EZ Reads 7/22/09: Learning

You never realize how much you have to learn until you start learning it. You also never realize just how much you can already do from common sense and what you do know until you start trying it. It's quite interesting how even if one implicitly knows this, it's still a bit of a surprise once the person is faced with it. And now, for some good readin':

• Chana with her guide on how to treat a woman. Interesting.
  
• Jewboy has a kollel conundrum.

  If I could do anything I wanted to, perhaps I would stay in yeshiva, at least for half the day. I am often left wondering how people that stay in kollel make it. How does someone who learns full time, has more kids than I do, and whose wife is marginally employed at best make a living? How does such a person afford to own a home in the inflated Jewish neighborhood and send their kids to school? The numbers just don't add up. And yet I personally know multiple people like this. My family was at an event recently. A young mother with at least 4 children emerged from a beautiful, spacious home and apologized that her husband would be late because he was "still in the kollel." How is it possible? I could not afford their house with my wife and I working decent jobs.

• A sad post at ProfK about a couple divorcing after 44 years... primarily because of pressures from their descendants to keep working hard to support them. Now the (higher-earning) wife is an outcast to all but the self-sufficient child for wanting to wind down her work, against the wishes of the husband and other kids. I hope we're not in for more of these - or grandparents and great-grandparents who feel pressured to continue working to support the lifestyles of their families.
  
• NMF#7 with an interesting post on writing, as she finishes reading a novel written by a girl younger than herself. As she notes, it pays to stop waiting and try doing.
• A very thought-provoking post by the Rebbetzin on the challenges of being non-Orthodox. When there's no Reform school in town, raising kids isn't quite as simple.
• An important history on the kashrus of Coca-Cola at Hirhurim. Important, yes, because it's Coke! V'hamaven Yavin.
  
• The Cavs switch to paperless ticketing, something I think is brilliant. The most interesting aspect: They had 5-6% less no-shows by switching over, as people could more easily transfer tickets to friends or others if they couldn't make it.