keep out of reach and sight of children

There is some really dire film starring Jennifer Lopez and Ben Afflek called Gigli or something, probably from the Bennifer days when them popping into Baja Fresh for a burrito was still BREAKING NEWS on E! News, and they team up to half-kidnap some retarded chap for money or something. As I say, it was a terrible film and not worth watching excpet for the retard who JUST HAS TO read something. Anything. And you know, I totally get that. I do. Because when I'm having a crap, I totally need to read something too.

Oh come on! Men do it all the time!

Usually when you're in the bathroom you don't get much of anything to read. The downstairs toilet in my house is considered the "boys toilet" and there is plenty of reading material in there. But I am a girl so I use the girls toilet which is the bathroom. I don't really need anything long, just something to take my mind off passing the poo. So I find myself grabbing the nearest thing and wrapping my tongue around the long ingredients of bathroom items. Did you know there's Tetrachlorohydrex GLY in my deodorant? And Sodium Diethylenetriamine Pentamethylene Phosphonate in my shampoo?

This morning I read the headlice treatment I brought back from england. I threw away the box when we were in england so the ingredients are lost to me. I had to entertain myself with the CAUTIONs. Do not smoke while using this product. Just the image of me (or anyone) treating my kids for headlice with a fag hanging out of the corner of my mouth made me laugh out loud!

And splash, I was done.

this is what is considered "public art"

Petach Tikva, January

Somebody made a killing doing sculptures for the city of Petach Tikva.

caught red handed

Gah! I am a criminal in my own bank! They have sophisticated ways of getting to you these days. Here I am, innocently trying to book something online when it tells me I need a securecode. A securewhat?! I put in the detaiils it asks me but it refuses to grant me a secure code. I call up the bank. He asks me some questions. Name, date of birth. First and fourth number of my internet bank code. I don't know, I never usually call you up! What are the 9 numbers at the bottom of the card? This is not going well. My mouth gets dry. I don't have the card on me! Its at home! All I have are the usual numbers I need to get stuff from amazon!So stupid! I panic and hang up the phone acting like anyone who's stolen the card details might.

Later, I call them back with my card in my hand. But its too late. My account has RED ALERT written all over it. They won't let me do anything over the phone and are in the process of dispatching a SECURITY PACK to my house. The man on his headset is from yorkshire and I don't like the way he's pronouncing my name. It's going to take a few good weeks to get the pack here and back and get me a securecode. Darn it! Cutting internet shopping privileges...why, that's behaviour worthy of THE EXPERIMENT!

while you go about your daily life, its always there lurking behind a corner...

I had a good chat today with one of my readers who was going through the archives and came across the one about THE EXPERIMENT. A manager was standing in the cube just then which is ALSO PART OF THE EXPERIMENT. So I sat and listened to him tell me how suddenly the clouds parted, the sun shone through, and it all became clear to him. He likened the experience to the level of nirvana he achieved watching the Matrix. Holy compliments, Batman! Glad to help.
I experienced THE EXPERIMENT firsthand this morning. I tell you, some people I interact with are either victims of the experiment, or perpetrators. Or could well be both!

Here are some other facets of THE EXPERIMENT that I have identified recently:

• Put walnuts in the chocolate cookies and insist that they ALWAYS had walnuts in there.
• My mouse now makes a distinctive deep plastic click when I click.
• Tell me I have a new dotted boss
• Tell me unofficially that I have to justify my job for the next year (mention out-sourcing)
• Tell me not to tell anyone (no worries, just the whole internet)
• Tell me you are thinking XML is great for my cv and that's about it
• Take away my right to print in color for the 3rd or 4th time in as many months.
• Set up an employee event and as usual block my access to sign up. Let me in on the 50th attempt only to reveal that the event involves paying to clean up a beach.
  

