Taanis Esther

The Fast of Esther. Time to go deep and connect with Esther.  Think of her situation.  Caught in the middle - the "double agent" of all time! And what do we know - who's side did they (Achashverush/Haman) think she was on? Had they no intel regarding her past? The Maharal says an amazing thing - King A, who knew nothing of Esther's past, loved her each day like the first time -- he had nothing to connect her to, or to connect to her. Esther the Trickster. Maybe she read Mother Rifka's instructional manual on disguise, planning and pullingoff the impossible plot.  Did they have the help of G-d? Duh... the eternal master-mind, the Chess Player par execellence --the Ribbono Shel Olam -- the Master of the Universe - By G-d they had his help.
The Fast of Esher - going deep - going deep down the well of knowing and not knowing, seeing and not seeing, understanding and understanding that its' all beyond our mind, our experiences, our ability to connect -- and yet, we do connect. We feel the pain and the suffering all around us, and we relate to the underdog who will come out victorious.  We understand the kicks in the butt that we need to wake us up, and we understand that all we really need to do is to cry out - G-d Save Us!
And guess what folks, even for this we have a soundtrack!
Starting at 12:15 pm'ish - we have Shlomo, and then at 1:00 we have our Israeli Soul afternoon today featuring:  Aaron Razel, the Diasporah Band, Purimm, Simply Tsfat,and R' Yitzhak Marmorstein and Greg Wall and the Later Prophets. Torah Today will be at 2:30 PM - and feature: R' Avrohom Sutton, on Purim.
7:30PM we'll go back to the 2nd session of the Rebbe Nachman Chabura with R' Ozer Bergman.
8:30 PM we begin "Cookin' for Shabbos" - Again, Already????
and the beat goes on.....
As far as the overnight goes --
11PM - 1:30 AM - The Grateful Dead - 3/18/71 St. Louis, Mo.
2:15 AM - Jimi Hendrix - Winterland - 1968
3:20 AM - Sting - Bring on the Night
4:45 AM - The Grateful Dead - 3/17/75 - from Ace's farm.
and don't forget - between 8 and 9:30 AM - Music for the morning, or Music if you've been up all night -
submitted by our own....
...and Friday's Plan, you ask?
Let it remain hidden until is is revealed.