Point of View

If you're interested in what's going on over here go take a look at this.

Chayyei Sarah, who usually blogs here, was interviewed about her feelings and opinions on the war with Lebanon.

In general, I tend to be on the same side of the political fence as she is. In this interview she manages to express very eloquently a lot of the things that I've been feeling and thinking. Reading it was very calming for me, no hate spewing, no arguing, just clear articulation of what she's been feeling. I'm glad Sarah wrote it and I'm glad Iraqi Blogger Central gave her the space to express herself.

Again, I'm sorry to be such a downer, this is turning into a full scale war and it really is all encompassing.

Why must every post need a title?

I think this post is going to be about as clearly thought out as the title. I hope you all enjoy.

First of all, am I the only one who's head feels like it's going to pop off before I get my period? Just checking. God how I hate that hormones rule my life. It's either my thyroid, my period, or something.

One of E's coworkers who also has thyroid issues told E that she had a dream about me and we were discussing our thyroids. Something along the lines of "you look so skinny! your metabolism must be working again", oh, how I wish.

And in an attempt to kill both of the above birds with one stone I'm going swimming after work today. I started swimming about four weeks ago and I absolutely love it. I get a great workout (jumpstart thyroid suppressed metabolism here) and I always feel great afterwards (override whatever other crappy hormones here).

I haven't tried to swim laps since I learned how to swim as a kid. I hate hate hate running, and most other cardio vascular activities (except Israeli folk dancing, oh remind me to write that post later) so I figured swimming would be the same. Then out of nowhere, I was hanging out at the local pool and I started swimming. I just tried it and kept going. And now I sport a very nerdy swimming cap and goggles. I love it. I've tried to keep it up twice a week and I'm already feeling much healthier.

I don't know what it is about swimming, it's just the right pace for my body. I can go fast enough that I get a great workout, but not so fast that I pass out after the first lap and then get nothing accomplished.

And on that note I'm outta here. I hope everyone is having/had a great relaxing weekend. E and I actually enjoyed ourselves. Had some company over (but not too much), made some great food, did some hiking with a very happy puppy, and slept. Good stuff.

Politics Shmolitics

I hope I didn't scare lots of well meaning people off with my "no political comments" declaration.

When I started this blog (I speak as if I've been doing this for such a long time) I wanted it to be as apolitical as possible. I wanted to write as a normal girl, caught up in the inevitable changes that life brings. I thought that maybe I could get away with people not really paying attention to the fact that I live in Israel, only bringing the subject up when I wanted to for entertainment purposes. I thought that I could use this blog for an outlet without dredging up all of the negativity, stress, and hatred that comes with living in the Middle East.

Unfortunately, as this new situation has recently shown me, a lot of those feelings are there (and that it really does feel good to write about them). Ironically I feel a need to express my feelings about this stuff even more on my blog than in real life because I feel like I'm speaking to the world at large. Plus, I feel like I'm giving my readers a disservice by leaving out huge chunks of my being. As much as I like to pretend that I am not, in reality I'm one opinionated girlie (E is laughing is ass off right now, and saying "Duh" as he reads this).

But what it comes down too, is that what I try to write about here are my feelings about stuff that is happening. I really don't want to get into who I think is right, who is wrong blah, blah, blah, mainly in part because I really don't know. No situation is black and white, if it was this whole "crisis" would have ended a long, long time ago.

When I made my no political comments edict I made it because the first thing that tends to get lost in political conversations is awareness that there is a living, breathing, caring person on the receiving end of the comments (particularly on the internet).

So, comments are more than welcome. Just remember that I am reading, and I am really just a girl with lots and lots of feelings, who is caught up in a situation that really gets people's fires burning.

And if comments on the last post were just quiet because no one really cares about what's going on here, or that you didn't have anything nice to say, well then, in a way, more power to you. Hope to hear from you on happier posts.

No title, just suck

I feel like I have to write something about what is going on here. I just don't really know what to say. It sucks.

I am extremely lucky to be living in the center of the country. Nine people were just killed in Haifa, can you imagine rockets falling on your home in Washington, DC or some other large metropolitan area?

It sucks that we were attacked (and continue to be attacked, eventhough certain news sources have started to ignore that part of the story, "cough" CNN international) and already people are starting to blame Israel.

I feel absolutely sick to my stomach that Beirut and the surrounding areas are being bombed. It's about their government and they're being punished for it. At the same time I think the airstrikes are completely justified.

I can promise you that while the Arabs in the village near our home are sending up fireworks in celebration every time a rocket lands in an Israeli city, no one is celebrating the air strikes in Lebanon.

I feel so shitty that I can't even get up the courage to email my good friend in Lebanon. Ray, I love you.

