Random rambles on............house work

Laundry! I hate it! Hate it. Hate it! It is not too bad now that I have a washer and dryer. With two kids and a husband I do a load every day or so! I hate folding clothes and putting them away, and since we all that I am a huge procrastinator sometimes they stay in the dryer or in the basket for few days, meaning that now I have to fold at least 3-4 loads and my laundry room gets all messy! I cannot wait until the kids are old enough, they will be doing their own laundry.

House cleaning: I am not too fond of that either! Bas ya3ni I do not hate it as much as I hate laundry. With two very active and messy kids I have to tidy up at least three times a day. Every few months their toys get to be too much. There are too many little teeny toys that I have to keep on picking up few times a day. The kids are awful when it comes to cleaning up. It takes Ziad forever to pickup few toys and put them in the toy box, because he is whining and feeling sorry for himself. It is not fair he says! So all those toys go into a garbage bag and given to the diabetes association which sells them to second hand stores.

I have my own system in tidying up and cleaning. If I do not have enough to time to follow through that I just leave it until later, except now I do not have the luxury! So I have to tidy up before I go to bed every night. :o(

I start from my bathroom, my bedroom, the main bathroom, the kids’ rooms, the laundry room if it needs cleaning, then downstairs to the living room, the dinning room, the powder room, the family room, and finally the kitchen and then the floor, vacuum the carpet and mob the kitchen and foyer. If I cannot do it in that order I get so anxious and annoyed! And would rather just not do anything. I know I am weird. And I hate it when people make the outside tidy but then you look in the closet and everything is just shoved in there! That drives me crazy! The closets have to be as neat as possible as well.

Cooking! I am not a good cook because I just do not enjoy it! I would rather have someone cook for me and I do not mind eating out. When hubby is nice like he has been lately I do not mind cooking. When he is a meano then I do not cook anything good and worth mentioning. My kids are not into tabeekh. They love manakeesh, hummus, and white rice with yogurt, pasta with meatballs, pizza and salad. You know what that means!! When in Amman I will not be cooking at all!! Yippy! Ok maybe I will every now and then so I will not forget how to cook, but I am leaving my cookbook at home.

Ok among those three I am not fond of ironing, dusting, vacuuming or doing the dishes! When I was working hubby and I shared all those chores. Of course most of the time his work was not up to my standards and I had to fix them. Now that I am not working out of home hubby has taken the back seat. Every now and then he may vacuum or load the dishwasher then 7amel me meet jmeeli. I so need a shagalleh! But then again maybe not, although I hate doing all those tasks at the end I am glad to see things done and it is good for our health to stay active. There are a lot of calories burned doing all those chores! If you iron for one hour you burn 90 calories! Not too shabby, it alot more than we burn blogging and browing the net, eh??

rain go away!

rain, rain go away, come again some other day!

It has been raining since yesterday! It is so windy, and cold!

I hate this weather. I guess I have to wear my hair curly today. No point spending 20min blow drying my hair straight only to have it rained on and going back to curly any ways!
This is the perfect stay at home, watch a movie or read a nice book weather! But noooo I have to take the kids to the dentist, then to the gym and then to the library. It is so unfair! I hate going out in the rain. I hate it when water comes on my feet so I have to wear my winterish shoes since all my summer shoes are open toed sandals. It is only +5 , so I have to dig into my not so summery clothes. It is supposed to stay like this until tomorrow evening. I am so not going out tomorrow! I’ll work on my assignment. I am starting to really hate pride and prejudice! Books are fun to read, not to analyse! My essay is going to be on the significance of letters in the book. I found a perfect essay about it online! Damned plagiarism! And then I will start reading 1984, it’d better be good!

This month I have read four books! It is driving hubby crazy! Ya3ni isn’t it better than watching tv?? I am usually not the read a chapter here and chapter there kind of person. Usually when I start a book I finish it within a day or two max. These days between hubby, the kids and my mommy and wifely responsibilities it is next to impossible. So I am training myself to be like a normal person and read few chapters, put the book down, read more the next day and so on. So far so good!

