Starting "yanuar" (January) 9, we celebrate "Clean Off Your Desk Week."

"Reynikn" and "oysreynikn" are the Yiddish words meaning "to clean." This year I've resolved to become more organized. My "shraybtish"is a mess! So, I've decided to empty my IN/OUT box and note its contents:

3" x 5" index card containing a quote by Dr. Bruce Powell, Head of New Community Jewish H.S.:
"You own it. It's your inheritance. Not to speak Yiddish would be like having a million dollars in the bank and not knowing the name of the bank or the account number. Yiddish will give students access to a thousand years of their own past. They'll have the keys to part of the kingdom."

Invitation to attend a program titled," Kids and Yiddish: The Meshugas Continues."
The program is designed for those kids having trouble separating the schlemiel from the schlimazel and the mensch from the meshuggeneh.

Article by Joel Stein titled, "Oy To the World:
Have a merry Christmas already." He writes about a group called Jews Against Anti-Christian Defamation. Founding member, Jackie Mason, spoke out against the war on Christmas. He basically argued that if people can't say "Merry Christmas," then he won't be allowed to wish people an "Exceptional Purim." That one doesn't translate from Yiddish well.

Post-it note containing a Conan O'Brien joke:
"President Bush is traveling right now. Today he was in Japan and took a tour of the temple with the prime minister. There was an awkward moment when President Bush said, "Funny, you don't look Jewish."

Admission ticket to the 41st annual Int'l Fancy Food & Confection Show...and an ad for Tearless Onions which said, "Let us do the crying for you."

Lenore Skenazy column (Daily News) containing a new disorder:
"Shleptomania"--Going from store to store even though you don't really know what you want and are maxed out on your credit cards anyway."

E-mail from Sylvia Schildt stating that Bush's claims about WMD are "nisht geshtoygn un nisht gefloygn."

Brochure from the American Communities Helping Israel, stating "The best way to the heart of the Israeli economy is through the American stomachs." (It's like the 11th Commandment. Thou shall not leave the supermarket without a product from Israel.)

Hanukkah 2005 card. Inscription:
"Hey it is a Hanukkah card just from me!... although my bubbie would like to be included, along with her sister Sadie and great-grand nephews (Such nice boys). Oh, and I can't forget Uncle Saul, who still has a slight touch of indigestion, or his wife Miriam, who sends her love and wants you to call once in a while (not that she's complaining). And, Oh! Did I mention cousin Rachel, who's married to that chiropractor... Uh, anyway, Happy Hanukkah! Whoops - I forgot to mention that nice neighbor of your Aunt Sophie, who makes the best rugelach..."

Printout of an e-mail from Naday Ben-Ami stating that the Yiddish word for Christmas is NOT "Krismes"; it's "Nitl."

Ad for Oreck XL Ultra Vacuum:
"You think your pets mess up the place? Try eight reindeer."
Mrs. Claus, North Pole

Photograph of a sculpture of NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg made out of Sabra hummis.

3" x 5" index card containing an excerpt from press material from "So Jewtastic":
"In an age when Madonna demands to be called 'Esther,' Jon Stewart is a sex symbol and seemingly everyone speaks a little Yiddish, it's never been hipper to be a Jew."

Article titled "iGeezer Generation" by Lenore Skenazy. She writes:
"When I was about 9, my grandfather saw me using a push-button phone and exclaimed to my mother, 'Kenahora!' which roughly translates as: Move over, Einstein (and while we're at it, Golda Meir). 'So young and she can push the keys!'"

Review of the movie, "The Producers" (by A. O. Scott, New York Times):
"...Ms. Stroman, meanwhile, does not have the film making instincts to match her deft, emphatic choreography. The close-ups may cause you to cower under your seat or reach for an umbrella to fend off the spray of saliva that seems about to pour from the screen."

New York Times listing for the B'way show, "The Odd Couple." "Odd is not the word for this couple. and it's not a natural fit. Don't even consider killing yourself because the show is already sold out."

Article by David M. Halbfinger (New York Times) stating that Mel Gibson, whose "Passion of the Christ" was criticized by some as anti-Semitic--and whose father has said that the Holocaust did not happen--is developing a nonfiction mini-series about the Holocaust.

Receipt for the purchase of three copies of Michael Wex's book, "Born To Kvetch."

Article titled, "Oy Tannenbaum" by KatharineWeber (New York Times) in which she discusses how her father negotiated the purchase of a Xmas tree:
"When they are done, my father says something to the tree man, who shrugs and replies, 'Zay gezunt' before he turns away to deal with another customer. Driving away, slowly, because of the tree, which is not aerodynamic, my father explains to me what a goniff is (the tree man), and what hondling is (bargaining to get a fair price for our tree from the goniff).

Because we are in the neighborhood, we stop to get knishes at the store where the people behind the counter still know my father, so they give us extras. We eat the knishes on the way home. A hot knish - that is the taste of Christmas."

Article from the Washington Post which calls Rabbi Shmuley Boteach "Dr. Ruth with a yarmulke."

William Safire's "On Language" column (New York Times Magazine, 8/28/05):
"According to Sol [Steinmetz], a data-bank search shows klutz to be among the Top 10 Yiddishisms in English. The others: glitsch, kosher, bagel ,maven, mensch, schlock, schmooze, tush and chutzpah."

Package of Wet Ones moist wipes.
Pkg. says, "Out there lurks a world full of unanticipated schmutz. Need we say more?..."

Movie review by A. O. Scott of "Prime," starring Uma Thurman, Meryl Streep, and Jerry Adler:
"Lisa is played by Meryl Streep, in a strenuous but not unamusing performance that suggests Dr. Melfi from 'The Soprano's' crossed with Molly Goldberg, the Yiddishe Mama dynamo from the long-running radio and television series...Ms. Streep shows her fondness for Yiddish inflections and polite ethnic shtick. To which I can only say: Meryl, enough already! So you can say tuchis and nosh on some pastrami... Mazel-tov! Jackie Mason you're not."

Paper sign--found in supermarket wagon:
ATTENTION: TATE-MAME: UNATTENDED CHILDREN WILL BE GIVEN AN ESPRESSO AND A FREE PUPPY!