Desserts

I could have titled this post, "Why I'm getting fat."

I ended up not eating two of these. What will power!

Conference

Reminder - I get to go to a conference for professional development. If you can think of one anywhere in the midwest let me know... preferably in March or April.

Otherwise, I'll start looking at conferences in Pheonix or Las Vegas in December!

I am geeky enough to enjoy most conferences. To have the university pay for another trip back to the states... too good to be true.

Thought for the day

Unless the stock market makes an incredible rebound by January 20, 2009, George Bush will be the only 8 year president to have a Dow lower than when he came into office.

Update:
I've received the Republican talking points:
The longest expansion in history during the Clinton years is thanks to Ronald Reagan.
The first recession under W. is Clinton's fault.
The stock market's recent decline is because the market is scared of an Obama victory.

I'm sure the fact the Dow is lower today than when Bush took office is somehow Democrats fault as well.

If you think we've got it bad...

... it's worse in Europe.

I'm watching the Dow drop another 700 points today. Things are bad for the markets in the US. Our central bank - The Fed - and the government bailout are doing all that can be done to unfreeze credit in the markets. The risk is banks failing left and right. The risk is also good banks refusing to lend money to even their good customers. That's clearly happening. If we don't get out of this soon we'll be facing a recession worse than any in my lifetime.

BUT, imagine each state in the US having to protect the banks within its borders. Plus, the states have a rule that they cannot exceed a deficit of 3% or their output. If more than one bank fails the state won't have enough money to cover the losses.

That's the current situation in Europe. Each country is responsible for protecting its banks, but unlike our government, they are not allowed to simply borrow more money.

Update: The story above has led to a resurging dollar. (In other words, the world markets are saying, "It's bad in the US... but oh, man, it's worse in Europe.")

100th Post

And dear readers, here's what I want for Christmas:

Two way communication! I know some of you have tried to make comments but couldn't. E-mails are fine.

Send me questions. As you go about your day and see things that make you wonder, "What is that like over there?" send those questions to me.

By the numbers

Days in the hotel: 51

Room charge: $7556

Meal charges: $1940

Internet charges: $326

Laundry: $155

Total cost: $9977

If half of that had been applied to my housing allowance I could have moved out of the Hilton a month ago.

Change please

I have mentioned this before: It drives me nuts to buy things in this country. The bill is seven dirham. I hand the checkout person a 10. "Do you have 2 dirham, sir?" NO! You are the one with a change drawer. How about giving me my change!

So far I've been able to politely respond, "No, I'm sorry. I don't."

Today I ordered food that came to twenty two dirham. All I had was a 100 bill. The fact I paid with a hundred didn't phase the checkout woman. The fact I didn't have two dirham did.

She handed me change and only handed me bills. (Single dirhams are coins the size of a quarter.)

Imagine going to a store and having a bill for $5.50. You hand the clerk a $20 bill. The clerk only hands you back paper money.

I didn't complain because they gave me more soup than I was supposed to get... so who cares if it cost me $.50 more...

Well, much to my surprise when I checked my change they actually gave me back 80 Dirham.

Imagine, "The bill is $5.50. Oh, you don't have $.50? I'll just charge you $5."

Thought for the day

I live in a country with no rivers.

It's a thought didn't even occur to me until I was talking about the flooding in my home town this summer. I repeatedly used the word "river". Finally a student stopped me. In this country there are "Wadis" which are dry creek beds. If there is rain the wadis fill temporary... and empty quickly.

The concept of a river is complete foreign.

*********
The picture is above is from Fall 2005. I'll post more later. That fall was the most colorful fall in recent memory.

It's about to hit the fan.

New comedy coming to Al Ain. It's called "Administrative Stories."

Plot line:
A courageous group of new faculty try to find answers. They hear one story from one administrator. Another from one level higher up. Yet another from the top person.

Low level administrators have been lying to upper level administrators. Will the upper level administrators strike at the liars or shoot the messengers (AKA, the courageous group of new faculty)?

Stay tuned.

A rare comment

From a colleague: "Among faculty you are one of the quieter ones."

Weather trivia

In 2008 Cedar Rapids temperatures have been below normal every month. I don't know when we last went nine months into a year with below normal temperatures. September was the closest to normal month of the year - less than a degree below normal.
Great, the weather turns normal after I leave.
On October 3, 1997, I was working weather and it was memorable: The high in Cedar Rapids was 94 degrees.
The weather here is surprisingly nice. Yes, it's still too hot to stand in the sun in the middle of the day, but it's really not that bad.

