Too Hot To Sleep

I had a haircut today. For 8,500 Iraqi Dinars probably one of the most expensive I've ever had in Baghdad. I've been trying to go to sleep and even though the window is open there isn't even the most subtle of breezes. The back of my neck was burning up because the barber had used a cut-throat blade to clean all the bum-fluff of it.

I just called Hans up in Sweden it's been a long time since we've heard each other's voices. Within 24 minutes of conversation we hit so many subjects so fast. It was a very efficient phone call. There wasn't a moment of silence or need to go on for too long about any one topic. We spoke about prositutes and the willingness to give them a go, about the wasted self-governance of some part of Denmark, how it seems that every brain problem seems to have its roots from previous drug use, and how few healthy romantic relationships that we both knew which led to the realisation of how many insane people around us (of which I'm one).

The guys somehow have managed to go to sleep. A helicopter flew over the house and activated one of their car's car alarm. Running low on laptop battery. The damn electricity better hurry up. Tomorrow I've got my first final: Database. I don't need to do well on it. I just need a 10% on the test to pass the course. I love it that the passing mark is 50% instead of 60% here.

Me Dissolute?

7:30 AM Sav and Angus brought over some beer and a prostitute last night. An idea we're sure to regret today. All three are asleep right now. I'd love to go to sleep, but I want to make sure the girl leaves without nicking anything. I've been trying to wake her up for the past half hour but it ain't happening. We'll be regretting what we've done last night. What we seem to have failed to predict is that by sleeping late last night we'll be spending the day asleep. I'm not too worried about the finals myself. We've covered much more material over the past 3 days than I could've covered in a week maybe even two.

I was so glad to have a taste of beer. And enjoyed getting drunk too despite a couple of unfortunate accidents both of which involved broken glass. Was playing with my skipping-rope and knocked a glass shade off of a chandelier. I've picked up all the broken pieces of glass and have put them in a plastic bag which I'll give to one of the guys to put in the car. Hopefully nobody will notice the missing piece of the chandlier. A wet glass bottle of juice also slipped out of my hand and smashed on the floor as I was putting it back in the cool polyphylene cooler container thing in the kitchen that we were using to keep the beers cool with half a block of ice.

Cette experience était l'inverse du precedente avec Farah. Il ne y'avait pas de excitation préliminaire au debut de quoi en parler. Et j'ai duré. J'ai duré plus d'une demie heure! Au point au qu'elle commencait a plaindre. Elle a même essayé de me sucer le bit. J'ai fini en me frottant moi-même pendant que je léchais sa chatte. On est ensuite entrés dans le bain ou j'ai trouvé du dentifrice a manger. Plutard puisqu'on a tous couché avec la fille on a pu conclure qu'elle était très froide et une mauvaise baise.

...Well it's nearly 9 PM now. Everybody left and I'm wrapping this post up. I guess there's more to be told about last night, but I can't be bothered so I'll just continue with the events that followed after saving the above part of this post as a draft...

I had fallen asleep on my desk and I think the girl woke me up to tell me that she was ready to leave at around 8:30 AM. We kept a vigilant eye on all our valuables as she left and Angus drove her off to the main street. Sav stayed asleep and Angus tried to sleep but my guitar practise kept him awake. We then got Sav awake around about 10 AM and got our lahma b'ajeens for breakfast.

They spent the rest of the day studying Communications (the one class in English) and I fell asleep for an hour. I tried helping them but I couldn't do as good as a job they did when they taught me other subjects. I'll try to do better tomorrow. The guys decided to not sleep over tonight. I don't blame them my house is alot hotter during the night than it is during the day for some reason. But they'll be back tomorrow at the usual time of 10 AM.

Got Lahma B'Ajeen

Sav and Angus came over this morning at around 10 in the morning to start our time-exhausting preparations for our final exams that start in a week. I suggested that we go get ourselves some lahma b'ajeens. And guess what! We got some! Today was might've been my 5th attempt during the past month to get some (all previous attempts had failed). Like last friday when the lahma b'ajeen place closed early because they were refurbishing the restaurant.

Sav and Angus just left. We studied a net total of 6 hours! I'd never thought I was capable of such a feat. Now keeping it up for the next couple of weeks is going to be incredible. I think that once I get studying intensively I end up liking it.

