from music to cavemen

i was quite surprised this morning to discover that within fifteen minutes i could arrive at the health ministry's offices and within another fifteen be done there. i also learned the hebrew word for conjunctiva and that itis means "infection".

urchin had forgotten our plans, which worked to our advantage as i randomly walked down the road until i arrived at george, which appeared to be a good enough spot. as i sat down i overheard the waitress mentioning playing music and i offered my ipod to their service.

so the music was excellent - i was worried that the randomness of the playlist would cause embarrassing moments but when asaf avidan - hangwoman came on the waitress came out to thank me for making her day. the music just got better and better; urchin arrived and we had a wonderful breakfast, and by the time we were ready to go the waitress was having none of it: "you? you're not going anywhere. my shift ends at 2pm, and you *can't* take the ipod away from me!"

i let her play one last song (wolfmother) before apologizing and dragging it away. we'd even received cookies with our coffee and a plate of brownies as thanks - the other patrons had been enjoying the groovy psychedelic rock too ^_^

i hopped a bus to the american embassy. i stood outside for a while, but the guard did me a personal favour and took my passport with its exit visa in to determine my status; usually the response is "no invitation, no entrance". he came back after a few minutes and informed me that i have nothing to worry about, i'm registered as having left the country and the exit visa is worthless.

cool!

i bussed to campus, waited a short while and was informed that there will be no reductions in municipal taxes for me because i earned a good enough salary during the last three months of 2009. that's... ummm... not a particularly enlightened or fair policy.

i sat on the grass and waited for pg to finish her class, then she joined me in the cafeteria for lunch. the ghoulash was well made if i don't take into account the plastic tag i found in it...
after she gave me a quick tour of the library i ducked, running into my first welfare officer for an amusing chat - their entire office is studying at tel aviv this year :)

after a long and funny interchange with my insurance agent, i arrived at work only to discover that the systems were down. at least the material i need to read is in my pc's memory, and our english major manager is in :)

once the systems were back up i spent the afternoon rediscovering weird flex bits and applying for jobs.

note to self: don't argue with people over who had the worse military service. you're going to win.

having the guys in the next room harping on loudly about the army wasn't comfortable for me. i need a bit more time, i think.

i finally found what i was looking for (it's not a bad setup, but flex is somewhat too subtle for my tastes - i don't like having to search so long), printed a copy of allegory of the cave and read it on the way home, pausing only to have my ears burned by a long call from someone who received my cv this afternoon. now prepping to return to the rollerblading group.