S T R E S S

Today is a stressful day …

Not only is it the day of the “BIG” launch “DINNER”, where I’ve planned every single aspect of the event and managed it…when I never even completely planned my own birthday parties…
Not only is it the day that I have been anxious about for the last week and been shouting at anyone who dared to speak to me (or so they tell me!)…
Not only is it the longest working day ever (at office since 6:30 am!)

BUT
I also had to fire someone today!
And I mean give that person the walking orders and Not the usual “control the damaged goods after the shock of being fired crashed and smashed them”!

AND
That person didn’t want to go easily!!!
NOOOOOO
She had to make my life harder and argue her case!!


It’s a stressful day …
And if you are wondering how I was able to blog during this demanding & hectic time…
Well…don’t you know that I’m excellent at multi tasking??? (among other things of course!)

No Bravery

Go on...listen to this:

No Bravery

An Awakening Thought

Have you ever woken up in the morning when you were supposed to finally commit to your personal self-challenge of exercising daily and thought “Oh Gosh I Can’t!”?

Have you ever thought if you can exercise while lying down?
I’m not talking about those bed exercises that doctors would recommend to the bed-ridden to help keep their strength, flexibility, and circulation.
And, to those nymphets out there, NO I’m not talking about THAT calories burning exercise!

I’m talking about an exercise where you don’t have to move even your eyelids. The only matter that would move is that resides in your skull.
Just look at the inside of your eyelids and imagine!
Do the Cat posture, then up to the Mountain, and down for the Forward Bend. Move into the Triangle and the Warrior II and bend for the Downward Facing Dog. Slither into the Cobra then turn into the Bridge. End it with the Corpse!

Now did I stretch my full body muscles or just my brain?
Did I loose any fat cells or did I loose instead grey cells?
Since I didn’t perspire, was the only secretion in the form of a cerebral hemorrhage?

Hmmmm maybe I should move some brown muscle next time!

Shopping with Hippo

Two reasons why I shouldn’t shop with Hiba again:

1. She goes shopping for her self. She focuses on that only. She can’t understand that who comes with her is allowed to shop for themselves too. One day Hiba will be a seasoned shopper like me: I can shop for the whole world at the same time! But till then...
   
2. I don’t like it when Hiba likes something and wants to buy it, but doesn’t cause she can’t afford it. I don’t want my lil sis wanting anything, so I buy it for her. Simply put: this good deed is Not good!!

Movies Movies Movies

It was Movies week for Hiba & I.

On Tuesday, we literally Rock-Paper-Scissored which movie to see! She rocked my scissors and we ended up watching 16 Blocks.

My verdict: Unexpectedly good. No super human maneuvers from Bruce Willis (the perfect shot from the drunken cup doesn’t qualify as super human!). Mos Def was pleasantly annoying that so many times in the movie we wanted to shoot him to shut him up! Watch it on DVD.


On Thursday we watched Tom Cruise and MI3.
I don’t care if he is short, jumps on coaches or believes in scientology, the man is gorgeous and can act!!

My Verdict: I’m no mission impossible fan, but this movie should be seen in the theaters! It was too loud for my taste, but still a good movie to watch. And hopefully you wouldn’t get a smelly movie goer sitting next to you as Hiba did!

On Saturday we watched Just Friends, where the tickets clerk swore that Just Friends are really the worse two words any man can hear!
The movie starts with reminding me of old days, and my love to All4One and

I swear
By the moon and stars in the sky
I'll be there
I swear
Like the shadow that's by your side
I'll be there
For better or worse
Till death do us part
I'll love you with every beat of my heart
I swear

My Verdict: As expected, the movie was funny and stupid. Wait for it till it comes out on DVD, and rent it with a couple more for a one of those long movie nights! After all, the best laugh we had was before the movie started and about the woman who kept cleaning her date's ear with her tongue! It seems that it was VERY dirty!

That’s Chicago!

We heard that Chicago is coming to Dubai. We, of course, refers to my girl gang.
So we rushed and got tickets. Since each gang member has her own financial commitments (and problems), we decided to go for the cheap tickets. I usually get the VIP tickets, so does Ghiz. The closer we are to the stage the better. After all this is not a Movie theatre!!
But we were going as a group, so we managed to bring our noses down, and accept what the majority could pay.

