THE EXPERIMENT and its last ugly turn

Last week on Thursday the cubemate asked me if I wanted to get coffee. This is code for "lets talk about something secret". The cubemate told me that next week would be the end of his term. He was getting fired. Skeptical, I demanded evidence.

The cubemate had it all thought out. He'd made an erroneous error before passover and hadn't been called up on it even though everyone was mad. They only get mad at people who are in. When you're out, they don't care so much. Also, The Snake had sent him an email which only contained a screen capture of another one of his errors. And The Scientist had added him to Linked In.
He was out.

All day Thursday he nervously preceeded each phonecall with "It's THE CALL".

We got through Thursday and concluded that they would do it on Sunday.

On Sunday he was much calmer. He was already tasting life on the outside. Again, all day he was disappointed when he answered THE CALL and it was only The Co-ordinator.

I went home as usual. At 4.45 there was an invitation to a meeting at 9.30 the following morning. The title: "updates".

In big corporations, "updates" is code for someone got fired/some shit is going down. If you haven't been fired before the meeting, you're ok. Most of the time, of course.

The next morning, no-one is doing any work. Everyone is huddled around in threes and fours discussing "updates". No-one knows of anyone who was fired. It must affect us all. At 9.10 I get a call from a former employee who was apparantly-accidentally sent an email by The Scientist saying that he was fired. So maybe it doesn't affect us all. The Scitentist's salary alone could save the division! In the toilets there's a whole bunch of women discussing the 9.30.

In the meeting, we are wooed by our charismatic leader and the gum-chewing nutjob from Canada. Difficult market blah blah, affected by the recession blah blah, not the core focus of company strategy blah blah, tried everything we could blah blah, but left with no alternatives blah blah, closing the division. Lots of people ask questions pertaining to the "tried everything we could" part. We are reminded to come to work on Thursday. And to keep it quiet. Oops. I've already sms'd a live feed and have people in england who know about it by now.

The aftershock: everyone who had drunk the koolaid* is flabbergasted. How can this be? What went so wrong? After 29 years here, WHAT are they going to do now???

Not me though, I'm alright. I've been fantasing about this for months! I'll be able to do all the things I've been putting off for years. And get a base-tan, tan-tan, and an after-tan. And I can't WAIT to blog about the Israeli unemployment office!

Best of all, I'm free of the EXPERIMENT. I can go and join a new one. But first, lazy summer days at the beach.


*It has come to my attention that not everyone if familiar with this expression. If you're not, use the comments.

subtelties of cross-cultural animal sounds

A typical conversation around the dinner table:

AnguBogu: Look, I've got a frog.
Mummy: What do frogs say?
AnguBogu: Quack quack.
Mummy: Ducks say Quack. What do frogs say?
AnguBogu: Quack quack.
Mummy: No, thats what ducks say. Frogs say "ribbit ribbit".
AnguBogu: Quack quack.
Mummy: No, ribbit ribbit.
AnguBogu: Quack quack.
Mummy: Look boy, you're never going to make it in the real world if you go around saying frogs say quack. Thats Israeli. I'm trying to teach you things so you're not going to look stupid out there. Frogs say ribbit.
AnguBogu: Quack quack.
Mummy: [clenches teeth, lowers chin] ribbit ribbit.
AnguBogu: [clenches teeth, lowers chin, moves lips around trying to nail correct aggression level] Quack quack.
Mummy: RIBBIT RIBBIT!
AnguBogu: QUACK QUACK!
Mummy: Ribbit.
AnguBogu: Quack.
Mummy: Ribbit.
AnguBogu: Quack.
Mummy: RIBBIT.
AnguBogu: QUACK.
Mummy: Eat your food.

i eat too much

So I’ve been thinking about pedophiles. I think I can understand where they’re coming from. (If this alone is enough to inspire you into hate mail, please do leave a ranting comment).

I imagine it must work like this: They get an urge. Probably when they’re out at the park and see a little child playing or something. Then their brain gets to thinking. I want me some of that. Their brain doesn’t stop sending these thoughts. They can’t get them out of their head. The thoughts become all-consuming. Must. Have. A child’s ass. The thoughts and physical urge flood their veins and pervade every atom in their body. Maybe they try to control it by trying to focus themselves on something else. Ah but look at the ducks! Lovely ducks! Not as lovely as that 6 year old over there though. Doomed to failure, they can’t control it. It’s agony until they get what they want. Maybe they get it that day. Maybe they don’t. But they are overcome by the WANT to have it.

I know this because I feel the same way about food. Internet, I confess that My name’s zebra, and I’m an addict.

I like food. Not just any food. Don’t want none of that healthy salad shit. Legumes, be gone! Don’t be waving that lettuce leaf at me. I need some crap, and I want it now. I have to physically restrain myself from going and getting something crap to eat. To prevent myself from gorging between meals (the gorging becomes the meal). It might be crisps, it might be a marmite sandwich. It might be chocolate or biscuits. Or wine gums. Or mini eggs. Or a croissant. Or bread. Once I fix on something, its very hard to forget it. It taunts me. It calls to me.

I can totally identify with the pedophile. I suppose it’s the same for serial killers, druggies, and alcoholics. If they feel the way I do when I know I’ve got a packet of m&m peanuts stashed in the cupboard, the longing teeming through their veins, the way the thoughts of a sweet reward pervade every thought I have, making it impossible to concentrate, well…I’m get that. I do.

I am not a pedophile, a serial killer, or an alcoholic. But I get addiction.

where's zebra?

Next time I post, I hope to be answering this burning question.

feckin hilarious

"I once bought a very nice and special גמד גינה (garden gnome) in Amsterdam, and tied it to the olive tree with an iron chain…and he stayed there quietly for a few years until my boys played football in theחצר (yard) and decapitated it :-)"

talking of slough…

One brilliant sitcom to come out of the uk (one of many, obviously) is The Office. Class.

