CheetahhhhhhhBlog Mark III

Item #1, for those of you out there who are totally Cheetahhhhhhh-crazed, well you’re in luck today, because the Cheetahhhhhhh has gotten off his idle arse and done some web development. Dad, you made the front page of the blog and T2 (pictures from Manila).  Incidentally I don’t like how T2 looks in Firefox, what’s with all the damn blue hyperlink lines. Well, T2 is designed to be viewed in WindozeXP with IE and broadband, sorry to say, I just can’t deal with this Firefox problem.

In particular I have added a small Manila 2006 photo album. I’m also working on the Rome and Tuscany albums.This is very labor-intensive and I might not finish today.

 Item #2. I have mentioned before how the local Devil Children (as Van has named them) run around destroying things in the middle of the night. Well last night they went into our garage and twisted up everybody’s license plates. One of my neighbors, who owns an expensive Audi, was there when I got into my car and he pointed out the vandalism. I was about to go knock on their father’s door and have a tete-a-tete as best I could in Arabic, but my neighbor said, “Don’t bother, I’ve spoken with him many times. He doesn’t care.” So anyway I am vaguely thinking of putting in a request to the RC to move to a house. This was impractical before, without a car. But now, why not.

Item #3, we’re back up and podcasting. Here is a podcast from July, Vanessa’s village on Leyte during the village festival.

Van’s village

8 months… almost ready!

Well it’s the holy month of Ramadan, which means short classes, so I’m not complaining. I really like one of my classes. Not the subject, but the kids themselves. Generally a class gets a “vibe” and for a teacher, it’s really the luck of the draw. This class has a good vibe. They’re no smarter than any other class, but teaching them is mildly fun.

 Missy, my new car, is driving like a dream. However one of the back doors won’t open. It’s under warranty so I’ll get this fixed in Jeddah, but I’m a tad annoyed.

I handed in the new paperwork to get nanay Gloria a visa yesterday. We should have a visa for her in 10 days or so.

I bought Van a sewing machine and she’s giddy as a schoolgirl about it.

I’m still reading Anna Karenina, on page 550 and still have 350 to go.

Not a lot to report, we’re not up to much. Today I was actually a bit bored out of my mind. I am sick of playing Total War and we had some bad luck with the DVDs we recently bought… so what to do, what to do… it’s sometimes a real challenge amusing yourself. Van is working on a cross-stitch of an angel. I need to get myself another hobby, perhaps. I’ve been trying to find somebody to exercise with me but nobody is game so far. And in terms of boredom, I suppose we only have 3 or 4 weeks to go and we’ll be quite busy indeed with the new rugrat. But just to give you an example of my level of idleness, I wanted to take a nap today just to have something to do. Usually I’m quite good at amusing myself. Usually I have things on the burner. Today, though… eh…

Item #1, Van  has put me on a diet. This is good considering my fatness is her fault. She seems quite excited to put me on a diet too. I requested it because I had to go out and buy Very Fat Pants, which are an upgrade to last April’s Fat Pants. And I’m getting sick of spending (slightly) hard-earned riyals on pants.

Item #1, the Cheetahhhhhhh loves his new car. Named Melissa or “Missy” and bless her heart, she’s a good girl and a looker, too. I never thought I’d love a Honda but I do. This morning while I was driving to work, there was a little bit of a sandstorm whipping over the town, and I got scared for Missy, because sandstorms strip the paint of cars. The Saudis, if they know they’ll be driving through a sandstorm, have a little trick. They take dish soap and pour it over the car. It dries almost instantly in this sun. The dried soap forms a little micro-shield against the sand. 

Item #2, apparently we have a new prof from France arriving any day now. Like me, he’s a linguist and may be a bit disappointed to find we have no linguistics department yet (ie, he will end up teaching English).

