Wesalkom hal Email il ‘3abee? O b3dain Wyakom!? October 31, 2008

Shino y3ni email ib hal ‘3aba2 yosalnee o im expected to believe it o forward it?

Mo ma3qoola y3ni… tra wee3… ay shay! Ignorance is one thing, not using ur brains AT ALL is just another… its a catastrophy actually!

Here is the email…

Subject: عاااااااااااااااااااااجل جدا جدا جدا………………………

 اعزائي

وصلنا من مصدر موثوق ان مستشفى الاميري وصل اليه 35 حالة قد تتوفى في غضون ايام والسبب

 

وجود بعض البائعة على اشارات المرور وعرضه عليك شم الروائح الموجودة عنده بغرض البيع وما هي الا مادة قد تميتك خلال ايام وهو اشخاص مبعوثون من العراق ، فكل الحرص عدم فتح شباك السيارة والتحدث معهم حتى لتفادي رشه لك هذه المادة

 أو نوع من انواع المخدرات

 

والله يحمينا منهم

 

Walla allah ya7meena min amthal ilee alefaw hal email, o dazooh 7g khalg allah…

Walla allah ya7meena min hal takhalof il 3aqli o il fekree ilee imkhaleena insadeg anything that comes into our mailbox…

o b3dain wyakom?! laysh itdezoon emails chithee y3ni?! shino hal tafaha? Laysh terfo3oon tha’36ee? right?! o nass actually

Y3ni halle yay min il iraq o 6ag darb o shayel shalaylah o yayeb hal madda il se7rya, ishloon dash il q8?

Mo yabeelah kart zyara? y3ni ga3ed 3nd nass bel Q8 o hal nass qadreen inhom ayeboon visitors! Y3ni mo bangaliya bel sekka mathalan! Y3ni hal nass shino ilee imkhaleehom aydakhloon mojremeen o beedhom mada mokhadera taqtel ahal il deera y3ni?

B3dain when they entered il 7dood, ma fateshohom y3ni? mo ma3qoola they didnt catch them with the susbstance!!! Unless it was flown over to Q8 by the genie of the lamp riding on the magic carpet!!!

O fal nafroth yalla harebooha bedon ma7ad yesedhom… ma fakartaw… min WAYN yabaw hal mada?? Min il Iraq? Min Wayn lihom? They do not have food to eat!!!! Either they have stolen it or invented it!

If stolen, min ween? il amrecan ilee ihnak? 3yal why they didnt kill the amreekan ile ihnak or simply killed each other with it? Laysh ye6ogoon bu 7wash min gal3at wadreen just 3shan they stand 3nd il ishara o yeshamomoon il q8yeen 3shan yezbo7onhom? Gololee leesh leesh?

O if they have invented it.. y3ni do you believe that, inhom itha they are THAT ADVANCED masha2 allah, they would have the brains the size of a lady bird, o instead of selling its rights to a weapon maker or to a medicine maker for millions, they’ will leave all behind and come over to you 3shaaaaaaaan they kill you??

Ma sarat cham q8y!!! Ma sarat hal sha3b il mostahdaf il maskeen ilee people are inventing stuff just to kill us?! WHY? min our scientists ilee ayroshoon bel arth with their inventions? Min our 3olama2 o odaba2 ilee hogging all poleitzer o noble prizes? Min our actors o singers ilee stealing the shows at the emmys oo oscars? 3la shino hal mooga 3la shino?!

Shino mako shaghla bel denya ila intaw? Yoba min dara 3nkom!!!!

O b3dain why are all of these casualities in  Al-Amiri Hospital?! Why not in al 3addan or imbarak ? or il amrath il sarya?! Wella all the casualities min sokkan il da2ere il awal b3d?

GROW UP!!! STOP FORWARDING RUMORS!!! OFFFFFF!!!

Sega Master System Emulator … the solution to my insomnia! October 31, 2008

I recall the day i knew what i wanted to be when i grew up…

I was 7 years old, and daddy walks in with a Sakhar MSX PC in hand. We all gather around him, open mouthed, while he connected it to our tv, put in a cartridge called Alf Ba2 Ta2, and started making us play…

On that day… i knew i wanted a profession where i know every thing about this little box of wonders!

