Hebrew Lesson

סבלנות - sav.lan.ut - n. Patience, specifically patience for the speaker from others. Note: there is no word for patience in the other direction.

Going Mad

This must be what going mad feels like.

So it's almost Purim, the one Jewish holiday totally saturated in silliness. And yesterday, I was dressed up in a makeshift diaper and eyepatch, standing in front of 50 people, sucking my thumb.

And the show hits...a new low.

You see, our office has fun activities from time to time. And Purim, I imagine, is one of the bigger ones. Fine, no problem. But I wasn't in the mood for silliness and fun today. I wanted to just sit and do my work, or at least get distracted accidentally, not intetionally. But one of the managers came in to my cubicle and told me to go. I asked if I have to. She said yes. (I soon expected the German-accented "you veell be go-ink and you veell be enjoyink eet.") So I went.

They introduced the game: each group would use the available materials (pipe cleaners, large pieces of construction paper, etc. to make costumes, and the best costume would get a prize. So our group decided to dress up one of us, and I let them bicker about it, having no desire to participate at all in this silliness. And I got increasingly annoyed and just wanted this silly thing to be over. I was in a bad mood, I guess. So finally, after like seven minutes of this I threw my hands up and said I'd dress up. Anything to get the agony over with. Unfortunately, I hadn't been paying close enough attention to what they were planning on doing, which is how I ended up prancing about the stage, supposedly dressed as Moshe Dayan's great-grandson. This, mind you, in front of many people I had not even met, but who will now likely remember me as "the guy who dressed up as a baby." Great.

Oh, and to top it all off, though I tried washing off the red makeup they used to make me "rosy-cheeked," it just kind of faded, so I looked like I was blushing for a while afterwards. Which maybe I should've been.

That's it. I've entered the Twilight Zone. There's something on the wing, and only I can see it, and no one's gonna believe me.

P.S. I'm back in Israel, for those of you who didn't know. I intend to give you some stories about Arizona and returning to Israel sometime soon. LOTS of writing to do, and a lot of other things. Like finding a place to live.

Life Lessons: Superheroes

There is a fine line between a superhero and a man in tights who likes to sit on rooftops and watch people. Maybe it's the cape.

Somewhat Super

In response to a letter I had sent him, a friend of mine emailed me the following:

How's the weather out there? What exactly are you learning during this 'training' period? Are you learning how to build a nuclear bomb from silicone? Really?

Now, this was an odd series of questions, to say the least. I responded in kind:

Ok, you got me. We're building bombs. Not out of silicone - which is used as a sealant, for firestops (whatever those are), and certain types of -ahem- implants. I think you were referring to silicon - without the 'e', which is used in making computer chips. But we don't use those to make bombs either. In any case, the training is going just fine, except for the interesting effects of prolonged radiation exposure. I now lack eyebrows, but have developed some interesting powers. I can now detect mimes at a distance of 100 kilometers and I read people's minds, but only in haiku form. It's a interesting talent, that last one. Often when I try to use it on women, I get something like the following: Creepy guy staring Really have to go get a Restraining order. And sometimes, it's hard to understand what they're saying, so I get things like this: My thoughts don't always Make sense or flow together. Cauliflower duck.

There are some questions better left unasked.

Tweed

A few weeks ago, I was in New Haven to take a flight to Philadelphia. Mind you, I didn't want to be in either New Haven or Philadelphia, but airports tend to be the kind of place you are with no clue why you're there and a strong desire to leave - like the dentist's office, or Germany. You don't like the place you're going any more than the place you're leaving, but you're at the airport, so what the heck. You fly. This was, without a doubt, the smallest airport I have ever been in. Unfortunately, it wasn't comically small, or this would be a more entertaining blog post. In any case, in the airport was this sign: (I know it would seem that I was drunk or not wearing my glasses, but neither is true.) In case you can't read it, it says "ATTENTION ALL PASSENGERS: TWEED NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT!" Needless to say, this was a bit perplexing. Why would tweed need my support? It seems to be a well-supported fabric, what with the abundance of elderly and/or stuffy British men. And why not promote support of some of the more flamboyant fabrics? Where is the taffeta lobby? The chiffon promoters? (Yes, those are both great band names.) Furthermore, how does one support tweed? Is there a Tweed Workers' Union or a Tweed Foundation? This truly is one of man's great mysteries. (It turns out that the airport is named Tweed, and apparently needs handouts. But I still think that Tweed Foundation idea has merit.)