from the camera phone

HaYarkon River by night, January 2009

it's good to talk

Last week I was in no mood to post here. It was a hard week and I had the yuppie disease for oh at least 3 days of it. I was struck quite hard and did a lot of sleeping. I think I might still have it, at least during office hours. You try staying awake for more than 5 minutes straight and see how you fare. It was a depressing week in THE EXPERIMENT, with firings and ch-ch-changes in the air. I think the only time I really laughed was having an instant messenger conversation on Tuesday applauding the genius of the name STIFFROD.
Having said that, the week was not a total write off, and we did manage to get the ball rolling on 2 projects for this year. And I got to do what I enjoy the most in the world…connect with people. Very British Telecom and Nokia, I know. After last week where two family members declared they never want to see us ever again, things turned around and I managed to meet up with an old friend, develop a relatively new friendship, meet up with a bunch of old friends over delicious food!, speak with a few other mothers from the kindergarten and bond, AND the husband cooked a lovely dinner for our friends.
I love connecting with people. There's nothing finer in life than sitting down with someone and really feeling that you're on the same page as them. It is so liberating to feel validated. Smiles and laughter abound and you feel loved and appreciated. Life is good.
We also went to another birthday party with TimTam. Could any clown possibly be cuter? He gave us his new dvd containing a free poster. I managed to nab that before the kids saw! The poster is now in its new home under my pillow. I hug the poster tight in bed all night long. Not sure who's going to watch the dvd more; the kids, or myself…

so outta here

Somebody big left last week (voluntarily) (we think). There is a certain etiquette in leaving that is often not observed by leavers. Here's what you should do if you are leaving your place of work:

1. Money collection. You want to leave with a good present. The present is going to be the trophy of your time at the company so if you get something you're not into, its going to mean you had a bad employment experience. Make sure you get somebody good to collect your money. Ideally, someone who liked you, and is dedicated to the cause (i.e. will send out 2 if not 3 email reminders—maybe even walk around the office with a chink-chink of change, will tell people who ask what the "going rate" is the highest amount given, and most importantly who will ask you what you want). Don't be wishy washy about what you want. Aim high.
   
2. Drink. Schedule a half hour. Nobody is going to diss off work for an hour for you. You're outta here. Timing is important: a 10.30 am late breakfast on the day you leave is optimal. The drink is more than a drink. It's your way of saying: this is who I am and why you're going to miss me. That's why serving dark chocolate cake and strawberries looks good. And why serving in-house catering looks nasty. Extra brownie points for homemade stuff.
3. Speech. Hopefully you've had good bosses who will give you a good speech. If not, they might drone on forever about the company and then give you some formula of thanks for all your hard work. Avoid making everyone in the room say something about you. Not a good look. Then it's your turn. Almost every speech I hear inspires me to mentally start writing my own. Mine has changed over the years, but it would have been so great to leave about 100 times and used every draft. Most people give the saccharin speech: I've learnt so much from all of you, this is a really great place to work. BARF! Two great speeches I've attended stand out in my mind. One chap gave his guidelines for getting by in the workplace, eg. smile at everyone (and mean it!) and sing out loud. The other girl gave a list of things from THE EXPERIMENT that had prompted her decision to leave. EG. "They took away the swap shop--I'm leaving!" "They took away my room--I'm leaving!" We were all pissing ourselves!
   
4. Final email. This tool is often used in place of the drink by people who got fired. It tends to be a soppy "farewell, my friends" email. It is also used by people leaving of their own accord as a here are my new contact details email. Only the best ones will contain phrases like "great springboard to world domination", "leaving to pursue my dream as a (well-known airline) pilot", references to Elton John, and "I won't miss you. Die, suckers!"

there's an elephant in my blogroom too, but I keep stubbing my toe on it

In our company we have a library that serves the company. I've been there for 5.5 years and never needed the library. When it moved location, they did a grand reopening. I hear 4 people turned up, and 2 of them work in the library.

Slash slash slash!

The sound of layoffs is in the air. 30 people go home. Your friends. Your colleagues. Good people. Long-serving people. Management are huddled in the conference room with the good chairs. They've gone past the fat and are cutting the meat. Groups of two and three have "corridor conversations". Meetings are entitled "updates". Everyone looks grave (except for some people who must work for finance who still find the mood to play ping pong). Why this one and not that one? Why me and not them? How much longer do I have? My boss advises us to keep our powder dry. I'm not sure if he means gun powder or foot powder because the advice follows a story about his nephew the soldier who was holed up in Gaza and didn't change his socks for 12 days.

The library is still safe. They say that the librarians will be the ones to lock the front door after we all leave.

at my desk...all the pencils are sharp

There comes a time in my job, once or twice a year, where the projects dry up and you slowly find yourself s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g out everything you need to do, doing the admin work you never usually have time for (backing up all of your files, for example), and wondering how you are going to fill in the next 8.5 hours on the clock.

Nobody likes to not work. Especially when they are being paid to work. Especially when management is casting for a new line up on soon-to-be-ex-employees. A time when being caught chatting on facebook is not a good look. A time when it simply isn't wise to run up to your boss with your tongue flapping asking for some new projects. This will certainly get you on the list. You have to appear to be so busy that you are indispensible. At least for this round (at the current rate, firing rounds are every 3 months, next one rumoured for next week).

