Quiet, beautiful day before a long weekend....
Last weekend was far, far too social and I've been making up for it with early nights all week. Might take a walk on the Corniche tonight.
Ball bouncing, brain buzzing. Since my slipped disc episode last month, my desk chair is now a Therapy Ball. It looks vaguely like an oversized testicle with an acne problem, but my other option was a giant hot pink bit with handles. Talk about picking your poison...I get strange looks from visitors. Occasionally I come back from the bathroom to find my Assistant bouncing on it.
I'm playing with old Christmas decorations on my desk when I pause, thinking about what to write. Ball, bell and drum. For almost everyone I talk to, the first two months of 2009 have been *miserable* and I am no exception. Death, friendships and relationships crashing, other friendships renewing in light of tragedies, back injuries. One friend of mine jokingly referred to "Some sort of celestial crapstorm" for January and February and I had to tell him he's right- there was some sort of eclipse at the end of January. No wonder people in the Dark Ages buried themselves in holes during eclipses. If the next eclipse on schedule is anything like this one I'm starting my own bunker.
So, clear cutting is also always an opportunity or series of opportunities waiting to be taken advantage of. Yes. But let me add my voice to The Universe right now..."I'm listening already. Y'all don't gotta be...like that. I know there is a "whiteboard and markers" version somewhere."
However, spiritual clearcutting appears to be finished (at least for today, touch wood). The end result being, by doing the one thing I told myself I would never do, I found something I didn't think existed. Now you can argue that the back injury, the death, the relationships and friendships crashing and renewing within 8 weeks all put me in a spot to do this thing, but I'm starting to wonder where The Universe took their teaching credential.
For the time being, I'm going to enjoy the impossible and take a walk on the Corniche.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Saturday, February 28, 2009
20 sec at black diamond
Home, good people of the world. This is home.
And he asked me if I believe in God.
Okay, I'm bored
and I'm going to make the world suffer in spite of it.
(Though I will tell you now, I'd rather be comfortably bored at home than under any social or necessary constraint to go out in the filth storm raging outside right now.)
So, the 25 Random Things About Me. Enjoy.
1. I did run with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain in 1996. Those things are the size of a Fiat and twice as fast.
2. I like people a lot, but everyone gets an honest slice of me with every interaction. So it drains me very quickly, and I spend a lot of time alone recharging. If it goes too far, it affects my physical health.
3. I want want want to see the final resting place of Bucephalus, the horse of Alexander the Great. 'Parently it is somewhere in India, complete with a temple. I will find it, oh yes.
4. Alexander the Great is one of my heroes. How one man can move that much Whup-A** on foot across a continent, 300 years BCE, is a source of ceaseless amazement and inspiration to me.( It couldn’t have been done without Bucephalus.)
5. I look almost exactly like my mother, who assured me until I was 27 that I looked exactly like my father.
6. I'm far more personally conservative than most people realize. However, do as you like- I might or might not, but I'm sincerely glad to see you living your life to your own lights.
7. On the flip side, if I decide to lark off looking for the grave of Bucephalus...
8. I have five brothers. One is dead, c. 1992.
9. I am a Special Needs (Special Education) teacher, Moderate/Severe Special Education, Autism Specific. This means, I talk to the people who can’t “Talk”.
10. I grew up on an island, 10 KM away from San Francisco.
11. I was in the army, briefly, to pay for college. I know how to shoot (which I love to do) as well as place a Claymore Mine strategically in an ambush. I know how to stage an ambush. In a pinch, I could probably recall how to call in air support when the ambush doesn’t work, but don’t push it.
12. If I'm walking outside, quickly, hands in pockets with sunglasses on and I don't turn or answer, full of attitude, chances are that I'm running a poem or number patterns through my head and you haven't registered yet. You can be in front of me for several seconds and not register. It's really not personal.
13. That weird eye-rolling back thing I have is my only legacy from Attila the Hun.
14. It is profoundly against every value I hold precious to tell you, by word or by withheld word or by look or by giggle or implication or breath of thought, how to live your life. If you are puking in bucket, I will help wipe your face because that is most useful, not two people puking in bucket. However, if you ask my advice, I will give it to you.
15. I love wearing pretty clothes.
16. I find something to like in everyone and almost everything except green peas.
17. I was raised Mormon. Orthodox Mormon. Look it up. I said RAISED.
18. The worst sick in the world for me is stomach upset.
19. I started reading when I was 2.
20. I do not own a microwave or television. I have not owned either one for over 5 years.
21. Children, my own or teaching/watching other peoples, is critical to my everyday happiness.
22. My ancestors were indeed “Fined, whipped and burned out of Salem” by Nathaniel Hawthorne’s grandfather, for being Quakers.
23. I am not fearless. I'm terribly shy.
24. I bake really good bread from scratch.
25. I would rather be outside with a backpack. Period.
(Though I will tell you now, I'd rather be comfortably bored at home than under any social or necessary constraint to go out in the filth storm raging outside right now.)
So, the 25 Random Things About Me. Enjoy.
1. I did run with the bulls in Pamplona, Spain in 1996. Those things are the size of a Fiat and twice as fast.
2. I like people a lot, but everyone gets an honest slice of me with every interaction. So it drains me very quickly, and I spend a lot of time alone recharging. If it goes too far, it affects my physical health.
3. I want want want to see the final resting place of Bucephalus, the horse of Alexander the Great. 'Parently it is somewhere in India, complete with a temple. I will find it, oh yes.
4. Alexander the Great is one of my heroes. How one man can move that much Whup-A** on foot across a continent, 300 years BCE, is a source of ceaseless amazement and inspiration to me.( It couldn’t have been done without Bucephalus.)
5. I look almost exactly like my mother, who assured me until I was 27 that I looked exactly like my father.
6. I'm far more personally conservative than most people realize. However, do as you like- I might or might not, but I'm sincerely glad to see you living your life to your own lights.
7. On the flip side, if I decide to lark off looking for the grave of Bucephalus...
8. I have five brothers. One is dead, c. 1992.
9. I am a Special Needs (Special Education) teacher, Moderate/Severe Special Education, Autism Specific. This means, I talk to the people who can’t “Talk”.
10. I grew up on an island, 10 KM away from San Francisco.
11. I was in the army, briefly, to pay for college. I know how to shoot (which I love to do) as well as place a Claymore Mine strategically in an ambush. I know how to stage an ambush. In a pinch, I could probably recall how to call in air support when the ambush doesn’t work, but don’t push it.
12. If I'm walking outside, quickly, hands in pockets with sunglasses on and I don't turn or answer, full of attitude, chances are that I'm running a poem or number patterns through my head and you haven't registered yet. You can be in front of me for several seconds and not register. It's really not personal.
13. That weird eye-rolling back thing I have is my only legacy from Attila the Hun.
14. It is profoundly against every value I hold precious to tell you, by word or by withheld word or by look or by giggle or implication or breath of thought, how to live your life. If you are puking in bucket, I will help wipe your face because that is most useful, not two people puking in bucket. However, if you ask my advice, I will give it to you.
15. I love wearing pretty clothes.
16. I find something to like in everyone and almost everything except green peas.
17. I was raised Mormon. Orthodox Mormon. Look it up. I said RAISED.
18. The worst sick in the world for me is stomach upset.
19. I started reading when I was 2.
20. I do not own a microwave or television. I have not owned either one for over 5 years.
21. Children, my own or teaching/watching other peoples, is critical to my everyday happiness.
22. My ancestors were indeed “Fined, whipped and burned out of Salem” by Nathaniel Hawthorne’s grandfather, for being Quakers.
23. I am not fearless. I'm terribly shy.
24. I bake really good bread from scratch.
25. I would rather be outside with a backpack. Period.
Friday, February 27, 2009
I had these fabulous dreams of sleeping in, this morning. Till a whopping 8 AM, when I would turn over and contemplate going back to sleep or a hot cup of coffee. Alas.
6AM I woke up from a vivid dream where I was stationed outside my childhood church, watching a "High School Musical" sort of production set. Instead of "High School Musical", it was something like "The Trouble With Geeks Hooking Up For Love Or Marriage". One of my college friends drifted inside the church with Impatiens in her hair just as a guy in white coat with clipboard whirled around and informed me that "the numbers aren't looking good this year".
That's when I woke up. 6:21 AM. Five hours of sleep, two nights in a row, and I've been on holiday for the last 4 days. Essh.
"Oh the weather outsiiiiiiide is frightful..." yes Bing, it sure is. Sitting in bed with the curtains open, I can't tell if it's dust or impending rain. I keep getting up to look for a film of dust on the cars outside, because I'm not sanguine enough to think it could be free floating moisture obscuring my window. Anteus might be naive to the umpteenth degree, but dumb she is not.
