When Pigs Fly: Purim 5780

I get that Purim is about breaking the normal rules and formalized transgression, but I still felt guilty about a giant gathering in the time of coronavirus.

Last night was Mishkan's 2020 Purimspiel, entitled "When Pigs Fly" and held in the Chop Shop in Wicker Park. I was a little about that degree of transgression, since last year it was held in a theatre, but all the food was vegetarian and there was a ton of candy and treats donated by Silverstein Base Hillel, none of which I could eat when I got there because it was still Ta'anit Esther and the sun hadn't set yet. But after getting a nametag, I got a plate of food, went in to sit down, and saw kevin.hogan.353 walk in right behind me:

kevin.hogan.353: "What are you dressed as?"
Me: "I'm dressed as 'guy who came straight from work.' "

The spiel was designed by dana.kroop and themed around Fiddler on the Roof, so they had songs with a whole crowd singing and the lyrics projected up on the screen. There were a couple interstitial skits as well, about Mishkan trying to find a new location (they settled on the International Space Station), about sex ed (with free lube samples!), and a tap dancing act by one of the rabbis. But the centerpiece was the reading of the Megillah, which as far as I could tell used the same jokes as last year:

Stop me if you've heard the one about how we run the world.

I could have done without all the dick jokes about Achashverosh, which just reminded me that calls to stop using humor over innate characteristics are usually disingenuous or hypocritical because people are fine directing those jokes at people they don't like. Oh, see, those are bad people, so it's okay to make fat jokes. I'm sure you know the type.

On the other hand, someone came in costume as San from Mononoke-Hime, so the costumes were great.

Mishkan had set up a bunch of stations and performers here and there, with a juggler, a guy on stilts, a Tarot reading, a spontaneous poetry writer, and so on, but I spent almost the entire time either talking to or dancing with britshlez, dana.kroop, and kevin.hogan.353. When the evening wrapped up, we asked one of the doormen where a good bar was, and walked two doors over to Tapster, the pour-your-own-drink bar, and pretty soon after we ensconced ourselves in leather seats one of the rabbis, his fiancée, and someone else showed up, so we sat together for a while:

Him: "We’ll smoke a little weed, study a little text..."
Me: "Like some kind of Dank Yomi?"

...closed down the bar, and then went home at midnight, where I did more chores and now I'm at work.

I'm exhausted, but the Purimspiel was great! 🥳