I read the time traveller’s wife, which I loved! It is a very nice book, well written and keeps you interest all the way though. I just heard they are making a movie! It will be interesting to watch! I can not wait!

The kite runner was good too. I enjoyed reading the book. By the middle it gets a bit depressing especially when talking about the Taliban and he does exaggerate a bit I believe. But all in all I enjoyed reading it and I am looking forward to reading his new book.

For an light read on the drive back home from jasper I got a light read. Sweet revenge, I love books about revenge. It was ok, not great, but after reading two somewhat intense novels it was nice to read something light.

And I finally finished reading pride and prejudice! I watched the movies when I was half way through it. So I was not too exited about reading it. Note to self: never watch the movie until done with the book!

I am also reading parts of Palestine children for Ghassan Kanafani. I’ve never read his books in English before! I like the Arabic versions better. From time to time I read from speak bird speak again. I finally found a folk tale that my cousin used to always tell us when we were kids. What is up with all this ghoul stuff old folks used to tell!

Ok I am done procrastinating and writing blah blahs. see when I write about everything and everything it means im procrastinating.

Our vacation pictures

medicine lake in Jasper. It is very cool, because it drains in some seasons and is full in others..

the mud slide that kept us waiting for three hours, aparently we were lucky..they eventually had to close the road and it would have taken us alot longer to get from banff to kelwna

Leaving the prairies of Saskatchewan

stuck in traffic for three hours due to a mud slide

At sunpeak Resort in B.C.

Leaving Banff

Riding horses in Kelowna, the horse were so cute!

The kids and the donkey at theVancouver zoo

A deer we came across in Jasper

The mountains in Jasper

Bolbol looking for interesting rocks by a lake in Jasper

Mana'eesh

Yesterday was our mana’eesh day. The kids woke up waiting for their ‘ooshi when I realized that the pizza crust I have in the fridge expired few days ago. What to do, I promised the kids mana’eesh for breakfast? O well no biggi, I was only 8am and I didn’t have to be at the gym until 12. So I got the white flour out and got to work.
I decided to do it differently this time. I usually hate it sticking so I add flour until the dough is not sticky anymore. I decided I will be brave and add more water and who cares if it sticky. I even forgot to add oil! Tsk tsk tsk eh?? Well not really! Those were my best mana’eesh ever! They were so soft and moist and so yummy, Even if I say so myself.

Later we went to the lake, I decided to take the few ‘ooshis left with us, just in case. The lake is 100km away and the drive is in rural Saskatchewan with no Tim Hortins or anything in between. After we played at the lake, built few sand mountains, ate ice cream and played at the playground we got in the car and we were all hungry. So the mana’eesh came in handy. Hubby and I were talking about how yummy they were:

Me: isn’t the dough so good, it is so soft and moist, 7eta a7la min paramount mana’eesh

Hubby: yeh they are good.

Me: yeh bas ya3ni they are so good I do not believe it!

Hubby: 3ala sho shaifi 7alik? It is ready-made dough you bought from the store, why are you taking all the credit!

Me: what?? O no the dough was expired so I threw it in the garbage, I made these myself from scratch

Hubby: walah? 3an jad? They are very good. I would have never though so!

O well, so my mistake was always not putting enough water! Go figure!!

I even downloaded my pictures from the camera to show you guys! Notice the tiny man’ooshi on top?? That is bolbol’s manooshi. The kids love to help. Each gets a piece of dough and they roll it and roll and then make it balls, then roll eventually we put in the oven with some za’taar and they eat it proudly. Zozo is not satisfied with just getting dough. He likes to do it from scratch. I give him a small bowl with some flour and he pours water over it and makes his own dough, with a little help from me of course. He covers it and waits for it to rise, checking on it every few seconds. Is it bigger yet??

Daloo3a??