Well now they're gone there's not much point in studying, and I'm feeling bored. I'm not hungry. The electricity comes for an hour every five or six hours. I think it's going to go out here in half an hour.

Ever since I've stopped downloading mp3s through torrents. I've been downloading porn from a german website. Well I've got to download something don't I! So far I've been pretty unlucky and not getting anything worthwhile. But a thought hit me last night: It really sucks to see someone else screwing a hot chick. Just watching someone getting some action and not getting any myself. It takes the piss.

After we got some take away for lunch today and were at a supermarket to buy some soft drinks, Farah called, she told me she needed some internet credit urgently because her sister-in-law or someone got killed or something(I didn't really bother to understand what the deal was).

It was awfully fortunate that I happened to be in the supermarket. I called her back on the number that she had called me on, and checked that it was Farah because I wasn't sure if I had recognized her voice the first time she called, told her that I was going to SMS her the top-up code and then did so. She sent me one back thanking me.

I wonder if she's planning to screw me again someday. Last time I had spoken to her she said that she was too caught up with things to meet up.

Missed My Test Today

I stayed up late last night, and woke up late today. I could've woken up earlier but figured that since the test was going to be at around mid-day I could stay in bed a couple hours extra. Then around about 9 in the morning Suzy called to tell me the test was in 15 minutes because the teacher said he was busy. Suzy said she'll try to have a word with the teacher regarding me and I got ready without getting in too much of a rush. Nahida wanted to tag along with me to go to the bank nearby my college but I couldn't be bothered to have her on my case throughout the cab ride so I had a go at her and told her to take her own cab.

The traffic on the way which usually takes about 45 minutes was really bad so about half way I asked the cab driver to turn around and drop me back home. On the way back Suzy called to tell me that they were about to start the test. I thought to myself that it was a good thing that I choose to go back, because I wouldn't of been able to make it anyway. Quantitative Techniques is one of the subjects that I've got a good mark in and have no worries about passing, so losing a few marks from my final average because of this test wasn't a problem.

So I get back home and I practise some progressions, listen to some audio lecture that's supposed to teach one how to distinguish notes and I fall back asleep. An hour after Souad's last call, some guy calls to tell me that they've just started the test. And at that moment I felt like I just lost a 50$ bet. But it was a calculated risk and after reminding myself that I needed the extra marks I felt better. The only thing I got worried about was whether the teacher postponed the test for my sake.

Suzy called after the test. She told me that Dick had spoken to the teacher and that the teacher agreed to give me the same mark I got in my last test. Dick just called a little while ago to make sure I stick to the story he gave the teacher. He told the teacher that a mortar fell near my home and that was why I couldn't make it. I've got no clue how I'm going to repeat such a bad lie to my teacher. The trouble is that it seems like the teacher did indeed deem it a feasible excuse. But then again he's not the kind of teacher that would bother arguing.

Sweat Levels Are Reasonable

Got home and within minutes the electricity came on. Nothing could be more sublime than that. It didn't take long for it to go off again. And I'm sweating gently now. I'm waiting for a couple of guys from my class to show up now. We're going to study quantitation methods (I think that's what it's called in English, oh no I think it's called quantitative techniques). Anyway it's pretty easy for me considering since it's a mathematic study with little Arabic.

After initially wanting to have a relationship with Suzy no matter how lame and then having some confusion of where we stood towards each other and then eventually just getting sick of the whole deal yet aware of how dependent I am towards her in regards to my studies, I think I can confidently say that things between Suzy and I are just plain friendly. The conclusion came when how comfortable she acted when I suggested that I had a fancy for some girl that I've never spoken but just think that is pretty. Suzy started teasing me by trying to convince me to go walk up to the girl with her, so that she may introduce me to her.

Well it's past midnight now. The guys came and we studied for a couple of hours. I've spent the rest of the night mucking about on my laptop. My satellite receiver got reparied a couple of days ago, and I still haven't sat down to watch it. I miss TV. As a young kid I used to spend way too much time watching television. But the tellie I saw growing up in the UK and France was great, learnt plenty of stuff. Even when I was in Lebanon I remember watching biology documentarys at 3 in the morning that would have information about the stuff I was studying at school.