I got the tickets almost three weeks ahead of time. Excitement was building. I resisted reading any reviews on the musical. I closed my ears to the complaints about the seats. I was too excited that I was going to see a Musical…in DUBAI!

We agreed to meet at eight in the evening at the theatre even though the show starts at 9:30. It’s free seating, and with balcony tickets, we really needed the front seats there!

Four hours before the meeting time, Aminah, my own blood, cancels. She can’t come because Jassem was coming to town. URGH!!
No let me clarify that: URGH with HAIR PULLING FROM HER SCALP!
A couple of months engaged, and she is already canceling her all-girls night which they both knew about since we got the tickets! I’m dreading what will happen after she gets married!!

Of course it was a short notice to get rid of the ticket. No one even bothered to answer my email. After all, it was the show before the last; most people already saw the performance and none was interested in a sole “balcony” ticket.

The ticket was not wasted at the end. But my blood was still boiling.

Then at 8 pm we saw the line! We are actually queuing outside the theatre more than an hour before the start of the show!! And people have their cushions with them!!!
8:20, the doors opened and we went in. We were told then that there is no Balcony and Balcony tickets were upgraded to Grand stand. Hmmmmm.
Upgrading Balcony meant that it was dedicated the last three rows of grandstand!!
And by the time we were up, the middle of the first two were taken!!
So… we got to sit in the LAST ROW.
As in NO ONE BEHIND US and EVERYONE IN FRONT OF US!!!

The stage looked so small and so far away. It seemed as if it was in another Galaxy!

Five minutes on the chairs and we knew why people needed cushions. Even if you had a J Lo ass, you would need a cushion to bear sitting on these seats. I can’t think of anything to compare these seats to. Even seats at stadiums have more shape and are more comfy than these. Emirates Airlines has more leg room in their economy class than these seats, and I take aisle seats on Emirates!

It was a horror. It was a nightmare.
And people started to fill in, the air was diminishing, the empty seats were going, so was the view!!
We moaned, we groaned. We grumbled, we whined.
We nagged. And we bitched.
But by the time we heard “All that jazz” we were bewitched!
Of course we were charmed standing up!!!

When the first interval came, we sat. We were glad to have the last seats as otherwise we would have suffocated between two rows of people sitting TOO close to us.
We were enjoying the show even though we didn’t see any faces. I have the best eyesight of the group and all I could see of a face was red lips and black spots for eyes!!

We managed to stay for the second part, even though many of the audience left, including Hoda.

I personally loved the show. I was able to clap, move to the rhythm, laugh and cheer loudly.

My best parts of the show:

Roxie: He was trying to burgle me.
Policeman: From what I hear, he's been burgling you three times a week for the past month.

Roxie: And then I started fooling around... and then I started screwing around, which is fooling around without dinner.

From the tango of the cell mates:
Cell mate 1: and I fired two warning shots......into his head.
Cell mate 2: And then he ran into my knife. He ran into my knife ten times!

Amos: Mr. Cellophane, Should have been my name, cause you can look right through me

And not everything you see is what it seems…the surprise of Mary Sunshine, that literally had Ghiz and I scream!!!

And of course…
Billy: You're a phony celebrity and in two weeks no one's going to give a shit about you...that's Chicago. ;)

My Tongue & I!

When I was a teenager, I was always accused of having a sharp dart of a tongue.
I plead guilty!

I still have it.
I use a blaze of words (bright enough to cause genetic mutations) as effectively as the fists of Muhammad Ali in his golden days to crack the thickest skulls, throttle the bulkiest throats, stomp the most beastly of hearts…till I hear a pleading cry for mama!

My quick wit, once unleashed, is like a steamroller on the loose, flattening everything in its way! (My honesty is admirable, right?)

However, I’m not mean. Ok, so Hodz has been repeating lately and frequently that I am a bitch. But to my credit, she says it while laughing!!

I have a talent for acerbic put-downs but they are not laced with venom.
Except if I really don’t like that person!

I’m not a snake with a tongue fluttering in anticipation of a bared-fang strike.

I use my sarcastic replies, slick humor (which could be, I admit, both inadequate and inappropriate) on my closest friends and those I feel comfortable with and who I expect I would get from them more that I give!