So, I solved all of this by making a fresh pot of coffee.
My stomach actually hurts a lot, which is probably why I woke up so early with such vivid dreams. It could be the burgers I ate last night. OR it could be the raw beef with pureed garlic chaser I dug into at the Lebanese restaurant yesterday afternoon. Naw, it was the burgers for sure.
In bed with the 'puter and a cup of coffee, and Joseph Heller's "Catch 22".
This book has been on my "Must Read" list for years as a sort of duty to lists of "Must Read" books (the most recent being batted around Facebook with a BBC warning that an average person has read 6). I was put off it years ago by my 10th grade english teacher, who sort of dismissed it out of hand with a passing reference to a Catch 22. What I did not anticipate was that this book would be side splittingly funny. If you have ever watched the MOVIE, not the series I mean the movie M.A.S.H, this is the WWII version in codex format. Highly recommended.
Decadent, is what this is. After the last two days of lunch and shopping and people and late evenings and getting together, to sit in my pyjamas and glasses and no bra and no makeup by myself in the morning without a single plan for my day is a, how you say, indulgence that my married and Impendingly Married friends do not enjoy- a couple of them are in the first few days of figuring this out. Ooops, I just belched! Is someone going to control this woman? ;-) I think I will get more coffee.
It's raining marriages/engagments right now, which explains part of the vivid dream. Man-Thing being the next to latest to punch the numbers: hajj, 30, "suitable" wife. Mas'allah, I have not met her and will not. Mas'allah, I will never have to deal with what she does for a Mother In Law! For a western feminist raised in California to read that, it might sound archaic and quaint: be clear in understanding, THIS IS NOT YOUR COUNTRY! THIS IS NOT YOUR CULTURE! For the record, it's not mine either, but it doesn't make the statement any less true, Mother In Law included. Kuwait, this place, doesn't exist anywhere else, sometimes we living here doubt our own existence.
6AM I woke up from a vivid dream where I was stationed outside my childhood church, watching a "High School Musical" sort of production set. Instead of "High School Musical", it was something like "The Trouble With Geeks Hooking Up For Love Or Marriage". One of my college friends drifted inside the church with Impatiens in her hair just as a guy in white coat with clipboard whirled around and informed me that "the numbers aren't looking good this year".
That's when I woke up. 6:21 AM. Five hours of sleep, two nights in a row, and I've been on holiday for the last 4 days. Essh.
"Oh the weather outsiiiiiiide is frightful..." yes Bing, it sure is. Sitting in bed with the curtains open, I can't tell if it's dust or impending rain. I keep getting up to look for a film of dust on the cars outside, because I'm not sanguine enough to think it could be free floating moisture obscuring my window. Anteus might be naive to the umpteenth degree, but dumb she is not.
So, I solved all of this by making a fresh pot of coffee.
My stomach actually hurts a lot, which is probably why I woke up so early with such vivid dreams. It could be the burgers I ate last night. OR it could be the raw beef with pureed garlic chaser I dug into at the Lebanese restaurant yesterday afternoon. Naw, it was the burgers for sure.
In bed with the 'puter and a cup of coffee, and Joseph Heller's "Catch 22".
This book has been on my "Must Read" list for years as a sort of duty to lists of "Must Read" books (the most recent being batted around Facebook with a BBC warning that an average person has read 6). I was put off it years ago by my 10th grade english teacher, who sort of dismissed it out of hand with a passing reference to a Catch 22. What I did not anticipate was that this book would be side splittingly funny. If you have ever watched the MOVIE, not the series I mean the movie M.A.S.H, this is the WWII version in codex format. Highly recommended.
Decadent, is what this is. After the last two days of lunch and shopping and people and late evenings and getting together, to sit in my pyjamas and glasses and no bra and no makeup by myself in the morning without a single plan for my day is a, how you say, indulgence that my married and Impendingly Married friends do not enjoy- a couple of them are in the first few days of figuring this out. Ooops, I just belched! Is someone going to control this woman? ;-) I think I will get more coffee.
It's raining marriages/engagments right now, which explains part of the vivid dream. Man-Thing being the next to latest to punch the numbers: hajj, 30, "suitable" wife. Mas'allah, I have not met her and will not. Mas'allah, I will never have to deal with what she does for a Mother In Law! For a western feminist raised in California to read that, it might sound archaic and quaint: be clear in understanding, THIS IS NOT YOUR COUNTRY! THIS IS NOT YOUR CULTURE! For the record, it's not mine either, but it doesn't make the statement any less true, Mother In Law included. Kuwait, this place, doesn't exist anywhere else, sometimes we living here doubt our own existence.
My Hair Smells Like Charcoal Smoke
And I'm up far, far past my bedtime for the second night in a row.
I'm hoping that somehow the smoke-a-licious flavor to my hair will be absorbed by the pillow in about an hour, as I don't feel like shoving off to Salon tomorrow. In fact, the entire agenda for my Tomorrow can be encapsulated by a pair of pyjamas.
It's Liberation Day weekend in Kuwait. For the children, young adults and like minded grownups, a four day weekend, three of which are spent dancing on top of cars on Arabian Gulf Road and spraying copious amounts of foam over everyone and everything. For those holding down day jobs, four days of scheduling everything possible in Farwaniya.
It was a very productive weekend for me, I have to admit. I have socks, jeans, bras and shoes. Not just any shoes- I managed to score a pair of "I've been looking for these in Kuwait for 18 months" plain old black and white LOW TOP Converse. Now, I've had a great deal of trouble
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finding these without "extras": red graffiti, zippers, unfinished edges, etc. One friend of mine went so far as to simply chop down the black and white hightops with a paring knife, he so despaired of finding this shoe- and he grew UP in Kuwait. Never fear I would fail a friend- I got him a pair at the same time cos they were selling out so fast.And I finally scored the shoe of my dreams- I mean, the shoe of my dreams besides those Kate Spade "Eden"'s at the top of my wardrobe. I'm a pencil skirt, sweater set and pearls type. I've been trying to scare up a pair of Mary Janes on the...wrong... side of "Lolita" (err on adulthood for that metaphor) since I came to Kuwait. Victory! A perfect pair of Steve Madden "Luvvy" this afternoon, when a disappointed friend tossed the box to me in a shop because they were too big for her...and now I find out they have a secret identity feature in the strap. Oooh.
Oh I have to sleep...I have a wee rant about men in Kuwait, but I'm wanting to make it coherent...
Friday, February 20, 2009
Thursday, February 19, 2009
S-S-S Slacking
Let me point out right now, this is not a gratuitous "Rub In The Collective Face of the Global Economy" post.
I understand quite clearly that around the world and around me, people with families are scrambling for jobs and food and housing and even some meaning to the global upheaval.
However, I am a teacher. I have been a teacher through the last two economic downturns. I am a Special Needs teacher because I like Special Needs kids more, and I am beginning to believe there really is karma in spades for the line of work I do.
The first year of teaching is ALWAYS the hardest. Always and anywhere. And then you get your groove and move steadily towards either Administration (bleah) or Mentoring where you walk around classrooms and wipe First Year teacher tears. Or as I do, "What you cryin for now 'Crybaby'?"
So. Ten years this year.
If I haven't spelled it out clearly enough: I AM A 'NICHE' TEACHER. I fill a gap very slight on first inspection, but to my administration it is the equivalent of trying to fill in the Mariana Trench with cement, a spoon and two paperclips. So I am very happy to take 200 KD less than I could be getting elsewhere, for a sunny Thursday morning at 11 AM where I can look at the driver and say,
"Where are we going?"
"Hawalli, to pick up_______ from a conference."
"Where's _______?"
"Having Sheesha at Marina Crescent."
"Where's _______?"
"Having Sheesha seaside. We're probably going to Marina Mall after this."
And then, I call my Assistant and ask them to handle the last parent, IF they come in (they didn't). Life can be boooooo-ti-fuuuuuuuuuuullllll...
I understand quite clearly that around the world and around me, people with families are scrambling for jobs and food and housing and even some meaning to the global upheaval.
However, I am a teacher. I have been a teacher through the last two economic downturns. I am a Special Needs teacher because I like Special Needs kids more, and I am beginning to believe there really is karma in spades for the line of work I do.
The first year of teaching is ALWAYS the hardest. Always and anywhere. And then you get your groove and move steadily towards either Administration (bleah) or Mentoring where you walk around classrooms and wipe First Year teacher tears. Or as I do, "What you cryin for now 'Crybaby'?"
