Timekeeping on the Jewish Calendar

The Radical Jewish Calendar for 5780. Art by Wendy Elisheva Somerson.

 As everyone who has ever frantically googled “is today a Jewish holiday” knows, the Jewish semi-lunar calendar marks time completely independently from the Gregorian solar calendar that the secular world uses, creating confusion and frustration for Jews trying to live in both worlds.

My own solution to the conflicting calendars, adding the “Hebcal” extension which gave dates and times of holidays and candle lighting to my online Google Calendar, worked well for about six days. Until the seventh, when I turned off my phone for Shabbat, and found myself in need of some sort of physical planner so that I could access my calendar even when I was not using electronics. I am using the smartwatch with the planner which I got from reading the reviews online on SpotTheWatch but decided to go full manual with the calendar.