When I was going to school in Lebanon my friends and not so friends used to call me eldaloo3a. I used to hate that nick name. I acquired that nick name because I called my mom and dad "mama and baba" instead of yama and yaba like they did in those ancient days when I was a kid.

I do not why this just popped into my mind right his second, when I was contemplating finishing my damned assignment. Of course instead of working on my assignment I decided to blog this silly thought.

I wonder what my old friend's kids call them now, do they call them mama and baba or the old fashioned yama and yaba?

OK khalas I am going to work on my assignment now, no more blogs, no more baby center, no more face book, no more anything. My exam is in three weeks and I still have two assignments to finish. This correspondence study is sooo not for a procrastinator like myself!

O well of I go comparing and contrasting short stories, yippee!

o remember how I said I love the grass cutting thing on my guilty pleasures post? Well now the maintenance guy is cutting the grass, I love the smell but I hate the sound when it is right under my window. OK who cares eh??

hmmmm what else do I want to babble and ramble about before I log out and start on my assignment??

nothing comes to mind, so I guess I'll get back to work :o)

o no wait, let me list the nicknames I was called growing up. My uncles had nicknames for all of us. Two of my nicknames were najeeb eltaweel, and watwatoon. I have no idea what watwatoon means, I guess someone who is very tall. I guess I was tall when I was a little kid. I hated being tall, I used to spend the night praying to god not to let me grow anymore so my uncles will not call me najeeb eltaweel and watwatoon anymore. Well guess what? god listened to my prayers and I stopped growing at 10 years old. I was 5'2 and still am until this day. I wish god did not listen to my prayers until 2 inches later. But there you have it. I am not najeeb eltaweel or watwatoon anymore! Thankfully I left Lebanon before they came up with more nicknames for shorty little me eh?
My cousin was very chubby, and she lived with them in the same house. They had many nicknames for her. It is not wonder that when she got the chance for revenge she took it, who can blame her eh?

Back to comparing and contrasting.

the tooth fairy..

Tonight the tooth fairy came to our home for a visit. She picked up zozo’s tooth. She will be using it to finish building her castle. And she left him a $20 bill. He wanted a kite. I guess the tooth fairy should have left 20 coins! A bill meant nothing to him; it is just a green piece of paper! He was not too thrilled about getting money he wanted a kite! How the heck was the tooth fairy supposed to put a kite under his pillow?

Apparently he likes the nail fairy better (the fairy that comes at night and cuts his nails because he is so annoying when awake and will not give me his hands to cut his nails). The nail fairy gives him candy. Because you know, candy is so much better than money. KIDS, it is so hard to figure them out.

Sniff, sniff, my baby is growing up! How the heck did that happen? One day he is a tiny baby and now he is a 5.5yr old boy with a missing baby tooth. This tooth came in in March 2002! It is the first tooth to come in and it the first one to come out.

It seems like a losing a baby tooth = tween attitude! In the past few days he has been talking back and giving us this attitude. He was calling me bossy this morning because I would not allow him to eat a cookie before his breakfast! ME! BOSSY!!!?? I am so taking my $20 back!
Is it just me or does time go by way too fast?? I do not remember time passing this quick when I was a little girl. It used to take forever for the school year to be over, now the year is finished with a blink of an eye! Hubby says that there is barakeh in time anymore. It is so true. I wonder if the time is really going by faster or is it that you notice it more as you age.

Finally back home

I cannot say I missed my dingy apartment, but it nice to be back “home” I guess. Our trip was great. The kids were better than great. They behaved so good considering they were stuck in their car seats for so long. We drove for a total of 4500km in those 11 days.

It was good being together as a family, without a computer, work, and phone calls in between us. We did have friends with us for the first 3 days of our trip. Which was even more fun. But they had to go back to Calgary when we drove to Vancouver.

We spent two days in Kelowna. I would not mind living there. It the warmest place in Canada, and it is beautiful. With a huge lake and surrounded by mountains. Why could hubby not have gotten a job there instead of Saskatoon?
We went sailing, horseback riding and shopping there. I was surprised when my son rode a horse all alone and was not scared. I guess it is time for some horse riding lessons eh?

