JIB Awards, Take 2

The JIB (Jewish and Israeli Blogging) awards continue. The first round of voting is over, and the second round begins.

In the first round, I lost in all categories. This is due to a combination of the fact that a large majority of my posts and readers are not Jewish/Israelis, while I was competing against very good and very popular sites that were entirely so.

Or perhaps due to the large scale voting fraud and hacking that the awards endured. Considering that the awards have generated almost no press, and the winners receive no cash, one wonders why these miscreants bothered.

Anyway, the second round of voting is for individual posts. I noticed a couple of minor problems with the way the voting procedure works, but, again, considering the stakes and the fact that this is all done by volunteers, I'm not going to raise a fuss.

I'm up for Best Post (twice), Best Jewish Religious Post (twice), Best Humor Post (twice), Best Right Wing Post, and Best Picture or Video in a Post (twice).

I found a number of very good posts among those nominated, which I would like to share with you. These represent some of the Jewish and Israeli bloggers' best work over the past year, and are worth a looksee.

The always amazing Treppenwitz tells the story from his Navy days of how to get a proper surrender.

SerandErez contemplates that Pobody ever needs to be Nerfect. And has a bit of a surreal hitchhiking experience.

Westbankblog brings an American perspective to learning how to use a gun in On Holocaust Remembrance Day, M16's, and a New Respect for Veterans.

The Curious Jew writes some heartfelt words about Jews who go Off the Derech.

Ask Shifra posts an amazing tale of childhood disappointment in Nothing Special. She also introduces into the Jewish lexicon the term "Hot Chanie" in this marvelous post.

EllieTalk remembers the day she was told her husband had died, and reflects on her new husband dealing with it.

Frum Satire thought an entire singles shabbaton was hilarious.

The Muqata's pre-shabbat gender role division sounds vaguely familiar to me.

The disgraceful episode on the #2 bus, where a woman was attacked for not sitting in the back, is reposted here.

Yehuda