I am guilty of having a wise-ass attitude, which is an acquired taste!

• Hippo loves it & gives as much as she gets. She got the same sarcastic gene as I.
• Asif, Rania, Maya, Christine, Dalia & Thamer endure it. They know I don’t mean harm even when the remark sounds poisonous. Of course they feel free to say “Shut Up Bitch!!”
• Hodz is a special case. I still have not directed my dart at her, I think! But we have united few times on few people (like Humpty Dumpty & IC) and we almost compete on who would draw the first droplet of blood from the vic!
• Amir, the new kid on the block, seems to be a good punching bag. The stronger the hit, the stronger he comes back!
• Med, who once told me I should stop thinking that men are inferior than women (I don’t think men are inferior than some (certain) women. I do think, of course, that I am superior than most of the men I know. Actually, more than most), has been subjected to some warm-ups punches, and didn’t like it. At All!
• Diana, sensitive and tender, has been excluded from the beginning of our friendship. I just knew she gets bruised so quickly!

And I’m writing this post today, to promise myself that I would stop.
No, I won’t stop! I would always try to get more people involved in my verbal boxing.
However, I’ll throw one punch, if I get one back, I will continue. If I don’t, I would stop.
Promise!

This promise will plug my larynx as effectively as any cork ever stoppered a bottle!!
I will repress my sarcasm even if I heard it crawling up my voice, felt it twist my features and harden them as if a thick plaster was applied to my face to cast a life mask titled Acerbity.

Now ain’t that admirable?!!

It wasn't her!

Al Arabiya, where Atwar Bahjat last worked, denied that the lady shown being tortured & killed in the tape is Atwar. Her family who received her body, washed it, and buried it, also denied that their daughter was beheaded. They did say that there was evidence of torture and that she was shot dead.

I'm relieved that Atwar didn’t have to be tortured that way.

But I wonder….if it was not Atwar… who was that the poor woman?! Does her family even know of her death?!!!

Red Tears

Why did I have to read the newspaper?!! I only look at newspapers to check the company's ads!!
But Today...
My attention was caught...By Atwar Bahajat's name!!

The reporter was not shot dead...she was tortured...
In what religion do these beasts believe... it can not be Islam..
It can not be humanity!

I could only think of the pain the Atwar's family are going through!
My heart goes to them... and to all those Iraqis who are dying believing in One Iraq!
May God Bless Your Souls!
May God Protect Iraq.... cause we sure are not!!

Part of me died when I saw this cruel killing
HALA JABER

EVEN by the stupefying standards of Iraq’s unspeakable violence, the murder of Atwar Bahjat, one of the country’s top television journalists, was an act of
exceptional cruelty.

Nobody but her killers knew just how much she had suffered until a film showing her death on February 22 at the hands of two musclebound men in military uniforms emerged last week. Her family’s worst fears of what might have happened have been far exceeded by the reality.

Bahjat was abducted after making three live broadcasts from the edge of her native city of Samarra on the day its golden-domed Shi’ite mosque was blown up, allegedly by Sunni terrorists.

Roadblocks prevented her from entering the city and her anxiety was obvious to everyone who saw her final report. Night was falling and tensions were high.
Two men drove up in a pick-up truck, asking for her. She appealed to a small crowd that had gathered around her crew but nobody was willing to help her. It was reported at the time that she had been shot dead with her cameraman and sound man.

We now know that it was not that swift for Bahjat. First she was stripped to the waist, a humiliation for any woman but particularly so for a pious Muslim who concealed her hair, arms and legs from men other than her father and brother.

Then her arms were bound behind her back. A golden locket in the shape of Iraq that became her glittering trademark in front of the television cameras must have been removed at some point — it is nowhere to be seen in the grainy film, which was made by someone who pointed a mobile phone at her as she lay on a patch of earth in mortal terror.

By the time filming begins, the condemned woman has been blindfolded with a white bandage. It is stained with blood that trickles from a wound on the left side of her head. She is moaning, although whether from the pain of what has already been done to her or from the fear of what is about to be inflicted is unclear.

