planned out

oh, well. i'm quite disappointed. but even if she's not ready / interested, at least i met and spent time with someone i know i really like. when it comes to girls, that just doesn't happen very often.

trained!

and fed, now bed.

i hope spinnit and i actually meet up tonight, 'cause that's the plan and we haven't been sticking to those very much :(

training was great - i credit the pre-arrival energy drink with being able to keep up :P
we spent about an hour afterwards discussing the gym's current situation: it's high time our instructor left the organization and put her own name on the card, and we need sponsorship so we can send kids overseas to compete.

she's unsure how to begin, but that's like everything in life. things worth doing are never easy, but once you get going the way becomes clear.

step back

i managed to obtain a copy of noble brats - life in this order, although it was apparently sold out at my usual haunt... i borrowed the drill, have just put up (finally!) the soap / shampoo holder in the shower and a matching toilet roll holder next to the toilet, and decided to risk it and put up both clocks with nails instead.

seems good :)

now to return the drill and contemplate pre-training breakfast!

ha! a nap, he thought.

damn! i woke up at 7.30am... nuts.

oh, well. at least i have an achievement already: one of the inspiration particles that hit on wednesday was for a video short, and this morning i pieced together a song that would make a perfect match! only now i need to practice, because i don't have the skills to keep it smooth :P

squid - one in a million made it into the finals! i don't understand how it's possible to vote, though. 528 matches in 22 hours??!? there's not enough time! (even if i didn't leave the computer for the next 22 hours :P)

the noble brats album is available! i'm off to buy it now ^_^

i'm going to pick up a drill on the way, only i'm concerned about drilling for a heavy clock... particularly because i haven't a clue how one knows to avoid wiring...

thank the gods, thursday's over!

the tail end of a discussion on deborah (דבורה) and yael's ability to overcome revulsion and do the do... and wolfmother - woman came up on the playlist :)

there's been so much effort put into pulling a prank on the new guy that i was certain he'd suspect something, but apparently he's completely taken in. i'm glad i have a role to play, and it's being a right bastard :P

yesterday's forgeries' severity continued to be debated. one highlight:
"i really think that you're a great guy - sympathetic, upstanding, and a really cool dude"
my response? "i may be upstanding, but that's the only thing you got right. i'm just not as cool as you."

on a slightly lighter note - nystire informed me that a major i sent an email to months ago explained his lack of a response: "i didn't understand the mail, so i binned it". i sent him an explanation of how to reply with question marks.
...
i drew pictures.

i'm really impressed that i'm still going on two hours' sleep and two cups of coffee. i even enjoyed work today! a couple of solid milestones on my side-project that impressed the hell out of my TL.

i have tickets to tomorrow night's party - haltya and texas faggot are both playing ^_^
on the way back from the acquisition, i stopped to pay the chef a visit and let him impress me with a corned-beef salad that put classy food advertisements to shame - and tasted amazing :D

shite! is it 9pm already? all i did was shower and open facebook for just one second... nap!

a shocking morning meat discovery

is it possible that my TL is right??? less meat?

at least somebody's on my side of the prohibition fence this morning :)

push 'n tug

and half an hour before giving up and taking a taxi instead of a shuttle... at least i got the opportunity to inform a taxi driver that there's no point in creeping over the pedestrian crossing at the red light.

i had a good chat with my mum: i'm really glad i have someone to share the irony of today's events with :)

we watched a really good movie - strangers (israeli meets palestinian in berlin) - and we've fallen into a kind of a groove where things are strangely-comfortably-awkward. i'm hoping this will change now that her friend's going back to france and we won't have a chaperone anymore :P

anyway, T-2.5 to wake-up.

humidity rising

i thought yesterday's was bad... today was disgusting. i felt like the wickedest witch of the west after the bucket hits her. and being in uniform didn't help, either.

speaking of which, the feeling i got from the man in the suit today was positive. i'm praying that he's as honest as he comes across.

[i've never heard of anyone being told "TMI" in these situations]

[john milton - paradise lost: book ii, 236..249 - it's frightening how appropriate these verses are to both my current situation and my general outlook on life]

on the way to meet the man, the bastard bus driver "did me a favour" and told me i'd reached my stop about ten icky minutes' walk (and a slight navigational error) away; i found out when i left that the line stops right outside.

i made it back in time for the presentation of hive (tahoma was surprised), and lunch. we have a new kid who's hysterically unwittingly funny (he's trying to establish himself... badly...), and i was still giggling when i picked up the soup ladle. if i'd stopped to take a breath maybe i wouldn't have dropped it in the soup tureen :$

when we got back, it was time to hogtie and dowse the kinder, the cadet and the new kid (all at once). we were all having a raucous, grand old time - right until the unit commander appeared and put a stop to it.
even the victims were disappointed, it's a sign of respect. i had a go at the guy in charge for not checking beforehand that the unit commander was otherwise occupied.

i returned to an inbox containing a couple of mails between me and a kid with whom i share mutual disgust... someone else had been cutting and pasting mails to make it look like the two of us were having an online altercation. i sent a very serious threat (which i *really* hope nobody pushes me to carry out) to deal with any further forgeries in an official manner. that will not be fun.

our entire unit was subjected to a presentation, one of the highlights being that someone was written about and somebody else's picture was displayed - causing mass hysterics and embarrassing the person responsible no end. the picture was of someone with the same name as mine, and later on our pointy-haired boss came to my desk to make a joke about my picture being splashed all over the place... maybe i shouldn't have climbed into him for not recognizing me, as usual... [it was one of the points i raised a couple of weeks ago: he can't differentiate between us at all]

nystire and i have been pretty good about exercising every day! today was really sweaty.

i've been introducing another section's commander to the israeli indie scene after he expressed interest, and i've continued to bring him discs even though his positive responses seemed a little off... i realized today that he's really not into any of it. oh, well.

on the way home i was hit by two giant inspiration particles. then i went shopping, and came back feeling even more inspired. and then these two happened:
"i don't care if they *DO* call themselves heinz, mustard is NOT supposed to turn into juice"
"when בגל'ה go bad" [bagelleh, pretzels]

i'm back judging indie rock; squid hit the semi-finals ^_^

nap-time, then heading off to spinnit's to watch a movie. it's the 9th of av, a severe mourning day so we won't be going out. almost everything's closed, anyway.

i miss the animaniacs; i think i'm gonna buy a dvd or two.

aww - that wasn't it at all!

i meant to nap for an hour, not sleep for eight! i haven't been rollerblading in ages :/

at least i remembered to take out the laundry :P

nystire and i suspect that someone in our office wrote this

if nobody ate meat...

then nobody would raise cattle. therefore we can infer that if you were to reduce your personal red-meat consumption by fifteen percent, less cattle would be raised, which would reduce carbon-emissions.
- my glorious team leader

one really super-awesome thing about the bus station at 6.30am: super-awesome if you love flies, that is...

i spent my morning bleary-eyed and struggling with c# - the event system is so convoluted that while i've got sound logic on an incredibly useful tool i've written, i can't make all the functionality available because the events begin calling themselves... in spite of my having built in fail-safes.