So. Ten years this year.
If I haven't spelled it out clearly enough: I AM A 'NICHE' TEACHER. I fill a gap very slight on first inspection, but to my administration it is the equivalent of trying to fill in the Mariana Trench with cement, a spoon and two paperclips. So I am very happy to take 200 KD less than I could be getting elsewhere, for a sunny Thursday morning at 11 AM where I can look at the driver and say,
"Where are we going?"
"Hawalli, to pick up_______ from a conference."
"Where's _______?"
"Having Sheesha at Marina Crescent."
"Where's _______?"
"Having Sheesha seaside. We're probably going to Marina Mall after this."
And then, I call my Assistant and ask them to handle the last parent, IF they come in (they didn't). Life can be boooooo-ti-fuuuuuuuuuuullllll...
Monday, February 16, 2009
Ch-Ch-Changes
I hate that song. Even worse than "Turn Turn Turn".
I won't dwell too much on it here, but a very good friend passed away last week and I was unable to attend the funeral due to a back injury the week before THAT. I started another blog about it, mabrook if you find it and read it, but I disabled the comments.
Yeeerugh. Yes, Man Thing is gone. He went his way but not quite, and we still see each other at gatherings with mutual friends.
Sunglasses. You can't be in Kuwait without sunglasses. I had been putting away for a pair of prescription sunglasses because I wear glasses. Duh. Meanwhile I had been...squinting and bearing it. When I mentioned this to Man Thing casually, he looked at me and said, "Why don't you just get contact lenses and buy a pair of sunglasses?"
Duh.
(I was still nursing a joke from another friend, who I made the mistake of showing pictures of my extended family. He pointed at my Uncle sporting wide windowpane plaid and a bow tie in his engagement picture c. 1972 "Look! The glasses are hereditary!")
Now I wear contacts. These have their own problems, as I have an Astigmatism and the damn things just don't mesh with air conditioning.
One thing leads to another, feeling particularly down and out after Man Thing and I parted ways, I went to a friend's salon and got my hair cut. Beautifully. In a way that suits me completely. "And the crowd went wild..."
To backtrack a little, there are two unresolved fitting crises within every woman's life, no matter what her shape or size. One is a bra. The other is jeans. I have very long legs and clothes that don't "Feel Right" just don't get worn, so this problem is compounded for me (I cried on the day I discovered Abercrombie- I hate sweatshops but their clothes are supersoft).
Yeah, a good pair of jeans is hard to come by, and since I came to Kuwait I was wearing one pair to death while searching for a substitute without frigging rhinestones and bows and God knows whatelse. I was in and out of Massimo Dutti for their clearance sales (more supersoft clothes in the line of silk/cashmere sweaters for supercheap). And then I saw...a leg...peeping out from a rack...
Ooooooo.
It is bluuuuuuuuuue.
And approaching carefully it feels rubbing between two fingers like potential.
Going to the dressing room. Could it be? Could it BE?! Jeans that fit?
Ahhhh.
And no you perves, I don't sleep in them. Though I sometimes get seperation anxiety during the night.
By the numbers, over 4 months: 1. Contacts. 2. New hairstyle. 3. New jeans. H'ohkay...
I slipped my L-5 disc during the last week in January. My friend T died on the 11th of Feb.
In a spree of Distract Me combined with Posture Improvement, I had to make good on getting a new bra.
This. Is. Hard.
If you think trying to get them OFF a woman is a challenge, it is nothing to the time investment and footpower that piece of equipment requires to be on that woman to begin with. My Bra Oddessy was now some 24 months in the making with no results. Part of it is cultural (what is available in Kuwait) and part of it is intimidation, and part of it is that boobies never formed a critical part in my self identity until I was finding my lunch on them instead of my lap. I was 28.
Good news is that Debenhams in the Avenues was actually carrying a line that I'd considered buying (a line without airplane propellers on the nipples). I took a random sampling of sizes and reenacted Goldilocks and The Three Bras. This one too hard, this one too Madonna, this one too Waah! (are they supposed to be ...there?)
I knew I struck gold when I removed one, and wanted to put it back on immediately. The weird part was, it was a size smaller and cup larger than what I had been wearing previously. Whaaa?
(Expensive, but the rule is to buy it immediately. Especially in Kuwait. It won't be there when you come back.)
It went home with me, and I tried it on again. Looked in the mirror. Freeeeeeeeaky. My own casual assessment equated me with a pool float. Where did...these...come from? Had they been there all along, lurking? What about everything going on below?
I took it off and put it on the dresser. Bra looked at me. I looked at bra.
No. Way.
I put it back on. Comfy. Shirt over it. Not bad. And aside from getting used to having them in the way when I reach for something, we have 1. contacts 2. new hairstyle 3. new jeans that fit 4. posture.
Last of all, we have sunglasses.
I won't dwell too much on it here, but a very good friend passed away last week and I was unable to attend the funeral due to a back injury the week before THAT. I started another blog about it, mabrook if you find it and read it, but I disabled the comments.
Yeeerugh. Yes, Man Thing is gone. He went his way but not quite, and we still see each other at gatherings with mutual friends.
Sunglasses. You can't be in Kuwait without sunglasses. I had been putting away for a pair of prescription sunglasses because I wear glasses. Duh. Meanwhile I had been...squinting and bearing it. When I mentioned this to Man Thing casually, he looked at me and said, "Why don't you just get contact lenses and buy a pair of sunglasses?"
Duh.
(I was still nursing a joke from another friend, who I made the mistake of showing pictures of my extended family. He pointed at my Uncle sporting wide windowpane plaid and a bow tie in his engagement picture c. 1972 "Look! The glasses are hereditary!")
Now I wear contacts. These have their own problems, as I have an Astigmatism and the damn things just don't mesh with air conditioning.
One thing leads to another, feeling particularly down and out after Man Thing and I parted ways, I went to a friend's salon and got my hair cut. Beautifully. In a way that suits me completely. "And the crowd went wild..."
To backtrack a little, there are two unresolved fitting crises within every woman's life, no matter what her shape or size. One is a bra. The other is jeans. I have very long legs and clothes that don't "Feel Right" just don't get worn, so this problem is compounded for me (I cried on the day I discovered Abercrombie- I hate sweatshops but their clothes are supersoft).
Yeah, a good pair of jeans is hard to come by, and since I came to Kuwait I was wearing one pair to death while searching for a substitute without frigging rhinestones and bows and God knows whatelse. I was in and out of Massimo Dutti for their clearance sales (more supersoft clothes in the line of silk/cashmere sweaters for supercheap). And then I saw...a leg...peeping out from a rack...
Ooooooo.
It is bluuuuuuuuuue.
And approaching carefully it feels rubbing between two fingers like potential.
Going to the dressing room. Could it be? Could it BE?! Jeans that fit?
Ahhhh.
And no you perves, I don't sleep in them. Though I sometimes get seperation anxiety during the night.
By the numbers, over 4 months: 1. Contacts. 2. New hairstyle. 3. New jeans. H'ohkay...
I slipped my L-5 disc during the last week in January. My friend T died on the 11th of Feb.
In a spree of Distract Me combined with Posture Improvement, I had to make good on getting a new bra.
This. Is. Hard.
If you think trying to get them OFF a woman is a challenge, it is nothing to the time investment and footpower that piece of equipment requires to be on that woman to begin with. My Bra Oddessy was now some 24 months in the making with no results. Part of it is cultural (what is available in Kuwait) and part of it is intimidation, and part of it is that boobies never formed a critical part in my self identity until I was finding my lunch on them instead of my lap. I was 28.
Good news is that Debenhams in the Avenues was actually carrying a line that I'd considered buying (a line without airplane propellers on the nipples). I took a random sampling of sizes and reenacted Goldilocks and The Three Bras. This one too hard, this one too Madonna, this one too Waah! (are they supposed to be ...there?)
I knew I struck gold when I removed one, and wanted to put it back on immediately. The weird part was, it was a size smaller and cup larger than what I had been wearing previously. Whaaa?
(Expensive, but the rule is to buy it immediately. Especially in Kuwait. It won't be there when you come back.)
It went home with me, and I tried it on again. Looked in the mirror. Freeeeeeeeaky. My own casual assessment equated me with a pool float. Where did...these...come from? Had they been there all along, lurking? What about everything going on below?
I took it off and put it on the dresser. Bra looked at me. I looked at bra.
No. Way.
I put it back on. Comfy. Shirt over it. Not bad. And aside from getting used to having them in the way when I reach for something, we have 1. contacts 2. new hairstyle 3. new jeans that fit 4. posture.
