Thursday, December 27, 2007

Stuff from life lately

* The company I work in has an evening out in a restaurant for the workers. Me and another girl are doing shift at the call center. I ask for food delivery and, as drinks to go with the food, we get diet coke....because all women are obsessed with their weight and want to drink diet...

* Signed up to the university gym with the BF to help BF get into shape together. I hate the atmosphere there, so full of people high on adrenalin and obsessed with how firm the other's butt is compared to theirs and how more defined their abs are than the abs of the guy on the next treadmill. However, said gym has a swimming pull, which is hella-cool.

* Mom and Dad had their birthday this week, dad's is tomorrow and mom's was this monday. Happy birthday parents!

* Still no sign of an end to the lecturers' strike and now there's both a deadline beyond which the semester (and the year, probably) will be canceled and a threat from the universities to get the lecturers back in the classrooms via court warrents.

* Staring at many hyrax pictures, I'm beginning to see two fur patterns repeating themselves. Whether I'm bothered with gracing my proff and project guide with this is questionable since I'm not sure they'll pay attention or take me seriously.

* Attention all LJ friends, you can sign in with your username when commenting on this blog ^_^

Friday, December 21, 2007

Fun Link Time!

Yup yup, long time not fun link, huh? Well, it's back again and better than ever!

1. 24 Bizarre Creatures of the Deep, with stunning pictures of some of nature's most brilliant and bizarre monsters.

2. Black hole destroys a small galaxy, Death Star style, with a stunning picture to boot.
(at this point Scarlett sat herself in front of the screen and is making typing a tab difficult to do...)

3. Porn for girls, by girls. I can't say I agree with everything, but it is stuff that'd make us melt XD.

4. Geekerama aplenty; Five awesome sci-fi inventions and why they'd actually suck is they ever came to existence. I know, I know, I always wanted a holodeck myself, but the guy has some good points there...

5. Stress bakes your brain, but how can you un-bake your brain? OK, so there are a couple of medicinal tips here that smell somewhat of a commercial but the other tips look very good, try it.

6. Let's play Buffy on phantom power and have a look at modern day's biggest power vampires. Look at the list and have a good think about the electrical appliances you leave plugged to heir sockets when you don't need them.

7. Ants are good for camouflage as well as for food, claims a new study about ant-snatching assassin bugs who use a backpack of their prey to avoid being noticed by vision-guided predators. This reminds me of one of Dick Winters' Battle of the Bulge stories, though the anal prick couldn't see the dark humor in using dead enemy soldier bodies to cover his foxhole. Ah well, when you're that full of yourself others just can't be properly comprehended.

8. The origin of whales; a small deer-like mamal, latest study claims. Now let's take a break to wrap out brains around the concept of those huge flippers starting off as tiny dainty matchstick legs deer have...

9. Not my cattle of fish quite just yet, but still quite an interesting mystery pondered here; why pregnant women don't tip over! To be honest, I never ever thought about that. The next obvious mystery is, I suppose, why bosomly-enhanced porn stars don't tip over...

10. We'd all be very sad if we couldn't laugh at the germans, right? So here's Hitler on Facebook (the place I refuse to join due to over-popularity) I find the family album particularly amusing.

11. And speaking of World War 2, the BBC have raised a truly stunning project - The People's War. It is an archive of personal testimonies from almost every angle of that war from POWs to citizens of all sides to soldiers to partizan's. It is an amazing gift to future generations and is a goldmine to history-infested writers like me with a need to research.

12. The Great War in color! This small article contains some beautiful pictures of a world long gone and a war that should have never happened. These are really, really stunning pices.

That's it for today, hope you enjoyed the links!

Monday, December 17, 2007

D'jya like dags?

Watched Snatch; fucking brilliant film! Funny, flowing, insane, Vinnie Jones, jews, gypsies, you name it. However wrote the script was downright insane. When I'll have a dog of my own I'll call it Dag. Dj'ya like dags? ^_~

Also watched The Simpsons Movie which was also hilarious. I can see why they didn't let people know about the real plot of the movie since it's ever so snappy and awesome.

Great movies, both extremely recommended, folks.

And to top it off, here are a couple of new Sam & Scarlett pictures to kill you with teh cute

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Saturday, December 15, 2007

A saturday morning's shift boredom

I am smarter than 98.33% of the rest of the world.
Dumb Test now bow before me

Found this amusing:

"To the citizens of the United States of America...


