Watch this trailer for the animated film Mary and Max that is playing absolutely nowhere, but looks amazing.

Now read The Forward‘s review. The last line of this write-up just kills me.

It’s probably too good to be included on the Academy list. Oscars declare who the winners are; “Mary and Max” is firmly set in the land of the lost.

I occasionally get stuck in the position of having to explain to someone why I usually don’t care for mainstream films. I don’t think its because I’m an indie film snob. I just have trouble connecting to stories of Hollywood epicness. It’s the shaky, self-conscious characters of low budget, foreign, or otherwise unpopular films that always get me. Mary and Max seems right up my alley.

From the Toronto Sun:

BERLIN — Esther Bejarano says music helped keep her alive as a Jewish prisoner in Auschwitz and in the years that followed.

Now, 65 years after the liberation of the Nazi death camp, the 85-year-old has teamed up with the hip-hop band Microphone Mafia to spread her anti-racism message to German youth.

This sounds awesome and I really want to hear some of Bejarano’s tracks.

Former Seattleite Shmuly Tennenhaus, whom readers may remember from the 2008 election as the genius behind the Obamica and McKippah, has produced a helpful (not really) video with advice for observant Jews who wish to pray with tefillin on an airplane without arousing the suspicion of their fellow passengers. I recommend skipping ahead to about the two-minute mark. That’s where the funny starts.

Bummer, dude.

Via JTA:

A commercial flight was diverted to Philadelphia after a Jewish passenger’s tefillin were mistaken for a bomb.

A passenger on the US Air flight Thursday from New York to Louisville mistook the religious prayer article as a bomb, after the Jewish passenger had taken them out to pray, according to reports.

Tefillin consist of two boxes each on a strap of leather.

The passengers and crew were taken off the plane in Philadelphia. Fire trucks and police met the plane on the runway. The Jewish passenger, reportedly 17, was questioned and released. No one was arrested in the incident.

So, in Judaism there are a number of animals that are forbidden to eat. Those with cloven hooves, bottom-feeding sea creatures, etc. But the pig seems to get a particularly bad rap. I can’t imagine the lobster receiving so much scorn…

Anyway, here’s my question: Would kosher-keeping folks out there consider having non-kosher pets? Not for eating, of course. For companionship. Consider these adorable hogs. I want one.