Assessment of life

In February I planned and bought tickets for a trip to Egypt with my two closest friends in the Emirates.  A month later they froze me out and did the Egypt trip without me. I decided to make a last minute trip back home.  It was good to remind me that I have friends and close family in the US.

Back in the Emirates I have worked hard over the past two months to make my life better.  I realized I couldn't put so much weight in only two friends - it left me too vulnerable.  I started working out.  I've been working out 6 days a week since early March.  I've been religiously taking my meds.  Soon I'll have blood work done to see if the 20 pounds I've lost and being a good pill taker have any effect.

Work has not been going well.  I pretty much fell short on every goal I had for my new job.  My boss is more OK with it than I am.  I'm going to give it one more year mainly because I have to prove I can do better.

Overall, I am in much better shape physically and mentally compared to March.  My next step is to get back to blogging. Given what was going on in my life blogging was hard - I felt screwed over by close friends and nothing at work was going right.  Good times.

I think things are better now but the test will be if I can post every day in June.   Wish me luck and please try to remember to stop back here.  I know you get out of the habit of checking the blog when I don't post...

Weekend remainders

Father of the year he is not:  A man here has made it his mission in life to have 100 children. It is acceptable here to have up to four wives at a time so he keeps as long as they are fertile.

Here's an interactive map of gay rights in the US.  Jon Stewart points out that the best measure of how far we've come is that Republicans criticized Obama for being opportunistic.  I admit I was pleasantly surprised that not one of my far right friends on FB posted anything negative.

On a somewhat related topic, it appears John Travolta really likes happy endings from his massage therapists.  If you have a few minutes it is worth reading the lawsuit.

My alma mater Coe is now over $41,920 for residential students.  I am happy I went to Coe but I don't think I could make the same choice today.  Here's an interactive graph on colleges and their graduates' level of debt.  Student loan debt has now passed credit card debt and auto loans.

Pastafarians unite:  A man has won the right to wear a pasta strainer in his ID photo.

A Kmart in Kentucky was closing.  After the store had marked down the remaining merchandise to one-tenth of its value a man bought it all and gave it to a shelter.  He initially thought he'd try to resell it all but the 76 year-old had a change of heart.  Good for him.

And finally, a college friend is a trial lawyer.  He's developed a product to help companies to keep from being sued.

A sad reality

After changing back to atenolol (for high blood pressure) two days ago I started feeling very dizzy.  More than once today I felt so woozy I thought I might black out.  OK, so I'll stop taking the drug.

I took my last pill early this morning.  As I felt awful all day I hoped things would get better as time passed.  Unfortunately, I'm just as dizzy as I was earlier.  I won't go to the hospital because this is a relatively common side effect for the drug (although the websites say, "If you experience this symptom see your doctor.")  And death is not listed as one of the side effects so I'm gonna bet I'll be OK.

But...

Thursday is the start of the weekend here.  I've made no plans with anyone this weekend.  It would be Sunday before anyone might wonder what happened to me...

Tune in tomorrow because, 1.  I promise to post saying I'm alive and, 2. I have a list of stories I have missed blogging about over the past couple of weeks.

Summer School

When I was home in March I had tile laid in my basement and had a quote done for the upstairs.  The cost? $4900.  

This summer I want to go to Germany to visit the area my Great-Great-Grandfather came from.  I could afford the trip OR I could afford the new floor, not both.  So the opportunity came up to teach summer school.  The pay?  $4900

Therefore...

Now my plans are to leave here on August 7 for Germany and continue on to the US on August 16.

(No homeless person was intentionally mocked in the creation of this blog post.)

Tragedy in Pokhara

Pokhara is the most popular tourist resort in Nepal.  It is beautiful, serene and perhaps the only place I've been that makes *me* feel at peace.  Sadly, water backed up after a landslide and when it finally broke through the rush of water swept away 60+ people and many homes.

I found out about this from my friend Sanjaya - a hotel manager I met two years ago and we've kept in touch.  He was with me on my last trip when I took this picture of the river that tragically killed many two days ago:

Here's the latest news story.  It mentions that the victims of the families will receive 125,000 rupees and those who lost their homes will get 25,000 rupees.  That's $1,500 per death and $300 for a lost house.

Nepal is a spectacular country - beautiful in an almost fairy tale way.  It is also poor, poor beyond the imagination for this Iowa boy.  The people could easily be resentful of foreigners yet they are unbelievably nice.  If ever there was a country and people deserving a break it is the people of Nepal.

I'm famous!

This is from the front page of the "Youth" section of a national newspaper.  You can read the story here if you understand Arabic.  If you don't just trust me that it says "Steve is a god... he's so amazing it is beyond belief."

Maybe it doesn't quite say that but since I can't read Arabic I'm going to believe it does.

Quotes of the day

Comments that would be considered inappropriate are somewhat common here.  Partly, I think language barrier is part of it - just not using the right words.  Culture plays another role and good ole' fashioned rudeness must also play a part.

As I was going up an elevator today a woman I don't know said, "Sir, you used to be a little bit fat.  No you are not.  What happened?"

I had no response.  I am down 20 pounds so thanks for noticing but who are you?

My  barber speaks little English but since I give a 100% tip I'm pretty sure I'm his favorite client.  I never have to wait when I come in three times a week for a shave.  Clearly this has made him wonder how much I make...

Barber: Money.  How much do you get?
Me: What?
Barber:  Money.  Month (pointing to calendar). How much you take?

I should have told him it was none of his business but instead I basically cut my salary in half and told him that.  The sad reality is that he sits in his shop seven days a week from 10AM-11PM and makes less than one-tenth what I make.  Yes, he gets to sleep during the day when business is slow but imagine spending 13 hours every day at your job.  I have no problem giving a 100% tip and now that he has asked me how much I make he'll be expecting at least that much.