So growing up, i loved my video games! I would sit with my brother for hours, playing on the latest it machine, just like the rest of our generation i guess. After the invasion of 1990 we have lost the MSX machine, but i do still have the cartdiges, so we began wandering into the world of Sega, and nintendos, and then later dreamcast and psps and ds and finally Wii, there was a machine that didnt last much, i dont recall its name, it had a worm dressed up as a space man game…

So anyways, the first of the lot began with Sega Master System… it is black and maroon as i recall and we had three games for it (we bought the sega genesis very shortly afterwards fa no time for it)… Alex in Miracle World, A warrior game, and the most stupid penguin game on earth…

so we took the Master System to our place in the UK and kept it there. In the years to come, whenever i was sick in the summer, or bored, i would get it out, finish the Alex game, and fiddle with the warrior game that goes on forever…

I am a person who doesnt like change much, so when u say sonic the hedgehog, i would not enjoy it UNLESS it was the very first sonic. I would play it for hours on end, each song and each turn pulling me back int ime, actually the smells and conversations that took place in that era comes back full force. I still remember the cheat code for Alladin game (right left up down A+Start)… and the codes for mortal combat that would make the loser a baby, or make him die a violent death!!! Or the story lines that would come up after Street Fighter, how i would finish with each character only to read the story lines.

But alas, my mother hates clutter. So at any given chance, she would  throw away the old unused machines and its cartdiges.

The only one i have now sitting next to me is my nintendo DS, my Wii (almost about to finish paper mario by the way), and my old dream cast!!! I keep the dreamcast for two reasons… 1- Crazy Taxi and 2- Shenmu… my 2nd most favourite game after all the zelda’s!!! I finished Shenmu 1, which at its time was a big hit in 3d games, and im almost done with shenmu 2, but because that stupid last CD from hawalli wont work, i had to buy it all the way from UK, only to remember that i have changed the lense of my dreamcast from the UK original one to the US one to run shenmu 1!!! and there is no shenmu 2 US version!!!! So unless Bu Tootee tolerates me and takes it back to Hawalli for a change, i must wait..

Anyways, back to tonight…

Since i have nostalgic pangs to my childhood, i discovered THE BEST WAY EVER to play all your favourite games, on ur PC…

It’s a little thing called an emulator.

Its basically a program, you run it on ur pc, and you download the games you want to play, and you open those games from the program and VOILA!!! you play whatever u want!!!

I finished Knightmare and Rambo, the Goonies, and almost the Penguin and the Pyramids using my MSX emulator.

I finished Sonic 1 & 2 using my Sega Genesis Emulator. I play many other games all the time. But mostly i miss sonic 1

and today, i was craving playing with Alex Kidd, it reminds me soo much of london.

so i cannot sleep. I downloaded the Emulator for Sega megadrive, downloaded the rom for Alex Kidd in miracle word, and im playing away… Wanasa!!!

It looks that i will sleep today at 6 am… i plan on finishing the game tonight insha2 allah…

My Yummy Tea Time Treat In Pictures… October 30, 2008

We recieved a box of mini Flakes from the UK… YAY!!!

So… Tea time (or coffee time) for me is sacred. It always reminds me of my father, who after waking up in the evening would gather us around him o feed us tea, mary biscuits,

The Soo’3a Contents… in pictures October 30, 2008

Gateau Aux Neux, a famous cake from Zurcher Confiserie in Montreux, Montana Honey, two shoes, two YSL socks, a souviner from Cannes, i guess it should be an ashtray but we could use it for pins, and a box of Milka chocolates that Bu Tootee adores

These are the last things he is ever getting from his mom :~(

Well, he had (and still has by the time this post was written) a grin filling his whole face…

I do not know how can he smile regarding this… i was in tears the whole time?