Last of all, we have sunglasses.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Monday, May 19, 2008
And it continues...
Much to my surprise.
I have long toes. I mean, freakishly long toes. Ordinarily I don't wear sandals because I hate it when my feet get dirty and dried out- it's just a pet peeve of mine. I don't go barefoot at home either, stateside or Kuwait because I hate the feeling. So when my feet are exposed... To be fair, my fingers and hands are very long and narrow. To be unfair, some people are looking at my feet when asking "Do you play piano?"
Due to a dress code at work and a whole new depth of cultural quicksand, I wear sandals now. Pretty, leather Clarks that I got on sale a couple of years ago and stuffed in the back of the closet figuring they would come in handy at some point. One of the pair barely made it into the suitcase to Kuwait. Now, they are practically all I wear.
It's not because of the heat- I managed to rustle up a pair of Converse All Stars that I prefer to wear much more. It's that a pair of shoes really do make the outfit you're wearing, and this particular pair happens dress up everything from cotton pants to skirts to capri pants. Very handy if you feel like looking like a girl in under 10 seconds on 2 1/2 hours of sleep.
Yes, Man-Thing is still quite present. As J. at The Silver Star said, "Too much handsome, too much money, too much problems!" I couldn't agree more. Until now.
This is where the toes come in.
Picture, if you will, a warm Kuwait evening near Arabian Gulf road...a little humid, somewhat fragrant...cats wander by, roaches wander by, palms trees wave gently in the, well, fragrance. In the distance, small Kuwaiti children are tearing apart a brightly lit, 3 story Burger King.
A man and woman are sitting on a low wall overlooking the water, leaning into each other, talking quietly. One of those early gentle conversations undercut with "The World Is Much Better With You Around" tones.
There is a lull in the conversation. The woman looks up and out at the lights of boats on the water. The man glances down at the ground, catches sight of her feet.
"You have really long toes."
The woman gives an "Aw shit here it comes" sigh
"No, seriously, you have really long toes. Can you do things with them?"
The woman sighs again. "Look..."
Cut to a month later, 1 AM, standing in a parking lot in Dasman after an evening smoking Sheesa with friends. The man and woman have been playfully poking each other in the stomach, and have taken the opportunity of Everyone Else Is Gone to lean into each other, against the car. There is a lull in the conversation. He looks down.
"You have really long toes..."
"Look, you know I have really long toes..."
"No! No!"
"Come on, my toes aren't just long, they're bizzare. You know it, I know it. The reason I like you, is that you can look down at my toes and say, 'Man your feet are freakish" but you still like me, you still think I'm pretty. That's the reason I like you."
He smiled.
So, Man Thing is still around for a number of reasons. Some of which, I haven't scared him off yet. Others being, I'm curious why I haven't scared him off yet and still others, I'm worried why I haven't scared him off yet- I mean, if my toes don't do it and he can more than keep up a conversation with me and he beat my ass in Chess, I think I have a lot to worry about.
I have long toes. I mean, freakishly long toes. Ordinarily I don't wear sandals because I hate it when my feet get dirty and dried out- it's just a pet peeve of mine. I don't go barefoot at home either, stateside or Kuwait because I hate the feeling. So when my feet are exposed... To be fair, my fingers and hands are very long and narrow. To be unfair, some people are looking at my feet when asking "Do you play piano?"
Due to a dress code at work and a whole new depth of cultural quicksand, I wear sandals now. Pretty, leather Clarks that I got on sale a couple of years ago and stuffed in the back of the closet figuring they would come in handy at some point. One of the pair barely made it into the suitcase to Kuwait. Now, they are practically all I wear.
It's not because of the heat- I managed to rustle up a pair of Converse All Stars that I prefer to wear much more. It's that a pair of shoes really do make the outfit you're wearing, and this particular pair happens dress up everything from cotton pants to skirts to capri pants. Very handy if you feel like looking like a girl in under 10 seconds on 2 1/2 hours of sleep.
Yes, Man-Thing is still quite present. As J. at The Silver Star said, "Too much handsome, too much money, too much problems!" I couldn't agree more. Until now.
This is where the toes come in.
Picture, if you will, a warm Kuwait evening near Arabian Gulf road...a little humid, somewhat fragrant...cats wander by, roaches wander by, palms trees wave gently in the, well, fragrance. In the distance, small Kuwaiti children are tearing apart a brightly lit, 3 story Burger King.
A man and woman are sitting on a low wall overlooking the water, leaning into each other, talking quietly. One of those early gentle conversations undercut with "The World Is Much Better With You Around" tones.
There is a lull in the conversation. The woman looks up and out at the lights of boats on the water. The man glances down at the ground, catches sight of her feet.
"You have really long toes."
The woman gives an "Aw shit here it comes" sigh
"No, seriously, you have really long toes. Can you do things with them?"
The woman sighs again. "Look..."
Cut to a month later, 1 AM, standing in a parking lot in Dasman after an evening smoking Sheesa with friends. The man and woman have been playfully poking each other in the stomach, and have taken the opportunity of Everyone Else Is Gone to lean into each other, against the car. There is a lull in the conversation. He looks down.
"You have really long toes..."
"Look, you know I have really long toes..."
"No! No!"
"Come on, my toes aren't just long, they're bizzare. You know it, I know it. The reason I like you, is that you can look down at my toes and say, 'Man your feet are freakish" but you still like me, you still think I'm pretty. That's the reason I like you."
He smiled.
So, Man Thing is still around for a number of reasons. Some of which, I haven't scared him off yet. Others being, I'm curious why I haven't scared him off yet and still others, I'm worried why I haven't scared him off yet- I mean, if my toes don't do it and he can more than keep up a conversation with me and he beat my ass in Chess, I think I have a lot to worry about.
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
So
back to our scheduled post...
(had to take care of a student who was opting between sirens only he could hear, and music class. You can't go to music if "the sirens" are hurting your ears? Right? Much better to stay and finish your multiplication...? Guess the sirens aren't that loud.)
Six more weeks of school, Spring Break was just last week. I've come to the realization that, despite H. faking a choking/heart attack/general dying spell when served with detention, and J. asking about cross dressers in Paris during math, and O.'s genuine "Fish Stories" (without having the faintest cultural clue to the words), and watching Y. trying to collect rocks while being pursued in slow speed by three administrators, I'm going to miss these miscreants terribly. Despite driving me up the tree every day, I am sure next year will be much more dull.
In neighborhood terms...I have the windows open, it's a nice night. Someone took the equivalent of a Ford Fiesta and managed to back it straight into the only '84 Honda Prelude ever quipped with an alarm. This emptied all of Friend Bakkala, the International Phone Booth, and two apartment buildings. What I don't understand is the Ford Fiesta- the thing can fit in my armpit with turning radius, and it managed to go back three car lengths and across the street into a separate bank of cars without turning the wheel.
What was I thinking? Fifth Ring is in sight! Nothin' sez Kuwait like 4 wheelin in a Fiesta through a construction job. In reverse. Over your neighbor's Prelude.
(had to take care of a student who was opting between sirens only he could hear, and music class. You can't go to music if "the sirens" are hurting your ears? Right? Much better to stay and finish your multiplication...? Guess the sirens aren't that loud.)
Six more weeks of school, Spring Break was just last week. I've come to the realization that, despite H. faking a choking/heart attack/general dying spell when served with detention, and J. asking about cross dressers in Paris during math, and O.'s genuine "Fish Stories" (without having the faintest cultural clue to the words), and watching Y. trying to collect rocks while being pursued in slow speed by three administrators, I'm going to miss these miscreants terribly. Despite driving me up the tree every day, I am sure next year will be much more dull.
In neighborhood terms...I have the windows open, it's a nice night. Someone took the equivalent of a Ford Fiesta and managed to back it straight into the only '84 Honda Prelude ever quipped with an alarm. This emptied all of Friend Bakkala, the International Phone Booth, and two apartment buildings. What I don't understand is the Ford Fiesta- the thing can fit in my armpit with turning radius, and it managed to go back three car lengths and across the street into a separate bank of cars without turning the wheel.
What was I thinking? Fifth Ring is in sight! Nothin' sez Kuwait like 4 wheelin in a Fiesta through a construction job. In reverse. Over your neighbor's Prelude.
Monday, May 5, 2008
I haven't posted here in forever
for several reasons...
The first being there is a Man-Thing in my life. My goodness. No, I guarantee that no one is more shocked than I am.
This Man-Thing happens to be handsome enough, that when we're out together I have to keep looking to the side to make sure we're still out together. Yet handsome without being egotistical? With a work ethic? What the....