Right now I am busy on squat diddly. I've made a to do list and realised I have 2 open cases and both those are dependant on other people pulling their finger out. I've archived all my jobs from the last 6 months. (Apart from 2 projects that were shelved and one that I can't find but think it was a document they gave to a non writer and it begins "In 1929…") and I've muda'd my desk. (A few years ago we had a tidy up the office drive and called it muda. Its supposed to be Japanese.)

I even wrote to support to see if they fancied making up a user tip which is usually something they bug me to do when I have no time.
- Do you have some tips or something for me to do??
- Not really, But I can scrape something together , why?
- Bored.
- Shhhhuush Not so loud. I have some very angry turks writing us letter, but a bit sensitive. Very funny probably to someone from outside support.
- Give me whatever you have and regale me with tales of anything interesting.
- No.
- pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease
[no response]

Oh well, back to facebook. No change in the last 5 minutes. It's obviously all part of THE EXPERIMENT.

2009: will walk around kicking people's asses with great footwear

Recently I've bought two pairs of heals that are so fucking luscious that I can hardly control myself! They are so comfortable I get to wear them all day long and sleep with them all night long and life has never been better.

The first pair I noticed at a great social event: the 4 year old's birthday party. Not on a four-year old.

Immediate case of MUST-HAVE-ME-THOSE-SHOES!

I rushed out that very weekend and got them. Or, I would have gotten them had they had my size in stock, so I had to order them in and then wait another week.

Here they are:
Top view:

Detail:

Birds eye view:


Other side view:


nab yourself a pair here!

Also, I got some red ones from in England from a well-known high street store.

Kick-ass!

OK, watch out! I'm coming to stamp on your face!

sublime pleasure is...

...eating a packet of beef hula hoops and watching a new episode of Grey's Anatomy in an empty house at 5.20 in the afternoon

not a hot dog...MY hot dog!!

Every now and then the universe brings together a melody of things that collide at the same time. And this time it’s hot dogs. We had hot dogs for dinner last night. (A well-balanced meal goes a long way. Amit was full for about oh-an hour and a half on his half hot dog and cried himself to sleep moaning “but I’m hungry, but I’m hungry!”)(TOUGH TITTY!) Also, we’ve been reading the well-known children’s classic (if you don’t have it, GET IT) The pigeon finds a hot dog by Mo Willems. It’s a great little story about (guess what) a pigeon finding a (guess guess!) hot dog! And a duckling who comes along and annoys him about it.

And now Ora sent me a GAZA-WAR news link: Islamic Jihad seizes IDF rocket, hotdogs. Apparently Hamas fighters seized some Israeli army equipment which included some Zoglovek hot dogs. The article suggests that the hot dog packets were already empty by the time Hamas got their hands on it, which is surely a good example of Israeli brutality and injustice in Gaza.

I especially like the quote by Islamic Jihad in relation to the incident: "Our message to the gutless enemy is that our fighters will ambush you everywhere," the group said. "They will surprise you and hurt you in response to your crimes in the Strip. You should be aware that we still possess many surprises that will hurt you and make you sorry."
Gah! They’ll be after our buns next!

pear guitar...interesting

Most people who know me just know that I do not care for a puppy in a field of daisies or propped up on a log. (The exception being my aunt whose love for the sweet puppy eyes or uplifting verses often overrides the will to not click Forward and enter my email address). Nor do I care for the Dalai Lama's Millennium Musings 9 years later. Nor emails that start with "Make sure you scroll all the way down and read what is written". Nor emails promising bad things if not forwarded to 10 people within 5 minutes. Nor emails parodying chain emails or emails that promise you GAP will track you down and give you $25 worth of t-shirts. Nor emails containing outrage over something or the other when a quick check in Snopes will reveal it as a falsehood. I hate emails containing pps files where you can't click through quickly. I especially hate pps's where pps-creator has flexed the tools available to him and has text appearing letter by letter, or coming in from the left corner with a swirl before landing at its place on the slide. No. No. No. And don't even think about setting it to any kind of music. Especially if it's a collection of 2 inch babies made out of marzipan.

I have a bunch of people who like to send me fwds. Most people know to only send me the highest quality kick-ass stuff. But apparantly, some don't. In particular, I have a former colleague who sends me fwds WITHOUT FILTERING THE CONTENT.