I guess the reality of his mom not being there anymore haven’t sank in yet…

He was smelling the things, everything… taking big deep breaths, as if trying to smell his mom … stroking the bags, smelling each one in turn, making up stories “oh this bag if from the plane for sure… she must have bought somethign onboard” and “oh this one is from the supermarket near home!!!” … etc… There was a wollen vest, he wore it even though it will make him itch & boil, he did not care,he wouldn’t take it off even now that im writing this post and he is having dinner!!!! W3lya maskeen :~(

He couldn’t wait for his dinner to end so we would drink tea with the gateau… I remember him telling her about us nearly missing our train out of montreux last year because we tried to get ourselves a gateau before we left… so we chose interlakken over the gateau! She remembered, of course she would, it was just her kind of thing allah yer7amha… and this year she brought us one… i recall once i had said something about me craving a sugar and spice cake, the next day it was at my door… ordered by her and picked up especially by her and delivered to me… :~(

Allah yer7emich khalty. Mashkoora o ma gasartay… allah ye’3amid roo7ich il janna insha2 allah :~(

Leave you with the pix…

 

The White Shoe

The Honey...

Milka Chocolate

Cannes Souvenier

Bu Tootee wearing the wool sweater & looking @ the soo'3a :~(

Gateau Wrapping...

Gateau Au Noix Box

The Gateaux...

By the way… i don’t know if the cake is edible after two month? Do you think i should tell him gently that we cannot eat it?  

A Soo’3a… From Beyond the Grave!!!!! October 29, 2008

Two months ago, she was just getting off the plane, coming home from her yearly european trip…

Her plane was delayed, she was tired, she had a high blood pressure condition, and on the day she arrived, tommorow would be first day of shahar ramadan, su7oor and preperations and all,which means she had slept for only two hours… before collapsing the very next day from a hypertensive intracerebral hemorrhage (i.e. Bleeding inside the brain because her high blood pressure caused a vein to explode)… her collapse put her into a coma… and two weeks later… she was gone.

Her death shook Bu Tootee, my hubby, very very badly. He is mama’s boy, and he had talked to her a little while before her collapse, making plans to meet with her tonight to go to their relatives for ramadan greetings. She told him she was tired today, she might do it tommorow… little did he know that was their last conversation together…

and now, two months later, 45 days after she passed away. One of his brothers calls him, comes over … and gives him a bag with many little bags inside. Telling him this is his mama’s soogha… as prepared by her the night she arrived!!!

My dear Bu Tootee … he cannot stop smiling!!! He had something to do so he dropped me home with the bag, promising he will be back soon insha2 allah to see it’s content, afraid what is inside might spoil in the car… he is the silent type, he won’t say what goes in his heart… he dreams of his mama almost every day… and im sure tonight he will have some thanking to do if he dreams about her…

It is kinda morbid. It is a bag of goodies chosen with love from a person who touched those, packed those, and merely hours later, she was brain dead! She was the kind of person who would open her suitcases the moment she got home, not resting until everything was cleared up and all sowaye’3 (gifts) where put in bags for their recievers… I know this is the last time ever he is recieving something from his mama, i don’t know what to do, do i film it for him? him opening it? I am sure we are both keeping every wrapper from every chocolate we see in that bag… but still…

If you had read the book P.S. I Love You (no, watching the stupid movie where heroin is the ugliest hollywood actress and cast as an american who happens to cross paths with an irish hearthrob, bulldozing away the whole story line, doesnt count)… again if u had read the book, and wept, you would remember with dread the day she recieved the last letter from her dead husband, and how she felt that if she had opened it, thats it! no more things from him? i had been worrying about that chapter and about that letter since i read the first page of the book… and here it is something similar…

I think im going to cry a bit… still waiting for Bo tootee to come home… i kept the bag in the corridor cause im a bit spooked by it actually… i will give a description of its content later… brb

***** UPDATE ******

I took pictures of the whole thing…. i wrote a post about it… i will publish it in a little while…

*****UPDATE 2******

Pictures are available in the next post i have just published… he is happily wearing one of the shoes today for work :~)

Christmas Day in London… Cloudy Weekend in Q8 October 23, 2008

Now that im stuck at work, at 3:15 on a Thursday… knowing i’m going home to an empty house… remembering that this morning there were some clouds in the sky and im hoping i would still see them when im out… and my mind is wandering to another time… to a happy time…

Christmas day in London…

Now plz, don’t go fret on me “7raaam o islaaaaaam o mayjooooz o i7tefal ib a3yad il kofaaaaaaaaaaaar…”

This is not the point ok?