Get Up, Get Down

So I said I would tell the story from after I arrived at the airport to go home for Thanksgiving. I get to the airport plenty early, and jump through the various hoops security makes you jump through ("Please remove your jacket, sir. Please remover your shoes, sir.....No, sir - j-just your shoes! Sir, please put your pants back on." "But they were chafing something fierce!") and arrive at the gate with nothing to do for an hour and a half. So I take my suit and my carry-on bag and go to see if I can't get caught up on my email and blog reading. I take out my laptop and behold! There is free wireless internet access, and lo, it is good. Well, I start going through my reading, and soon my 1.5 hours become 3 hours, due to a delay. I realize that I should keep my laptop battery charged for the plane, and I look around and find an outlet. I close my laptop, put it in my bag, and take my bag and suit and go over to the seat with the outlet. Put down suit, put down bag, open bag, get plug, plug in, get laptop, open laptop. And then I think I hear my name over the loudspeaker. Ok, I unplug the plug, close the laptop, put it and the plug in my bag, pick up my bag, pick up my suit, and go and wait in line to talk to the person at the information desk. In retrospect, I think I'm so obsessed with my own name that I just assumed it was me they were calling. I'd probably respond to any name with a reasonable number of vowels and consonants. For example, I could see this scene playing out:

LOUDSPEAKER: Marie Antoinette, Marie Antoinette, please come to the front desk. There's an mob of angry French peasants waiting for you. ME: Hi, my name's Ilan, there's a mob here for me? AIRLINE PERSON: Um, yes...over there. Are you- ANGRY PEASANT 1: Hey, I thought she was prettier! ANGRY PEASANT 2: Hey, I thought she was a woman! ANGRY PEASANT 3: Hey, I thought love was only true in fairy tales / Meant for someone else but not for me / Love was out to get me, that's the way it seemed / Disappointment haunted all my dreams. / Then I saw her face, now I'm a believer / Not a trace of doubt in my mind.... [At this juncture, a wonderfully choreographed dance starts, complete with the peasants twirling their pitchforks and juggling their torches. At some point, the real Marie Antoinette shows up, and the control and grace the dancers exhibit when setting up the guillotine and executing her - without missing a beat, mind you - can be described as nothing short of "masterful."]

Eh, where was I? Oh, right. So, as you see, my tendency to assume everyone's talking to me can dangerous. Beheading-level dangerous, or worse - spontaneous-public-musicals-level dangerous. But nothing so dramatic happened. After waiting for fifteen minutes on line, holding my carry-on and my suit, I get to the front of the line, where I am promptly informed that I wasn't called at all. Shoot, I could've spent that time I wasted in line watching a cat attacking an air conditioner on YouTube! (My money's on the air conditioner.) So I go to sit down again and discover my outlet's been taken. Oh, well. Suit down, bag down, laptop out, laptop open. And then I hear the announcement again. It sure does sound like my name, but they're saying to go to the desk by the gate instead. Well, at least there's no line there. I ask the woman sitting next to me if she heard what name they just called. She says no. (I will note at this juncture that I have no qualms speaking to total strangers. The reverse is not always true.) Close laptop, put in bag, pick up bag, pick up suit, go over to desk. As I'm walking there, I hear an announcement for a woman named Linda with the same last name as me. I pause and check my ID. No, I'm not Linda. It must've been her they've been calling. I go back to my seat, smiling sheepishly at the woman. "It wasn't me," I say, not wanting to seem like a crazy person. She just smiles in my general direction and goes back to her computer. Then (wouldn't you know it) comes another announcement, and they most definitely just called me to the gate desk. Close laptop, put in bag, pick up bag, pick up suit, and march over to the desk. "Did you call _________, party of one?" "Yes are you [checking the list] Ilan?" "Yes." "Oh, well, there's a problem with your assigned seat." "There is?" "Yes, it doesn't exist." "It doesn't...?" "Yeah, there isn't a row 23 on the plane." At this point, I consider going mad, perhaps gibberingly so. I decline. "So....now what?" "Oh, we're assigning you to a different seat." And I get a new boarding pass, and go back to sit down. I was worried for a moment there that I would be forced to sit on someone's lap for the whole flight. I mean, that could be ok, depending on the comfortableness of the lap in question, but non-lap seats are certainly preferable. Anyhow, I put down my suit, put down my bag, sit down, open my bag, take out my laptop, and soon, a plug becomes available, so I plug it in. Then, after a while, the boarding call finally comes. Plug. Laptop. Bag. Go! I stop, turn around and go back. I pick up my suit and go back towards the gate. Sighing, I enter the line for boarding. This is going to be a long flight.

