As we start the next 50 years of married life, I see that we share an anniversary, more or less, with the film Rocky, and that there is going to be a limited re-release very soon. Since, we missed it the first time, should we see it now? I know it takes place in Philadelphia, maybe, and I know that Sylvester Stallone runs up the stairs to the Philadelphia Art Museum, maybe. Ask me any other questions about Rocky, and you will draw a blank.

That’s the story of my life. I think I know and understand so much, and I don’t know the most basic things about American culture, things that virtually everyone else not only knows, but seems to know instinctively. I have never seen any of the Rocky films (I think there was more than one), not any of the Godfather films (there were three?), not The Sopranos on TV. In fact, if I made a list of everything that each of you have seen time and time again, perhaps, that list would take up the remainder of this blog post. I won’t bore you.

Our 50th anniversary went very nicely, thank you. Our big celebration was the trip we all (most of us, at least) went on in July. That was meant to be the big anniversary celebration. And, in a way, it was. But, golly gee, it was so long ago, it hardly counts.

We did think about having a party – but we figured that every time you plan a party, you have to leave someone out, and we didn’t want to do that. It was bad enough that we did that when we got married.

We had a very small wedding, with then very close friends. Today, some of those friends, as you might imagine, are no longer with us, at least one is suffering from a very sad, chronic, long term illness, one we don’t know if we saw at all after the wedding, a couple we haven’t seen in decades, and a few we see quite a bit of. We thought about finding all of them we are alive and kicking sufficiently to join us, and just getting together with those who have survived the past 50 years. We thought about that very seriously…..for three or four minutes, before discarding it as an impractical idea.

So, everything was low(ish) key. We had Shabbat dinner at daughter Hannah’s with Hannah, Andrew, Joan and Izzy. And it was very good, and we got to see Izzy’s Halloween costume. He was “Link” (no, I had no idea), and we had a long discussion about whether Link, a character in Nintendo’s Zelda series (series of what?), was left handed or right handed. This turns out to be a matter of some interest to those who are interested, and if you ask Gemini the question, as we did, you will get a complete answer, with a very complete explanation.

With Joan, we got talking about Pan, Pandora, Pandemonium, and their relationships to each other. Did you know that Pandemonium came from Paradise Lost, so it is a word (actually a location) invented by John Milton? None of us did.

Yesterday morning, Edie and I had an aliyah at Adas Israel, which was very nice. We didn’t stumble (either on our feet or giving the Torah blessing), and Rabbi Lauren Holtzblatt said some nice things about us (really about Edie, but I pretended that it was about me, as well). Our family came and six year old Izzy did sit through a good part of the service, before needing to explore the entire building that he knows so well.

As an extra treat, having nothing to do with us, retired D.C. Circuit Court Judge David Tatel spoke at Adas after kiddush about his book Vision (we already have a copy) and his life as a blind judge. Rabbi Holtzblatt’s husband, Ari, had served as his clerk and he was described as the reason the Holtzblatts moved to DC in the first place. We had heard Judge Tatel speak at Politics and Prose when the book first came out, and it was a delight to hear him again, speak both about his journey and about the unfortunate changes which have taken place in the American judiciary over the past few decades.

Then we had free time until we left for dinner in Bethesda with Michelle and Josh at Aventino, an Italian restaurant where we have eaten a few times before, but not for quite a while. I must say that the food, as well as the company, was superior. We splurged. For an appetizer, we had strips of anchovies on sourdough bread with cultured butter, lemon and dill. Then we had a salad with butterhead lettuce, pears, pecans, feta cheese and who knows what else. Edie and I each then had rockfish with roasted potatoes and baby artichokes. And then we had four desserts – a chocolate sorbetto, a risotto cake with mascarpone cream, a chocolate and roasted almond cake and tiramisu cookies. Could not have been better.

This morning (no longer our anniversary), we, with our good friends Simon and Rosie, set all of our clocks back, and took a walk in Rock Creek Park.

We then had brunch at a restaurant new to us all, Three Whistles, at the corner of Georgia Avenue and Military Road, in the old Masonic Temple building. It opened earlier this year; we had driven by it numerous times (as thousands of people do every day; it is a very busy intersection), and had seen the sign above the door (“Eat Drink Work Gather”), wondered a bit about it, but never had a reason to stop. But today we did, and it turns out it is a delightful place. I had scrambled eggs, hash browns and toast, and the eggs and hash browns were of very high quality. Three Whistles is a restaurant, a cafe, a music venue, and a co-work place. Very, very pleasant. Just right for an informal Sunday brunch.

It is now 1:30 pm Eastern STANDARD time. I have the rest of my day ahead of me.