A few posts ago, I mentioned that I was out at Al Hashemi Ballroom to listen to a mezzo soprano. He was one of the "friends" that I mentioned, he sat next to me and we all went out for coffee afterwards. The main thing I remember is that he was figety the entire performance, and I was worried to think he was bored or not enjoying himself.
It was several weeks before we were all out to coffee again. This time I rounded the corner of the booth with my mug, just to hear him tail off on a conversation about work with Hot Mama. I put my cup down, and said very politely "Excuse me, I missed it: what is it you do again?"
(completely deadpan, looking me straight in the eye)"Oh, I'm a pimp."
At which point, I absolutely lost it.
All things considered, Man-Thing and work have kept me wondering and keeping to myself, not really wanting to post, not having too much to post about that wouldn't bore anyone but me to tears.
(being hijacked by a student)
The first being there is a Man-Thing in my life. My goodness. No, I guarantee that no one is more shocked than I am.
This Man-Thing happens to be handsome enough, that when we're out together I have to keep looking to the side to make sure we're still out together. Yet handsome without being egotistical? With a work ethic? What the....
A few posts ago, I mentioned that I was out at Al Hashemi Ballroom to listen to a mezzo soprano. He was one of the "friends" that I mentioned, he sat next to me and we all went out for coffee afterwards. The main thing I remember is that he was figety the entire performance, and I was worried to think he was bored or not enjoying himself.
It was several weeks before we were all out to coffee again. This time I rounded the corner of the booth with my mug, just to hear him tail off on a conversation about work with Hot Mama. I put my cup down, and said very politely "Excuse me, I missed it: what is it you do again?"
(completely deadpan, looking me straight in the eye)"Oh, I'm a pimp."
At which point, I absolutely lost it.
All things considered, Man-Thing and work have kept me wondering and keeping to myself, not really wanting to post, not having too much to post about that wouldn't bore anyone but me to tears.
(being hijacked by a student)
Sunday, April 6, 2008
"Mwummph Mmphh Mhh Mhh"
Which translates loosely as "Ima lay face down on my bed and talk into the duvet and the damn building can burn down around me before I'm moving".
I got hungry again. Abruptly. About 8 this morning- just far enough into the day that I couldn't do anything except take the edge off occasionally. The most fantabulous thing, was that this co-worker who rooked me into presenting part of this discussion on Foucault on Thursday turned up with a copy of a book I'd been shaking down Kuwait for, with no results. So we got very happy and excited about this upcoming event.
Then I tried reading a little while on prep. No go.
What is originative is the caesura that establishes the distance between reason and nonreason; reason's subjugation of nonreason, wresting from its truth as madness, crime or disease, derives explicitly from this point. (Madness and Civilization, pg. xii)
"Miss? Miss? He called me 'eggplant'!"
After work, I was supposed to tutor this guy from my French class, but we got our paths crossed. He said we agreed on Starbucks, I had in mind the restaurant in the Holiday Inn Dasman. Which is where I went anyway and ate everything except the tablecloth until he called trying to figure out where I was.
Found him, tutored him, then 90 minutes worth of French. Back home again in a semi daze wreaking havoc on the maid's cleaning job and dripping cranberry jelly all over the carpet.
It's only Sunday...
I got hungry again. Abruptly. About 8 this morning- just far enough into the day that I couldn't do anything except take the edge off occasionally. The most fantabulous thing, was that this co-worker who rooked me into presenting part of this discussion on Foucault on Thursday turned up with a copy of a book I'd been shaking down Kuwait for, with no results. So we got very happy and excited about this upcoming event.
Then I tried reading a little while on prep. No go.
What is originative is the caesura that establishes the distance between reason and nonreason; reason's subjugation of nonreason, wresting from its truth as madness, crime or disease, derives explicitly from this point. (Madness and Civilization, pg. xii)
"Miss? Miss? He called me 'eggplant'!"
After work, I was supposed to tutor this guy from my French class, but we got our paths crossed. He said we agreed on Starbucks, I had in mind the restaurant in the Holiday Inn Dasman. Which is where I went anyway and ate everything except the tablecloth until he called trying to figure out where I was.
Found him, tutored him, then 90 minutes worth of French. Back home again in a semi daze wreaking havoc on the maid's cleaning job and dripping cranberry jelly all over the carpet.
It's only Sunday...
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Bad dreams.
No more sour cream and a baked potato before bed. I just woke up from a too real to be true dream that M. and I were friends again, that he was giving me a bad time in a forest somewhere while I tested out a remote control car that I'd built.
That type of shit'll kill ya for sure.
More distance, the clearer you see things. I want my friend back, the one at the end of the hallway where I ran through light rooms and dark, doors opened and closed to throw myself into his sheepskin coated self after he'd been gone for weeks. I'd never been so loved on a January morning, sometimes doubt I will be again. Tendon and bone.
Some dynamic changed between us when I started putting on girl clothes and kept them on as more than an experiment. Oh, I never left the cargo pants behind, and my closet always has stocked more from the Men's Department at J.Crew than the women's. Let's just say my clothes started to fit better after he started dating L, part of a process that had started with glacial slowness in 2005. Even later when tensions would slightly lessen and I'd try and play around in the classroom with M., he would stand with his arms folded and narrow his eyes, refusing while balls of yarn danced off his head. He was trying to tell me something, but what?
Why didn't he want to play any more? He would play around with the other assistants in my room. Yes, I predicted a disastrous outcome to his relationship, but girls are girls and frankly the one he picked couldn't carry a relationship with handles and IKEA instructions. We both knew it- hell, he liked 'em semi-permanent that way. I was still the same underneath the clothes!
Maybe the change wasn't in my clothes after all. Maybe the change was when we came to words instead of hair pulling and kicking and cigarettes to resolve the only conflict we ever had, and the clothes came to fit. Talk about "You can't go home again"- If I had done like I should have at the time, kicked him in the balls and made an end of it and then stayed out of it, maybe we'd be in a forest somewhere playing with remote control cars.
What ifs. God, no more food before bed.
That type of shit'll kill ya for sure.
More distance, the clearer you see things. I want my friend back, the one at the end of the hallway where I ran through light rooms and dark, doors opened and closed to throw myself into his sheepskin coated self after he'd been gone for weeks. I'd never been so loved on a January morning, sometimes doubt I will be again. Tendon and bone.
Some dynamic changed between us when I started putting on girl clothes and kept them on as more than an experiment. Oh, I never left the cargo pants behind, and my closet always has stocked more from the Men's Department at J.Crew than the women's. Let's just say my clothes started to fit better after he started dating L, part of a process that had started with glacial slowness in 2005. Even later when tensions would slightly lessen and I'd try and play around in the classroom with M., he would stand with his arms folded and narrow his eyes, refusing while balls of yarn danced off his head. He was trying to tell me something, but what?
Why didn't he want to play any more? He would play around with the other assistants in my room. Yes, I predicted a disastrous outcome to his relationship, but girls are girls and frankly the one he picked couldn't carry a relationship with handles and IKEA instructions. We both knew it- hell, he liked 'em semi-permanent that way. I was still the same underneath the clothes!
Maybe the change wasn't in my clothes after all. Maybe the change was when we came to words instead of hair pulling and kicking and cigarettes to resolve the only conflict we ever had, and the clothes came to fit. Talk about "You can't go home again"- If I had done like I should have at the time, kicked him in the balls and made an end of it and then stayed out of it, maybe we'd be in a forest somewhere playing with remote control cars.
What ifs. God, no more food before bed.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Why is it
that when I look my absolute worst, I get the most attention from men?
This has happened two or three times. I'll be out on an absolutely urgent errand- I'll have hair on my legs long enough to braid; the humidity will be 130% so the thatch on my head is frizzy; it'll be 130 degrees so you can smell me before you see me; I'll have walked right out of six hours of air conditioning so you could grease a cake pan with my face- in California terms, 'Tore UP."
Or, as Akealla the All Wise would put it, "Y'all a hot mess."
One of those days. To top it off, I drove home along Arabian Gulf Road with the window down. For some reason I have hair growing in at all different lengths, which gives me the look of someone who just rode home with the window open in high humidity when I actually stayed home and read. You do the math.
So I made it in to the Sultan Center, rounded up groceries I knew I'd be interested in eating at some point (I'm still not hungry) and blessed the Clerk with my appearance and Rewards Card. The fellow next to me in line looked like a linebacker, sort of cute, purchasing a chicken the size of a largish lemon. Hey, what there was of it smelled good.
The bagger could have been an ex-student, and he was having trouble deciding which bag the soap went in. As I tried to help him out, the fellow behind me said, "Excuse me? Miss?"