*grumble*

i blame both parties for the prang we were in this afternoon - the driver of our car wasn't scanning obsessively while reversing, and the other driver was a complete **** who inserted his car neatly behind ours a) at an odd angle and b) when it was obvious that we were reversing (the motion and the lights are a bit of a give-away, i think).

i'm shocked that i had an appetite, actually - i got the next phone call. tomorrow isn't a big day, as such, but it is portentous.

while the morning was okay, the afternoon saw me incapable of coherent speech and physically unable to keep my eyes open - that's after two post-lunch cups of coffee (strong, black as usual) and even a couple of energy bars :S

we went off to see the kinder's promotion, with pleasant, dreamy music in the beginning and then der kommissar to wake us up when we neared the place. it was a nice ceremony, although the major handling it looked a bit... mmmm... empty.

the humidity was unbearable on the way home (it still is). i sat down to make a mess with the last mango, and am about to crash for an hour before rollerblading :)

wanting for more

dammit! i just got home, and i've still got tons to offload... i just sat with spinnit at a really cool bar (*really* cool, the music was absolutely insane, the bartender was actually pleasant and the crowd was friendly) and we talked for a helluva long time...

daylight points:
a) i found a phone on the cistern in the men's room this morning, sending out a message to the entire unit tactfully wasn't very simple. when one of the girls sent a response asking if she'd understood it correctly, i sarcastically answered "however did you guess?"... she responded with an explanation.

b) our SC has understood that the lack of translation software is a problem. i actually had to take one of the guys from another team to help me write out an investigation this afternoon - to be fair, it was a formal investigation into the causes and possible solutions for one of the girls failing to eat ice-cream without ruining her shirt :P

i slept like a baby on the shuttle home, and in the hurry to evacuate when we arrived at my stop (hey, you! this is your stop!) i almost took out my headphones. i thank protoplasm, he taught me a nifty looping trick in january that saved them :)

i hurried off to the mall, bought red ribbon and the gift (i convinced the guys to go with hive), stopped to grab a sandwich in preparation for the 8-11pm training and had already begun tucking in when our master called to ask where i was.

"bwff iff fwonly fich firty!", i mumbled, "training is at eight!"
apparently, during the last three or four years the times have been moved... now from 6-9pm. crappola!

the bus took an hour to get there, so i arrived at 8.20pm. what went down well was that a few of the guys could stay longer, so i got two hours of training anyway ^_^
and good training, serious work on the sack, painfully great stretching and good exercise in the forms :)

i feel good! and even better for having managed to go down to florentin to meet spinnit and still make it back in time for a couple of hours' sleep.

glimmer of hope

i got a phone call last night - i *really* didn't expect a phone call. maybe the spinnit story isn't over? we shall see.

i worry that my ring-tone is shortening my lifespan... i certainly don't miss phone calls, but maybe jumping out of my skin whenever someone tries to get hold of me isn't healthy.

i just had a financial moment, and checked my bills. i thought i went a bit nuts this month, but looking over the numbers i'm doing just fine ^_^ [i can't wait to earn a real salary, though]

a whine-song

behold, i send you forth as a wolf in the midst of sheep

i have sold my soul
to pay for my crimes
to live out my days
with pure reason, without rhyme

wearing my woolly coat
i snuck into the flock
to bump and chow and bleat
to the beat of a shepherd's clock

while my teeth become blunted
my eyes remain sharp
while my neighbours are scared
they know not of what

my brethren behold me
shake their heads disbelieving
convinced that it's only myself i'm deceiving
i watch them with envy
as they play with their claws
and i salivate as fresh blood drips from their jaws

i laugh bitterly
as sheepdog chases his tail
with self-loathing i placate him
with compliance and wail

and forget myself
and run circles
and back

despising my comrades,
but my brothers must eat

i ruminate on my dispo(sit/ssess)ion,
contemplating the wisdom of that earlier decision
hiding tears of anguish
while i quietly languish

my pack awaits, i pine
i dream wolf-dreams
intermittently my eyes do shine
for one day
my task will be done
and i'll return
from whence i've come

a day full of quotes

our SC:
"you know there are companies that don't have babylon?"
- they've just removed it from my computer, i was explaining to him that that's going to cost them in productivity. at least he tried to make it seem like a joke after i glared at him, instead of explaining (as is his wont) how much better it is to be in the army than in hi-tech.

my TL:
"but we knew that from the beginning!"
- after i just fixed the bug that's taken me more than two VERY frustrating weeks to find... so why didn't you freakin' TELL me in the beginning, brainiac?!
[whoever is responsible for that bug deservs to lose his fingers, it was a really dumb one and he didn't have the excuse of not understanding what he was trying to do]

my morning ride (although he's on holiday, it popped into my head to aggravate me this afternoon):
"if i can't understand it, it doesn't have meaning"
- on songs that use metaphor; also, he is of the opinion that people who live in the city and participate in the events and parties are doing so only because they feel that their lives are missing something.

the goto guy and i had a very amusing fight about which squid song (one in a million or not used to) he originally claimed sounds like the theme from doom 2 - i organized a meeting called "SQUID CHECK" which he forwarded on to others without context.

ourstage.com refers to me as a "gavel god". finally! the respect and recognition i deserve!
...
OR it could be that they're that grateful that i've judged so many rounds. 152 and counting... [out of 190]

i just went looking for a birthday present for an ex-team-mate. after giving up at the puzzle store, i went in to the gaming one... i got stuck there for longer than i expected... but at least i have a couple of ideas. one is a five-in-a-row tic-tac-toe with swiveling quarters, and the other is hive.

yeah, i was singing out loud - but not loud, like under my breath - on my way home. good songs. excellent songs. the two girls sitting on a bench on my way home didn't just snicker... they bawled. i think that was unnecessary.

cows.

i don't actually have anything to do this evening, so i think i'm gonna play some more final fantasy.

the yawn fantastic

final fantasy xiii was a fantastic way to end a day filled with... not much. that's what i call a great weekend!

now to prepare for another 5.30am... that can only be done with a pillow.

judgemental

i spent a surprising amount of today sleeping, and almost all of it indoors. most of the time where being indoors didn't intersect with sleeping, i spent going from battle to battle judging indie rock at ourstage.com, and have discovered a number of great songs in the process.

in particular: graffiti sun - el diablo, elephant gun - mexicana, browniesshow - slipping away, russell stafford - everytime i come down :)

and simultaneously practising scales... i'm not any good, although i'm definitely improving :P

i think spinnit is a non-happening, she's seemed on/off the last couple of days, and today: nothing. i don't get it, but whatever. a pity.

i'd forgotten how hard clipping in the ball of a piercing can be... and it's made much harder when it's not on your body. leverage is complicated on a metal ring.

glue! why didn't anyone else think of that?!

184 minutes

of surfing, browsing, reading, catching up...

doof 2009: i suddenly regret missing it :(
a mistake i don't want to make with texas faggot and haltya (next week!)

yay! brian malow explains my worldview far better than i do!

interesting space news (although a few days old)
present: spacex commercial satellite launch
future: ionic potential

i found bizarro's bunny blues very amusing. even more so was the story behind the previous comic.

blazblue looks like fun! i wonder what my life would be like if i had gaming buddies.

i don't know if it's really necessary to see the comic in order to appreciate tycho's take on profanity censorship

ojingogo - what a beautifully drawn comic!

sleepin'

i started walking to the beach, but soon realized that my legs weren't going to carry me that far. i was just woken up by two phone calls - i answered the second one, it was wr having an interesting moment - and i think i'm going to go back to bed.

*way* too tired to go shopping, and i have no food :/

spinnit sent me an sms earlier, it has an odd tone... i'm beginning to lose the initial excitement and feel a bit... dispassionate.

stretched and tender

... but i'll go play frisbee anyway :)

today was good - i got to sleep around 3am, woke up at 7.30am and managed to catch another two hours anyway :)

i did some shopping (another whiteboard) and had a cup of coffee with the hardware dude, then went to coffeeholic for an absolutely brilliant breakfast (the chef went a bit crazy) before going to train.

training was pretty good, and my new pads are big enough, comfortable and shiny :)

i was a bit irritated at the mall - they closed all the exits but one and there weren't any helpful signs around :/
eventually i got out, and have just had a shower. now it's beach time!