Just as Bahjat bore witness to countless atrocities that she covered for her television station, Al-Arabiya, during Iraq’s descent into sectarian conflict, so the recording of her execution embodies the depths of the country’s depravity after three years of war.

A large man dressed in military fatigues, boots and cap approaches from behind and covers her mouth with his left hand. In his right hand, he clutches a large knife with a black handle and an 8in blade. He proceeds to cut her throat from the middle, slicing
from side to side.

Her cries — “Ah, ah, ah” — can be heard above the “Allahu akbar” (God is greatest) intoned by the holder of the mobile phone. Even then, there is no quick release for Bahjat. Her executioner suddenly stands up, his job only half done. A second man in a dark T-shirt and camouflage trousers places his right khaki boot on her abdomen and pushes down hard eight times, forcing a rush of blood from her wounds as she moves her head from right to left.

Only now does the executioner return to finish the task. He hacks off her head and drops it to the ground, then picks it up again and perches it on her bare chest so that it faces the film-maker in a grotesque parody of one of her pieces to camera.
The voice of one of the Arab world’s most highly regarded and outspoken journalists has been silenced. She was 30.

As a friend of Bahjat who had worked with her on a variety of tough assignments, I
found it hard enough to bear the news of her murder. When I saw it replayed, it was as if part of me had died with her. How much more gruelling it must have been for a close family friend who watched the film this weekend and cried when he heard her voice.

The friend, who cannot be identified, knew nothing of her beheading but had been guarding other horrifying details of Bahjat’s ordeal. She had nine drill holes in her right arm and 10 in her left, he said. The drill had also been applied to her legs, her navel and her right eye. One can only hope that these mutilations were made after her death.

There is a wider significance to the appalling footage and the accompanying details. The film appears to show for the first time an Iraqi death squad in action.
The death squads have proliferated in recent months, spreading terror on both sides of the sectarian divide. The clothes worn by Bahjat’s killers are bound to be
scrutinised for clues to their identity.

Bahjat, with her professionalism and impartiality as a half-Shi’ite, half-Sunni, would have been the first to warn against any hasty conclusions, however. The uniforms seem to be those of the Iraqi National Guard but that does not mean she was murdered by guardsmen. The fatigues could have been stolen for disguise.

A source linked to the Sunni insurgency who supplied the film to The Sunday Times in London claimed it had come from a mobile phone found on the body of a Shi’ite Badr Brigade member killed during fighting in Baghdad.

But there is no evidence the Iranian-backed Badr militia was responsible. Indeed, there are conflicting indications. The drill is said to be a popular tool of torture with the Badr Brigade. But beheading is a hallmark of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by the Sunni Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

According to a report that was circulating after Bahjat’s murder, she had enraged the Shi’ite militias during her coverage of the bombing of the Samarra shrine by filming the interior minister, Bayan Jabr, ordering police to release two Iranians they had arrested. There is no confirmation of this and the Badr Brigade, with which she maintained good relations, protected her family after her funeral came under attack in Baghdad from a bomber and then from a gunman. Three people died that day.

Bahjat’s reporting of terrorist attacks and denunciations of violence to a wide audience across the Middle East made her plenty of enemies among both Shi’ite and Sunni gunmen. Death threats from Sunnis drove her away to Qatar for a spell but she believed her place was in Iraq and she returned to frontline reporting despite
the risks.

We may never know who killed Bahjat or why. But the manner of her death testifies to the breakdown of law, order and justice that she so bravely highlighted and illustrates the importance of a cause she espoused with passion.

Bahjat advocated the unity of Iraq and saw her golden locket as a symbol of her belief. She put it with her customary on-air eloquence on the last day of her life: “Whether you are a Sunni, a Shi’ite or a Kurd, there is no difference between Iraqis united in fear for this nation.”

