It's been a huge day, really.

President Bush nominated a crony with no judicial credentials to sit on the Supreme Court. Let the speculation begin that she's the target the Democrats are supposed to blast away at so that they're too tired and too politically spent to do anything about his real candidate, once Miers gets rejected (as some Republicans, angry that someone who went to a law school ranked lower in the US News list got nominated, cross the line).

The UFT and the City agreed to a new contract, though it really sounds like, at first blush, the city got the best of things, extending the work day for what seems like a fairly paltry raise.

John Roberts showed up in his robe and ... no gold stripes! CJ Rehnquist, of course, famously added gold stripes to his robe some time back, and there was great debate over whether Roberts would continue this potential new tradition. Though I never said so, I suspected he wouldn't. Everything about his character, as we can glean from his public behavior, points away from ostentatious displays, which certainly describes the stripes. Frankly, the simple black is far more stylish than the garish gold could hope to be.

Finally, tomorrow begins Rosh Hashanah, which apparently makes today Erev Rosh Hashanah (I suppose I'm learning some Hebrew?). That means I get two days off from law school, which could allow me to get ahead on the reading in a couple of my classes, which is exciting.

While I was walking toward the subway today after school, on 14th Street between 6th and 7th Avenues, I spied a small cadre of little Hasidic boys, maybe seven or eight years old. They were all wearing a bright orange sweatshirt with some kind of logo, perhaps from their school or youth group. They were apparently being shepharded by a young man nearby. I couldn't tell how old he was, but I'd figure my age or younger.

I had the Everclear bumping on my XClef when I realized that one of the little boys had caught my eye and was trying to ask me a question. I pulled out the left earbud and said, "Sorry?"

"Are you Jewish?" the kid asked, displaying a rather strong and, to me, unidentifiable accent.

"No, sorry." I'm not sure why I apologized. Am I sorry I'm not Jewish? Was I sorry he thought I was?

I realized as I walked away, glancing back at the group as they made their way east, that he and his mates weren't asking everybody this question. They weren't even asking all the white people. I thought it was odd that he thought I might be Jewish, though I did have a friend at Hampshire who assumed I was when he met me.

The big question, though: why'd he want to know? Was he going to give me something? Tell me something? As I mentioned, tomorrow begins Rosh Hashanah. Perhaps it's related? I must have a Jewish reader or two out there who can shed some light on this.