Nice Weather For May

The weather was nice today. It was very cloudy. It felt good to sleep without gushing sweat. I should've studied risk managment this week-end. The electricity has improved a little bit today. I'm not in the mood of posting. I want to get off my computer, sit on the couch and strum the guitar. I think my risk managment material is in the car. I should go get it.

Sweaty Afternoon

I'm sweating. My laptop is hot. I've waited over half an hour for my mug of tea to cool down. I'm looking at it, asking myself if I should check it. I check it. The mug is hot, but the tea is drinkable. I don't really have anything to do right now. I was hoping to go to Fal's but he's probably asleep since he's not answering his phone. I'm smoking too much. I stretch my back and think that I ought to change my laptop setup. I spend 10 seconds rubbing my right eye. I look around me and think nothing. Upstairs the generator is making it's regular noisy hum, the sound alternates if I pay attention, and Nahida's sister is compelled to raise her voice to talk. All the curtains are shut, but the sensation of a shaded room is missing. The tea doesn't taste great, but when I'm sweating this much it doesn't make much sense to me to get picky over what I drink as long as it doesn't aggravate a sense of thirst. I drink even if I'm not thirsty. I just drink. Take a deep breath and blow. Swipe some sweat off of my forehead. A thought goes through my head and is quickly forgotten. Setting up a net to catch the next one. I lost the sheet of paper on which I've marked all my expenses for the past couple of weeks. When I realised that this morning it made me quite angry. Maybe it's in my college folder. Called India a little earlier, he couldn't speak because he was at work. I want some honey in my tea next time. Bro interrupts me to say "hi". I'm building up motive to start using the 'invisible' function of Yahoo Messenger, or perhaps at least give the 'busy' status a try. All my bro has said so far was "hi". He's at the shop, where I hope I'll be working during the summer. I wonder if I could get a better or different job if I tried. He tells me that Mike's finally got a new job. Mike's been working/wasting his life in the shop for at least 5 years. He's become a nurse I think. I've run out of cigarettes, I yell for some so that Nahida can throw me a pack from upstairs, but she doesn't hear me.

Is You Spillin'?

I can't wait to get out of here for the summer. I'm worried that I might be building up my expectations. But I honestly can't imagine it being that bad. I'm pretty certain that I'm going to regret however I decide to spend my money during the vacation, but that's not a reason not to spend money is it.

I'm really not ready for my finals. I'm not ready to study. I've had enough. These scholastic years are too long. I need to find a way to unwind before the exams start. I recently realised that it's been a while since I've had a drink so I've been keeping my eye out for the alky store the past couple of days, and it's always closed! Just when I could need it the most and this time I've got no clue why.

I'm so tired of getting tired, and without alcohol it's a real drag. I remember that after a long shift running late into the night at my brother's corner shop I'd get myself a bottle of wine to unwind before going to bed. That's what I need now, but I can't have it. This just isn't right.

My ISP has bottlenecked the connection down to 17 KB/sec, and downloading torrents seems pretty useless right now. My Yahoo messenger disconnects when I download a file from Google Video.

I miss watching the tellie too. My downstairs satellite receiver still doesn't work. Not that there's anything good on TV anyway. But the passive absorption of media would be quite welcomed right now.

My psoriasis is flaring up. I think I remember one doc said that it's supposed to get better in the summer, but that doesn't seem to be the case with me. Which reminds me that I still need to get a filling for one of my teeth. And I've still got to check out what the deal is with my blood.

I fell asleep in one of my classes today, got no clue why I was so sleepy. I had spent all the afternoon asleep yesterday and I managed to get a few hours sleep in the night too. I ought to go to sleep early tonight.

Recently I've caught myself on the verge of spilling stuff on myself. But today I finally did it. While I was walking towards my car with a can of diet Coke and a Magnum biscuity ice cream in the same hand and reaching for the car key in my pocket with the other hand, I took a bite out of the ice cream and spilt the diet Coke on my shirt. Fortunately it was so hot it took just minutes to dry off.

So I had thought that I had the urge to spill something on myself had been satisfied. But I proved myself wrong. Later today, I had in my hands a couple of small glass bottles of Fanta and a textbook. I had left the window of my car partially open to not let the hot air cook inside. So instead of reaching for the key in my pocket, I decided to slid the textbook through, so as I tilted the book to fit it through I also tilted one of the bottles and spilt Fanta on my shirt.