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

متى يا إلهي!!؟

شعـوبٌ تبـادُ، دماءٌ تسيـلْ
ودهـرٌ جفـاهُ الشجاعُ النبيلْ

فجورٌ وجورٌ، فتـوقٌ وبـوْقُ
دمـارٌ وفقـرٌ وويـلٌ وئيـلْ

حرائـرُ تسـبى، ديارٌ تُهـدُّ
وحُـكمٌ يسـنّه بـاغٍ ضليلْ

تنوحُ العجائزُ، يبكي الشيوخُ
فيـقسو الطغاةُ ويبغي النغيـلْ

ونحن نطـالع في صمتِ مَـيْتٍ
نهـزّ الرؤوسَ وندعـو الوكيلْ

وبعدَ الدعاء نديـرُ الظهورَ
لجحـرٍ نفـرُّ فـرار الذليـل

وكنّا نـرددُ في الغـابرين
"يعيدُ الحقوقَ الحسـامُ السليلْ"

شُـغِلْنا بِدُنيا ، نسينا الحقوقَ
بعيـداً بصمتٍ رمينـا الصقيلْ

تَوَفـّت عزيمتُنا في القـلوبِ
وبـات الضميرُ مريضاً عليـلْ

إلهي متى من سباتِ القرونِ
نقومُ لصقلِ الحسـامِ الكـليلْ

متى من لدّنا يهـبّ شجـاعٌ
قويٌ أصيلٌ ويهـوى الصليلْ

إلهي! صلاحٌ جديـدٌ نريـدُ
لنصـرٍ مبيـنٍ وطردِ الدخيـلْ

Red Alert!

I'm in a red mood today...
NOT Danger Red....But "Amore" Red!
Not really sure why, especially that my sleep was disturbed by an "Unkown" caller at 3:30 am! (I just hate these people!)

Any way.... Good Morning World!

خزعبلات عاشقة 5

(أنت ذاكرتي)

أنت ذاكرتي...
بك
أذكر كل شيء...ومعك أنسى كل شيء

عيناك....
تذكراني
بالشمس....والقمر
أستيقظ حين تشعان....وأغفو بعد ليلة من
السمر
وأحيانا...أسبقهما....لأرى كيف تشرقان!

بسمتك....
تذكرني
بالمطر...
يأتي....بعد الصلاة....فيغسل الأرض ويسقي الزهر
وأحيانا...يأتي
فجأة...كالعاشق الولهان!

صوتك....
يذكرني بالبحر...
أمواجه
تداعب شاطئي بمد....وجزر
وأحيانا...يحملني معه...إلى عالم سحري
الألوان!

أنت ذاكرتي...
بك أذكر كل شيء...ومعك أنسى كل
شيء

حضورك....
يذكرني بمعطفي
الأول
الأريح....الأدفء....الأحن....الأجمل...
ودائما....ملاذي من قرص
الزمان!

حبك...
يذكرني بملمس المخمل
ورائحة الياسمين والنرجس
والقرنفل
ودائما....بطفولتي وحظي
والأمان!

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

(هذه....لك)

تسألني
دائما....
أين أنا في أشعارك؟
مَن أنا مِن أبطالك؟
متى ستكتبين
عني...
وتعلنين للكون عن حبك!

ليتك تعلم...
أنك في كل حرف
أكتبه
وأن كل بطل منك استويحته
أنك موجود في كل سطر
في كل خط وكل قطرة
حبر!

حبيبي...
هذه.....لك!

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

(حبك مغامرة)

حبك..لا يلتقي مع اليقين...
غامض كاللغز....مبهم
المصير...
حبك...يحرك فيني الفضول...
يعيد إليّ حب استطلاع
الأطفال...
واستكشاف المجهول...
حبك...سيدي...مغامرة...
يهويني أن
أخوضها!

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

(هذا ما أريد)

أريد أن أتزين بحبك...فتغار النساء من ردائي....
ولكن لا
أريد قيد حبك!
أريد أن أحلق بحرية في فضائك الرحب..
لا أن أوضع في قفص....
مفتاحه في يدك!
أريد أن تعشقني....حتى تثمل الحياة..
لا أريد حبا حتى
الموت...ينتهي في قبري أو قبرك!
أريد أن تحبني بكل طاقة قلبك كل ثانية في
"الآن"
لا أن تقسم الحب على أبدٍ .... ليس
ملكك!

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

(سؤال عجيب)

يسألوني...هل عشقت من قبل؟....سؤالهم عجيب!
يسألوني أنا!..
العاشقة...عن ما أفضل ما أجيد!!

هل عشقت من قبل؟
وأنا من تعلمت
الإقلاع في الليل....
لأداهم نومك...وأستوطن حلمك!!
وأنا من تعلمت ارتداء
البستان...
لتطل عليّ في الصباح من نافذتك!!