Vancouver was ok; I am not too crazy about the dark skies and rain. So I am not in a rush to move there, although hubby’s friend is badgering him to go work with him there. Thanks, but no thanks! We went to the zoo there. The zoo is not big; I am staring to think that the Toronto zoo is the biggest in Canada. It was fun; the kids are so into animals these days. We went to aquarium and took the ferry to Vancouver Island. Where there was a tiny mall beside a casino. I went shopping while hubby went into the casino. He actually won $2500! Which he is feeling guilty about, when the heck did hubby become so religious? And I know you are thinking I probably spent a lot in the mall, but not even one penny was spent there. The mall was so tiny there were no stores that appealed to me, not even the bookstore!

Of course Banff and Jasper were as amazing as ever! We saw two dead bears on the side of the road :o(poor little guys! And we got to see two bears walking around eating whatever off the ground. We also saw two deer fighting, MEN! No matter what species they are, they will never grow up!

We stayed at six different hotels. They were all nice. After our last mini vacation in Edmonton and that horrible hotel we stayed at, I had to be careful. In Edmonton we stayed at the Hilton, it is only 2 blocks away from the horrible hotel we stayed at last month, and only $40 more. But man what a difference!

Speaking of hotels, what they hell is deal with the stupid sheet tuck in. has anyone watched the Seinfeld episode when George is complaining about those tucked in sheets and asking the maid for one tuck in and one no tuck. He is right; those damned tucked in sheets are sooooo freakin’ annoying! I know, I know you can untuck them before going to bed. Sometimes you forget, and you are in bed all sleepy and you have to get up and untuck them, or be annoyed all night long trying to move the blanket around. Sheet tucking should be banned!

O and I got to finish three books on our drive. From Banff to kelowna we got stuck in traffic for three hours due to a mud slide. We were lucky it was only three hours; I heard it was worse the day after. I was so glad to have my books to read then, I would have gone crazy just sitting there. At the end my friend and I decided to walk down you know for exercise, but the minute we started walking the traffic moved.

Speaking of exercise, I planned on working out at the gyms at the hotel. I am so not a morning person, I got up early twice to workout and I barely had any energy to finish the 30min of cardio, so I gave up. We ate so much junk food; I am not going to eat out for at least a month to clean my system out of that junk. So needless to say, I am as fat as I was before I left, if not few pounds more. But as of today I am officially on weight loss mode and have to need to, and I will inshallah lose those goddamned 10lb before I leave to Toronto and maybe Jordan in mid July.

O o o..one more thing! I got home at 7:30 last night and I actually unpacked right away!! Not the next day, not a week later, or a month later like I used to do. I unpacked on the same day and I even did two loads of laundry. I am so proud of me! When I came from Jordan last summer, my bags sat on the floor for at least one month!

Ok I done now , for real, wallah!! I hope I did not bore you guys:) What? Me boring?? No way eh?

Almost home!!

finally i get some computer time...I only had few minutes here and there to check my emails in the past 11 days.

We had a blast in Alberta and B.C. We were on our way home today, but we decided to stay for a while longer in Jasper this morning and went for a drive (saw a black bear on our way, so cute!) and then we went to the hot spring for a while. We got to Edmonton at 7 pm and decided it will be unwise to drive the remaining 600km home. So here we are in Edmonton. We do not want to drive around. We have seen more than enough of Edmonton, so we are staying in the hotel and relaxing, we may go swimming later on tonight.

I'll be back to post more in the next few days, you know how much I loooooove to "talk" on my blog.

I will have to catch up on all the blogs on my favourites list at least. O man it is going to take me forever.

Phew! all done!

I am so glad I am not a travel agent. That is no easy job!!

I just finished booking our hotels for our upcoming trip to Vancouver. It took me forever! I have never planned a trip with multi stops. We usually go to one place stay there for few days and come back.

