Why Google?

Why are you so smart??

I'm just taking a break and checking email, not trying to get majorly nostalgic and too distracted to think at all.  Now my mind is in a million different places.  Instead of the usual couple thousand.  Hence, I'm blogging.

Khellas!  This thesis proposal won't write itself.

The View from My Window

Into the courtyard in my dorm.  It looks nice, but let me tell you, sound carries and echoes a lot here, when two roommates across the way start screaming at each other (no idea why, but it lasted a LONG time), I get to hear the whole thing.

And no, there isn't normally a rug on the lawn, but another room in the courtyard's toilet overflowed and flooded their room and they're drying it out until it doesn't smell like 'an old sock'.

Nothing like the vagaries of dorm life to ruin a nice picture.  Ok, fine, maybe not-so-nice picture.  But it's still been ruined.

I've Clearly Suffered a Head Injury

Talking about what I ate this summer (or didn't, as was the case for a while there), I struggled (and ultimately failed) to come up with the name for my favorite sandwich in Lebanon.

For the record its schwarma. Schwarma. Schwarma.  Schwarma.

A moment of reflection

I don't remember exactly what I was doing in the summer of 2006 besides working for this lovely gentleman, but I do remember telling myself that I wanted to go to the World Cup in 2010.  I had it all planned out, I'd study abroad at the University of Cape Town and then stay for the summer to watch some football.

Flash forward to a summer 2010, and while I did not stay in the US of A, I was nowhere near South Africa, and couldn't have been happier.  (Well, I could have been, but I'm pretty good with where I was).  The driving force of my summer was studying a language, but I got to do so many other things while I was in Lebanon and met so so many amazing people.

The older I get, the more inspiration I find in the people around me.  Some of the people I met (especially the girls) were such dynamic, interesting people who are going after what they want in life.  I hope I can be as brave as them, especially over the next few years.  I do not want to blink and find myself unhappy in the near future because I didn't have the guts to take the chances I should have.  That's probably my biggest fear in life right now.

So that's the theme of my life for a while now.  No regrets.  After all it is far easier to do something and apologize afterward than ask for permission beforehand.

We'll see how this goes.  I don't know how much of my life I will be writing about here, but we'll see.  I've enjoyed writing a lot this summer, but at the very best will be posting much less frequently in the coming months.

Salaam [peace in Arabic] out for now my friends.

Republic of My Sexist Heart

First heard this song on a boat up in Tripoli.  I liked it a lot, the melody was catchy and it had a lot of energy.  Come to find out (after translating it in class) that it's about how women should not want to do anything more than 'be the president of their man's heart'.  There's been a big to-do in Lebanon about it, but despite that I heard it EVERYWHERE while I was there.

The music video makes it a little better, because it's a man talking about his daughter, but I still don't like the message.

But I might have it on my iPod.

Defining mundane

If you've been reading the blog all summer, you might remember this entry.  Take a close look at the fourth and fifth steps and you'll know exactly what I'm doing this afternoon.  Told you my life was exciting.

My Comedy Hour

Just had my biannual appointment with my dentist, which I have to say is something I actually look forward to.  Allow me to explain why...

My dental hygienist should be a stand up comedian.  She is a forty-something mom who works part time at my dental practice, but I swear to you I spend most of my 45 minutes in the dentist's chair trying not to laugh too loud.  She doesn't talk about anything remarkable, but everything from her son's Korean lessons to her children's inexplicable adoration of the movie Julie & Julia makes me crack up.  Which is not something you usually find yourself doing in the dentists chair.

I would go to the dentist every week if I had the time.  No joke.  (Well, actually, they're a lot of them to be found there).