This morning I received an email containing 19 (19!) photos of fruit art. I kinda have to wonder about the people who create fruit art and marzipan babies. In fact, anyone who uses food as an art tool rather than just eating it must be pretty weird. Also, HOW MUCH TIME do they have on their hands?! I have so little time that even the thought of chopping a salad gives me conniptions! So I look at this email. The instructions state I must read all the way to the end. Here's a butterfly cut out of an apple. Here's a banana dolphin. Here's the bust of a man swimming butterfly stroke in a watermelon. Here's an egg pram (yolk and white still inside). Here's a loaf of bread fashioned to look like a homeless person's shoe complete with cut off toe section showing bread toes and crusty toenails! Here's a tomato wearing wire glasses talking to some cauliflower sheep. Here is a little man with an orange peel body and the top sixth of an orange-head about to ram it down onto a juicer. Lovely.

At the bottom of the email I am informed that it's International Disturbed People's Day. Damn right I am disturbed about witnessing that little orange man's impending suicide! "I don't care if you lick windows, take the special bus or occasionally pee on yourself…" Which category does my former colleague think I fit into!??!

And at the end, the email tells me:
You hang in there sunshine, you're friggin' special.

Well, I like that last bit.

bloody hell, this is a fucking shit-ass post!

My grandmother was Polish and lived in Poland. (I didn't really realize what this would mean until I got to Israel where the phenomena of having Polish in your blood is an understood and pitied syndrome, but that's another post!). As a child we would go to visit her and I remember watching television with her more than a few times. In Poland in the 80's, they didn't like subtitles or dubbing. But one man made a killing doing a voice-over of every single part in everything on the television in a non-emphatic monotone (female parts included). That way, in Ghostbusters II, Ray's yelling WHAT THE HELL IS THAT??! at the rumble of the underground slime would come out as a bland "what is that?". Luckily you could still kind of hear the English underneath it. My grandmother's reaction to monotone voiceover man was a sharp intake of breath in horror at pretty much everything he said. I hate to wonder what her reaction would have been had voiceover man put some effort into his job.

The sharp intake of breath trickled down a generation to my mother and was reserved for me for whenever I said anything that might be taken as my being rude. We were banned Grange Hill on the grounds that it was rude. Neighbours was more wholesome but Home and Away was also out. To be frank, we were lucky we got to watch Emu's All-live Pink Windmill Show!

Despite this, growing up in England, I would swear like a sailor with friends just because it was a way to rebel against the way your parents raised you. And saying an exam was a "fucking nightmare" wouldn't offend them in the slightest. It was a badge of commradary, a way to fit in. Still, I would avoid swearing in front of anyone I showed respect to. But I don't live in England anymore and here a lot of people use English swear words and it has lowered the effectiveness. For example, it is not uncommon for a fuck-up to be called a fuck at a meeting ("there was only one fuck…we didn't get the x's on time")(or for you: "hayah rak FUCK achad…sh-ha x-im lo igiyu bezman"). "Shit" is used as a loving expression for when things go wrong. Over time, the shock-value of swearing has dulled. I like ordering a big fuck-off coffee. In the good days, Nicole and Paris would be all Love you, Bitch, Love you, Bitch and that was ok. So all my environmental indications now suggest that swearing is becoming acceptable. And I still swear too.

It's generally considered not a good thing to swear in front of your kids. They are impressionable. Bad language is a sign of lack of education and lack of respect. But I am pretty relaxed, and I don't always remember to not swear in front of my children. In fact, my mother's sharp intake of breath is pretty much the only reason I fear using language around my own kids as we all know how they love to repeat things. But you know, it wouldn't offend me if they stubbed their toe and said "Shit!". I guess it might offend me if they said "Fuck you, you big fat fucker", but that's because talking about someone's weight, that's low.

top ten things that follow "i feel the need, the need for cheese"

10. "Brie..." (sniff) "you stink..."

9. "And there was that one incident with the Admiral's cheese"

8. "Your body's writing cheese your ego can't cash"
7. "She's lost that loving cheese" "She's what? Man, I hate it when she does that"
6 "Gooness gracious, great balls of cheese"
5. "It takes a lot more than just fancy cheese"
4. "You don't have time to think up there. If you think, you're cheese."
3. "What were you doing up there?" "We were giving them the cheese".

2. "That's right, Cheese...man. I am dangerous"

1. "Edam, you can be my wingman anytime!" "Bullshit, you can be mine!"

gaza war soapbox

How do you know that a tree makes a noise when it falls in a forest with nobody in earshot?
How do you know that the rest of the world exists when you are not looking at it?