"spit" and roll

i left an open door
i left an open door
so you could get to know me
my keys are hanging just inside
the inner walls are lonely

you'll find inside my style of death
you'll see through it to yourself
close by, not quite locked away
my story on a shelf

if you look deeper just through there
my nature splashed around
the half-formed pictures of my mind
their whys cannot be found

locked away deep in the back
the tools and space
to view my world around me
and turn it over
inside out
reflect it back for all to see

danny gilboa and his band were amazing tonight! that's two excellent performances in a row ^_^

gco called me up just before i left, and really annoyed me. i don't appreciate his attitude towards me, i don't need friends who don't respect me and i certainly don't need to waste my time with people who talk a lot and do little - or at the very least, think that *my* talk is cheap.

i left on time, arrived only a little late, and discovered that i'd been misinformed and that the theatre / club was only opening half an hour later... oh, well. i went to olive and had a sandwich, scribbling notes and laughing at some of the things i wrote half a year ago. i have filled the sketchpad i bought in december, it's now time for a new one :)

the addition of an electric guitar and a synth made an enormous difference, and it was a night of serious rock 'n roll - i thoroughly enjoyed myself. i walked back slowly, stopping for great frozen yoghurt on the way, and have been plucking my guitar and learning about sound and will soon get into bed.

i had a good laugh at myself on the way back - my conversation with the man in the suit has put me in a bit of a bind aside from the obvious stress of my future's uncertainty: i promised to really behave myself until the end of my service, and that's an awful long time :P

when the lord giveth,

the lord reserveth the right to make baa'ing noises. i began my day at the train station being struck repeatedly by inspiration particles.

here's the worst news of the week: i discovered today that i could've been getting up at 6.30 instead of 5.30 - the girl i wanted to get a ride with hasn't been on holiday, she simply wasn't getting my messages. i'd scream, but i guess it figures.

our SC was standing next to me when i exclaimed that getting up at 5.30am is inhuman. his response:
"what? i've been getting up before then for the past ten years!"
and i couldn't help myself - in a voice way louder than i'd intended and with most of our unit standing around... "BUT SIR, YOU'RE NOT A HUMAN BEING!"

... the funny bit was him trying unsuccessfully to pull a rescue, and then i went and twisted the knife by asking how all the interviews are going. at least if i get court-martialled for insubordination, it'll be justified :P

later on, outside his office my team-mate asked me how to sign for his interview with the SC; i told him (maybe a little too loud) "authorized absence", and that got everyone giggling...

i was so tired today that i needed a cup of coffee in order to go and buy more... and then i needed a nap before i had enough strength to raise the cup to my lips...

... work-wise: i got frustrated with the primary project and spent most of the day on the side one. it was slow going, though - c# still feels alien to me :/

... spinnit-wise: are things still good? it seems so, and i'm constantly surprised. i hope i get the hang of this without complicating anything :P

i'm going to see dani gilboa (דני גלבוע) tonight, it's always great to see him perform. i think i'm going to ask him for some mentoring.

who can live like this?

these hours should be reserved exclusively for people who haven't gone to bed yet!

it took me fifteen minutes to get out of bed - i was deeply into a really good dream... before that, i couldn't sleep without making some noise - and with that sensation alone the guitar has paid for itself :)

total-dark-waste

it's very painful having another slice of reality thrown in my face: i have squandered the most enjoyable and lively years of my life being serious and productive. if you don't have soul, that's excusable... if you don't have an inner beast, you might not even notice.

i have only one justification, and i'll be damned if i don't manage to make something of it.

---
what brought this on was me searching for spinnit* in florentin at an hour where everyone's out and about (the sane people, at least) and all i could think of was waking up at 5.30am. that's a stupid time for anyone to get out of bed. particularly if it's for work.

*sigh*

panic ensemble were absolutely phenomenal! as usual, i guess :) i felt like a bit of a heel for making the girls hurry when the performance began almost an hour late... and spinnit was exhausted so she left early.

* after her friend and i discovered that she wasn't at home after the show, we couldn't get hold of her. eventually she did call, and i stopped looking and made my way home.

at least i managed to tune my guitar.

out of tune

my body, feet included, matches my guitar: not good.

i had a long day, the bug i've been attempting to correct has been producing horrors unimaginable - or extremely confusing at the very least. i feel like i'm making headway, but it's slow going.

we went out for humus for lunch... i discovered that adding meat more than doubles the price and rediscovered that it's too heavy a meal to consume before going back to work.

i *can't* be this tired!

ridiculous.

and unpleasant.

swollen feet, lumpy legs

i can't believe i made it to training tonight! i can't believe i didn't drop dead from the sprint there!

the day was terrible, i was absolutely exhausted and doing the most draining of chores imaginable. i kept passing out, only to wake up in a worse state than before. two cups of strong coffee and an energy drink didn't help at all, a boring hour-and-a-half meeting put half-ton weights on my eyelids, and having to flee at a dead run* prior to lunch definitely didn't make it any easier.

* including a couple of serial-killer-movie style moments, one of which involved me holding my assailant at bay behind a door that he had better leverage with. i took a deep breath and launched myself at the next door (which thankfully swing outwards) and he missed me by an inch or two at the most as i hit the stairs and made it down them faster than him**.

** ah, yes. the story: my team-mate got promoted, to celebrate i organized a "washing". this meant catching him, wrestling with him until we had him under control, hog-tying him (nystire did a neat job), carrying him like a giant sack of potatoes and then drenching him with about six buckets of mucky water.
because it took a while to get organized once we had him tied, i took to tickling him while the other guys stuffed his mouth with grass and covered him with dirt. once he'd managed to free himself (with a little assistance from someone's pocket-knife... he was tied really well) he took to trying to hug us, to share his grimy state.

i had a haircut today. i don't like getting my hair cut :(
i got my copy of dork whore back, and found myself giggling at random snippets. definitely worth a re-read. one of the ultra-religious guys in our unit came over and looked at the cover... then ran away when he realized what he was reading }:D

i kept passing out on the train, but when i was nearing my stop i began to psyche myself up for the run. i got home, switched clothes and ran all the way to dizengoff center, joined the group and actually survived a couple of fights.

a pity that the last few moments of the last fight went like this:
a) a wince, a pause, and a couple of seconds hobbling around to avoid putting pressure on my right foot
b) resume fighting
c) two seconds pass, another attack, an even bigger wince, and then awkward shifting from left to right as both of them were out of commission
d) bowing out of the fight
e) discovering the damage to my legs about two minutes later - they're actually lumpy

i'm paid up for the next month, and am formally back in training. by next week i should have my pads, so at least this week's performance won't be repeated :P

i stopped by coffeeholic for an excellent post-training dinner and good talk with the chef and his girlfriend, then came home, showered, ran laundry, caught up with my mum, had a very funny / awkward conversation with spinnit and am now going to bed.

here's an interesting article on the internet's effect on how our brain works

it's another late night, but...

no, this one was also worth it. can we continue to be this comfortable? unfortunately, spinnit's coming down with something, so we couldn't go out. this was excellent, because it afforded us an hour or so just talking quietly while her friend who's staying with her busied herself around the apartment.

on the way home i sat with idiot girl on the bus, and our conversation was inane and pleasant. also, i find it much easier to deal with her when i can say that i'm seeing someone - she instantly becomes less pushy.

i must hit the hay... it was an odd day and tomorrow includes taekwondo and rollerblades.

the zombie theme runs through it

from joyous wake-up to the base i felt like i was sleepwalking. i slept strangely on the shuttle, and managed to damage my foot in the process :/

nystire jump-started my day by hitting the back of my noggin with a hard-boiled egg... those things frikkin' hurt. i spent the morning working on the frustration that's been dragging my brain into a vortex of boredom for the past couple of weeks - and was so excited when i found the solution that i actually *did* river-dance!