I turned. He leaned towards me, eyebrows working overtime, voice deepening for empasis. "Afternoon", he said slowly, making sure he kept eye contact as he leaned back.
Oh Jesus.
This has happened two or three times. I'll be out on an absolutely urgent errand- I'll have hair on my legs long enough to braid; the humidity will be 130% so the thatch on my head is frizzy; it'll be 130 degrees so you can smell me before you see me; I'll have walked right out of six hours of air conditioning so you could grease a cake pan with my face- in California terms, 'Tore UP."
Or, as Akealla the All Wise would put it, "Y'all a hot mess."
One of those days. To top it off, I drove home along Arabian Gulf Road with the window down. For some reason I have hair growing in at all different lengths, which gives me the look of someone who just rode home with the window open in high humidity when I actually stayed home and read. You do the math.
So I made it in to the Sultan Center, rounded up groceries I knew I'd be interested in eating at some point (I'm still not hungry) and blessed the Clerk with my appearance and Rewards Card. The fellow next to me in line looked like a linebacker, sort of cute, purchasing a chicken the size of a largish lemon. Hey, what there was of it smelled good.
The bagger could have been an ex-student, and he was having trouble deciding which bag the soap went in. As I tried to help him out, the fellow behind me said, "Excuse me? Miss?"
I turned. He leaned towards me, eyebrows working overtime, voice deepening for empasis. "Afternoon", he said slowly, making sure he kept eye contact as he leaned back.
Oh Jesus.
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
It's seven and I'm in bed
Funny thing is, since last Friday I've wanted nothing more than to do exactly what I'm doing now. Which is to sit around at home and finish several books. One thing or another has kept me out into the evening- Friday it was a Going Away party for the friend of a friend, Saturday was Horse Riding, Sunday was French, Monday was "Leningrad Cowboys Meet Moses" and three hours of spicy gossip at another friends' place.
So today, I wasn't feeling well anyway. There was a dust storm for the better part of the day and my head did, does still, feel like a basketball sized snowglobe balanced on a daisy stem. I fulfilled my promise to myself, sat on the couch to finish one book. Then proceeded to pace up and down the livingroom for 45 minutes doing pointless busyshit, pondering going down the street to buy a lightbulb.
I ended the debate by crawling into bed with my computer, making my body remember how tired I am.
I'm actually sort of disturbed. I haven't been really hungry for anything for the past five days, so I've been forcing myself to eat. Historically, this means one of 5 things: 1. The weather is changing 2. I'm extraordinarily upset 3. There's a stomach bug working it's way through my system 4. I ate something bad 5. hormones.
Only two of the above are true- the first and the last. Changes from season to season are marked intestinally, and I spent weeks on arrival eating bananas. The last one- sometimes my body likes to "reboot"and I simply won't have a desire to eat for two or three days. My entire problem with this is that I really, really like to eat and the way things taste. So eating without much craving or desire, going through the motions, depresses me. I have plenty of stuff on hand and every type of fast food I could desire- but even the Barscz didn't interest me.
Been busy trying to book my summer holiday in Poland...more like trying to figure out how to get back to Kuwait from Poland, because direct flights thereunto do not exist. I think the best example had me rerouted through Munich and Heathrow both, at 22 hours into WAW from KWI. Maaaaah! It's six hours to Frankfurt from Kuwait! Flying to San Francisco is a shorter flight!
Eventually I asked a co-worker, who uses Czech Air and flies through Prague. I went to the site, and while Czech Air admits that Kuwait exists and they might land some planes there occasionally, they damn well aren't going to let you book a seat. Even when you try and do it in Czech.
S'alright, it's the same thing for Tunisia.
More complications in finding the perfect BFN spot in Poland. At first, because I couldn't find any. Now I have something like three websites and 600 places. Then a friend I haven't seen since Cracow in 2006, emailed me to let me know a third friend is back in Poland instead of Australia, and shouldn't we get together? Hell yeah.
Side note: was at horse riding lesson on Saturday, watched two women go ass over teakettle off their horses. I know falling off is par for the course, but I'm worried about when my turn will come. One of the women was on the horse behind mine.
So today, I wasn't feeling well anyway. There was a dust storm for the better part of the day and my head did, does still, feel like a basketball sized snowglobe balanced on a daisy stem. I fulfilled my promise to myself, sat on the couch to finish one book. Then proceeded to pace up and down the livingroom for 45 minutes doing pointless busyshit, pondering going down the street to buy a lightbulb.
I ended the debate by crawling into bed with my computer, making my body remember how tired I am.
I'm actually sort of disturbed. I haven't been really hungry for anything for the past five days, so I've been forcing myself to eat. Historically, this means one of 5 things: 1. The weather is changing 2. I'm extraordinarily upset 3. There's a stomach bug working it's way through my system 4. I ate something bad 5. hormones.
Only two of the above are true- the first and the last. Changes from season to season are marked intestinally, and I spent weeks on arrival eating bananas. The last one- sometimes my body likes to "reboot"and I simply won't have a desire to eat for two or three days. My entire problem with this is that I really, really like to eat and the way things taste. So eating without much craving or desire, going through the motions, depresses me. I have plenty of stuff on hand and every type of fast food I could desire- but even the Barscz didn't interest me.
Been busy trying to book my summer holiday in Poland...more like trying to figure out how to get back to Kuwait from Poland, because direct flights thereunto do not exist. I think the best example had me rerouted through Munich and Heathrow both, at 22 hours into WAW from KWI. Maaaaah! It's six hours to Frankfurt from Kuwait! Flying to San Francisco is a shorter flight!
Eventually I asked a co-worker, who uses Czech Air and flies through Prague. I went to the site, and while Czech Air admits that Kuwait exists and they might land some planes there occasionally, they damn well aren't going to let you book a seat. Even when you try and do it in Czech.
S'alright, it's the same thing for Tunisia.
More complications in finding the perfect BFN spot in Poland. At first, because I couldn't find any. Now I have something like three websites and 600 places. Then a friend I haven't seen since Cracow in 2006, emailed me to let me know a third friend is back in Poland instead of Australia, and shouldn't we get together? Hell yeah.
Side note: was at horse riding lesson on Saturday, watched two women go ass over teakettle off their horses. I know falling off is par for the course, but I'm worried about when my turn will come. One of the women was on the horse behind mine.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Almost two
and what a stupid day.
Stupid as in stuporific- I went to bed late last night after reading a book, and slept through till 9 in the morning. Unheard of, for me. I woke up feeling like I'd been clubbed in the head after a dream where my students were randomly dropping from the sky, "WHUMP".
That was so not okay.
Made coffee, STRONG. Picked up a weeks worth of detritus from my room, made breakfast in the seventh orbit ring from Dinner Two Nights Ago. Sat back down on the couch with Jorge Luis Borges- a very bad idea considering the odd dreams I'd had. Ditched the Borges, considered going outside but felt too lazy and started fooling around on the computer. Went to the grocery store, decided it was definitely too warm and that I'd missed my walk by oversleeping. Ate, which made me sleepy again. I've decided that I'm vetoing my body's message for Jorge Luis Borges, after eating Kofta and Marzipan. I found myself planning a summer in Khazikstan online afterwards.
What. A. Stupid. Day.
Stupid as in stuporific- I went to bed late last night after reading a book, and slept through till 9 in the morning. Unheard of, for me. I woke up feeling like I'd been clubbed in the head after a dream where my students were randomly dropping from the sky, "WHUMP".
That was so not okay.
Made coffee, STRONG. Picked up a weeks worth of detritus from my room, made breakfast in the seventh orbit ring from Dinner Two Nights Ago. Sat back down on the couch with Jorge Luis Borges- a very bad idea considering the odd dreams I'd had. Ditched the Borges, considered going outside but felt too lazy and started fooling around on the computer. Went to the grocery store, decided it was definitely too warm and that I'd missed my walk by oversleeping. Ate, which made me sleepy again. I've decided that I'm vetoing my body's message for Jorge Luis Borges, after eating Kofta and Marzipan. I found myself planning a summer in Khazikstan online afterwards.
What. A. Stupid. Day.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Genuinely lovely time
If I talk about last night, naturally I have to talk about the one before. So it's been a genuinely lovely weekend, dust storms at 4 AM notwithstanding.
Screw it. We'll go back to Tuesday afternoon, when I discovered that the Czech embassy was hosting a Mezzo Soprano Piano Recital at the local SAS Radisson. Things like this aren't widely publicized at all (when they do happen), and even going to look for them online or in the paper, you won't find them. Honestly, the best news feed is word of text message in this country.