In the light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today.

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories.

Except Utah, which she does not fancy.

Your new Prime Minister (The Right Honourable Gordon Brown MP, for the 97.85% of you who have until now been unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a Minister for America without the need for further elections.

The House of Representatives and the Senate will be disbanded.

A questionnaire will be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed. To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

1. You should look up "revocation" in the Oxford English Dictionary. Then look up "aluminium." Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.

The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour'; skipping the letter 'U' is nothing more than laziness on your part. Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters.

You will end your love affair with the letter 'Z' (pronounced 'zed' not 'zee') and the suffix "ize" will be replaced by the suffix "ise."

You will learn that the suffix 'burgh' is pronounced 'burra' e.g. Edinburgh. You are welcome to re-spell Pittsburgh as 'Pittsberg' if you can't cope with correct pronunciation.

Generally, you should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up “vocabulary." Using the same thirty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as "uhh", "like", and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication.

Look up "interspersed."

There will be no more 'bleeps' in the Jerry Springer show. If you're not old enough to cope with bad language then you shouldn't have chat shows. When you learn to develop your vocabulary, then you won't have to use bad language as often.

2. There is no such thing as "US English." We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take account of the reinstated letter 'u' and the elimination of "-ize."

3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited to cockney, upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier).

You will also have to learn how to understand regional accents --- Scottish dramas such as "Taggart" will no longer be broadcast with subtitles.

While we're talking about regions, you must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in England. The name of the county is "Devon." If you persist in calling it Devonshire, all American States will become "shires" e.g. Texasshire, Floridashire, Louisianashire.

4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors to play English characters.

British sit-coms such as "Men Behaving Badly" or "Red Dwarf" will not be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audience who can't cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness. Popular British films such as the Italian Job and the Wicker Man should never be remade.

5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen", but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get confused and give up half way through.

6. You should stop playing American "football." There are other types of football such as Rugby, Aussie Rules & Gaelic football. However proper football - which will no longer be known as soccer, is the best known, most loved and most popular. What you refer to as American "football" is not a very good game.

The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football. You will no longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.

Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like nancies).

We are hoping to get together at least a US Rugby sevens side by 2008.

You should stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the 'World Series' for a game which is not played outside of North America. Since only 2.15% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. Instead of baseball, you will be allowed to play a girls' game called "rounders," which is baseball without fancy team strip, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs.

7. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable peeler. Because we don't believe you are sensible enough to handle potentially dangerous items, you will require a permit if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

8. The 4th of July is no longer a public holiday. The 2nd of November will be a new national holiday, but only in Britain. It will be called "Indecisive Day."

9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap, and it is for your own good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean.

All road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. You will start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call 'French fries' are not real chips. Fries aren't even French, they are Belgian though 97.85% of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in Europe) are not aware of a country called Belgium. Those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called "crisps." Real chips are thick cut and fried in animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be served warm and flat.

Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with customers.

11. As a sign of penance 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be added to all tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this quantity to be doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.

12. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling "beer" is not actually beer at all, it is lager . From November 1st only proper British Bitter will be referred to as "beer," and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as "Lager." The substances formerly known as "American Beer" will henceforth be referred to as "Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine," with the exception of the product of the American Budweiser company whose product will be referred to as "Weak Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine." This will allow true Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in the Czech Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

13. From the 10th of November the UK will harmonise petrol (or "gasoline," as you will be permitted to keep calling it until the 1st of April) prices with the former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices to those of the former USA and the Former USA will, in return, adopt UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon -- get used to it).

14. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not adult enough to be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you're not adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, then you're not grown up enough to handle a gun.

15. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy.

16. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

Thank you for your co-operation.


GOD SAVE THE QUEEN."

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Updates...

Work's going a little easier on me this week, though I took two extra shifts beyond what was planned. These decent work weeks might be a little wearing but as long as the strike's going they can't harm too. much.

Went to see In The Valley of Elah which is a downright brilliant movie which I recommend you all to watch. It was very life-like and completely kitsch-less save for the last scene which I'll spare you the spoiling of, Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandon act so naturally and realistically you can't see it's 'Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandon' anymore, but instead you see their actual characters which is a bit tricky once an actor is famous enough, and Charlize Theron is brilliant in a zero-sexuality-full-character role. Go watch it, it's a very good movie.

