roots - completed

teaser posted: 4/20/2007 04:34:00 AM
i'm too tired to write right now, so here's a teaser ;)

• cafeneto aggression
  spot and i both had to wait for the banks to open, so we sat over coffee killing half an hour. at some point some creep sidled up and demanded a cigarette. i look him in the eyes (although i had sunglasses on) and refuse to give him any. he could at least have asked, but i didn't particularly want to give him one.
  not only did he shout at me, in his odd, raspy, i'm-totally-fucked-up voice, but he sat down next to me and cursed me out for two minutes, repeatedly demanding a cigarette.
  spot and i were both convinced that he was going to pull a knife on me, and unfortunately the frames on my glasses interfered with my peripheral vision - i should have removed them.
  he never actually requested a cigarette during the entire tirade.


• base visit
  
  • comp-sec-shock
    the first familiar person i came across saw me from across the road as i was entering the base - she waved hello, and then physically JUMPED she was so shocked to see me (new uniform, rank, and most people thought i'd been released).
  
  
  • commanders
    i caught my previous TL walking out, having not received my email informing him of my visit... lucky, that. would've been the second time we've missed each other.
    i then paid my previous SC and BC a visit, and it felt really good to give them a positive report and to thank them again.
  
  
  • team
    awww - i missed them :)
    it was good to see the sergeant who took me under his wing in the very beginning of my service, and we had some good laughs while catching up.
  
  
  • missing mongoose
    the primary purpose of going to my old base was to visit the mongoose and sit with him on some graphics. i got to his section to discover it all locked up, and when i called him he informed me that they'd all gone off for the day.
    brilliant.
  
  
  • cute girls
    still so cute.
  
  
  • cheeky certificates
    nystire had requested a favour, and the girl whose job is to organize what he needed didn't stop giving me attitude the entire time; it took effort to make light of the situation and get her to be semi-helpful :/
  
  
  • wedding present
    i finally gave the wedding present that i bought in south africa for the wedding in november. took long enough, so i was a bit excited :)
  
  
  • chocolates
    turns out i arrived on my ex-teammate who we joined for the concert's birthday and the return of another ex-teammate from thailand... so i was invited to eat chocolate and listen to amusing stories about elephant crap being flung all over the place.
  
  
  • sexiest girl released
    the sexiest girl on the base? not any more - i bumped into her as i was leaving, all dressed up [OMGOMGOMG]...
  
  


• cute girl on the bus
  as in, one of the cute girls was on the bus with me, which made for a pleasant trip ;)


• hour from entrance to office


• ice-creaming
  the weekly "drinkage" that i sponsored went down extremely well ^_^ [a good impression, even though it wasn't my idea]
  when i got back to my office, i found my change (a bill) placed under my mouse. i commented out loud on my mouse's new profession as a stripper - the guy who placed it laughed, and my other teammate came around all confused... only he didn't find any answers because i'd already pocketed the note :D


• dog-tag fight
  i picked up some poor sod's dog-tag the other day, sent him an email and left in plain sight with instructions to give it back if he came to collect. now i'll admit that not leaving a note with it wasn't too smart, but one does NOT expect an officer to walk in, see it, break it in half and throw it away.
  those things are frikkin' HARD to obtain, and all because the officer in question couldn't be bothered to ask.
  we spent a good little while screaming at each other, because i cannot stand that sort of mentality, and he couldn't understand why it mattered.
  i can't figure out if the rest of our group was more upset or more entertained by all the excitement.


• personalization
  i finally brought personal effects into my work environment - certificates and other amusing things to entertain visitors. it does make a difference to see the little reminders.


• ...
  a bit of work and a bit of coffee (with supper at some point) while waiting for the ceremony to begin.


• ceremony
  a good ceremony, not lame and tacky and untidy. and the thing that got to me was that it's one of the first ceremonies that i've been to in israel where everybody actually sang the national anthem. i HATE it when people just mouth the words or mumble softly.


• cafeneto - crazy survivor
  i joined spot, then a friend of his joined us, and finally the kid arrived. we had some pretty funny conversations, the highlight of them being crazy survivor:
  a) find a bunch of nutjobs and hobos off the street, and leave them in a completely deserted town / industrial area / whatever according to the standard survivor formula.
  b) the winner gets a warm meal, a shower and nice threads.
  c) the top X survivors (after a warm meal, a shower and putting on nice clothes) then get their own "special" season of the apprentice. now THAT'S crap that i would enjoy watching.


• flag raising
  it's memorial day and independence day coming up, i brought out my flag and we're flying it high :)


• dragging the kid
  no, no. i had to LITERALLY carry and manhandle him, kicking and whining, to get him to come out with us instead of going to sleep. we're still laughing about it because he'd been about to put on pyjamas, and didn't have keys, phone or wallet >:D [hell, he was lucky he still had pants and shoes on!!]


• walking right
  my nose knows, my sense of direction amongst even the most confused of streets in tel aviv is definitely alright ^_^


• fun night - the kid's bitch
  it was a nice party, we had fun (and a tad too much to drink). there was a really foxy girl that i'd been staring at (and who'd been eyeballing me back), and i was a bit concerned that what appeared to be her boyfriend would take exception - although to be honest, he looked dodgy as hell and i wouldn't have minded giving him a beating.
  at some point she walked past holding his hand, and stood on her toes to give the kid a kiss on the neck, then carried on... we were all confused, and i was convinced that she was doing it to mess with me.
  boy, was i wrong.
  a bit later she came off the dancefloor with the ponce, and when she got to where we were standing she simply took the kid's hand, let go of the scaly one, and dragged the kid back to the dancefloor for sloppy make-outs.
  GO FIGURE.
  we all agreed that if she ended up sleeping at our place, we would all spend the morning walking around in boxers just to mess with her. pity she didn't, that would've been fun [spot and i were discussing it later; if she was confused enough about the previous night we could always ask her if the kid had been better than the rest of us ;)]


• the long way home
  we were wasted and it was a long walk before we eventually took a taxi to get sambusak, because at 4am that's really important.

it's absurd, but whenever a song like alice cooper - poison (i) or nin - closer (ii) is playing in a public place, two things happen:
a) my imaginary girlfriend (i) or "victim" (ii) makes an appearance for the duration of the song. she exists only in my head.
b) i see any cute girl in the vicinity as a potential realization of the fantasy created by the song.

GENIUS!! - she really is... *perfect*.

we were curious: the ad-lib from aretha franklin - respect is either TCB or TCP, the former being "Taking Care of Business" and the latter being "This Coloured Person". just so's you know.