It was quiet, freezing cold, and not one person is walking down the streets. We had our breakfast, then set out on foot, me and bu tootee… camera in hand. There are no undergrounds nor any buses operating on that day. Most stores were closed, and most cafes/restuarants were either closed or open for christmas lunch (set menu)… we walked on foot in oxford  street… it was raining like maaaaaaaad… cold drops of rain tickeling my nose and hair. I didnt bother with my umbrella… i knew i was getting drenched anyways and my hair is curly fa it wont be affected, if anything, it will be better…  (that was pre-7ejab days by the way)

So we set about… talking and laughing, walking smack in the middle of Oxford street… if i had wanted to sit down and have a picnic there i could have… not one car in sight… something wonderous if you have visited all time busy oxford street!!!!

All the stores were annoucing their boxing day sale, we were window shopping, jotting down the dates and opening times, and singing (yes mako a7ad bel sekka)… singing at the top of our lungs…

“Ya 7ayya ya om raseeen 6obeee ib jederhoom… semeee lee ahal il beet ilaaa waladhomm…

O il yomee lah yomeen ma mar 3layaaa… o mneen ajeeba mneen yes2aaal 3layaaa…

yomkin min3ooh halaaa dadaaa min3ooh ahalaaaa..”

Don’t ask. We don’t know why either…

We walk up and down everywhere, every sinlge little side street? We explored! singing with the rain and peacfullness… if you have seen 28 days later, you would understand how it felt in the scene when the man wakes up o finds london completly deserted!!! this is how it was on that day…

It was as if i had rented all of london to be privately mine for that single day…

so we walk, and walk, our feets start to hurt, we look as if we had just swam in the sea, until we reach liecter square…

and there, in a little italian cafe at the corner, we finally gave up, went inside, and had some coffee to warm us up!!!

The place was tiny… the clouds were making the sky darker and darker with each passing minute, it felt like winter in kuwait, in the 80’s, when there was clouds in the sky, preciesly the days when they showed Alice Fe Belad il 3aja2eb Cartoon, we would then have daddy put us next to him when he wakes up from his evening nap, bring some orange and marble sara lee cake, tea with carnation milk, on which we dunk our mary busicuts… and then we eat it like celerac… and the gray daffaya (heater) bought from ma3rafi will be blowing in the distance, and the sky gray with clouds, and rain every where…

How a darkening cloud can transfer me from one moment to another? I do not know…

Anyways,,, we sat there, had the best carrot cake in the whole wide world, the best cappucino in uk maybe… and sat in silence… panting and shivering… our throats (or rather mine) dry from singin all day long….

Then when we decided to leave, we said we would go straight to back home so we could wash the street grime that had creeped up our clothes, and we did get home, 3-4 hours later, because we had walked and walked and wandered and even got lost a little…

After we went home, then we decided that it was a good day to eat dinner at marroush… then we went back to re-run TV’s and to sleep early for next day’s boxing day

Ahhhh ya ma7la hathak il yoom. Insha2 allah allah yakteb lena o one day we repeat it again! this time i would sing something else of course

Happy cloudy weekend everyone… time for some BBQ, Dowwa, Fa7am, Qers 3qeelee, Darabeel, and Hot milk with Cardemom…

The Diet Post… My New Diet Diary October 22, 2008

*** UPDATE***

I have a special designated page now for the diet diary… next to the beauty & the beast

************

I have two big problems when im about to diet.

First, i have to follow  my diet bel milli, if i eat just one atom out of place, i feel soooo guilty i would raid my fridge and cupboards, eating till i become sick.

Second, Bu Tootee… whenever he sees that im on a diet, he becomes physically anxious, o 3nad starts bringing me food and personally putting together things and sitting next to me offering them to me so i would break down and eat them. He then goes to my mom sadly and says how im on a diet and how that is making him sad. I have never seen a man who would like a dinasour for a wife. Y3ni in the long run if im still this weight i will get diabetes and high blood pressure, can’t he think of that y3ni? Would he be happy?!