Things with the (now official) boyfriend (*squee*) are going smoothly and lovely but I'll spare you the gushy stuff.

However I will share with you some very romantic new pics of Sam and Scarlett bonding:

Scarlett: What? I'm not squishing him...
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Scarlett: He likes it, really...
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Sam: Uh....mooooom
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Sam: Mooooooooom!!
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Awww, they're kissing (or trying to bite each other's face off, lord knows)
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"And you, my dear, are no lady..."
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Cat smear I
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Cat smear II
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End of pic spam ^_^

Sunday, December 9, 2007

*sleep deprived*

Had six shifts this week, the last of which is coming to an end in an hour and a half. Said shift has been a just me for twelve hours!! *sigh* I brought my project stuff but as it turns out we only have Excelle VIEWER at work and twelve potential hours of working on my project went down the toilet. Luckily, I've found a stash of Absolutely Fabulous season 1 and a bit of 2 to keep me company through the night, sweetie.
The worst thing about the shift is that, as I usspect, some sort of mold's setteled into the kitchen somewhere, or something's in a very bad form in the fridge, and there's an aweful smell about the whole place, which reached where I'm sitting by the monitors and all. I had to spend most of the shift with two windows open to the early winter's freezing night air just so I won't be stuck with that aweful stench and be sick all over the computer.

However, I just might have found a really nice deacent guy I really like, who really likes me. Just might, don't want to jinx it, so I'll tell you more when there's more to tell >.<

Oooh, and HAPPY HANNUKAH!!

Last but not lease; The full Beach Cleaning Day photo stock.

Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Picture post!

Finally, I got pictures from two events I had last month; a birthday party for on of my university gang's member, and a beach cleaning operation my faculty's student council organized.

Birthday Party: The gang member, who's name is also Meirav, took us to a dance-bar called The Budha at the closed old Tel Aviv dock. The whole university gang was there, which is cool because we don't get to see each other much these days what with the strike still going on and everybody in their own job.

First off, the gang:
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From right to left; birthday girl Meirav, Neta, moi, Guy, Dana and Shai.

And this is Shiran who was taking the group picture:
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Olga, who was in the little ladies' room at the time:
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More group pictures:
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Meirav, Guy, Shay and Olga

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Olga, Neta and Moi

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Neta, moi and Dana (isn't she hot?)

I'll stop briefing you about the names already and just post the pictures...
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Being silly with chips...
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When you're drunk enough, you do stuff like this:
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We really aught to be studying engineering....so much talent...

Being a responsible adult, I was not drinking the whole evening because I gave Dana and Shiran a lift to the club and back *pats self* good girl. Managed to avoid smoking, too, after 6 months of no smoking, so yay for me.

Beach cleaning: The faculty of life science (zoology, microbiology, virology, botanics, ecology, biotechnology and bioinformatics) being the hub of tree hugging dorks (accept those who continue their studies and become mouse dissectors in Block-10-like labs...) our two representatives at the student council decided to organize a beach cleaning operation in Jaffa at a small beach. Indeed, not many came, but those who did come had a great fun. It's the beginning of bird migrating season and we kept seeing arrowheads and films of cormorants overhead coming like waves. Also, the beach was very quiet and serene like only a beach at a winter's late afternoon can be. I must warn you that I look awful in these pictures so you'll just have to pretend I have a paper bag on my head (bad hair day) Pictures:

We had these big plastic bags and ran around the beach picking trash up, playing "He who finds the first bong/used condom gets a free HIV test on behalf of the faculty" and many other fun games.
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And then, me and a couple of guys got into wheel digging, removing dumped wheels from the beach and boy was that a messy, hard work. My back and arms were insanely cramped the next day. Here are some wheel piccies:
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Ehn!
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Digging them up
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Dragging them away
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Taking them piece by piece
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And then I found some sea cucumbers (a few Holothuria tubulosa)!! Went over to brag them off to the rest of the biology nerds
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We put them back right where we found them afterwards, we did.

The whole gang
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The day's howl at sunset
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And that's the end of the picture post!