a pity that towards the end of the day we discovered that my solution was only partial, that there's another related bug that i wasn't aware of :'(

our SC is already blatantly ignoring our discussion yesterday. how surprising.

i had a very weird hallway experience - one of the guys caught up with me because the head of our unit had informed him that i was someone to speak to in terms of future plans for working in the space industry. that was very sweet.
i gave him my perspective and let him know which direction i'm planning on taking, and he expressed interest :)

around lunchtime spinnit got in touch with me via sms... we had a conversation that left me feeling so awkward that i had to call her to discover that i hadn't left a bad impression. i think i'll stick to voice responses.

i spent the latter half of the day discovering weaknesses in c#, and achieved another milestone in my side-project.

almost at home i realized that i hadn't place the order for the wedding gift telephonically... they really surprised me, it was ready when i got there - and it came out beautifully! now for the garnishing ;)

aside from having left 4k dead thrown at me, showering, eating, failing with skype's sound settings and catching up on cartoons, i've had a very nothing evening. so i'm going to do a little bit of c++ work before spinnit picks me up.

popcorned

it's been at least ten minutes, and i'm only now beginning to wake up from a terrible nightmare. it was so bad, in fact, that i've been unable to shake the feeling that it's a real external malevolent force, that it's something sharing the space i'm occupying.

this is an ugly feeling.

what reason could i possibly have for bringing out these emotions? what really scares me? how am i dreaming of ultra-violent assailants who refuse to die regardless of the kinds of wounds i inflict upon them? why am i forcing myself to watch my comrades die?

and why, when confronted with a forced image of empty midnight streets am i filled with a complete dread that gives me the sense that i could physically immerse myself in it? i actually felt that if i did so i would "open" my home to real bad spirits...

i don't know how to deal with such an irrational fear, especially not one so strong.

"poetically hectic"

* the above phrase hijacked from moonflake

wr just left after spending a couple of hours passing along english literature material from his bachelor's degree (and leaving me with absolutely wonderful books and things!). i'd forgotten that he loves william blake - tiger so much that he has a tiger tattooed on his chest, and he liked my response (dead eye) ^_^

it was really a lot of fun pouring over the material with him - the two of us and literature are like two little children with a chest of cool toys :)

i talked with spinnit on the phone a couple of times today, and it wasn't at all uncomfortable. that's actually very unusual. we agreed not to meet up tonight because we've managed, during the course of a week, to realize that we can't trust ourselves to meet alone and say goodbye in a short span of time. i'm very, very pleased. so pleased, in fact, that i'm also very, very worried that this is merely an illusory excitement...

and hell, i haven't figured out yet if we're playing the game or not. either something very good, or an aneurysm is on its way :P

stretched
a heart stopped
silence, dead
slow, agonizing pressure building up
and holds

an eon passes... and then

an explosion, fiery warmth flooding in
a tidal wave
rolling, slamming against the chamber wall
and the heart beats once again

---
today was a big day: and it began with a lucid dream. i don't remember what was a long and detailed back-story, but i do remember the bit where it suddenly turned into a crazy action movie, from a shoot-out in the street to being surrounded in an old-age home by our attackers.

i needed to wake up at 5.30am (and i'll need to repeat that for the next two weeks), but i forgot to set my second alarm and so woke up with only ten minutes to rub my eyes, shave, dress and exit. the fact that it's possible doesn't make it suck any less.

nystire made a terrifying point today: we really are living out dilbert. it was my turn to talk to the pointy-haired boss today, and i threw a full page essay on the things he does that demotivate me.

to be fair, i really didn't expect his response to be as mature as it seemed. he started off making notes of his responses, and towards the end read my comment on his responses and justifications... this caused him to go back and re-read it from the top. we had a very interesting and positive-sounding discussion afterwards, and as i wrote at the end: i'm certain that nothing good will come of this, but i feel better for having the weight off my chest and i can always hope that some miracle will occur.

a kid in our sister unit got killed in a horrible accident on thursday, so our building was in the dumps today. it was in very poor taste that nystire and i had a laugh at the announcement, printed throughout the site, with dates that made it seem like the guy had been buried a month before he died...

the work i managed to get done today confused me. this bug-hunt i'm doing is extremely challenging.

[i don't know if nystire still reads my blog, but if so then congratulations are in order.]

the train home was nice; i had time to think, and there was a guy juggling in our car and that brought a smile to my face. i went straight to the mall to verify that the wedding gift i've been working on is good, and aside from positive technical confirmation the woman at the store pointed out a couple of "misses" which i'm really grateful for. i tidied those up when i got home, and will have the gift on order by tomorrow :)

but for now... to bed!

the weirding way

meeting up with spinnit and her friend was strange today. lunch was amazing, but we were all being awkward... the way back was covered by tool and dredg and i'm feeling a bit better, only a bit inexplicably irritated.

the ai kicking my ass in tekken didn't help, either.

tycho was having a moment, and i really enjoyed the writing

revival of the dead + glory + gloom

i woke up yesterday morning at 4am.
4am???
4am.

i had a productive morning, particularly with the gimp and turning dead eye into a song i actually like ^_^

i even went through the insurance stuff, but i'll be damned if that doesn't get more frustrating every time i look at it :/

i went to the post-office to pick up a final we're-going-to-sue-you-soon from the hospital, which i'm going to have to deal with on sunday... they're supposed to know that the army has a habit of dragging its bureaucratic heels.

breakfast was going to be "me time", i took a book (milton) and went to coffeeholic for my almost-traditional beef parisian. unfortunately for my plans, the guy next to me took an interest in my book and caught me up in conversation until it was time to get ready for taekwondo. seems like a nice guy, with interestingly similar tastes to my brother - war / history buff kind of guy but interested in literature as well.

taekwondo was murder. not only was i reintroduced to the realities of stretching (as in, myself in tears and the guys around having a good laugh), but we all suffered from a lack of oxygen (the gym is a transformed bomb shelter that has terrible ventilation - even for a bomb shelter) and i just couldn't hack it. i even began forgetting my forms, which was kinda embarrassing.

i left early after two hours, because i *had* to find out what the techno roof party was all about... i'm very glad that i did. the guy whose advice i took last week to stay, a bunch of frisbee friends (one of them being the organizer of the party), and karnaf were all there, and i picked up spinnit and a friend of hers on the way. the music was great and the vibe was excellent, and i was really sorry to have to break off early for dinner. next week, i'll be staying until it ends :)

her sister picked me up, then her and her dog (the cutest little bulldog!), and we went to their parents' place for a really nice evening. i ate too much, again, this time so much so that i really didn't have place for dessert - which involved hot chocolate sauce that smelled like pure decadence.

i got a ride back to tel aviv, took two seconds to drop off my sunglasses and figure out where "the block" is, then took a walk to meet with spinnit. sadly, my adventurous moment on the way found me stuck at a dead end in the middle of the giant new park near azrieli... pretty, i'll go there again, but that wasn't the right time.

the party? seemed like a nice crowd, the people who weren't being so aggressively excited at least. the bartender upset me by ignoring us, and the bathrooms were nice although slightly confusing (you can identify a design flaw when everyone's standing at the sink and scratching their heads: how do i turn on the tap?!). the music? there were a couple of good tracks, especially notable the one we eventually walked out on. the rest was constructed from uninspired, empty beats with neither melody nor bassline. "he's a great scratcher"? but he can't freakin' beat-mix!!

i spent a lot of the evening standing and staring at everyone "dancing", feeling sorry for them that they're obviously not exposed to enough of the good stuff. i mean, the guy played cypress hill - i want to get high which then turned into an arbitrary collection of banging sounds (no, really, think of dwarves mining and silence otherwise)... and nobody seemed to notice.

also, next time i go partying with spinnit i'm definitely going to take earplugs, she and her friends were stationed right in front of the bass bins and i'm sure we'll all be paying for that one...

my left arm's been killing me since yesterday, the same kind of random, dull pain that built up and caused me to pass out last year. i need to be careful, only i can't figure out what triggers it.

i think i have comics to catch up on while drinking my marshmallow-mocha :)

digital samsara -stop the earth is an awesome track that just came on *grooves*

long zombie day

i was fine most of the morning, and okay for lunch (even if the soya sausages were super dodgy and tasted and felt like rubberized tofu), but after that it all went downhill. i've been on the verge of collapse until i caught some z's on the way home, and now i'm just feeling impatient.

i'm *really* glad that all the evening's plans got cancelled, because i need to crash for a bit.