Okay so I'm chatting to some Iraqi girl right now and she just told me that her friend quit her job because her boss was hitting on her. No big deal there. But what I find interesting is when a few months back I cited reporting a case of sexual harrassment as an example of cross-departmental communication in an organization in a Communications test at college the teacher left a remark saying that it was "inappropriate in this country" [to answer a question like that].

Oh my God is Suzy boring to chat to on-line. I rue the night that I taught her how to install Yahoo Messenger.

Sticky Me

I'm feeling sticky. I need to take a shower.

Yesterday was a big day in India's life. He finally did his master's thesis presentation. Something that's been delayed for more than a year maybe even two years. It went surprisingly well and he even got a 'very good' mark. He said he was very fortunate when after he made his 15 minute presentation the professors that were supposed to ask him questions (the tough part) ended up answering each other's questions. This was because India's project was an amalgamation of two different subjects and the teachers answered the questions that dealt with their own field.

I was surprised to find myself really happy for him. I'm also glad that I won't have to hear him whine about his thesis anymore. As is custom, India took us out for lunch and we had a sleep over at Kala's house. We brought our laptops to Kala's house and networked to play Quake 3 and Medal of Honour. We played for a while, but most of us had had little sleep the night before, so we slept a lot earlier than we usually do during a sleep over.

Today was a quiet day. We left Nais's house and went to get some Lahma B'Ajeen to eat. But the place was closing up. They told us they close early on Friday's. Just my luck with Lahma B'Ajeens. We then chose to go home, India came with me to upload some e-mail attachments and to pick some torrents for me to download.

I wonder what will I do tonight. Remy tells me that he's been practicing the guitar a lot. Making me feel that I ought to do the same too. All I've been doing is practicing a few open chords that I still can't switch through smoothly. He's looking for a new job since he got fired for his unkempt appearance despite being the best at what he does. He's Lebanese and lives in Ottawa so if you want a hire a hard working and don't mind him being unkempt, he's the man for the job.

I just remembered recently hearing that the dirty tap water that's available here is good for you in the sense that it builds tolerance against all the bad stuff that's in it. And that if someone who hadn't built up that tolerance is suddenly exposed to those prevalent bad microbes and stuff then that person's body will not be ready to fight it off. Now how about marketing dirty bottled water. It'd have all those bad organisms minus the heavy metals and other such dirt. It'd be bottled water for a stronger immunity system. And instead of advertising the altitude and location of a mountain source advertised a sewage drainage point could be designated instead.

I'm hearing the same problem about the tap water here as the one I heard when I was in Lebanon. The problem being that the pipes with the clean water and the pipes with the black water are cracked and the two are mixing together. Joy oh joy, having been to two such countries I must have a really good immunity system. But of course the far east is where the true challenge lies. I must go there and face the challenge someday.

I hate chewing gum. Not only do I hate chewing gum, but I hate those that chew it and then throw their chewing on the ground. Twice this week I've had chewing gum get stuck on my shoes. And I'm sick of it. It seems nobody appreciated putting the gum in a little piece of paper before throwing it away. Come to think of it I rarely do if I'm outdoors, but I don't chew gum that often. The kids at college for example don't seem to have broken out of the habit of chewing gum like school kids. There's always one with gum in my class. Kids at college ask for two things from each other chewing gum and tissues. They never use the tissues to wipe their noses, instead they use them to wipe their shoes or to wipe off the dust off the chairs before they sit on them. And it seems that a lot of times they wipe the chairs even if they don't need to be wiped. Unlike chewing gum, there doesn't always seem to be someone with tissues.

We've got two more weeks of classes and weekly exams before prep time for the finals. I hope I pass.

I bought Photoshop CS for Dummies yesterday when I met up with the guys at Sana'a street yesterday before catching up with India at his university. I've always wanted to learn how to use Photoshop ever since I had that awful computer in Lebanon. That was back in 1997. Well I've given up figuring it out by myself more times than I've tried. But by finally buying a book I think I'm on the right track for the first time. But I'm not going to start yet, I've got my finals that I should take care of first.

I don't want to study. But there's a silent voice in my head that says I should. It's a good thing it's silent.

