Guns and cholent

We spent Shabbat with friends in Elazar and had a really wonderful time.  We ate, we sang we talked and then we ate again.  And of course we ate a bit more.  Good thing the town has some hills.  Actually the panoramic views of the Judean hills are amazing.  It must be incredible to wake up to that view every day.  I was surprised that the kids didn't notice how many of the residents were packing heat.  A guard at the synagogue we went to had a machine gun.  N did notice a lot of barbed wire fences around and asked about it.  I explained that some of Israel's neighbors don't think that the Jews should live in Israel so sometimes we have to put up fences to protect ourselves.  Of course he took it in his own direction.  He talked about a country he knows with very friendly neighbors.   The United States.  The relations are so friendly he told us--Canada doesn't even have an army.  So I will apologize in advance to any Canadian readers but I don't know if that's true.  I mean it sounds absurd but N can kind of be convincing.  I wasn't really sure how to debate that point so I didn't.  Meanwhile we of course got lost on the way home.  Fortunately, we stopped at a quicktrip type place for some snacks and found Kosher sushi which was pretty exciting b/c I absolutely love sushi and would never be able to just stop in and find kosher sushi at a quicktrip in Kansas.  Turns out I haven't really been missing much (should be self evident but gas station sushi--not so great) but it was still fun.  We are now researching smart phones b/c the days of no GPS etc. need to be behind us.  Anyone with a phone they recommend please leave a comment.