CheetahhhhhhhBlog Mark III

The Cheetahhhhhh has been quite sick again, for 3 days now. Just a cold but it’s a rather nasty one. It’s winter here and everyone walks around in parkas with colds and sniffles. Never mind that it’s 75F, that’s frakkin cold for the Arabian desert and so it’s cold season. And while the Cheetahhhhhhhh personally still has the AC running, and certainly is not walking around in a parka, nevertheless, his students all have colds and walk around the college coughing their germs about. And so I’m sick again.

Little Bug has not been letting Van sleep much, and I’ve been feeling bad for her. Since I’ve had a cold I’ve been up at odd hours and seen her awake at 430AM.

We have been a tad bored this weekend. There’s nothing to do but lay in bed, sick, and there’s nothing on the frakkin TV. I get 5000 channels by satellite but 4980 of them are not in English, and of the 20 that are, there isn’t a damn thing to watch. We watched all our US DVDs already and they are already making the rounds for other people to watch. (Incidentally I wish somebody here in Yanbu besides me would sink some money into DVDs, they add up actually). Also I have finally grown bored with my Total War computer games. And since I’m sick there is no marital fun on the menu this weekend. So I’m a tad bored and Van was joking that we have spent our days waiting for night to come. Today after watching a bit of TV I joked, “5 hours to wait until night.”

I am starting to read Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. This is the second time I’m trying to read it and it’s a bit of a bear. I am not entirely sure why she has such a cult status with some people. I can tell you that American academe has largely ignored Ayn Rand. However this book is supposedly the second most influential book in American history, after the Bible. I don’t see it but then again last time I tried to read it, I only got about 150 pages into it before I grew too bored to continue. This time I’m going to try to stick it out and see what all the hoop-la is about.

On the outside I suppose I agree with her philosophical stance. Ayn Rand was what we would refer to in America as a Libertarian, which is the political party I personally would vote for if they had the slightest chance of winning. Outside America, her point of view is not called Libertarianism; it would be viewed as good-old-fashioned 19th century individualistic liberalism. However why she has such a cult status… well… I haven’t figured that out yet.

The Cheetahhhhhhh is pleased to see that Hillary has thrown her hat in the ring, as he long suspected she would. The Cheetahhhhhhh has long been a Hillary fan and she’s already got his vote.

The only thing that concerns me is that George Bush has made such a godawful mess that it may take Hillary forever to fix things. We all know that the States have been going to hell in a handbasket and Hillary is only human, after all.

Allow me to wax sentimental about the Clinton days. I votes for Bill twice and was proud to do so. Remember the good old days? The economy was strong, there was a budget surplus, the Euro was 80 cents to the dollar, and there were no wars going on like we have today. Bill knew what he was doing and I suspect he will be the silent power broker behind Hillary’s presidency.

We went to a party at the local expat compound. We don’t live on a compound; we live in town. The compound is a peculiar Saudi innovation. It’s basically a little western village behind high walls and barbed wire. The walls are so that the local population isn’t corrupted by decadent and immoral western practices, and also so that the expats can have a little down-time in a anormal environment. Van and the Bug and I really wish we were on the compound, indeed, I’m going to see if I can wrangle a transfer. Once you get past the security checkpoints and the walls and barbed wire, you might be in an affluent Chicago suburb. The women don’t wear abayas and there is lots of home-brewed booze.

There were lots of expats there–Kiwis, Aussis, Filipinos, a Kraut, a Croat, even a Frog. There was also a Spanish woman who spoke no English, and when she discovered I spoke Spanish, she clung to me for communicative purposes. I spoke 4 different languages in the course of the party.

Van was the prettiest girl there. Little Bug was the most popular. He is a party baby, he likes loud noise and meeting people. The ladies in particular loved him and didn’t want to give him back to me.

On the career front, I will be Coordinator of the Linguistics Department. In American parlance, “Coordinator” means “Chair.” This will be a nice addition to the ol’ resume. Ironically there is no Linguistics Department on the boys campus, because we don’t have anyone talented enough with languages. There are linguistics classes on the ladies’ campus. How in God’s name I’m supposed to coordinate classes which I can’t see with teachers I can’t see is a mystery, however, I’m not worrying about that until Feb 16th, when the semester starts.

It’s my sister Liza’s birthday today and cheers to her, best wishes.

This blog averages 45 unique hits per day, which I find surprising. One comes from me and then I’m pretty sure there are 2 hits from America, my mom and dad, and then I know there is probably my most devoted reader, Jingay in the Philippines. But who are the other 40? I say this periodically and I’ll say it once again: I can’t imagine what a stranger finds interesting about this blog. I don’t say this to discourage you. Indeed, cheers to all.

