I was instructed “to cover” this past Sunday’s Israel Parade, which was the usual six hours of sun, filled sweaty swarms of yeshiva students — excited to support the Jewish State (either that, or forced to attend by their parents and teachers). But all sarcasm aside, I, as usual, enjoyed the parade and loved hearing (and sometimes understanding!) Hebrew conversation all over Fifth Avenue. Almost made me think — just for a second — that I was in Tel Aviv.

My favorite part of the parade, however, without a doubt was when one of my best friends, a good Catholic girl named Kristin, ended up posing as a cover girl for a Jewish matchmaking service. Solicitors from Shoshanna’s Matches — for “non observant, Reform, Conservative & Conservadox, Modern Orthodox — were all over the place at this parade, distributing flyers and purse-friendly mint packs with Shoshanna (Rikon)’s picture stamped on them. Eyeing Kristin and myself, one of the men (though I think he was gay) apparently decided that he found us pleasing to the eye and asked if we would pose for photos with Shoshann’s ads, so they’d have something to ad to their PR repertoire.

Being a Jewish journalist who could potentially write/blog about them one day, I declined, but Kristin accepted the offer. And there she stood, modeling the mint packages and smiling for the camera, and instantly becoming the new poster child of the Jewish dating world.