stanza of four lines, for a total of 19 lines; the first and third lines of the first stanza alternate as the closing lines of subsequent stanzas and appear together in the final stanza.

   2. The rhyme scheme is ABA for the three-line stanzas, and ABAA for the concluding stanza.

   3. Two key lines, introduced in the first stanza, serve as refrains that cycle through the poem:

   4. Line 1 appears at the end of stanzas 2, 4, and 6.

   5. Line 3 appears at the end of stanzas 3, 5, and 6.

Skanky limericks do not qualify.

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23:12 Paris time

Chrismukkah Latkes

Here’s how to make really goyische but absolutely delicious coconut latkes with cranberry applesauce and cardamom mascarpone. If you have leftover cranberries, this is perfect.

For the latkes:

• 2 cups russet potatoes, washed and peeled

• 1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

• 2 eggs

• 2 Tbsps flour

• 2 Tbsps granulated sugar

• ½ tsp salt

• ½ cup canola oil

For the cranberry applesauce:

• 3 pounds apples (any kind)

• 2 cups fresh or frozen cranberries

• 2 Tbsps granulated sugar

• 1 tsp cinnamon

• ½ tsp ground ginger

• ½ tsp ground allspice

• Zest and juice from 1 orange

• 2/3 cup water (1/2 cup if using frozen cranberries)

• 1 Tbsp brandy (I use more, but I like my food liquored up.)

For the cardamom mascarpone:

• ¼ cup mascarpone

• 2 tsp cardamom

INSTRUCTIONS

First you make the cranberry applesauce. Put all ingredients in a saucepan, stir them together well, then bring them to a boil over a medium heat. Reduce the heat and simmer for about 15-20 minutes until apples begin to break down and cranberries begin to burst. Remove from the stove and let it cool a bit. Then blend everything or put it in a food processor until it’s applesauce-y. Put it in the fridge.

Mix the cardamom and mascarpone in another bowl and set it aside.

Then shred the potatoes on the large side of a box grater. Wring out all the moisture with a strainer, then put them in a towel and twist and squeeze them until you’ve got as much moisture out of them as you can. (That step is really important: They won’t cook right if they’re too wet.) Put them in a bowl and mix in the coconut, eggs, flour, sugar, and salt. Meanwhile, heat up the oil in a big skillet over medium-high heat. Scoop two-tablespoon dollops of the potato mixture, flatten it a bit, and fry until the latkes are golden brown—about 3-5 minutes. Flip them and fry the other side.

Drain them on a rack over paper towels.

You will love these. They’re only served on Chrismukkah.

If you want something more traditional—but better than the traditional ones—try these:

And if you want the super-traditional ones, try these. Turn on the subtitles:

I understand that they can come out well in an air fryer, too, which I would definitely consider trying because latkes can be a little greasy.

I haven’t tried these, but she looks like a woman who knows from latkes. She has some interesting thoughts about technique, too:

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The Chrismukkah Bush

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Dog heroes

Rachel suggested this very sweet video, which I watched with pleasure:

The YouTube algorithm observed my interest in trained dogs, combined it with my antecedent viewing history, and suggested I might like this:

Boy was it right! It’s about the training of a French Special Forces dog. I was riveted. Yoda is a 6-year-old Malinois member of the 1st Marine Infantry Parachute Regiment of Bayonne, and his human counterpart is named Patxi. This is a training exercise, but they’ve both been parachuted for real over war zones in Africa and the Middle East, on counter-terrorism missions, where Yoda was integral to the’ ‘neutralization” of the targets. (They weren’t forthcoming about the details, but Yoda’s in the running for a medal celebrating his heroism, apparently.)

You know, I love my kittens so much you’d think I whelped them personally, but I have to admit they’d be useless at rescuing hostages, seeing as they panic and race for cover at the sound of the food processor when I make a plate of latkes.

Unfortunately, the video is in French, and they didn’t enable closed captioning. But you’ll be able to follow it: It’s pretty obvious what’s going on.

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20:12 Paris time

SPELLING BEE!

Here’s the link. You’ve got one hour from the time I post this. Share your score in the comments. No spoilers.

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19:31 Paris time

Happy Chanukah! Happy Christmas!

And in honor of one of the very rare occasions when Christmas and the first day of Chanukah fall on the same day, please permit the Cosmopolitan Globalist to be the first to wish you the happiest of Chrismukkahs, too!

If you’ve been here a while, you know that on Christmas Day, the Cosmopolitan Globalist always celebrates with a Traditional Jewish Christmas:

Let Traditional Jewish Christmas Begin!

Merry Christmas and Joy to the World

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, Brain in a Vat Edition

It's the Cosmopolitan Globalist Christmas Lollapalooza!

There have only been five Chrismukkahs since 1900. (Store that fact in a drawer in your brain marked, “Useless information with which you might one day win a pub quiz.”)

So in honor of this very rare event, this year we’ll be performing the Traditional Chrismukkah Ritual.

“What’s that?” you ask. “And how does it differ from an ordinary Jewish Christmas?”

Well, first off, we’re skipping the Chinese. The ritual involves latkes, marscapone, ramen noodles, two oranges, and a nice, dry Manischewitz. (I’ll explain, just wait.)

Then we do everything we do during a Jewish Christmas Lollapalooza—only more so.¹

Plus, there’s a surprise.

Bookmark this page

I’ll be updating it throughout the Chrismukkah, blog style, with anything that amuses me. The only rule will be “nothing depressing.”

So no wars, famines, speculation about the solution to the Fermi paradox, or gloomy lucubrations on the demise of liberal democracy. Not today. Today, we’re going to pretend none of that’s happening. If they could do it on the Western Front, so can we. The Cosmopolitan Globalist, today, will be nothing but good news. There may even be games. Or quizzes!

Prizes might include free subscriptions to CG for the first person to leave the right answer in the comments. (Or they might not. Depends on my mood.)

And just for today, there’s no paywall. Not even for the comments section. So today’s the day for all of you readers who never pay for what I write to come meet the ones who do, or as I think of them, “the readers with honor.”

You can bring your whole family. And if things are getting a little fractious at your family Christmas dinner, I strongly suggest that you do. You know when Mad Uncle Myron starts talking about January 6, your aunt is opening—oh, my God, is that her fourth bottle of wine?—one kid’s screaming that the other one broke his new robot, someone needs a diaper change, and you’re getting that tight feeling in your temples prefatory to a monster headache? That’s your cue: It’s time to bring your whole family to the Chrismukkah Lollapalooza! We’ll distract them while you sneak off to the bathroom to see whether Grandma still keeps that bottle of Vicodin in her medicine chest to go with the gummies you stashed in the diaper bag. Your headache will be gone in no time.

Do you have an item to contribute? Something delightful, or adorable, or just interesting but not depressing? Leave it in the comments, or send me an email with Traditional Jewish Christmas Lollapalooza in the subject heading.

Merry Chanukah! Happy Christmas!

Our very, very best and warmest wishes from the Cosmopolitan Globalists to every one of you.

1. You may, if you prefer, replace the Manischewitz with a bottle of Portuguese vinho cheapho plonkho. That’s what I plan to do.