When I went to Cairo in ’07, I was totally blown away by the crazy place. Cairo is not very far from here. It only took all-day on a bus trip to get there at 3am. But that’s only because you have to drive through Eilat as it would be too dangerous to go through the Gaza strip. And probably also because we got held up somewhere in the middle of Sinai for over 2 hours arguing about bakshish (rub fingers and thumb together).

Cairo is unlike any other place I have ever been to. Not the shuk. That's familiar. They sell the same drums, camels, keffiyeh, and trinkets I can get in Jerusalem. And they are suprisingly uncreative with the pyramid souvineers. The same "my friend, my friend" attitude that is customary in the middle east and I hear India though I wouldn't know haven't ever been. The same tea with mint we drink here. The same nargila although they call it something else there.
The difference was the streets. As many lanes as lorries, vans, cars, camels, bikes, donkeys, and people that can squeeze into. No-one stops at a red light. Like EVER. You cross the road because you've got the balls to do it. You've just got to cross and hope that the driver values his donkey more than life itself and doesn't fancy your blood on its nose. A couple of times my brother saw my life flash before him and yanked me back on the kerb. But he didn't convert so hasn't got the hutzpah that comes with being Jewish. And what really amazed me was that all this daily balagan (*chaos) was going on 250 miles south west of my life! And its been going on for like EVER! It's going on RIGHT NOW!

But it's quiet in my apartment. I can't hear the honking horns of Cairo. I wouldn't even know that there's a war going on 44 miles from my posh neighbourhood. That yesterday morning a rocket fell 14 miles away and injured a 3 month old baby. That every day for the last 8 years rockets launched in Gaza and fall within a 50 mile radius from my house. So how do I know? Unlike when I was 14 and I looked out of a Surrey school window in a History lesson and thought "wow, there's a war going on in the gulf and I can't feel it", I do feel it. I know that my husband will get called up next month if its still going on. I know what that means because we were at war with Lebanon 2 years ago. I know that the cubemate is at the border. And that the finance guy is in there. I know my husband's cousin's husband is in there. They put a box up at work next to the lifts asking for any spare army equipment that the male workforce is likely to have. My cubemate called his boss and said "make sure HR know I'm here...you get chocolates..." We have the news on all night. With the news we visit the shiva (*wake) of the killed soldiers and the hospital beds of the injured soldiers. We discuss it endlessly and we have the news internet sites on all the time. We're all nervous. We're all conscious that Israel gets a bad press for this kind of thing. And that no-one said anything to Russia about Georgia or the massacre last week in the Congo. We feel bad about the innocent victims but at the same time we know that these terrorists don't think twice before hiding behind a school child as body armour. We know that if another country had rockets fired upon them every day that they would retaliate. So we do and most of us want Gaza cleaned up. We left there 3 years ago and they are still blaming us for every problem in their infrastructure. Nobody is on the television shouting about how much money and how many chances they've had to build themselves a viable country there. They want more. They want it all. They want what was offered to them in the UN partitian plan of 47. And then they want the rest. They want us in the sea. So, forgive us for defending ourselves and for fighting back a bit.

Maybe you don't see what's happening here or maybe you don't see this at all. After all, you can't see it from your house.

PS> I bloody loved Cairo.

i'm baa-aack! and so glad about it!

I got back from my xmas trip yesterday morning and still feel hung over from the food and the flight. Never travel with children.

If there's one song that defined the trip, its the TING TINGS: That's not my name. I knew the song from driving around in Israel and found it mildly amusing. But then on holiday I saw it on some english comedy-quiz show (Oliver will tell me which) sung by some fat comedian (Oliver will tell me which) and it was on Jools Holland's NYE show. And then bam! it was the holiday song. Def not any song sung by DUFFY who, it turns out, IS NOT the former Casualty cast member after all. (disappointing!) However, Duffy was definitely not Irish, you're thinking of Megan.

They call me hell
They call me Sta-cey
They call me her
The call me Jane

That's not my name. (uh, uh)
That's not my name.

Being back is definitely not great. Life always looks shit in January. Israel is at war. The cubemate is serving his country again. So is the finance guy. The husband is not (too chubby?). Its time to start a diet. Its time to start working my butt off. My SME is gone. The head of sales quit so I'm getting a new dotted line boss (you'd have to be corporate to understand why you have a dotted line boss). The print tests came back bad. So much crap. I think I might call it hell.

I'll call it Sta-cey. I'll call it her. I'll call it Jane. That's not it's name. Uh. Uh. That's not it's name. Uh. Uh. It's name is FUCKED UP PIECE OF SHIT NEW YEARS PRESENTS.