So I texted Hot Mama, who knows everyone anyway, and we got all excited about Dressing Up. Then some people arranged to come, and some people declined, and my closet vomited shoes and skirts like usual, and the week went on.
Wednesday I was notified about a party, on Thursday night. There are actually very few things more pleasant than a message while at work saying "There is a party tomorrow night, and that person you've been thinking about all week is coming, and you should come too. Wear a dress." (I'm now waiting for the one that tells me a plane full of pals from Pittsburg are on the Tarmac with burritos and Zywiec). So I went to the salon, and subjected my eyebrows to cultural indignities I won't repeat and won't treat with language- there are no words. There is, however, Retin-A.
Thursday morning my assistant came in, frowned, and in a perfect Islamabad accent asked what happened to my eyebrows.
On Thursday my last period is a prep. Apparently the prep teacher crossed the Crazy Librarian in some former life- my class was supposed to be in the Library watching a movie so I could industriously finish that last episode of House MD, streaming online. Well, the Crazy Librarian threw everyone out. They ended up back in my room before the mid-episode crash cart- busy watching 13 in the throes of an medi/ethical crisis and suddenly there is a face in the window...that...shouldn't...be there. Waving cheerily. Long story short, I locked myself in the closet and finished the episode while my room became a camp out for two special needs classrooms, two assistants and a really irate Islamic teacher.
I ran away from the circus very quickly- a teacher colleague needed to get home quicker than usual and I drove him. Apparently, the rest of Kuwait had the same idea and they executed it in the same fashion: Colonel Mustard; On 5th Ring Road; With the SUV. It took something like 45 minutes to get home.
Supposed to go to French, but called it a week and called in sick. Instead, I sat in a chair and had a very nice lady do my toenails while I watched "Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid." The cinematography was so good it made me sort of miss Utah a little. (That's damn good cinematography, incidentally.)
Got a text message when I was leaving, that the party was off- apparently the guest list had topped six billion in two days, and the original invitee was (shocker) afraid the cops show up and unable to handle the texts from his grateful six billion. No worries! I went home, took a shower, put on polka dot pajamas, prepared dinner.
Hot Mama texted, still disappointed about the party and wanting out. She directed me to come up with something (preferably involving alcohol) with That Guy You've Been Thinking About All Week, even if it was crashing his place to watch a movie.
Well, that's what we came up with. Until Hot Mama got in my car with another party at about 9:30 PM.
That Guy You've Been Thinking About All Week had changed locations, moved from Dasman to Farwaniya (the euphanisim for Butt-F--- Egypt when Egypt is actually closer). So we went to get him, got lost twice because Kuwaiti urban planners just constructed everything in a circle rather than let you do a U Turn. He was expecting us to park and come up and watch a movie. What we did was drag him in the car without a wallet or ID and cart him off to an (unknown to us) A List party.
The way parties in Kuwait work is this: you know someone who knows someone, who asks if you're interested. You say yes, and later that evening (if you're lucky) you are provided with directions to meet someone to meet someone who will lead you to the place where it's being held. We had no idea that it was going to be the type of party where, when you walk out, people are going to cluster around you and beg you to get them in. Freaaaaakkky.
The original organizer of the Grateful 6 Billion had regrouped and reorganized, trimming to twenty. It was very, very nice- I felt distinctly inferior, by the way. Every Arabic woman in there had at least a triple H cup and 150 pounds on me, no joke. All arranged on couched at the front of the room, they surgically attached themselves to their man-things (stoically chain smoking) when we walked in. Funny as hell-we were at a table in front of the speakers, so Hot Mama and I were texting back and forth when they loosened up and started folk dancing to the house beat.
After about an hour Hot Mama got a summons from Handsome Guy, who was denied entrance. Hot Mama was smelling trouble anyway, since her escort into the party, Bruiser, was giving other men squiffy attitude about talking to us. We decamped to go find Handsome Guy, taking a now buzzed and cheery Guy I'd Been Thinking About All Week, too. Three AM, hooked Hot Mama up with Handsome Guy and poured Guy I'd Been Thinking About All Week into shotgun.
And we're off, back to Farwaniya in a dust storm so bad I can't see what's on the side of the road. It took us an hour and 4 misses to get to his hotel. En route, we saw South Keitan, North Subhan access road, cargo shipment area of the airport, and both directions of 4th Ring Road.
The problem was this: picking him up had only been the second time I'd ever been to Farwaniya. He'd only been in Kuwait for a month, wasn't any help. There was only one way I knew to get to the road that he lived on, which was through two other roads I only knew one way to get on. It was dark and extremely dusty and I did not have my inhaler. I had been racking my brain to get there six hours earlier with Hot Mama. The end of the evening was sort of nightmarish.
Me: (nose to windshield, trying to see) "So what do you think of Serbia and Kosovo?
Him: "I think this is a perfect opportunity for someone to start a conflict, the US hands are tied, this is a one way street..."
Me: "They see me, they can go around. Smile and wave."
When I finally dropped him off, he was sweet enough to ask me up for a glass of water. I thanked him, hinted it might be another hour trying to find my own house , made it home by 4:30 AM muttering "He's twenty six, he's twenty six, he's twenty six."
I tried to sleep longer, but I woke up by nine. Got a nice Thank You from That Guy for finding his hotel instead of dropping him in the desert. Poked around the house, made a recipe I'd been dying to try for ages. Unfortunately, I used Egg Roll wrappers instead of Won Ton wrappers. The moment of truth came when I threw dinner in a pot of boiling water and it turned to sludge. Damn it.
Skirt and top, hair into shape, cup of coffee. Ran to pick up Hot Mama, who decided my name was now Hot Mama. She was running late, got dressed while we talked about Handsome Guy. Out the door to the SAS Radisson and The Big Ass Boat.
En route to The Big Ass Boat, I told her about the dinner disaster. She insisted that I get something to eat. "There!" So I dove across 4 lanes of Gulf Road and down a side alley that ended up as a Carl's Junior Drive Thru. We were running later for The Big Ass Boat, you see.
So we're in the car, back on Gulf Road, I'm wearing a silk top and skirt, hair up, driving with one hand and balancing a burger the size of a dinner plate in the other. Processing the personal history of Handsome Guy.
"So he teaches at University?"
"Yeah. Of course his passport is the wrong color so he's paid next to nothing"
(waiting at light, burger in hand, looks down) "This tastes kind of good." (remembers that Hot Mama is a vegetarian, looks at her) "Oh."
The Big Ass Boat is actually a ballroom. It's called the Al Hashemi Ballroom. I wasn't aware of this until Tuesday. Until I was run out by spiders the size of trashcan lids, I'd been going to a small private beach in Salwa. The Big Ass Boat sort of dominated the left hand view, but who am I to question who parks a dhow the size of a football field in their backyard?
http://library.thinkquest.org/C007541F/structure_of_dhows.htm
The Guy I Had Been Thinking About All Week had pleaded off the Mezzo Soprano, citing an unsophisticated childhood. We were due to meet two other people, a friend and a colleague of Hot Mama. Finishing the burger (neatly, heimdullilah, nothing on the silk), we drove actually down under the Big Ass Boat and parked. The event was upstairs, a cluster of about 150 chairs around a small platform in a dazzling room, so brightly lit it was bringing tears to my eyes.
The event was superb, the reception was wonderful. Afterwards we all went to Cafe Supremo in Salmiya to drink coffee and talk politics. The guy who claimed that I was the only woman in the world to make him happy did a couple of angry Stomp Bys with a pal, sent a nasty text. I traded seats with Hot Mama and kept talking. Next time, bring the fucking chess board.
And...home again at 1:30 AM. I got up at 9, listened to Third Leg talking really, really loud to my neighbor on the landing about going to Fallika Island while trying to finish another House MD episode. I think my life is supposed to feel empty and strangely hollow without two-syllable conversation and eating fast food....
Screw it. We'll go back to Tuesday afternoon, when I discovered that the Czech embassy was hosting a Mezzo Soprano Piano Recital at the local SAS Radisson. Things like this aren't widely publicized at all (when they do happen), and even going to look for them online or in the paper, you won't find them. Honestly, the best news feed is word of text message in this country.
So I texted Hot Mama, who knows everyone anyway, and we got all excited about Dressing Up. Then some people arranged to come, and some people declined, and my closet vomited shoes and skirts like usual, and the week went on.
Wednesday I was notified about a party, on Thursday night. There are actually very few things more pleasant than a message while at work saying "There is a party tomorrow night, and that person you've been thinking about all week is coming, and you should come too. Wear a dress." (I'm now waiting for the one that tells me a plane full of pals from Pittsburg are on the Tarmac with burritos and Zywiec). So I went to the salon, and subjected my eyebrows to cultural indignities I won't repeat and won't treat with language- there are no words. There is, however, Retin-A.