I Hate Afternoon Naps

I just had an afternoon nap. The most significant difference between a normal nap and the afternoon type is that when I wake up from a normal nap I feel refreshed and when I wake up from a afternoon nap I feel like somebody has snuck a brick in my head.

I think the mistake I made earlier was to play the guitar in the toilet (good accoustics in there!). There are odd things that have had the ability to make me sleepy. The first of these was Radiohead's OK Computer album, when I first had that album I would not be able to stay awake throughout the first side of listening that tape. Playing games on my Nintendo DS also has also had that same effect especially when playing WarioWare. And now the guitar can knock me out too.

I'm hungry, I could take the car out or even walk to get some food from the local posh grocery store. But I'm too lazy. Where's my phone? Some classmate that lives near my house was supposed to drop by so that we study quantitative techniques.

Found the phone, now I bought a mobile phone top-up card yesterday and I can't find that. I wonder where the hell it's gone. I hope it didn't fall underneath the car seats. There's too much stuff underneath those seats (Empty cans of Diet Coca-Cola and little bottles of mineral water). All that stuff must not be good for the motorised seat adjusters. Well I've given up hope on looking for that top-up card, but first I'll take a better look at the car.

After rummaging through 6 little bottles of mineral water (3 of which were still half-full), an empty can of soda and diet Coca-Cola, an empty bottle of Gatorade, a bunch of cigarette wrappers and unused tissues, I found the bleeding top-up card.

I asked Nahida for some fries a bit earlier, she just told me that we've both run out of gaz for the cookers. Over here we use those horrible gaz canisters, which she tells me now cost 10 bucks each as compared to 3 bucks a few months ago. And those are the prices from the annoying guy that drives a wagon around yelling "GAZ GAZ!" while drumming on something metallic. It should be even cheaper if you get it from the gas station but that involves a long queue and the inconvenience of transporting it back home. And in all cases a ration ticket is used.

Screw those canisters, I'll get her to cook for me using the electric stove. Just need to wait for some electricity then. I wonder when that'll come back (Imagining waiting for a very long time). And I was planning to make some molten cheese and meat rolls out of lebanese bread when the electricity comes back. If I get really hungry, there's always tuna to be eaten. I love these tuna in packets that the local posh grocery store has been stocking recently. The tuna is one of those things that were brought to Iraq to be sold in AAFES (I think that's how it's spelt) stores in US bases. I'm not really sure how these AAFES things find their way into local Iraqi stores.

And the electricity just came back. Nicely! I'll be eating some fries soon. I'm going to make those sandwiches.

Drowsy Afternoons

That bleeding commerical law exam got postponed yet again. The teacher didn't show up this time. It's really taking the mickey. Tomorrow I've got quantative techniques, my second easiest subject. It's the ones with math or English that I need not worry about, and this one has both.

The weather is nice today, a little rain drizzled twice. This spring is remarkably cooler than previous ones. Looking back, last winter was remarkably warmer than previous ones too. I'm considering changing my stance on global warming if it means the weather in Iraq would get better.

I've given up on the idea of getting a guitar tutor for now. I'll get one when I come back from my summer vacation. I've got a keyboard back in the UK, could mess with that while I'm there. I wonder if there are piano tabs on the net. In the mean time, I'm learning chords and how to switch from one to another. Having a little trouble going from A to G right now.

When I was at that restaurant a couple days ago I discovered one of the benefits of playing guitar. The callouses that developed on my finger tips have made holding a hot little glass of tea easier. It's not perfect since I don't have any callouses on my thumb. But I thought it was pretty cool anyway.

Plugging my electro-accoustic guitar to my laptop doesn't seem to really work, I ought to fix my old pc which has a Creative sound card and get a better plug adapter for the guitar.

All of a sudden I'm really drowsy. I hate taking afternoon naps. But right now I'm very tempted. Maybe I just need to lie down.

Tea Makes Me Happy

I don't know what I'm doing to myself these days. Last night I slept at 5 AM and woke up 3 hours later to go to college. And I get home over 12 hours later. I'm definitely not going to stay up late tonight, even though I've got no class tomorrow. Yes! No way am I staying up late tonight I say with a decreasing sense of confidence.