After our last hotel stay in Edmonton, did I talk about how horrible the hotel was in my last post?? Well it was bad, horrible, nightmarish, ok maybe not this bad but bad enough to make me paranoid. So I had to be more careful. I wanted something that was at least three stars and I wanted it in nice areas.

So there it is all done now we will be driving from Saskatoon to Banff, staying there for one night. That is a 9.5hrs drive! We leave Banff and drive to Kelowna, we stay for 2 night there. That is a 7hr drive. From Kelowna we drive to Vancouver. We stay for 3 nights in Vancouver. We leave Vancouver to a resort near Kamloops. We stay there for two nights. Then we drive to jasper, stay there for one night and then come home to Saskatoon. Total drive is 37hrs. We will need a vacation after our vacation.

Three of the hotels have an exercise room, none of the hotels in Jasper or Banff have one but we are only staying there for one night so it is ok. I have this plan to get up very early, at 6:30 and go workout before we start the day. This way I can shower and get dressed early too so I do not get hubby whining about how long I take to get ready. MEN! Do you think I can do it?? I am not a morning person! But I will try; all for the sake for losing some fat and gaining some muscle, so all my cute summer outfits will fit good again. Which will be worth it, sa7? I can do it, no more lazy Sam! Just think of the burst of energy I will get waking up so early and working out!

Our friends may join us from Calgary, but I am not sure yet. It will be fun going togther.

Now I have to call our travel agent to book tickets to amman. yikes!

Guilty Pleasures

I was tagged by Dima, thank u Dima :)
List 10 simple pleasures and the rules are as follows:
1. You have to list exactly 10 points.
2. You have to tag 3 bloggers when you are done.

1) My kids’ smiles, laughs, hugs and kisses

2) Sitting by the fire during a blizzard drinking hot coco and watching the snowfall.

3) Waking up to the sound of neighbours cutting grass. I love the smell the sound, it is
associated with summer and like everyone knows by now, I love summer!

4) Long drives accross the country with my husband.

5) Guiltless chocolate treats. Since I am working on losing 10lb, I do not get too many of
those.

6) Watching the scale, the body fat calliper, and the measuring tape saying smaller numbers
and my clothes fitting good again

7) Playing in the playground with my kids. I become more of a kid than them. Beating them
to the swings, and having slide races.

8) Seeing my husband after we have been away from each other for few weeks. It is just like
when we first met, the newness is somewhat restored for a while.

9) Drinking an icy cup of water when very thirsty. Nothing beats that!

10) Being on the beach, preferably the oceans but lakes are ok too. tanning, checking out
some eye candy, building sand castles, swimming and looking out for sharks. it is all
good!

I tag...hmmmmmmmmmmmm...everyone has been tagged...but I'll take long shot here.
I'll tag who-sane, 7aki fadi and Qwaider. if they have been already tagged, then I tag anyone who has not been tagged :)

why, why why?

I have always heard people (mama comes to mind) say that Arabs are great people but our governments hold us back, westerns have good governments behind them to make them more organized, and to help them keep their countries clean and other things that we are lacking in the middl east. For some time I did believe this, but the more the older and wiser I get the more this remark stops making sense. I guess on the big scale of things there is some truth to this, but what about the small things here and there, which is what I want to talk about.

Yesterday I went downstairs to throw a garbage bag in the garbage dump by my apartment. I live in a three story building so there is no garbage shoot :o(
It brought back memories of going down to throw the garbage in the dump by my house in Lebanon as a little kid. There is a huge difference between the two.
Here it looks neat, you are not disgusted when you pass by it, everything is inside the dump, there are no bags sitting on the side, no loose garbage flying by. If you didn’t know better you would never guess this green container contains garbage. A huge contrast from how the garbage dump looked in Lebanon. It was disgusting. There were 2 big round containers that were to hold the garbage. The containers were never full; they were empty most of the time. Why were they empty you ask?? Because people were too lazy to walk one extra step to throw their garbage in the pail, instead they would throw them at the pail and it was a miss or hit. But who cares right. How could one not care, this garbage is in your parking lot for god’s sake, why could they not make a tiny effort to put the garbage where it belongs. Ya3ni I cannot blame this on the government, on the Zionists or what have you, but on the idiots who did were too lazy to throw the garbage where it belongs.