...

oh, and we had a section meeting today - the village idiot gets mad props for broaching the subject of our issues, and i've taken the reins as first to be interviewed and i've been preparing a list of topics for discussion. as i told him, i don't expect results, only to continue to be as disappointed and frustrated as i am already... but it certainly won't make it worse.

again? even better?

i'm on a bus on my way home again, and this time my alarm's already going off...

frisbee last night was crazy, that was extreme exercise and the guys who were there were all of a decent level and up. blading there and back was a good idea, although due to uneven flagstones and construction i almost face-planted a couple of times. the people who witnessed these occurrences were either shocked by my lack of skill or impressed with my ability to rescue myself, i couldn't really judge.

i had a shower when i got home and then hopped the last bus to spinnit's. things were a bit awkward at first, but for the first time that i can recall we were able to talk through the awkward.

in fact, we ended up having an amazing night and although the sleep deprivation is going to hurt i know it was worth it ^_^

on rain in july

how did i forget?? on the way back last night, it began to rain!
yesterday afternoon, i looked outside the window and said to one of the guys: "smells like it's going to rain", and he laughed at me. i didn't think of it again until the realization that there were water droplets on the windscreen struck home :)

this morning was crazy - i missed the bus by a minute and had to wait another half an hour for the next one :(
the second bus wasn't too much of a problem, though - i kept passing out, and although none of the sleeps could have been more than a few minutes, they were very good :)

i was too late to enter the useful side of the base, but was fortunate enough to get a ride with someone from my unit... i then discovered that while i was napping on the bus, it had rained again :)

the day didn't begin well: the stickers that i'd printed were no good. that'll teach me to play with transparency. i just got them redone, so tomorrow we can finally hand it over...

i had a fight with a girl who really doesn't dig me - she's been curt for a while now, but we had to work together today and we didn't stop getting on each other's nerves. at one point she began screaming at me, and one of the guys in her office was recording her... she's not impressed with him, either :P

anyway, because she's a bit of an idiot *i* had to have a busy-doing-nothing morning. when i got back onto my primary project, i discovered that i had some really unpleasant grud-work to do. i called over nystire, and together we ran a quick design for an application to grind through it. i wrote a proposal, and after a bit of wordplay managed to convince my TL that it's a good idea. now i have to take it to our SC...
this is the bit i'm not so happy about. chances are that he won't approve it and we'll have to do it in secret - and then he'll be thrilled that he made us "more efficient" and take the credit for it.

i don't sound bitter, do i?

i think i made some headway during the afternoon, but boy was i pleased to get out of there.

SxS called me on the way home, and it's always nice to chat with him. someone was trying to convince him to try some disgusting homeopathic seed extract, so he handed him the phone and i explained that prayer would be more effective and less distasteful.

40+ and swimming

yesterday was a really, really long day. i'm still not feeling so great; apparently six hours of sleep for over forty missed isn't quite enough :P

i spent most of yesterday staring hopelessly at my screen. i got a couple of phone calls - one from csn's friend and one from spinnit (like, "spin-it", the girl from monday's date). i wasn't really in a good state to be talking on the phone...

during the last couple of weeks it was announced that my TL would be replaced in the near future. i got all excited because i've been in this team since february / march and miserable since i got there - now he's going to be TL of my previous team and someone else (a definite improvement) will be replacing him!

the pointy-haired boss came over to happily inform me that i'll be moving back along with him.
i can't win :'(

it was nystire's 30th birthday, and the day began with cake and us making "over the hill" jokes. when i got back to tel aviv, i rushed off to secure a part of his gift - of course they hadn't prepared the order like i'd asked - and then came back home to switch into civvies and bus to his place for a surprise party.

it was nice to see his family again - they're all a bit crazy and loads of fun, but i was completely trashed and when ptsd needed to head off to tel aviv i joined her. i chatted with my mum, talked quickly with spinnit*, ate a sandwich and then crashed.

* i don't know if i'm supposed to be playing a push / pull game when everything seems great, but it's to early to tell and i'm worried about screwing things up for either of us by getting too excited :/

i just found out that my usual ride's not available - getting to base is going to be hell :(

semi-spontaneous

i don't even know where to begin - that was undoubtedly the most interesting date i've ever been on. she called me as i got up from the pc, so i didn't get a chance to nap...

1. it was all perfect until it went sour... and then things improved just after the police arrived.

2. neither of us attempted to climb through the window from the 3rd floor stairwell; although we both reckon we can do it.

3. i didn't have to fake surprise when i discovered that she's older than me.

4. standing knee deep in the sea on a beautiful summer's night rocks.

5. the guys at the bar nearby her magnificent apartment + studio not only welcomed us in past closing time to use their facilities, but offered us free drinks as well before they heard our story.

6. the locksmith and i had a misunderstanding on the telephone, but although he arrived ill-equipped he did the job beautifully.

7. i left her place at 5.45 and arrived in time to turn off my 6am alarm, shower and shave, have breakfast and get ready to begin the new day.

8. i'm not going to train today, i will probably die if i do.

9. i just realized that her mother might call me from france today because she no longer possesses a phone. that could be awkward, as i don't speak french.

10. i know i shouldn't get too excited, but i think in this case it's appropriate. time will tell, obviously.

no need to run

it's even hotter and more humid than yesterday... and there i was, in uniform, hurrying in the blazing sun to buy something and get on the bus in time to organize the rest of it... but the bus took forever to arrive, and the antsy, irritable driver* scraped someone and it took that much longer to get home.

so i'll have to organize it tomorrow. oh, well - that kinda screws up my plans a bit.

* we stopped to pick up some people, and he turned around and began yelling at me for getting on at the back. i thought he was talking to someone else, so i turned around to make myself useful... only this aggravated him more. he got up and clambered over, calling me "kid" the whole time (i found it quite complementary, actually), and i actually laughed when i realized it was me he suspected :P

---
i woke up this morning to regina spektor, who makes great music! i especially love the calculation, but laughing with is the best video i could find.

today was definitely an improvement over yesterday, possibly helped along by my TL being on holiday, and definitely helped by a lot of chocolates (a lot) and excellent cakes at my ex-team-mate's daughter's farewell. and maybe by my achievements with my side-project (which impressed a number of people). and of course, without any doubt, it was improved by the vote.

every half-year our SC harasses us to vote a "person of the period" (like "person of the year", or "person of the month", only less inspired). this period was no exception, but i came up with a plan. i told everyone we need to vote for him, which would be our most ironic response possible. it's a way to poke fun at him, which we all need because - as i said yesterday - we can't really do anything about his being a miserable, pathetic failure.

the guys thought the idea was cute, but not serious. we have a lot of talkers around, so i can understand that... what they didn't expect was for me to send our SC a response with everyone else bcc'd -
"i vote for you! for your incomparable performance, for representing in every way possible the success of our projects - when i think of success, i think of you!"