I've been going on about my new wireless internet connection for a while now. So to keep it simple this time: I'm downloading alot of music late at night so as to not piss off my provider.

I'm losing a grasp over myself of late. Spending so much time outside of home and when I do get home I spend hours on the internet leaving me with very little time for reflection. I could argue that's a good thing by saying something like it leaves me less time to dwell on all the depressing thoughts one could have when left with nothing to do.

The heat is becoming unbearable, was quite fortunate to have a sandstorm late in the day to cool things down. I have to leave for the summer. The electricity is terrible, something like one hour for every 10 hours of electricity. Petrol queues are also verging on the unbearable, took me about hour to fill up my car a few days ago.

Kiki's birthday was yesterday, had no clue about that. I ought to add that to some on-line calender. I'm planning to transfer my short birthday list from the Yahoo calender to the Google one. I like Google, too bad Microsoft is going to give it to them. Quite amazing how Microsoft relies on the incompetence of it's clients to keep an advantage edge over competition.

Today I had lunch at a restaurant that I had never been to before, it was more traditional than the ones that I'm used to going to. They served yogourt drink in big tin cups which was awfully good, the kebab on the other hand wasn't so good.

While I was waiting for my tea to arrive the waiter threw a remark with a sprinkle of scorn that translated word for word would be: "You're in a different world". At first I thought he was referring to how drowsy I was and so I replied that I hadn't slept last night he quickly retorted that neither had he. Obviously I got the message wrong the first time.

I imagine something unusual does emanate from me, maybe it's my emancipation of current events or maybe I don't have those eyes that tell the same story of a lifetime of suffering that nearly all Iraqis share.

Need more tea.

Another Long Day

It seems to be the case that every time I can take out the car to drive (which is every other day) I end up coming back home at around 7 in the evening which is relatively late especially if you left home around 7 in the morning. I wonder how many hours I spend driving on days like these. I think I must've drove at least 3 hours today. That's alot of wasted time.

So today I went to college, I only had one class which is a piss take considering the one hour of traffic to get to college involves. One hour driving through horrible traffic to attend a half hour of class of Marketing. We used to have another class on Wednesdays but the teacher ran off to the UK a couple of weeks ago and I think she's planning to stay there. I did ask the teacher to change the schedule and she said she'll speak to the dean of the department.

I spent the rest of my time at college acting like a kid infront of Suzy and her friends. I picked round buds from a plant and tried lobbing them into the shirt pocket of her friend.

At around 2 PM Ennie and I left to go to his house so that he could pick up some money and then we went to Sana'a Street so he could buy a hard disk and I could pick up my repaired UPS. And I'm glad to say that I'm using it right now and it's working wonderfully. The guys at the shop even got that annoying buzzer removed for me. I'm so happy. Now I can use the internet with no electricity at all for at least an hour and a half.

We then spent an hour in his neighbourhood looking for some food for me lahma b'ajeen ('meat on bread' looks kind of like a very thin pizza), restaurants. There were 3 of them, and all of them were open but weren't cooking any. It was like some conspiracy, we got to another restaurant that we had lunch at the last time I was over and they had just closed! We drove back to his and realised that one of the lahma b'ajeen places said they'd be cooking by now. So we drove back, and the dude who was supposed to bring the gas to run the oven hadn't got back yet. Driving around in this guy's neighbourhood is a real pain in the ass because of all the potholes in the side alleys.

Ennie's mum wound up feeding me felafels and kebab, and Ennie taught me what was left of the commercial law material for tomorrow's exam. I'm actually suprised we got round to doing it And then I drove home completely knackered.

Farah's back in town, just chatted to her. I wonder how soon I'll be seeing her again. And the UPS is working wonderfully.

The weather has become suddenly alot hotter over the past couple days. It's uncomfortable. A little stroll can lead to alot of sweating. The electricity has also become alot worse since the change in weather. Nahida has chucked a bunch of food out of the freezers into the bin.

Last week-end I accidently shaved my goatie off. Ever since I've been getting remarks about it being missing. It's sacreligous to shave off your moustache or beard here. Well I think it's finally grown back enough to put an end to the madness.

Remy's teaching me how to play blues guitar yesterday he taught me to play a 12 bar blues 1-4-5 progression, today he gave me different chords to play it with. Not being as well acquainted with blues as he is, I'm having to download a Muddy Waters album. I'm still taking too much time switching chords, but I do see myself improving.