هل عشقت من
قبل؟
وأنا من تعلمت الطيران...
ليعانق جناحيّ جنون رياحك!!
وأنا من تحولت
لكرة دم حمراء
تجول وتتغلغل في كل خلايا جسدك؟!

هل عشقت من
قبل؟!
وأنا ولدت....لأعشقك!

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

في رابعة الشوق

إنها الرابعة بعد منتصف الشوق،
على مرفأ ذكريات لقائنا،
وأنا ما زلت أحبك.

حبك طائر هبط على مركبي
مزقزقاً بصوت كالمطر الملون
بنى عشه بين أضلعي
وفي كل ثانية، يفرد جناحيه، مدغدغا قلبي!

في رابعة الشوق،
في رابعة الحنين، والمراكب المهجورة
في رابعة الشواطيء العنيدة
في رابعة الحب المرفوض
أهمس اسمك
وبعده بدعاء مرتجف بأن يبدأ شوق لي... جديد
في قلبك
مع الفجر الجديد!

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

اسمك

إن نسيتَ اسمك،
ذات لحظةٍ مجنونة،
فاسأل الليل عنه
فلا زلت أبوح به له، كلما حل عليّ!

أو انتظر الشمس حتى تشرق
فأشعتها تحمل قلبي يوميا لشرفتك
خذه منها!
وافتحه!
هناك في تمام السويداء
ستجد اسمك موشوماً!
ولكن عدني أن ترجعه لي مع نسمات الضحى
فأنا لا أستطيع
أن أعيش
بلا... حبك!

60 Minutes & Ignorance

I like to watch 60 Minutes.
Though sometimes I wonder if the "60" actually refers to the minimum age of the presenters!!
I'm not being prejudice.
At All!
I really like the Old American accent. It's almost English!!

I received today an email with the segment of a recent episode of the show where Andy Ronney says his thoughts.
It was very funny. It started with a proof of illiteracy and ended with a conceiting sarcastic remark. He showed that arrogance and ignorance are NOT mutually exclusive to the President of the USA!

Listen to Andy’s view on the Dubai Port issue.

Andy, old man,
You just gave an example of why they should outsource jobs to outside the USA!
Jobs are outsourced to outside the US, cause the jobs need brighter, smarter, more cultured & courteous people.
If they do outsource your position, it would be given to “Anwar” alright (Anwar means brighter!!) who is cable of researching simple facts like: What is the capital of the UAE (no Andy, it is not Dubai), and he will be able to place most of the world countries in their place on the map, unlike you and many other Americans. (Check out this video)

And oh by the way, who told you that the White House isn’t outsourced?
Don’t you know that the White House was sent an Agenda for the US Foreign and Security policies that is in alignment with that of Ariel Sharon & the Israeli right wing?
Don’t you know that White House takes its orders from Israel?

It amazes me how a country that invades other countries to free & “enlighten” the people, has such a high percentage of ignorance spread among its own people!! Shouldn't we start at home first?

Bad Day

How do you know it will be a bad day?

1. You wake up with a splintering headache.
2. You come early to work and see the new curtains and suddenly you are sick and your stomach turns inside out.
3. You ask your boss for a short meeting and you go in, when you leave content that he likes your creativity, you trip over his “designer” coffee tables and scream AAAAAAAAKH and the whole office hears you! (Not to mention that since he bought these damned coffee tables you just knew that you would trip over them!!)

And that’s just the beginning of the day.... and the week!!!

I work in hell!

My desk in the new office is among 20 desks in an open space. A large space.
It is made of wood. Nice milk chocolate color and good quality of wood (imported and cut from the same tree!!).
The chairs are usual office chairs, in grey.

Within the first two days, we were told to keep it down. We are not allowed to talk to each other, even if it is business related!
Talk about dictatorship! Actually hand signal that!!

Then within the first week, we were told that we should keep our desks clean. Not as in no dirty mess, but as in nothing on it but the pc/laptop and one-two paper trays.
I’m someone who likes messy desks. I can operate only if my desk is messy! (A messy desk is a sign of genius!)
I also have so many junk on my desk: souvenirs & gifts from ex-colleagues and friends that I received over the last four years.
But since it’s a new office, I decided to pile the junk and take it home. I even cleared all the paper mess, and filed everything.

