I thought religion would make me live with my head in the clouds, but as often as not, it grounds me in this world.

This is what the Sabbath should feel like. A pause. Not just a minor pause, but a major pause. Not just lowering the volume, but a muting. As the famous rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel put it, the Sabbath is a sanctuary in time.

Giulia Melucci has written a wonderfully funny and moving book. It's like Eat, Pray, Love, with recipes.

I was very good at sitting. But I just read so much research about how horrible sitting is for you. It's like, it's really bad. It's like Paula-Deen-glazed-bacon-doughnut bad. So I now move around as much as possible.

I'm still agnostic. But in the words of Elton Richards, I'm now a reverant agnostic. Which isn't an oxymoron, I swear. I now believe that whether or not there's a God, there is such a thing as sacredness. Life is sacred. The Sabbath can be a sacred day. Prayer can be a sacred ritual. There is something transcendent, beyond the everyday. It's possible that humans created this sacredness ourselves, but that doesn't take away from its power or importance.

I love to live things, so I wanted to immerse myself and get into the mindset - and sandals - of my forefathers.

Plus, in one of his e-mails, the guy said he didn't like pancakes. What kind of asshole doesn't like pancakes?