Na7ees… 

Il mohim, fa i took Nemo’s comment into consideration from the last two posts. I will make this public. If i want to put something in my mouth i would blog it here in this page first. I hope someone will be there to make me stop… public humilation is an important factor in this trial…

Now i will tell you how my day went to far…

Braekfast: Two toast, Slice Cheese, Lettuce tomatoe cucumbers black nescafe sweet and low

Snack: Apple and water (so far so good)

Snack2: at 4 pm, skim milk cappucino and 2 tablespoons of napkits choco mousse (ham mo bad y3ni)

then i didnt come home till about 7 pm, o i fell asleep on the couch… I woke up late to see a cup of steaming chinese vegeterian noodles by my side!!!! Bu tootee knows im most vulnerble to food the moment i wake up… so he urges me “eat eat… u didnt have lunch!” … fa i eat half the noodles.

Then wella he has also ordered big chunky potatoes. They were eaten with sweet chili sauce o ketchup.

Then i drank liban o banana…

Then a slice of ananas. Then one pear, then one bar of Kellogs Frosties cornflakes bar (103 calories)

Then two makintosh chocos (i had to finish the box before tommorow, since i will insha2 alla start fresh again)

Then i decided inah il diet kharab khalas… b3d shino? Mo?

Fa im going downstairs now to retrieve that box of one dozen mini little treats cupcakes with frosting… (i couldnt eat more than 3 since it was too sugary)

Insha2 allah tommorow is a brand new day. My plan for tommorow Insha2 Allah

Breakfast: 1 slice toast (enough), 1 slice cheese, Lettuce/Tomato/Cucumbers, Plain Black Coffee

Snack1: Apple, Water

Lunch: Grilled Giant Mushroom, Sun Dried  Tomatoe Paste, Pepsi Max

Snack 2:  Tea, Apple

Dinner: Liban, Pinapples, Grapes

Insha2 allah i stick to it tommrow…

o yeah by the way wii fit is still sleeping by the corner, gathering dust. Bacher insha2 allah…

A quick visit to Napkit… October 22, 2008

Although i said i will go on a diet, i am still on a diet, im skipping my snack later on adn having my drink/dessert now … o lunch later..

Place is empty… just how i like it, though it did take them a good 10 minutes to pay attention to me o get my order… which came to my table super fast. Bu Tootee took the grilled chiken and cherry tomatoe sandwich with a watermelon fresh juice. He says the sandiwhc is “y3ni”… but the color on that waterlemon juice was really vibrant. I wonder if they used food coloring for that..

Wait let me take a sip..

mmm good… just the right kind of cold…

Im having skimmed milk cappucino. Again as i said last time, the cappucino is gooood… the froth is … well FROTHY… somethign i enjoy really o the chocolate mousse?

Maybe the best dessert they have, hands down. IT is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo yummy … really really reallllly gooood… hmmmmmmm i vowed to have one spoonful. Seems like i will get three…

Again the crazy speakers suddenly get louder and lower… just did that now

O Butootee is complaining that the lettuce is kinda wasekh o imthawee… he didnt like his sandwich maskeen… but im enjoying my dessert coffee combo sara7a… if only the speakers go down to low like they were a mere minute ago..

O here is a word from Bu Tootee *Eating my mousse*

“Music suddenly became too loud, i cant even hear Daddy’s Girl talking, kinda discowish… and the music doesnt go with the books behind Daddy’s girls and the atmosphere in general… I wish i had my ipod with me… on that very nice unique slab of wood meant to serve as a plate, which i like, the sandwich cannot be eaten as whole, i had to eat it in level, the bread (foccasia) was too dry and too thick, so i ate the top foccasia first, then the insides, then the bottom. For a focaccia sandwich to work, it must not be that hard. Never eating it again. My watermelon juice is good… the black straw is making a nice contrast to the pinkness of the juice… “

GOD MY EARS SUDDENLY BLARED ON MYHEAD!!! PEOPLE ARE LAUGHING CAUSE THEY ALMOST WENT DEAF…

and then it went down as fast as it came… shel salfa? tra ma sarat!?