Then there is the waiting in line issue. Why is it so hard to make a neat line and wait your turn? We really cannot blame anyone on this. Why is it so easy for people to wait in line elsewhere? Has anyone been to that famous ice-cream shop in sook el7amadiye in Damascus? It is a zoo in there! One time I was trying to get past the people waiting in what in a different country would have been a line-up to get to the seating area, when I got squished by a not so skinny bald man. I was holding my then 8month old baby. It is a wonder no one dies in there! Anyways, I politely asked the man to move shwai, but he did not hear me or maybe he ignored me. How could he ignore cute little me? Huh? So I put all the muscle power I’ve got into my right arm and punched the guy with my elbow to get him to move before zozo and I suffocated to death. That did the trick and I was able to get by. I will never go into that place again, no ice cream is worth this! Besides I am more of a chocolate ice-cream gal. Maybe they should get those things they have in Canada’s wonderland, little fences to keep people in a straight line :o)

Let’s not talk about the people who clean their houses and then throw the dirty water from the balcony, or at their doorstep without any care to passer bys. I am hoping this has changed in the past 20year that I have been out of Lebanon. When walking through the za2azeek in the naher elbared camp in Lebanon you had to be on the lookout for housewives throwing water and splashing you.

Ok I could go on, but I have got to get off the computer and attend to my other duties :o)

Arabs are great people (of course I am biased on this), but they are too hamajeyeen in certain things.

Do you know so and so in Canada?

When I was in Lebanon few years ago. I was sitting at my uncle’s house when a neighbour(an elderly lady) dropped by for a finjan ahwi(a cup of coffee)

Neighbour: men ween into ya 7abibti, sme3et inik jai min Canada.(I heard you came from Canada)

Me: aa (aha)

Neighbour: bte3rafi flan ibn flan? Kan jarna, wisa 3ayesh becanada(do you know so and so, the son of so and so? He lives in Canada)

Me: la wala ya khalto ma ba3rafo, ween 3ayesh becanada?(no I do not know him, which part of Canada does he live in?)

Neighbour: ma ba3raf ween, bas ya3ni saken nawa7eekom.(I do not know, but he lives there)

Me: Canada kteer kberi ya khalto, wfeeha 3arab kteer, ma ba3rafhom kolhom. (Canada is a very big country, and there are lots of Arabs, I do not know them all)

Neighbour: Gareeb (strange)

She finished her coffee and left thinking sho had, ma3'ool ma bti3rafo?.

It is so funny how she expected me to know someone just because he lives in Canada. Really she lives in a camp the size of my apartment complex. Does she know every single person there?? Some times people surprise you with their questions and comments.
She probably just came by to ask me this question :o) old people are so cute sometimes:)

Our Trip to Vancouver

Our Trip to Vancouver is fast approaching. Hubby is taking 10 days or so off. We plan on leaving on Saturday morning. Hubby won, we are renting a van for our trip. I would have liked to rent an SUV, but we were as cramped in that as we were in the car, and for such a long trip you do not want to be cramped.

The first eight hours of our trip will be pretty boring, driving in the prairies of Saskatchewan and Alberta *yaaaaaaawn*. We will drive from Saskatoon to Banff; a 9.5hr drive. Did you know that King Hussein had a home in Banff?

From there I still do not know where we will go. I need to book hotels. We will probably stop at radium hot spring for few hours. It is so refreshing. I cannot wait! I think we will stop at Kelowna, and few other places. The drive from Banff to Vancouver is not that long, but because we want to drive around the mountains it will be slow.

I have never been to Vancouver, it is on the ocean and I love the ocean. Maybe we’ll go to the island and to the beach.

The one cool thing is I will have ten computer less days! I’ll miss my blog! And my baby center friends. How will I live without my computer? If I want to order pizza, I usually come online to find the number and the info.