Little Chris is growing like a weed. Had to buy him bigger socks. He can now support his own head. He is also making attempts to get onto his belly so he can crawl, but he doesn’t have the muscle mass or dexterity to accomplish it. His visual acuity is also improving. He watches us when we’re walking around the room. Considering he’s only 3 months old, I am surprised by how quickly he’s developing. He’s doubled in size. I swear, one day I’ll wake up and he’ll be in college.

So my new job of developing our curriculum will start next semester. It’s going to be an incredible amount of work, because I will have to develop 10 classes in 3 months. I’m not sure I can do it all, actually. It will be golden for the ol’ resume however.

Not much else to say from Cheetopia except the Cheetah is really enjoying his Entourage DVDs.

One final note to all. The Cheetahhhhhh would like to go on record for saying that Saudi Telecom STINKS. Hear me now and believe me later. THEY STINK. My bill this month was 650 riyals which is about $150 and we barely use our damn phones, indeed, we were out of the country for 2 weeks.

It’s not the concept of spending money that bothers me. I don’t mind it. It’s the whole sneaky little nonsense of getting “nickle-and-dimed to death.” You ever see that movie Falling Down? Well, I’d like to go on in to Saudi Telecom and pull a Falling Down by which I mean (if you haven’t watched the movie) blow them to kingdom come. Luckily for the chaps at Saudi Telecom, the Cheetahhhhhhh is not actually homicidal by nature.

I am considering revising my early retirement plans because of the slow collapse of the US dollar. Dear Uncle Sam, will you please do something about this? I know our president is keeping the dollar low to fund his war machine, but when will this bullshite end, eh?

I remember the good old days when the dollar was high. Imagine, I used to travel to Spain and Amsterdam because they were cheap! That’s a laugh now.

Anyway all things move in cycles and eventually the dollar will come back up. However when is “eventually” and how the f*ck much patience am I supposed to have here? Hopefully we will have HIllary in the Oval Office in 2 years and, realistically, it will probably take her a couple years to fix things. 

The slow collapse of the dollar concerns me primarily because the Saudi riyal is pegged to the dollar and, also, because it is in the interest of my sanity to get the F out of Saudi the minute I have any vacation time.

Vanessa, Little Bug, and I are quite bummed to hear the our favorite soap, the OC, has been canceled. What are we going to watch now? Since I don’t really know what’s on American TV these days, can anyone tell me a good primetime soap along the lines of OC-Melrose Place-90210?
The Cheetahhhhhhh is sick as a dog from this Egyptian bug, but thankfully the Little Bug seems to have recovered. He’s still quite cranky though.

We’re really loving wireless and actually I don’t know how I survived 37 years without it. I’m blogging in bed again.

We’re planning to go to Thailand after our Catholic wedding in June, to relax on the beach of Ko Samet. God I’m excited about it. I love Thailand to bits. It’s one of my favorite places on earth. This will be a little 2nd honeymoon of sorts, though it won’t have the romantic feel of a honeymoon since we’re bringing the Little Bug and my mother-in-law AKA nanay in tow.

We got back to Saudi yesterday. Saudia airlines was delayed as always. I swear, they’re like a third world airline. I went back to work today. There are 2 weeks to go, then exams, and then the midterm vacation.
We bought an Apple Airport for wireless. I am presently blogging in bed and loving it. Vanessa is doing Yahoo messenger on her fancy Nokia 9500, and Little Bug is checking his Friendster account on his PDA.

We all caught a cold in Cairo. My Egyptian colleague came back to the office with a nasty cold also. The big problem is the Bug, who has his first cold, and is not enjoying it much. Vanessa went to the hospital and got him baby meds.

Liza and my mom left yesterday. We had a nice little visit though nobody seems too excited about Cairo itself. Indeed on the last day we just didn’t leave the hotel. That’s OK because it’s a resort and why leave when they’re got everything here. What people didn’t seem to like was the filth everywhere, and also the robber merchants. Van says Cairo is worse than Manila. However we did have a good time.

First, we saw the pyramids and sphinx, which were really cool, though not as big as I’d imagined. We did a lot of shopping, since my mom AKA the Shopahaulic was here. My mom and sister went to Alexandria for a day but Van and I stayed home with the Bug. We also visited the museum of ancient Egypt which was cool. My mom brought Van a whole suitcase of presents.

We got loaded for New Year’s at the hotel bar. I do like the local brew Luxor, it’s quite tasty. Van drank 3 cocktails for New Years which is a record! My mom and Liza and I spent the 1st-2nd-3rd of January with drinking at every opportunity. I enjoy Rubis D’Egypt, which is an Egyptian rose wine.

Little Chris was werewolfing a lot and at first we thought it was the full moon. Then later we realized that he didn’t cry in our hotel room. Then we put it all together and realized the poor little guy has been freezing outside. We bundled him up last night and he was just fine.