So I was a bit confused about Ramadan holidays. We have a 3 day weekend now, because Saturday is Saudi national day. Then we have 3 weeks of the reduced-load Ramadan schedule. Then a 10 day vacation. The reduced-load Ramadan schedule is a mini-vacation in itself if you’re not Muslim. You know Muslims fast during the day in Ramadan. They also can’t drink water or smoke. So most people get fried pretty quickly and so class times are reduced to 30 minutes. This means a work day for me from 1030 until 130, and you can’t complain with that.

Van and I bought the collected Chucky movies. I’m not sure why she’s so excited about Chucky because it looks really scarry to me. We also watched a really scarry movie, The Exorcism of Emily Rose. Scared the bajesus out of me. Growing up Catholic, you know, the Devil scares me. And this Emily Rose girl was posessed by 6 demons, including the big guy himself. Damn, I was scared. Apparently this is a true story, too. I mentioned it in the office and one of my Muslim colleagues told me he saw an exorcism performed by an imam. As a scientist I am reluctant to believe this kind of thing, but I do know the very thought of it scares the $%^$ out of me.

It’s only week 2 of football season (American football) and it’s quite clear the Packers stink. Very sad. And what the hell is Brett doing? Why didn’t he retire? Will somebody please explain what the hell he’s still doing in Green Bay?
So I went in to Jeddah the other day and paid the down payment on my new Honda, 6045 riyals. Today after work I’m flying in to Jeddah to collect her. We’re excited and already have a baby seat and a “baby on board” sticker.

Vanessa and I scrounged an almost-new crib that our neighbor had tossed away. She was worried about bad luck. Asians seem to have their own ideas about luck. I said, “It’s a piece of wood!” in response. Anyway it was her call on scrounging it, we can afford a new crib, and I don’t want any potential bad luck to be my fault. So we eyed the crib for about 2 weeks before Van finally decided she wanted it.

Little Chris won’t let Van sleep and she’s getting bored with the whole pregnancy thing. She’s really hoping for an early delivery.

So I have to go in and do actual toil this week, which I’m not thrilled about, however, I do mildly enjoy teaching. Mildly.

It’s only week 2 of football season (American football) and it’s quite clear the Packers stink. Very sad. And what the hell is Brett doing? Why didn’t he retire? Will somebody please explain what the hell he’s still doing in Green Bay?
So I went in to Jeddah the other day and paid the down payment on my new Honda, 6045 riyals. Today after work I’m flying in to Jeddah to collect her. We’re excited and already have a baby seat and a “baby on board” sticker.

Vanessa and I scrounged an almost-new crib that our neighbor had tossed away. She was worried about bad luck. Asians seem to have their own ideas about luck. I said, “It’s a piece of wood!” in response. Anyway it was her call on scrounging it, we can afoord a new crib, and I don’t want any potential bad luck to be my fault. So we eyed the crib for about 2 weeks before Van finally decided she wanted it.

Little Chris won’t let Van sleep and she’s getting bored with the whole pregnancy thing. She’s really hoping for an early delivery.

So I have to go in and do actual toil this week, which I’m not thrilled about, however, I do mildly enjoy teaching. Mildly.

Anyhoo the Cheetahhhhhhh’s eye is much better, thanks for asking.

The Cheetahhhhhhh was mistaken about Ramadan, it starts in 2 weeks, which means I’ll actually have to do real toil this month.

And now the big news, the Cheetahhhhhhh’s going to be getting his new Honda on Tues or Weds. We’re pleased though a part of me is still quite annoyed about the necessity for a car. Also you know in Islam, charging interest is forbodden. So they charge a flat fee which by some odd logic is not considered interest. And guess what? It’s just as hefty as regular interest. I’m buying a car and a half. And not to be a sourpuss, but the memory of my childhood and teenage and 20s dream of a Porsche 911 (after I got a job that paid decently) floated back up and I couldn’t help feeling a little blue about a frack-a-lackin Honda. I know, I sound like a real sourpuss about this car. Actually we’re happy.

I fihured out why the dean postponed the start of teaching this week. Next week is the start of the Ramadan holiday! This means I won’t be getting down to any serious work until October. God bless.