The only thing is that we are scared of is running into bears!! Man those things look so cute and cuddly, but they are huge! Did you know that a 20million year or so ago bears were the size of dogs? In the information booklet you get when entering Banff, they have information on what to do if you run into a bear. Are they kidding me? Do not move while a huge 1000lb bear is charging at me at few km/hr? Gosh I’d probably pass out if a bear charges at me! Well let’s hope that we do not run into any bears or cougars. Nice wild life is ok and the kids will love it.

O and their goes my weight loss efforts! No gym, and eating out for 10 days! I guess I will have to find a way to workout everyday before going to bed. Pilates, some weight training or hopefully the hotels will have exercise rooms! Where there is a will, there is a way :o)

Yikes! Our move to Amman!

It is becoming more and more real. Hubby just went to western union to wire some money to his sister, a deposit for our rental in Amman.

I just sent a message to someone who is looking for a short-term rental in Milton. I guess their home closes in December but they want to move sooner. If the rental goes through there is no turning back! I have to leave or else stay in s’toon or live at my parent’s house until December. Yup no that won’t do. I love my parents but their house is a 24hrs full house and everyone keeps on telling my kids don’t do this and don’t do that. Ma badi ta3keed lelawlad.

I will be calling my travel agent to get tickets for the four of us. I guess I will keep mine and the kids open for a year.

3an jad a big yikes!! I am so worried now because I could not buy coats for the kids. By the time we decided to come all the winter stock was out of the stores. Ya3ni I am so pathetic it is not like I am moving to the middle of nowhere. There are coats in Amman for god’s sake; maybe a bit more expensive than what I would spend at sears here, bas sho ya3ni? I am a huge spender; hell I usually spend $200 in less than 24hr usually 3la ashya’s fadyi. And now I am worried that coats for the kids might cost $20-50 more? Big deal! And I am acting like I will not be buying clothes and stuff from Amman. Now this is a big joke! I would have to never step into a mall for that to happen. I am a shopaholic! Who cares how much more expensive things are in Amman than in Canada? Like that ever stopped me from shopping eh? What a joke! And now I know there is an Aldo in Amman, nothing will stop me!

Racism & stereotype

Racism is a huge issue; I am not making light of it. Sometimes people used racism as an excuse. If they do not get a good grade, it is because the proff. is a racist bastard, he is Jewish for sure and hates Arabs! If someone does not get a job, or is not given enough responsibilities at work it is because dol 3noseryeen awi! He does not look around to see that his manager is Indian, and his Palestinian colleague is given more than enough responsibility. Sometimes we do not want to see and acknowledge our failures so we blame it on racism.

Every culture has their racist people. Among us Arabs are the most racists of all! I have heard all the stereotypes and racism remarks. They are from Lebanon; they must be sluts. People from Jordan are very rude and inconsiderate, I have dealt with few Jordanians and they were awful. People from Gaza are strong headed and you cannot deal with them rashom nashef. Khaleeji people are big snobs and conceded, they saw money and now they think they own the world. Egyptians are this, and Syrians are that…and so on. And lets not forget the, I hate black people. I hate white people. All Americans are bad people. It is very pathetic and very disturbing; we judge a whole nation by the few we encounter!

If you find a bad apple in the basket, you do not throw away the whole basket. It is the same with people. It really bugs me when I hear those remarks, and I just want to slap these people few time to wake them up. Thankfully the majority of people who utter those remarks are the older generation, my dad and his friends. So maybe there is hope that the newer generations will not be this poisoned. I guess that is too much to hope for eh? Well the least I can do is to teach my children to be understanding and tolerant of other cultures and beliefs and that stereotyping is wrong! So I can make sure two (maybe three one day) people in this world will not do this. :o)

When are people going to grow up, and judge others based on their own faults and merits and not based on where they come from or on their religion and beliefs?

How do we expect others not to stereotype us and utter racist remarks towards us, when we do it to each other everyday?