incomparable? definitely. representative? our projects have all been sloppy and behind schedule since he took command. hysterical laughter could be heard throughout the section, and a number of the guys have joined in...

even better was his response... he thanked me heartily ^_^

i ran into a buddy from last year's course, and heard that the personnel situation of their side is almost worse than ours... our chain of command is headed by people who need to be beaten within inches of their lives with clue sticks. lots of clue sticks. wielded by us.
one of the more painful examples that he shared with me is that now all office doors are to be kept closed at all times, and access to offices will be granted with a keycard only. you want to see if your friend next door is available for a chat or a cup of coffee? send him an email, or knock and hope.

while on the topic, i caught up with the academic studies officer for a two-minute "tough, bye" conversation. it appears that it's not the end of the world if i choose to study without permission, but it is against regulation, the direct result of which is that if anything happens to me while i'm on campus i'm not insured. what a load of crap.

oh, and still on topic - we were unable to rescue lunch with sweet-chili sauce, which usually works on everything. it looked like kebabs. it probably wasn't.

i had a terrifying experience this afternoon - i thought it would put my evening plans on hold (but they're not, the french aerobic instructor is going to call me later for a drink). gco called me, and as i answered the phone something got into my eye. i don't know what it was, all i know is immediate pain and my eye opening and shutting uncontrollably - whatever it was seemed to have caused a scratch on its way, and for the next hour or so i was in pain every blink unless i held my eyelid at an awkward angle.

i was expecting it to stay that way for a lot longer, but i'm thrilled to say that while my eye's still uncomfortable, it's not stinging anymore ^_^
it got better just in time to go and celebrate by hogtying someone, then soaking him with water. this is the usual, but at the end nystire pulled out a finishing touch - a bucket of rancid wine. i didn't see that coming.

i did some grudwork on the horrible, primary project before the end of the day, and our exercise session went well (although it was quite a sweaty one, a pity that our air-conditioner's on the blink).

now to play with the gimp again (i'm enjoying all the graphic stuff), and then eat and nap before going out tonight.

staring into the screen

dammit - i spent most of my evening doing nothing.

i thought i'd get some work done on the c++ project, and i couldn't figure out why, no matter what i did, i couldn't get the compiler warnings to go away. then i realized that all of my changes were in the backup file. no shit.

the purity test: a girl i work with keeps doing really, really lame facebook ones, so i sent her the link... only now i'm in the middle of it. genius.

but i'll go to bed as soon as i'm done.

a little misunderstanding

today's post written in the order of my little memory-map-style sketch that i did on the bus while ignoring the policewoman making eyes at me. kind of cute, but still - a policewoman.

that jerk i was talking about the other day? nystire informed me today that he's actually the tool pushing the policy to see how far he can take it, and i think we need to tell him that he's taken it too far.

i had to suffer our SC in all his glory this morning; unashamedly passing the buck (and this time i actually said to him, "if everyone had your attitude nothing would get done"), and coming up with plans so pathetic that they border on ludicrous. and the giggling from others in the background doesn't really make it easier to deal with.

that's a huge issue for us - we have so many points to bring up about his mismanagement and there isn't any politically correct way to do it. the results will be very similar to those if we don't say anything, but we'll have to pay for anything that comes out of our mouths... there are still a number of us who don't feel that they can stand idly by any longer, even if the only possible reaction is to slam our feet into our mouths.

there's been definite improvement in the daily exercise - i'm doing way more push-ups :)

my primary task: a bug hunt that keeps resulting in dead ends. i've spent ages hunting through spaghetti code and i still don't know where to begin.

the cereal that i brought back from the party got put to good use today, although in real terms that means that i ate too much junk as usual. it's not unhealthy, but i need to lose the belly and it's not helping.

i at least made some headway in my side project, but i didn't spend enough time on it to make up for the disappointment of the other one.

the goto guy informed me today that because i don't like metallica - s&m my musical opinion is suspect - not only do i consider that blasphemy in and of itself, but the kid HAS NEVER HEARD any of their real, pre-load albums. DAMN.

i passed my copy of yael deckelbaum's album to one of our SC's, as part of an agreement whereby i introduce him to a bunch of indie artists. i also made it abundantly clear that because it's indie all the proceeds are important to them :)

i tried to meet with the girl in charge of the unit's external academic studies program to see if i can organize permission in spite of the bureaucratic blocks. i failed. i'll try again tomorrow.

our SC tried to make nice this afternoon with some really stupid comments. how surprising. he was trying to be funny about violence in south africa, so i shared an unsympathetic perspective and then shocked him with the story of the last "fight" i was in.
damn - finding that story got me browsing my archives again; how did i get through all that shit?!

the end of the day was cut short by cleaning the office, so by the time 6pm rolled around i'd already done some shopping and had a driver get all excited when he saw me in uniform and bouncing in a manner that can only indicate good psy-trance ^_^

speaking of uniforms - it's stinking hot outside and they don't help.

speaking of speaking of uniforms - i've been in touch (thank you, facebook!) with the only girl i've ever written letters to :)

*SHUDDER*
far too much sauce on the tuna salad.

eye-scrubbing

everything's a little sensitive at the moment...

my sister sent me an email that got me worried for my safety, but snopes put me at ease.

i forgot that someone mentioned that south african army medics replaced striking health workers...

being succinct is very important.

conclusions

a) less than an hour's sleep after deprivation and exercise: difficult to wake up from

b) all the meat left in the fridge, straight out the packet, makes a decent protein source

c) brushing my teeth twice - smooth

d) the truth: sometimes rather heartening

e) tamar eisenman is made of awesome, and i'm very glad i bought her albums

f) uploading pics and videos before going to bed... probably not a good idea, it's taking forever.

g) getting in touch with the french girl: definitely good timing :)

the beginning of a new season

i actually did clean my pad yesterday! between rooms, i went hunting for a birthday present and an element of a wedding present. i found a couple of options for both the former and the latter, and bought two copies of michael chabon - the amazing adventures of kavalier & clay (one for me, one for a gift).

i also got started on the wedding present itself: it's begun nicely, i hope i prove good enough for the finishing as well :)

then i went to train. i got to the mall a little early, so i went hunting for another element of the wedding present - a nose ring. it's very difficult to persuade tattoo-parlour workers that you're buying a ring and not planning on inserting it into your body.

the training was insane. i spent most of it working myself to dizziness, which meant stopping every now and then to breathe before rejoining the fray. this worked fine until the fighting: in the middle of a round, my body just stopped responding. that's very bad, in case you're wondering, and i had to "soak damage".

we ended the three hour training with stretching and massages. the latter was unexpected, and i taught a couple of kids a thing or two - there was much awe and wonder when i sorted out the neck and back of a girl who suffers chronic pain in the area. there is much good to be made of being a chronic sufferer myself.

i met up with karnaf for a beer and a chicken salad that was way over the top both in taste and quantity, then took my smelly self home for a shower and a two hour nap. i spent half an hour getting ready for the party, then hopped into the car with gco, his girlfriend and a friend of his from the last israeli trance party i went to (please notice the date - that's messed up).

we did some shopping at tiv tam, where i bought cupcakes. i was the only person who seemed to appreciate them. we hung around until directions to the party became available - i'd already noticed that his girlfriend wasn't at ease with the rest of us. on the way there, things turned sour and she eventually decided she was going to leave us at the party and go home.

it took gco a long time to calm her down, during which time i got to know his friend and discover a naive know-it-all ultra-liberal pseudo-politically aware ne'er-do-well. he's not a bad guy, though, and after a lengthy discussion - i'd like to say debate, i think it might well have been - we began to get along in spite of our differences.