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Book Report

Finished reading Alan Levy's Nazi Hunter.
All in all a good book; it was balanced, well written, informative and composed. It's a very good book if you're just starting up on the subject of the holocaust, or as a book to inform someone who only vaguely heard about it and give them a better, deeper knowledge of what happened where and when. It's not THE most informative book but the subject it covers, it covers with enough good details to not leave a job half assed.
Something did bother me, though, and that was the fact that - the way it's written in the english version I read it in - it's aimed completely and quite obviously to an American audience. Every unit of measurement or currency is translated to inches/pounds/dollars, and many times there are little footnote marks to often unimportant comments on other bland subjects. I suppose the Levy's ideal scenario in buidling this book is some history-ignorant American person's eye caught on the cover's shocking colors and inviting title, tempted to buy it and from its pages gather the very critical knowledge on the works of war crimes, cruelty, and justice as Weisenthal himself would love to have done and have done when he was alive.
However, if you're like me and already read quite a few things about the holocaust, all the little footnotes and pointless translations to a currency and measurement system which is not mine, is very, very distracting and often annoying.
It's a good book, an educational book and I have learned a lot from it and enjoyed reading it, I won't say I didn't enjoy it, but it could do some work.

Next up: Marion Zimmer Bradley's The Mists of Avalon.

Monday, December 3, 2007

*dead from the cute*

Two of last post's problems are being solved, on the third I was working while writing the post, so not all's too bad.
BUT FOR NOW LET US PUT THAT BEHIND US!!

Sam was snoozing on the parents' bed today and since it was a rare moment in which he sleeps on a furniture I took the liberty to implant Scarlett near him as well. This is what became of the operation:



And a picture:
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Saturday, December 1, 2007

Henh...

In case you were wondering (or in case you even noticed...) I disappeared for a while due to a very hectic week. I've had a shift every day, including night shifts, and my god did it wreck havoc on my life. At least I got the weekend off, which was great.
I've been very down lately and it took me a while to understand why. Sat with myself and thought about it, I realized I had one of the toughest years of my life:

My first year in university was a flop no matter how much I try to cheer myself up thinking it's because of all the math-physics-chemistry I've had this year and how relatively well I did in the more animal-centered courses; I'd believe myself with these cheers if only I didn't know I let myself down in properly sitting my ass to study and cramm properly.

The project, which started on very high and mighty airs, is a flop I hope not a lot of people in my academic year will take any notice of, it's so unprofessional and lame. At least here I don't have anything to blame myself for, but rather the people I'm working with. Still, it's annoying.

My love life's been one crash after another, mostly because of my hubris, one certain condescending asshole and my lack of skills in anything that has to do with flirting, managing myself around sane normal males or choosing sane normal males as mates.

I finished my three-year-written fic and am now fumbling with editing it at a rather disappointing rate and if I knew my beta bothered reading this blog I wouldn't say I think our friendship is lacking now that our once mutual fandom is not on my interest list and the burden of how little we have in common is finally taking a toll on how quickly she does me the favor of betaing my fics. It's not that she's a bad person or that I'm angry with her but I do feel a certain loosening of the delicate voluntary bond between a writer and a beta which we used to have. I don't blame her; I'm not paying her and she owes me nothing so I feel like the fact that something's creaking in the way we work together must come from me because she's not the kind of person to demand something for a favor she does, she's great like that.

I'm 24 and I'm still living with the parents. This is going to change, now that I have a seriously profiting job and I will be seriously looking for a place to move to as soon as I have a safe layer of financial fat in my bank account (which I assume will be in a couple of months or so), but it doesn't change the strain it put on me so far or the stupidity of my behavior which lead to this situation after three years of having jobs between my army service's end and the start of my university studies.

I guess the only thing I did manage to do properly this year was to quit smoking. Way to go, me.

Then there's Clio's death. I knew Clio since she came out of her mother's belly; I raised her, I loved her, I grew to know her as she is alone with her mother and Speedy both went their own ways. Losing Clio was far more than I allowed myself or others know, for a long time. Sure, Scarlett and Sam are wonderful, adorable little treasures, but Clio has a special place in my heart.

I'm not the type to despair and I never let a problem bother me for too long without thinking up ways of solving it and seeing beyond it. That doesn't mean I can't feel bad about said problem...

I wanted to tell you about the beach cleaning operation I went to this thursday, but I didn't have the right strength for it. Also, I don't have the pictures from it yet, so...