Here we go again :(

Our regular cantor is having some necessary medical testing done after Yom Kippur/the Day of Atonement on one of the upcoming holidays, so the president of our synagogue, in his infinite wisdom (quoth she sarcastically) is bringing back our would-be High Holiday cantor to replace him temporarily.  He thinks it doesn't matter because "it's the same as Shabbos."  Uh, no.  It does matter, because the nusach for the Shalosh R'galim/Pilgrimage Festivals is not the same as the nusach for Shabbos/Shabbat/Sabbath, and because this under-trained Sefardi cantor, never having led a Shalosh R'galim service in an Ashkenazi congregation before (to the best of my knowledge), is probably no better qualified to lead an Ashkenazi Shalosh R'galim service than he was to lead an Ashkenazi Yamim Noraim/High Holiday service.  If our thinks-he-knows-it-all president had had the good sense to, ya know, ask someone who actually knows something about leading services, he might have concluded that the smart thing would have been to to hire someone else to lein and let my husband lead, rather that the other way around.  Instead, my poor husband is going to have to sweat bullets learning to lein the entire Torah reading for that holiday morning in less than three weeks, whereas he probably could have led a reasonably-respectable and "nusach-ically correct" Shacharit/Morning Service and Musaf/Additional Service with some practice.  (Remember that my husband, while a faster Hebrew reader and learner than I am and, unlike me, perfectly capable of chanting a haftarah without practice, is still, like me, a Hebrew School grad, not a yeshiva grad, and is not fluent in Hebrew, and therefore, is not much faster than I am at learning a no-vowels, no-punctuation, no-cantillation-marks Torah reading.  On the other hand, as a regular attendee of our Ashkenazi synagogue services, he can probably sing the Ashkenazi Shalosh R'galim nusach in his sleep, as can I.)   But the president doesn't care--he just wants someone cheap who's had some formal cantorial and voice training.  (He loves chazzanut.)  Sigh.  The president's a stubborn and incorrigible egocentric who rarely asks for help and/or advice unless he thinks he has no choice, but I suppose that, come Yom Kippur, I'll have to forgive him anyway.

And now, for something completely different.