Got A New Wireless Connection

And it's going great. There was a palm tree in the way of my grid so the dudes spent a half hour setting up my gird on a long piece of wood so that I could get a decent connection unfortunately they couldn't rotate the grid in the exact direction because of the square nature of the wood. But it's working pretty well. I'll have to get a pipe installed on my roof to improve reception and to use as a durable solution since that piece of wood isn't very well secured. Now to try posting on my blog...

No More Wireless... For Now

Well of the three things I wanted to do today. I got two done. I e-mailed my bro's pics and I discontinued my subscription to my non-blogger-friendly wireless ISP. I did go to Enie's but I couldn't be bothered to study. Next time I should have breakfast and not get to his house hungry. Maybe it'd be better if I got to his after lunch. Well I'll be off to his house on Wednesday. But oh my god does he like to spend time hanging out at college. Well I could go pick up my UPS and come back to college I guess. My UPS better be fixed by then. I forgot that I'll need my UPS to set up a new wireless connection.

Posting Can Be Hard

I've been having trouble posting and editing using my wireless ISP lately. So this is going to be a final test before I choose to switch ISP. Should've had tried out a different ISP ahead of time.

Not much going on.

Did okay on my risk managment test today. Alot of classmates screwed up one of the questions and provided the wrong answer. It's funny cause all of them made the same mistake of trying to write down the '13 rules' of fire insurance (an impossible task) instead of the 3 factors of risk (dead easy). Suzy was the one who walked me through the material for this test. She's a really smart girl.

And I got lucky with cab fares today too. I usually pay 5,000 dinars (just over 3 bucks) to go or come back from college. I got a ride to college for 4,000 dinars and 3,000 dinars on the way back, and without haggling too.

I'm getting pissed off that that classmate with whom I'm supposed to start guitar lessons hasn't called any of the teachers up so that we could start. I'm thinking that I might have to do it myself along with Miz a guy I know through India who's been waiting for someone to take lessons with him.

Spoke to Dad over the phone last night. He gave me a lecture about how the accounts should be done and that I should call up Fozzy at the end of every month to find out the expenses accumulated at the end of the month. When it comes to business my dad gives good advice unlike he does in other walks of life. He also told me he's planning to buy a PC. My dad is the kind of man that can't operate a TV, so I'm left to wonder how in the world he's going to operate a PC.

Was too tired to go to the internet cafe and send the pics of my bro's house under-construction to my bro. I might as well try to send the pics through Picasa. I've got to go Ennie's place tomorrow morning so he can finish teaching me the material for the commercial law test. And I should send those pics in case Picasa fails.

I don't know if I've mentioned this before but it's really not me to be getting stressed out about exams and stuff. But it seems that if I have any chance to leave for the summer I can't fail college and get stuck here to do re-tests and a summer course which I think I've heard being mentioned.

I keep forgetting to mention that Nahida's bro has finally been released from US custody. I was suprised to find him in good health and good spirits. He's spent over a year held up. I'm glad he's back, it means I can finally maybe get a new car or just at least fix up the one I got. He's a very important part of my Nahida support network and it's been a nuisance not having him about. Aside from that he's a real nice guy, always excited about everything and very lively.

I'm really tired I'm going to bed soon. Oh crap posting still doesn't work with my wireless ISP... just going to have to rely on the ever so unreliable modem connection.

I just caught the end of an Iraqi show on the telly with people calling in to talk about internet chat rooms. I didn't catch what an Iraqi girl had to say about on-line relationships between boys and girls, but the rest of the callers seemed not to have had any experience with on-line chatting but expressed disapproval of it anyway.

One woman complained that it creates problems between married couples when the wife catches her husband chatting to women, a man complained that it's wasting the money of the parents of teenagers, and another man described the internet as something that could be used in a good way and a wrong way.

I wish I caught the show from the beginning. It seemed pretty interesting to me, angry adults complaining about the corruption of their youth taking place in front of their eyes.

Still trying to get this post up... giving up on posting using modem. I once managed to sneak in a post before my ISP could screw me up. Not working so far. So after spending maybe over an hour to post I think I'm finally going to do it. I got a nice modem connection working here. So here it goes...