i ran into a couple of old friends at the party, which was extremely lucky because gco's girlfriend and friend decided at 8am that they were ready to go.
faders.
and the party only got interesting about two hours later...

aside from the chicken salad and the cupcake, i had a really decent shuwarma at about 2am. since then and until around 3pm all i ate was handfuls of a really tasty cinnamon cereal, which gave a lot of people the willies and the impression that i'm a health freak. in fact, one of the guys i met later on asked me what hell someone like me was doing at a party like that :P

friends: i made a couple of new ones, really nice guys. i met them through one of the old ones, and when it was time to go i took the role of designated driver which they were all really grateful for. and i was too, both for being able to get home and for the fun of driving a manual vehicle :)

music: minimal minimal. that translates to "very boring" and "difficult to distinguish", but around 10am the dj's began injecting groove and i had a lot of fun.

people: LOVED the people! excellent crowd, beautiful faces and great big smiles, loads of silliness and the guy who got hit on the back of the neck with my frisbee didn't strike back. we did put the frisbee away, though.

venue: really nice spot, dusty as hell. excellent mist system above the dancefloor ^_^

weather: OMG. it was fantastic right until the moment the sun came out, at which point it turned into "fiery annihilation". lots of sunscreen, hats, shirts, water, and stomping in the shade (and grinning into the mist) ensued.

i wore my orange overalls, and i was surprised to get comments on how great my outfit was :)
i did manage to sleep an hour before daybreak, but i'm still amazed that i was still digging (although by that stage it was more like "patting" :P) by noon when the sound went down.

we stopped by the organizer's apartment for a couple of hours, exquisite espresso and alfajores, fun conversation, brilliant music and the intermittent passing out. i just got dropped off at home, and now that i've had a shower and set the washing machine running:

i can see my feet! now i'm clean, but how am i going to unpack my bag? do i call up the french girl from thursday night yet? i MUST brush my teeth, emergency! sleep is for mortals! zzzzzzzz...

neuron-gargling

oh, man - not even a hangover can keep me in bed, apparently. this is most unexpected {]:/

oh, well. maybe i'll clean up a bit.

tenser, said the tensor: i understand that this is good to know? maybe i should read it.

contraband on amazon: the final source for all your solutions

mixed drinks and a number

buffalo boots were amazing! and that said in spite of the terrible sound - the sound man's obviously a bit deaf.
i ran into csn's friend and a very cute french friend of hers, and then one of the mongoose's friends joined me. all in all, the evening was great fun and i got the french girl's number, in the form of a business card in response to mine :P

jumpy - did it skip a beat?

i slept through the night after posting, but i didn't feel better for it. i was sour for most of the day, although it did have its successful moments.

regarding our unsuccessful ones, however:

a) i work in an environment where nobody gives two shits how unproductive you are, just as long as you put in the mandated hours, kiss the right butt and suffer the indignities silently. how did it get so bad?!

b) our new security policy is run by that jerk that everyone loves to tease just to see how much of an ass he can make of himself. the new implementation: executables are a potential source of viruses, so software developers are now forbidden to compile to their own disk space. we can only store and run binaries in centralized locations.

my response would have been* to send a mail informing everyone that in order to save electricity we've been instructed to disconnect our physical keyboards and use the on-screen accessibility one instead.

* although everyone agrees with me, i was advised against it.

---
i'm now having my entire system jump-started by furious and excited - grabs me: i'm not certain if the energy i've got is from the week having ended, having exercised during it, having bought tickets to tomorrow's trance party, doing some unintentional shopping which resulted in my possession of two very cool, very twisty wall clocks and both of tamar eisenman's albums, or very good coffee and company at coffeeholic.

or, it could be because i'm now leaving for tonight's performance by buffalo boots :)

raining out

the day started off all wrong: i realized as i walked out that i'd left my sunglasses at the gym last night.

i can't believe i let my TL put me in such a pissy mood today - i'm still irritable in the extreme. some of it's to do with tiredness, but the majority of the day was overshadowed by his constantly walking in and out of the office, staring at my screen and making snide remarks if anything other than Priority One was open.

by the end of the day i'd developed a headache, had been staring at the same piece of annoying code for almost an hour and had had enough - and i let it out. an unpleasant couple of minutes, but he seems to understand what i'm getting at (kind of, it's more like he'll let me work like i normally do if i think it'll cause less outbursts)... we'll see what tomorrow brings.

something clicked into place during a conversation today: during the big talk i had a couple of weeks ago i was told that one of the possible outcomes is that nothing will happen. i suddenly realized that it really is possible, and it really is the worst outcome i can imagine at the moment. how is my work environment getting me this down?!

i can't decide if i should sleep or go for a run. i just came back from the gym, where i found my glasses, and i was broody the whole way there and back. not cool.

negative! i am a human ________!

dammit! i passed out after turning on the a/c, and now i'm shivering and worried about getting sick. and it's been such a healthy few days!

summary
the first day, sunday, we arrived at the vacation base, changed into exercise gear and began - aerobics, step, exercise ball, and kickboxing, followed by good frisbee in the pool.

the lessons were tough for me, and not just physically - at one point the cute girl taking the class screamed at us "suck your bellies in!", then walked past me, smacked mine and repeated her instruction. i was holding my tummy in.

so day 1 - rediscovered whole sets of muscles and wore myself out.

the second day saw an early wake-up for pilates, then a return to bed before spinning began. i *knew* spinning would be bad for me. we played volleyball in the afternoon, with everyone agreeing with my strategy verbally and then coming up with excuses as to why they couldn't play it properly. we won a game based on luck, then sucked it the second one.

at least our pool frisbee was great :)

day 3: the end of the exercise, and i don't know if scrubbing dishes counts. what i do know is that rejoining the taekwondo group in the evening was a terrific idea, a very serious but fun workout and i definitely have to get my act together and get there regularly.

my body is sore, but i feel good.

other stuff

day 1:
shave, pack, dress like a human being; i met the kinder on the way to the train, and we talked all the way until my stop.

we paid a visit to my team-mate's parents' vineyard in the desert. they have a huge, successful vineyard. in the middle of the desert. it's crazy and wonderful :) [and they have a piano outside on a small hill overlooking the vines]

in the evening we had our annual israeli trivia competition. the guys running it really invested a lot, they built a walkable monopoly board with giant dice, and wrote a program to handle everything... only when it came to the actual management of the game they screwed everything up.

and then, to make matters worse, i managed to land on "go to jail" - not just once, but twice. so not cool.

day 2:

we watched an episode of hell's kitchen and the tail end of the sixth sense, both of which were a lot of fun. we paid a visit to a base that it turns out quite a few of us would like to move our offices to - closer to the results of our work, and with much nicer people (and pretty girls, too). yeah, we know it won't happen.

our SC, the world's biggest doofus, is throwing his weight around like a king because of his new accessory - his bluetooth headset. i haven't been able to stop smirking, giggling and commenting for three days now }:)

the music evening on the second day was horrible. our SC sang, making it worse.

day 3:

comparing tattoos in the kitchen with a fellow trance-bunny, bouncing to great tracks while making light work of the clean-up.

it was beautiful in the desert.

after a long distance travelled we had sandwiches and threw the frisbee around, then went through a tour of the beer / fruit drink facilities and watched videos that prove that you shouldn't pay your director with your alcoholic product.

i was a bit agitated when i got home, but i went shopping and was on my way to dizengoff when i called my taekwondo instructor to tell her i need to get back into shape. she invited me to join them...

so i trained, got a small book standand a compliment from the cute girl at the art store :)

i hung out laundry when i got home, then went off to cinema city with sjo to see the transformers sequel (very cool), and we got a ride back with crasher who i haven't seen in a long time. four hours later...