Middle east - and the rest of the world -needs to conserve energy

(Note: GCC stands for Gulf Cooperation Council. It's six nations of the middle east including Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.)

From today's page one of the Khaleej Times Business section:

"The report said that the specific case of the oil-surplus GCC shows that domestic demand growth has exceeded supply growth... Hence, having once been the swing producer of oil, the GCC may no longer be able to play a role in rectifying the global imbalance... the only way to ease global demand is for sufficient demand destruction in the (world)."

Translation: We in the middle east are consuming a lot more energy every year. In fact, our increased consumption has cut our ability to export oil. Please cut demand everywhere.

Interesting.

One day's trash

Imagine seeing this at an American oceanside park. Fortunately, the Emirates employs teams of worker bees to clean this up each morning. By 8AM nobody would ever know it looked like this.

Shark Roundabout

I have only been driving for two weeks but I have come to appreciate roundabouts. They are great for traffic flow in low-to-moderate traffic intersections. Some of the roundabouts have interesting statues in the center. This is one from our trip to Fujairah.

Roadside market

Along the road there are a couple of markets like this one. I would love to buy some stuff but, 1. I have no home, and 2. I HATE bargaining. Hate it, hate it, hate it!

Roadtrip!

Living in NE Nebraska I learned that not all of the state is as flat and boring at the Platte River Basin along I-80. Living in the UAE I have learned that it's not all desert.
Here's a sign as we leave Dibba wishing us a good bye.

These pictures are on the way back from Fujairah (and Snoopy Rock). Ann's friend Debbie was our host and was a terrific host. Unfortunately, I have no good pics from our time together.
The ocean is to the right, mountains to the left.

Tea Tree Oil

The pictures below do not justice to the distance Snoopy Rock is from the public beach. By the time I made it out there I was dead. I had a brilliant thought, "Try resting by hanging on to the rocks around Snoopy."

The tide moved the water up and down 3 feet and slammed me against the rocks. In vain I tried to get a good grip. In the process I sliced my thumb, index finger, legs, forearms... well you get the picture.

I continued to snorkel because the view was stunning.

After having my head in the water for 10 minutes I looked up and realized I was 30 yards away from Snoopy Rock headed in the wrong direction. The undertow was taking me out to sea.

The realization that there are no lifeguards and my level of exhaustion caused a momentary panic.

Obviously, I made it back in. After I emerged from the water I realized how much my thumb and legs were still bleeding.

************
Over dinner I told this story to a colleague. He said, "All that bleeding and you saw a shark in the water? You are lucky."

Gee, I hadn't even thought of that.

Meanwhile he gave me Tea Tree Oil (something I had never heard of) to serve as a natural antiseptic for my cuts.

Snoopy Rock

We went snorkeling this morning at Snoopy Rock (Check out the picture below in "Going off the Grid". It looks like Snoopy laying on his back.) We could have paid $60 and went through the hotel. Instead Ann and I decided, "We're former lifeguards, let's swim from the public beach."

The snorkeling was simply incredible. We got to see hundreds of colorful fish. It was like a moment out of National Geographic. More than once I found myself in the middle of a school of fish. Completely surrounded. Amazing!

I even saw a small shark.



Here's Ann returning well after me. She swam for a good two hours. I made it for 90 minutes. The reason? I'm out of shape and it's been a long time since I've been swimming.

Behind the beach are mountains with paths to take with an SUV. This will definitely be on the itinerary of a future trip.

Sunrise over the Indian Ocean

Stunningly beautiful.

I remembered this morning that I have yet to send flowers to the person at Kaplan who made this all possible.

Debate disaster

While many will tune in tonight to see a Palin train wreck, it will most likely be a Democratic disaster.

Why?

Joe Biden will say, "The Sunni - Shia - Kurdish federal government must..."

Palin will respond, "Oh, there you go again Joe, using those Washington insider words..."

The right-wing will do cartwheels.

Still don't believe me? Ask yourself this: Is it possible to say after the debate, "Sarah Palin did worse than expected"?

All she has to do is string two coherent sentences together. Add a folksy tale about her "First Dude" husband and the media will proclaim "Palin beats all expectations."