The Banner Photos
The banner photos in the slideshow at the top of this Home Page were taken by me (and my aging but trusty Nikon D50). Most of the photos (such as the garden spider, redbud blossoms and Town Lake photos) were taken in Austin, but a few others were shot in places like the Bay Area, California (the ice plant blossom and poppies) Sarasota, Florida (the sunset) and Greene Family Camp (the tree foliage).

  • Who made this site?

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    This web site is the work of Steve Folberg, Senior Rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel in Austin, Texas. It's a place for me to share things I'm interested in and care about with members of my congregation and others.

  • Blogs

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    You'll find two blogs here.
    There's torahblog, a general blog on occasional topics of Jewish interest.
    There's also omerblog, an annual, interactive foray into the spiritual themes of the 50 day period between Passover and Shavuot, known as the Counting Of The Omer.
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  • Geekery

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    This Site
    I design and maintain this site. I use the amazing RapidWeaver web authoring application for Mac OS, along with the astonishingly useful Stacks plugin by YourHead software, a pile of third-party Stacks by Joe Workman and Weaverthings and the Abstract theme by Elixer. My computer is a trusty early 2008 MacBook Pro with a number of (*ahem*) "modifications" including a 500 gigabyte Samsung SSD. I am thinking of renaming it The Golem.
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    The Laptop Project
    For several years, I've been collecting old laptops from friends, neighbors and members of Congregation Beth Israel. I refurbish them and donate them to folks who need a computer and can't afford one.
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    Fun Stuff
    I think that even a serious web site should reward exploration and give the visitor a sense of delight and discovery. That's why you'll find "pop up captions" that are triggered by mouse hovering on most of the graphics on this site and various little widgets and buttons that either give you more information or are just there for the heck of it or because I figured out how to do it. :-)
    For example, whenever you see one of these little guys1 hover over it (or tap on it on your mobile device) and some extra snippet of info will pop up.
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    Your Proverbial "Ta-Da!"
    Pointless, but fun, no?