to the better end

a very pleasant walk (a beautiful sunset), enough time for a beer, and then i went downstairs to be wowed by ma'ayan hirschbein and liad sher - phenomenal performance!

we stood outside for ages, then split up, and two of us went to ze sushi for... you guessed it. i've just got back, am about to shower, finish packing for a trip that i really don't want to go on, and i should be back tuesday to bitch about how lame it was.

another weekend slipped through my fingers

that uneasy feeling just got worse. i went past coffeeholic, but the new girl was there so i made a sharp turn left and headed for the atm, which wasn't ready to sprout cash for me. i suddenly began to feel horrible, so i came back home and lay down for a while... then i went for a walk to the beach, where after watching the surfers for a bit i returned to coffeeholic.

this time the guys i was looking for were there. i dropped off the panic ensemble disc and had a good cup of iced espresso, eventually feeling a bit of improvement and coming back to churn out a few lines of code.

soon i'll be off to another performance of ma'ayan hirschbein, this time i'll be walking and not relying on public transport.

stretch my brain

silent witness
in cold blood, i stand
watching as your tear at yourself
and flail
frozen, blood curdling
cold sweat and hot guilt
for to cry out would bind
these hands
forever

leary on drugs is full of intriguing insights - that's the point, really. i read this morning about the american government's fear of hedonism leading to the empire's downfall... it does explain the drug prohibition. it makes it a bit more insidious, in fact.

i'm uneasy, i've been trying to get some work done on the next section of the c++ project and i just can't concentrate. i'm heading outside for a breath of, well, the same air as i get in here.

infantile snooze (ii)

sjo and i met across from rabin square, and sat down at the wannabe-posh 24-hour place (can never remember its name). nobody looked at us twice, we sat down at a free table and chatted while waiting for the waitron to arrive... she eventually did, only to go and find the manager so she could inform us that we were sitting at a reserved table.

either you're serious about service, or you aren't. if you don't have somebody on the lookout for new customers, then don't treat those that do arrive like they've made a mistake. i won't be going back there. we walked his bicycle to my place, i put on my blades, and we rolled on to shine.

the table we were seated at (the only outside one available) wasn't good, and they only served boiled eggs: a total deal-breaker. we didn't have to look too far though, bleaker's is on the next corner and the food, service and setting were all great. of course, it's one of those places i walk past all the time and never stop at... that shall be remedied.

their salmon parisian was downgraded to a poached egg and salmon sandwich (croissant shortage, and i can see why), but the tapas and salad held it together and the dessert was brilliant: it's a bakery at heart :)

in order to work off the food, i joined sjo all the way to his place and then continued on home, stopping at a shop to get some orange juice and be asked to put my shirt back on. this is how i know that to the east of ibn gvirol is no longer really tel aviv :P

i watched an episode of battlestar galactica, showered and went on my way back to the dark side of tel aviv to her apartment, and she and her boyfriend gave me a ride to her grandparents' place for dinner.

dinner was too good - i'm stuffed. and the pavlova and cake at the end were incredible! we watched wall-e, then i got a ride home. i'm exhausted, i think it's bedtime.

infantile snooze

i tried to sleep after posting, but failed. i tried meditating, and arrived at a Very Important Conclusion. i remembered that i need to take control of my situation, that letting my army issues get the better of me is not okay. in fact, after thinking about this for a while and focusing on where my head should be, i felt the urge to make the most of my evening.

that's how i got to coffeeholic, in time for the guy there to make me an incredibly generous beef parisian (as in, *stuffed* with beef and cheese) and to catch a number of friendlies for good conversation. i was on my way back when his girlfriend rocked up, and that kept me on my seat for another ten minutes until i remembered that i had laundry to deal with :P

i slept through the night - and like a baby! i woke up around 9am, made some phone calls and went to the post office to pick up a poster for my team (team spirit, i'll display it even if i don't have it), then shopped for and found a decent whiteboard. after installing it, enjoying a cup of coffee and a wonderful article on my patio, i tidied up the place a bit and then went to get a bottle of chivas for her grandfather's birthday.

on the way, i ran into one of my niece's best friends and her boyfriend, so i sat down with them to hear that my niece will be crashing my pad shortly - we all found this highly amusing, i had no clue :P

i came home and did some sorting through my papers, while watching some episodes of invader zim and playing a bit of tekken, then went to meet sjo for lunch.

<to be continued, gotta go out for dinner>

not enough caffeine?

yesterday was a day in the oven. with the fan on.

i was completely bombed, having slept 3.5 hours after two nights of exercise and my thighs were agonizingly sensitive the entire day.
i learned more about .net security - namely that it's bleeding impossible to write a program that can access anything over a network, and i found out that the "richtextbox" is useful.

i also spent a lot of it horribly aware of my oversized belly, and the quantity of rubbish i consume on an hourly basis. am i eating because i'm unhappy? should i take up smoking again? [probably not]

i got some satisfaction from the c++ project, at least. the guy called to say he's very happy with it :)

we went to an event last night that was absolutely mind-boggling. i'm not going to discuss the ridiculously long drive in both directions, or the sub-standard food and terrible seating. the show itself was freaky: a lot of kids singing strange songs really badly, and they had a gorram circus on stage. like, juggling, and stilts, breakdancing... wtf?!?!

and the speakers were bored. and the MC doesn't appear to have a sense of humour so his jokes were out of place.

at the end we sang the national anthem. the creepy bit is that i *forgot* to salute - i'm still a bit embarrassed about it. at least nystire was standing behind me to hiss a reminder.

the laughter came at 1am, being dropped off at the train station. the girl who gave me a ride wasn't comfortable because she's afraid of the tunnel that i had to use. if this was south africa, or new york, or somewhere where crime is a problem... maybe i'd have been cautious. i couldn't stop giggling the whole way; especially when i entered and saw the colourful new lighting they've installed.

...

today began with a cranberry-flavoured energy drink, had a guarana break in the middle and ended with strong turkish coffee: i'm still completely buggered.

as it is i'm lucky i managed to reach my alarm after only half an hour of beeping, i had ten minutes to shave, dress and be outside waiting for the damn bus. i spent most of the day working on the fun project, and the last part of it breaking my head over irritating problems with other things.

no-go: nystire and i were on our way to oversee the culmination of a project we were responsible for last year, when we got a message from our SC: only one can be present. the man *really* knows how to improve motivation.

studies: because i have *no* clue if i'll be a civilian by the time the next semester begins, it looks like i'll have to forgo my return to academia this year. i'm not happy about that. i'll have to check out correspondence courses, but that's *so* not the same.

seeing as i had nothing to lose, i upset my TL by asking him if he'd allow me the time to study in spite of my non-adherence to the bureaucratic oath... he was mortified. i'm sorry to say that that didn't make me feel particularly bad.

shower, bed, and maybe i'll go out tonight.

what's another 30km?

once home, i spent a couple of hours debugging an extremely strange error - the weirdest ones are often caused by the tiniest typos, i'd typed "i" instead of "j" when performing a merge and it took forever to find out that i was inserting zeroes into the resulting array.
the good news is that once i fixed that, everything worked the way it should - it was batch job (everything dependent on everything else), so that kind of means something to me.

i went blading! that was a very, very serious route we did tonight - a pity about the sandy bits, especially the one where some idiot cut in front of me and forced me into a pit of it :/ (now i have to clean the wheels properly, that sucks)

that was mostly a different set of muscles from last night, but the ones that i used twice - like my thighs - are burning. and i'm quite pleased :)

i should be consuming proteins, not an apple - but i don't have anything convenient :/

yay! i have to get up in 3.5 hours. dammit.