And then they took it to America and butchered it. I know Americans who love it. For me though, watching it is like having my eyelids forcibly pulled apart and stabbing dirty butter knives into my eyes.

And yet I now hear they intend to bring it to Israel and do an Israeli version. But there is no Israeli like Gareth. Everyone’s been in the army for a start. No-one has a company pub quiz night. No comic relief. And nobody here would ever put someone else’s stapler into jelly. Its doomed to fail already.

Having said that, there is plenty of material to make an extremely funny sitcom out of being a technical writer at a big American corporation in Israel. For example, a typical day starts like this:


Oh yes. I work in a department where the “start up” mentality reins supreme. Its all about fires, covering our asses, and damage control. Usually in documentation because I am the last pit stop.
Example: I pulled this off last year’s Stupidest Things Ever Said wall calendar:


This is exactly the sort of thing I’m talking about. The “oops shit, we’ve already programmed it and closed the application” thought. Quickly followed by “it’ll be ok, we’ll cover our asses in documentation”.

And while you may snigger, I see this and feel the TW’s pain. This is what they’re doing while they’re professionally massaging the text so that it resembles some sort of sane and logical grammatically correct English: …mumble mumble…This is sooooo stupid…mumble mumble…ruining our reputation…mumble mumble…gonna look like fools…mumble mumble…FOOLS, I tell you! …mumble mumble…Feckin IDIOTS…mumble mumble…Bunch of fucking fuckwits…

And later, getting a coffee while PDFing the offensive document: …mumble mumble…IDIOTS!!!!

For more material, remind me next time to tell you all about Israel’s technical writing conventions!!!!

she has a nice ass...

t5

For the observant among you, I have been away. I went back to the motherland for what I'd call a weekend. Someone from work called it a honeymoon. In that case I'd call it a rip off.

So here you are, a Twitteresque feed of the flight home:
19.38 check in. You have to do it by computer. Fumble around looking for booking ref, BA frequent flyer card.
19.45 fast bag drop. Not fast. Bag, no! ~the lady was lovely@! And the drop more like strained thump. Bag is 28 kilos. 25 pounds please.
19.50 queuing up to pay for excess baggage. At least BA then take it off your hands. My therapist makes me take it home with me.
19.55 still queuing. Arab mother and daughter who speak no English can’t work out what they’re doing. Keith behind desk having a problem with the airlock chute.
20.00 all ok. Decide to enter duty free lounge from the other end. After a long walk, realize other entrance is for first class only. It’s like you’re back at school and been rejected by all your peers. You’re just not good enough. Did you think you were good enough?
20.10 Back down at the plebs end, long queue.
20.20 After queue jumping a large Chinese family to passport control, now waiting in line for x-ray.
20.35 Everybody else’s cosmetics are in a plastic bag. Mine were checked luggage. Everyone else has taken off and are carrying their high heels. My shoes are still on foot. I am not a lady.
20.36 It occurs to me that actually I have overpaid for a second ticket on this flight, one which we are not using since my husband preferred a Malev to Budapest, and that in fact, BA OWE ME!!!! Or at least I should have a free seat next to me. I am such a MUG!
20.40 Felt up by security after beeping through. When I asked her if it was good for her, she doesn’t laugh. She must get that a lot. Cringe.
20.50 I’ve bought 2 books (one chick lit and one on mormon polygamy) (i love mormon polygamy!), chocolate, water, and a sandwich.
20.51 Find the comfy sofas and read til its time to board the flight.
22.00 Boarding. Find seat. Look at lady in front of me who is wearing a bandanna weirdly. That bitch has the empty seat that belongs to my husband next to her!
22.10 My neighbour arrives. I look up briefly. That woman in front is holding a dead long-haired rat in the safety information card. Confused. Back to Marian Keyes.
22.30 We’re in the air. I look down at London (well, more possibly, Slough). It looks gorgeous. Don’t know when I’ll be back here again. Feel my guts wrenched out of me and falling away to the ground below.
22.31 Shut eyes. Sleep.
05.05 Frantic rubbing of arm. Through blur can see non-gay air steward. SEAT. BACK. UPRIGHT.
05.10 As soon as you can make out Reading, you can work out where everything else is. EXCEPT FOR I HAVE THE WING BLOCKING EVERYTHING IN MY VIEW. And we’re coming in slightly further south than other landings. We fly over Ramat Gan.
05.15 Landed. Everybody up (this is Israel! We never wait until the aircraft is safely docked at the gate!) Woman in front is WEARING her long haired rat. Oh, so she’s religious.
05.38 After a long hike, arrive at passport control which is typically heaving BUT OF COURSE NOT TODAY because I finally did the hand identification passport control on the way out to save myself the queue….AND THERE IS NO BLOODY QUEUE!
05.39 Brain can't work out how to do the hand press. Eventually get it on 4th attempt: one must squeeze one's fingers together.
05.45 Collecting the duty free we bought on the way out. Cigarettes, check. Hair straighteners, check. Bug box, check. What the hell was in that bug box? Its covered in ladybirds and Amit will later ask me if the box is full of ladybirds. Yes, dear, your father and I thought it would be best to buy a box of ladybirds.
06.00 Taxi home. I am quiet. Taxi driver has the urge to talk. Taxi driver explains that he has to work a 14 hour shift in order to put food on his table. The first 8 hours he works he doesn’t actually make any money on. Compare it to a black cab, he says, he charges a third of the price. He blames the government. I really care. He gets a 5 shekel tip.
06.20 Key in lock. Home.