At the Gym

I do not why I don’t go to the gym more often. Working out is the best energy pill ever!

While I am on the elliptical huffing and buffing, I am so tired my legs and heart cannot take one more minute of this, I give myself the 5 more minutes pep talk. Why does that 30min of cardio feel like forever? It makes it even worse when the elliptical facing the TV are in use, and I have to use the ones on the opposite direction, or when the TV’s are playing something stupid like an annoying football game! In few weeks if I keep on going, the 30minutes on the E-trainer will not feel so long. I love the soreness I get after a weight training session, today is lower body day, I may not be able to walk without saying ouch for a couple of day but I will be loving it.

I do not get how people can workout while reading a magazine though?? The most I can multi task while at the gym is working out, listing to my mp3 and watching a TV show, but reading? No way!

Anyways, so yesterday I finally made it to the gym. I am feeling better, just a little cough and the kids are feeling better so I can leave them at the gym daycare. It is like everything is against me losing this weight. When I decide to start being good and working out regularly we all get sick! Sheesh! After gym, the kids and I went shopping, I bought the cutest pair of sandals, then we had dinner at Tim Hortins, came home I tidied my apartment while hubby read the kids some books and got them ready for bed, folded the laundry, put away, and I still had lots of energy to do more, but I opted to reading a book instead (the time traveller’s wife) which I am loving so far! Usually by 5pm I am so out of energy and ready for bed! J

I love my gym, it is close to home, have a great day care and the facilities are nice. But social life at the gym has become none existent over the years. I remember few years ago I spent more time chitchatting than actual exercise at the gym. But now everyone has their headphone on, making them very unapproachable. Everyone just works out and leaves, with a polite hello and a smile here and there.

However, the best time at the gym ever was at college though. We would all decide to go to the gym for little workout, a game of badminton or to just shoot hoop. We had good intention; we wanted to get some exercise during our break! On the gym floor we’ll find a group of our friends sitting playing cards, and it is rude not to join them sa7? That was the time I learned how to play 6arneeb. But it was not all bad; every little while some of us would get up and play badminton or shoot hoops (I suck at both). Thankfully I was going to an outside gym in the morning before classes, otherwise I would have gained a lot of weight; that was my Harvey’s poutine phase! I had Poutine for lunch and when I had late classes I ate it for dinner as well! I drove my friends crazy with my poutine habit. Thankfully that phase was over before I graduated. A sit-down all day office job, and eating 700 calories for lunch, would have made for a very fat Sam!

So as I was saying, working out is awesome; the benefits are countless. It gives us energy. It is great for our hearts. It keeps our bones healthy and prevents loss. It increases our muscle mass so metabolism does not slow down as we age. It keeps us feeling younger, and it is great for our skin. Of the course the biggest plus is that it keeps the flap away, and makes clothes shopping a lot easier. With all those benefits I do not know why anyone would choose not to exercise!

Real Age

What is your real age??

http://www.realage.com/

Stages we go through as we age:

At 5 you love your age, and will go into a screaming fit if someone says you are 6 or 4

At 12, you start lying about your age. Adding 2 years to your age, because older is cooler.

At 18 you are finally at a cool age so you happy with your age .it is the perfect age, no need to lie. You are at the perfect age until you hit 25.

At 25 you start to practice lying about your age. You jokingly say I am 24 and 15 months and so on. It is ok because you are still in your 20’s

At 30 you officially start lying about your age it is not a joke anymore. You will be 29 years old for so long you eventually forget how old you really are.

At 40 you are still lying about your age, but now you are stuck at 35 for the next few years.

After 50 you will be 45 for few years.

After 60 you stop caring, you have more improtant things to worry about

If you happen to make to 100, you gloat about it and feel special. I am 100 years old and I am alive! Go me, go me....

But really, what is age? It is just a number. How you feel, look and act is what determines your age.

And hey according to real age, if I “chose” to lie about my age, I will not be lying since I am 6 years younger than what my age is