I was very pleased with myself that I was finally able to control the mess and that now I have one of the tidiest desks!
And then came the shock.

We are not allowed to keep ANYTHING on the desks but the pc/laptop and the two CLEAR trays. That means, we can’t keep the staplers, the hole punchers, the calculators or the tissue boxes!!!
I can live without any of the stationary. BUT THE TISSUE BOX IS IMPORTANT! I have an allergy (most probably from work) and I need my tissue at easy reach. Defiant, I still have it on my desk!

I mean, seriously, what’s next?
No cups on the desk?
You want to drink something, put it under your desk, attach a feeding tube, and insert it (in you know where)??
How about uniforms? Maybe ones that are striped in white and black and a number across the chest!!


So the office is new and it cost an arm and a leg.
But it really looks like someone with one hemisphere of a brain designed the office. With the color and taste areas in the other missing hemisphere!!

We have beige carpets which collect more stains than a white shirt worn by a kid running around in a theme park!
The conference tables are oval, white & grey marble, seen and used in kitchens.
We have a couple of “designer” items that must have come from an old attic where old, broken, and ugly thing were stored!
We have two nightclub corner seats in patterned red.
Next to them is a wall with a blue pattern using the company’s logo.

It’s a nightmare of an office, so keeping the minimal look on desks just doesn’t agree with the crowded and clashing colors.

The nightmare intensified yesterday when we received the pin boards.
Each desk gets one.
This is how it looks: (and remember it's repeated on every desk!)

















Now we can’t have tissue boxes on our desk but we have to have these eyesores!
Ok, I’ll be positive.
The pin boards will be effective as I’ll gladly cover them with paper!!

My stomach turned though when I was told that this pattern will be used for the curtains!!

This is the insult that added to my injury of moving from Emirates Towers to DIFC. Emirates Towers where the good looking men from all races and nationalities walk around and smile at you! Aaaaaaaaaaaah!!


It’s time to look for another job!!
And it has to be in the Emirates Towers!

Don’t Pick Up The Phone!!

Hiba & went to see 16 Blocks. But due to traffic we didn’t make it on time. The playing time was the measure we used to choose a movie. The options were “When a Stranger Calls” or “Keeping Mum”. I cannot watch Mr. Bean speaking, so we ended up watching the teens’ thriller.

Alert – Movie Spoiler (but then if you saw the trailer of the movie, you would have seen all the action in it!)

The first half an hour, Hiba I and kept debating if Jill, the babysitter, was beautiful or not. We both agreed that she is a scaredy cat. The girl kept jumping for no obvious reason, and getting startled by everything and anything. Of course it is a movie of music and sound effects, and when there was some dialogue, you wished for the music back! I don't think the dialogue an important aspect in the movie to concentrate on!
The “suspense” was stretched for almost most of the movie's length, that Hiba kept chanting Waste The Bitch! Well… not in those exact words, but the tone of her voice said those words!
As usual, I kept reminding Hiba not to scream, and to expect a sudden move now & then!
The last 15 minutes, all the action started and finished. And of course Jill survived...with the kids.

There were two parts that I liked the most:

1. She calls the police and asks them for help, and the deputy tells her that he really can’t do much and that she is safe inside the house. He tells the terrified girl in a patronizing and bored tone that he will dispatch a police car but it will take about 20 minutes, and if that’s ok with her? My reaction: As if she has a choice you bastard!
2. The ending was good. Unlike other movies, where the lead character goes through an exceptional and taxing ordeal, fights like he/she never fought, runs, jumps, falls over glass and other objects, and still be able to walk the second day as if nothing happened. Jill had a real ending. She had to be hospitalized for her injuries and for her trauma!!

I understood at the end of the movie why its called a Teens' Thriller. There was NO blood! You know people got killed, but you don’t see the actual act of murder or the bodies that made the veteran policemen squeamish! The two bodies you get to see had no blood on them. I guess it’s a movie where they want you to use your imagination!!!

My final verdict: Wait till it comes out on DVD and then rent it when you want light entertainment or you want to scare your kid nephews & nieces! :D