Thursday morning my assistant came in, frowned, and in a perfect Islamabad accent asked what happened to my eyebrows.
On Thursday my last period is a prep. Apparently the prep teacher crossed the Crazy Librarian in some former life- my class was supposed to be in the Library watching a movie so I could industriously finish that last episode of House MD, streaming online. Well, the Crazy Librarian threw everyone out. They ended up back in my room before the mid-episode crash cart- busy watching 13 in the throes of an medi/ethical crisis and suddenly there is a face in the window...that...shouldn't...be there. Waving cheerily. Long story short, I locked myself in the closet and finished the episode while my room became a camp out for two special needs classrooms, two assistants and a really irate Islamic teacher.
I ran away from the circus very quickly- a teacher colleague needed to get home quicker than usual and I drove him. Apparently, the rest of Kuwait had the same idea and they executed it in the same fashion: Colonel Mustard; On 5th Ring Road; With the SUV. It took something like 45 minutes to get home.
Supposed to go to French, but called it a week and called in sick. Instead, I sat in a chair and had a very nice lady do my toenails while I watched "Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid." The cinematography was so good it made me sort of miss Utah a little. (That's damn good cinematography, incidentally.)
Got a text message when I was leaving, that the party was off- apparently the guest list had topped six billion in two days, and the original invitee was (shocker) afraid the cops show up and unable to handle the texts from his grateful six billion. No worries! I went home, took a shower, put on polka dot pajamas, prepared dinner.
Hot Mama texted, still disappointed about the party and wanting out. She directed me to come up with something (preferably involving alcohol) with That Guy You've Been Thinking About All Week, even if it was crashing his place to watch a movie.
Well, that's what we came up with. Until Hot Mama got in my car with another party at about 9:30 PM.
That Guy You've Been Thinking About All Week had changed locations, moved from Dasman to Farwaniya (the euphanisim for Butt-F--- Egypt when Egypt is actually closer). So we went to get him, got lost twice because Kuwaiti urban planners just constructed everything in a circle rather than let you do a U Turn. He was expecting us to park and come up and watch a movie. What we did was drag him in the car without a wallet or ID and cart him off to an (unknown to us) A List party.
The way parties in Kuwait work is this: you know someone who knows someone, who asks if you're interested. You say yes, and later that evening (if you're lucky) you are provided with directions to meet someone to meet someone who will lead you to the place where it's being held. We had no idea that it was going to be the type of party where, when you walk out, people are going to cluster around you and beg you to get them in. Freaaaaakkky.
The original organizer of the Grateful 6 Billion had regrouped and reorganized, trimming to twenty. It was very, very nice- I felt distinctly inferior, by the way. Every Arabic woman in there had at least a triple H cup and 150 pounds on me, no joke. All arranged on couched at the front of the room, they surgically attached themselves to their man-things (stoically chain smoking) when we walked in. Funny as hell-we were at a table in front of the speakers, so Hot Mama and I were texting back and forth when they loosened up and started folk dancing to the house beat.
After about an hour Hot Mama got a summons from Handsome Guy, who was denied entrance. Hot Mama was smelling trouble anyway, since her escort into the party, Bruiser, was giving other men squiffy attitude about talking to us. We decamped to go find Handsome Guy, taking a now buzzed and cheery Guy I'd Been Thinking About All Week, too. Three AM, hooked Hot Mama up with Handsome Guy and poured Guy I'd Been Thinking About All Week into shotgun.
And we're off, back to Farwaniya in a dust storm so bad I can't see what's on the side of the road. It took us an hour and 4 misses to get to his hotel. En route, we saw South Keitan, North Subhan access road, cargo shipment area of the airport, and both directions of 4th Ring Road.
The problem was this: picking him up had only been the second time I'd ever been to Farwaniya. He'd only been in Kuwait for a month, wasn't any help. There was only one way I knew to get to the road that he lived on, which was through two other roads I only knew one way to get on. It was dark and extremely dusty and I did not have my inhaler. I had been racking my brain to get there six hours earlier with Hot Mama. The end of the evening was sort of nightmarish.
Me: (nose to windshield, trying to see) "So what do you think of Serbia and Kosovo?
Him: "I think this is a perfect opportunity for someone to start a conflict, the US hands are tied, this is a one way street..."
Me: "They see me, they can go around. Smile and wave."
When I finally dropped him off, he was sweet enough to ask me up for a glass of water. I thanked him, hinted it might be another hour trying to find my own house , made it home by 4:30 AM muttering "He's twenty six, he's twenty six, he's twenty six."
I tried to sleep longer, but I woke up by nine. Got a nice Thank You from That Guy for finding his hotel instead of dropping him in the desert. Poked around the house, made a recipe I'd been dying to try for ages. Unfortunately, I used Egg Roll wrappers instead of Won Ton wrappers. The moment of truth came when I threw dinner in a pot of boiling water and it turned to sludge. Damn it.
Skirt and top, hair into shape, cup of coffee. Ran to pick up Hot Mama, who decided my name was now Hot Mama. She was running late, got dressed while we talked about Handsome Guy. Out the door to the SAS Radisson and The Big Ass Boat.
En route to The Big Ass Boat, I told her about the dinner disaster. She insisted that I get something to eat. "There!" So I dove across 4 lanes of Gulf Road and down a side alley that ended up as a Carl's Junior Drive Thru. We were running later for The Big Ass Boat, you see.
So we're in the car, back on Gulf Road, I'm wearing a silk top and skirt, hair up, driving with one hand and balancing a burger the size of a dinner plate in the other. Processing the personal history of Handsome Guy.
"So he teaches at University?"
"Yeah. Of course his passport is the wrong color so he's paid next to nothing"
(waiting at light, burger in hand, looks down) "This tastes kind of good." (remembers that Hot Mama is a vegetarian, looks at her) "Oh."
The Big Ass Boat is actually a ballroom. It's called the Al Hashemi Ballroom. I wasn't aware of this until Tuesday. Until I was run out by spiders the size of trashcan lids, I'd been going to a small private beach in Salwa. The Big Ass Boat sort of dominated the left hand view, but who am I to question who parks a dhow the size of a football field in their backyard?
http://library.thinkquest.org/C007541F/structure_of_dhows.htm
The Guy I Had Been Thinking About All Week had pleaded off the Mezzo Soprano, citing an unsophisticated childhood. We were due to meet two other people, a friend and a colleague of Hot Mama. Finishing the burger (neatly, heimdullilah, nothing on the silk), we drove actually down under the Big Ass Boat and parked. The event was upstairs, a cluster of about 150 chairs around a small platform in a dazzling room, so brightly lit it was bringing tears to my eyes.
The event was superb, the reception was wonderful. Afterwards we all went to Cafe Supremo in Salmiya to drink coffee and talk politics. The guy who claimed that I was the only woman in the world to make him happy did a couple of angry Stomp Bys with a pal, sent a nasty text. I traded seats with Hot Mama and kept talking. Next time, bring the fucking chess board.
And...home again at 1:30 AM. I got up at 9, listened to Third Leg talking really, really loud to my neighbor on the landing about going to Fallika Island while trying to finish another House MD episode. I think my life is supposed to feel empty and strangely hollow without two-syllable conversation and eating fast food....
Saturday, March 8, 2008
Riding Lesson
messed up...consequently grouchy Jo. It's the third lesson and already riding is the high part of my week. You can say this is also because I haven't fallen off the horse yet. Everything in time.
Another crystal clear, beautiful day at just the right temperature, here in Kuwait. I washed a pair of jeans, wondering how much longer I have before I have to put them away for the summer. It's March 9th, I think I have until the 25th at this rate.
I need to decide what I'm doing for break, and what I'm doing for the even longer break. It's looking like Poland for at least part (I need me some Warsaw, stat) but I need to get off my ass and get to Petra. I know it's going to be busy busy busy there by April, maybe I should try Yemen. Maybe I should do anything as long as I make a decision....
Another crystal clear, beautiful day at just the right temperature, here in Kuwait. I washed a pair of jeans, wondering how much longer I have before I have to put them away for the summer. It's March 9th, I think I have until the 25th at this rate.
I need to decide what I'm doing for break, and what I'm doing for the even longer break. It's looking like Poland for at least part (I need me some Warsaw, stat) but I need to get off my ass and get to Petra. I know it's going to be busy busy busy there by April, maybe I should try Yemen. Maybe I should do anything as long as I make a decision....
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