I'm not asking for anyone's approval, I'm not trying to convince anyone as to who is right, I'm just writing what I am feeling. Political comments will be deleted. Especially political opinions from people not living here or in Lebanon, I've seen some already (not on my blog) and it pisses me off and makes me more depressed.

I hope this all ends soon.

Sephora will have to wait because we have vegetables!

I don't think I've mentioned it before, but we have a garden. Mostly vegetables, with a couple of dahlias thrown in by mistake. Since we're renting we have no grass in the backyard. Grass requires water, expensive, scarce water, and we're not going to pay to water grass that belongs to someone else. So in this country when you don't water grass there is none, not a couple of sickly patches, zero, because it doesn't rain at all in the summer, not a drop.

This situation is perfect for E because he has been dying to grow lots of veggies ever since we made the move over the ocean. He has no grass to rip up, nothing better to do with the yard (there would be lots of spiky sharp weeds if he didn't do anything, rendering the yard completely useless), and only has to share the area with the puppy who hangs out there while we're at work.

So, a fence was built to delineate between puppy territory and veggie territory and the rest is history. We had a couple of slow growing veggies in the winter, essentially leek and lettuce, and then the minute spring hit all hell broke loose. To say our backyard gets a lot of sun is an understatement, so all that energy makes the plants grow at a scary pace. Most of the zucchini and cucumbers get picked once they are too big because they grow so damn quickly. But besides that drawback, the vegetables are doing swimmingly.

We currently have zucchini, cucumbers, corn, hot peppers, eggplant, tomatoes, watermelon, and cantalope. The zucchini and cucumbers are coming faster then we can eat them, we've gotten a hot pepper, the eggplant should be ready in a week or so, and the corn is about ready to be picked. The tomatoes scare me a little bit. Right now we have none, but there are literally hundreds, lurking, green, just waiting to ripen all at once and drown us in tomatoes. They are taking their time, but I already am trying to figure out ways to not waste all those bad boys.

Here's a little tour for you.


It began like this.



Now the watermelons are about five times that size and the cucumbers continue to multiply. Here are some zukes and tomatoes, that's how they look now.



The bounty.



The Security. Trust me when I say no one is going to get near the vegetables, unless they happen to have a can of tuna on them.

Redecorating

Courtesy of html help from www.lissaexplains.com. It's a really great website, for kids, but it helped me with what I had no clue about.

Gone Fishing

Unfortunately not really, just my brain. It's summer, it's hot, I should be on vacation. Since I'm not, my brain went without me.

One of the most difficult things about living far away from my family is that every single vacation day that I have must be dedicated to visiting the fam. I use up a good 7 vacation days or so everytime I go to the US, and I just don't have a whole lot more than that. I have to prioritize, and my vacation in the Greek Islands, or Turkey, or even Tel Aviv is just constantly given up. E is really a good sport about the whole thing, it's not so much fun for him either. I just never really get the mental recharge that I need. Every now and then my brain just gives up and goes on vacation without me.

Things that I have been focusing on since I can't think about anything important (in no particular order):

• What am I going to buy when I go home? This is very important. I need (need in the loose sense of the word) to get new Jeans, books, ziplock freezer bags (don't ask, just know that Cosco has its benefits), and something fun at Sephora (this deserves a post in it of itself because we all know how crucial glittery makeup is in the grand scheme of things).
• Oooh. I better start shopping online now to prepare myself.
• Any suggestions from the peanut gallery (that's you, my readers)? What's the good stuff I've been missing out on?
• Oh, I forgot, must buy more Kraft mac and cheese (yes, I import the stuff).
• I must finish the Ketuba for my sister's wedding, otherwise my name will be mud. Here's a picture of my grandfather checking out the ketuba I made for my cousin's wedding a couple of weeks ago:
  

They are hard work, and I burnt myself out a bit on this one. But I don't really have a choice in the matter, that's why I take on the projects, it forces me to work. I do take on other projects by the way, so if anybody wants a really gorgeous, artsy ketuba, give me a call.

• I've been researching having a baby, and all things involved, in this country way more than I should be considering we're not even trying yet (much to E's chagrin). I found this really great website www.doula.co.il. It's in hebrew (and about having a baby in Israel so it's only applicable to Israelis anyway), but it has some great info. A lot of alternativey type stuff (not super baby cutesy), and really useful info like a comparison of all the L and D centers in the country. Very useful in a country where centralization of information is not its strongsuit (is that one word or two). I'm nothing if not prepared.

That's all folks. I really have no idea how to end this post. So I will leave you with the possibility of an upcoming post on nothing but the things I have bought at Sephora in my past trecks to America, for no reason other than to drool and share the wealth of some truly great glittery makeup.