P.S. Bu Tootee says their juice is not fresh. It looks and tastes good but its like a turkish juice powder thing… i am not sure if he is correct or not, it is kinda too pink to be fresh. Oh well it is GOOOD!

Upcoming wedding Delimma… need to lose 3KG+ fast October 22, 2008

Sha7leele before shahar ramadhan… i had a nice nice badla o ready o all… the wedding was postponed till Mid october, then pushed further to Early november… Ramadan came… and mom is nagging me to try my badla after ramadan… o to see what jewelry to go with it o how to do my hair…

So yesterday, although i noticed i look like a mini elephant, i tried the badla on… and i changed my mind.

I look like a full adult elephant that is overweight!!!!!

Thats aging for you, the metabolism slows down as you approach 30… evey year i have to give up something in order just to maintain my weight… last year i swore off croissants for good (make u hungry, fattening, and no nutritional value but fat!)… then this year i swore off any pasta that is made by anyone that is not me, and i do not get to do it that often, except london pasta. Meaning if i go to any rest. in Q8, i will not take a look at the pasta section… perioud. It ain’t worth it. No one knows how to do it properly and its full of unneeded fat. I broke that rule twice only, once in Prime & Toast and it was worth it. o one in Napkit o i regretted it till this day …

Oh well so … bema inah il badla itgool ge6eenee ya daddy’s girl.. ur so fat you shouldnt be allowed out of the house aslan… a criminal offence against human eyes… g63… fa here is my new diet… starting 2day

• BKFST: 2 toasts, cheese, lettuce, tomaotes, cucumbers, Ice cold coffee
• Snack1 (noon): apple and water
• Lunch (5 pm): Grilled giant mushroom with some cheese and sundried tomato paste. Pepsi Max
• Snack2(6-7 pm): Tea + piece of fruit
• Dinner (9 pm): KDD low fat leban, some red grapes, o some pinapples to burn what i ate all day long

I must also take 15 minutes of cardio on my wii fit… true it has been gathering dust int the corner… but if i want to lost those 3 fat kilos in two weeks and counting… i must play on it daily… im hoping the weekend will also help me burn calories with all the renovations planned…

Wish me luck…

My Weekend Plans… October 22, 2008

My tooth still hurt, my coffee which i have prepared in a flask is ice cold, might as well be a frappucino. Yesterday was fun, but i had too many little treats cupcakes that the sugar went into my head and i couldnt sleep till 2:30 AM… which means i woke up cranky and sleep deprived… i wish they would cut the amount of sugar they use in their icing into half… its just too sugary… still heart melting and irrisistable…

Wayed wanasa laman yekon 3ndich 3zema o you pig out o laugh and laugh… masha2 allah wanasa… one woman actually said she would buy the vegetable pasta from me if im willing to sell it??? What do you think? my own pasta making home business…?

My tooth hurt. Did i already say that? yeah still hurt… i wonder if i go to the dentist today after work, how long it would take them to fix it? I recall a simple filling used to take 20 minutes…

oh well i will see..

Bu Tootee is going to travel with a friend for the first time since we got married almost five years ago… i have soooo much planned for this weekend thata he is away…

 a) bring big carton boxes

1. Bring several big carton boxes
2. GET RID OF MOST OF HIS JUNK!!!!! JUST LYING AROUND!!!!
3. Go to ikea, buy most of the new catalouge. My place needs a face lift.
4. Go re-arrange the house according to the new suff i buy

The thing is, im not afraid of being alone. I will miss him terribly of course, but the thought of him bringing me soogha is soothing… plus… i really really need the personal space. I do not even want to spend my time with anyone… just me, my little place, my dvd’s, my blog (maybe), my visa credit card (eeh abi my money they took from me mo keefhom, la o foghom ikea points b3d)… the thing im worried about is how im going to sleep at night? Its kinda lonely in the third floor… almost foog il so6oo7, isolated from the world. I am not the kind who scares o must have human company, but after the flickering lights paranoia? If i got uneasy i will watch dvds until the dawn lights come out then sleep….