Keeping Me On My Toes

So...I'm in the airport right now, ready to fly to visit my family and friends back east. My flight should've left 20 minutes ago, but we have yet to board, due to a delay. So I figured I'd blog. It seems I've broken out of my 1.5-year-long posting slump lately. Let's hope it lasts. To get to the airport, I took a cab. I call up the taxi company, order a cab, and try to figure out why the receptionist keeps calling me "honey." (It may have been a reference to how some of my friends in college called me Hunny, but that would be odd, since none of those friends work at the All-State Taxicab company.) So after a half day at work, I go home, gather and pack the last few things, and catch the cab waiting outside. The cabbie is nice and jovial and figures out without me telling him that I'm going to the airport. Nice. We set off at a nice clip, and almost hit another car, but that's ok, since my motto in driving is "a near miss is still a miss." (This being my second driving motto, my first being "The brake is on the left, stupid.") And then as we're going along, the car hiccups, like we ran over something, or the engine is coming down with the black lung. I raise my eyebrows. "What was that?" I ask. "Oh, the air conditioning isn't working." He rolls down the windows. Hmmm. Kind of confused here. "What was that?" I ask again. "I don't know." "You don't...?" "Yeah, I don't know. I am surprised too." This would've been an ok thing to say if he had said it in an adult-being-concerned voice. But no, he said it with a kind of wonderment, as if the car had just started dispensing free candy out of the broken air conditioning vents, and we were just reaping the benefits. Note to self: Design candy-dispensing air conditioning system for cars. Make millions and get a tummy ache. "Oh," I say, unable to properly respond to this. Then he offers some new information. "The check engine light is on....like always." Great. I am going to die. UPDATE: I did not die after all. I'll tell you my in-the-airport story soon, but I think we may be boarding now.

Yes, But Where Do I Find the Lawn Ornaments?

Want to have some fun? Walk into Bed Bath and Beyond and have the following conversation:

YOU: Excuse me, where is the Bedding Department? BED BATH AND BEYONDER: (pointing) Over there. YOU: And where are the bath items? BED BATH AND BEYONDER: (pointing) Right there. YOU: Thank you. And, uh, where can I purchase the beyond? BED BATH AND BEYONDER: I hate you and everything you stand for. YOU: So...you're all out of beyond? BED BATH AND BEYONDER: There is not enough fire in hell to express the rage I am barely containing. YOU: Hmmm...I guess I'll just look around then. I heard they have the best beyond in town in this place.

Listen Up

So a few days ago, I posted an audio post, expecting accolades, pats on the back, and a possible Presidential Medal. But alas, I forgot that few people read this, fewer would be willing to sit and listen to 5 minutes of me prattling about waffles and Monopoly and how every male citizen of the Republic of Tonga has a crush on the same girl from Liechtenstein (a country whose primary claim to fame is that they are the largest exporter of false teeth - no joke!), and even fewer would be so bold or generous as to actually post a comment or give me a backrub. No, I'm here, commentless and with an aching back. But I decided to invesigate why I had gotten no real response. I realized that though more people than usual had visited my site - likely due to the actual presence of a new post, of all things. But I don't think people actually bothered to listen to my audiopost because - get this - it was pretty boring. You had to wait till the middle just to get to anything halfway entertaining. I think maybe if I try another time, I should start with a song and dance. Well, you'd only hear the song, but the dance would be hella cool, I assure you. So it seems that instead of actually posting, I posted about how I should post. In other words, I blogged about blogging. It is a well-known fact that bloggers love blogging about nothing more than themselves, the narcissistic ingrates. Note to self: a fun side project/post-modern digital perfomance art: make a blog whose every entry is about why I'm blogging, how I should stop blogging, that I'm thinking about stopping blogging, why people blog in general, or why the sitcom Becker was never really given a fair chance. Find a way to make ridicuous amounts of cash money off of this blog - enough to purchase Gary Coleman, or at least rent him once a month. In the meantime, I leave you with an excerpt from my in-progress novel, Limestone:

Mac woke up and instantly regretted it. He concluded that waking up would just be the first of a series of bad moves that day. He had no clue just how right he was. He rolled sideways and off of the bed. He realized it was not a bed, but a couch. Craig’s couch. He was in Craig’s apartment, he decided, as that was the standard location for Craig’s couch. The word apartment seemed to hold some special importance. He wasn’t sure why. Finally pushing himself up to his feet, Mac decided it was as good a time as any to open his eyes, and tried to. Succeeding on the third try, he discovered that the normally level ground was writhing and twisting like a python, or like he imagined a python might, were it a hardwood floor with furniture on it. He realized that his stomach was trying to tell him something, something urgent. He ran to the bathroom and vomited with gusto. Deciding that he had had such a good time of it the first time, he vomited again.

Vomit jokes. Will they ever get old? No. No they won't.

Moving Into the 20th Century

So I'm trying something new: audioblogging. Listen, and all will be explained. Let me know what you think, whether you prefer text, etc.
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