Flying Rice

We were at a Mama's daughter's house eating a rice & lamb dish. Traditionally you eat it with your right hand. You pull off a piece of meat and roll up your rice and meat in a ball and then you move it onto your thumb and push it into your mouth with touching any of your hand to your mouth.

Well after we'd been eating a while we were trying to flick the balls of rice and meat into our mouths like tossing up popcorn. Well, that got boring so we started trying to toss them into to each other's mouths.

So the first time we tried it a buddy tossed it to me. As soon as it left his hand it fell apart. So instead of a ball of rice flying up in the air, a wave of rice and lamb flew up above my head.

Naturally, I ducked out and move. Well Mama was behind me and was showered with rice and lamb.

So there stands Mama covered in rice. Oh the shame! You could have heard a pin drop. We were freaking out! We began apologizing like crazy. "Oh, Mama, we are so sorry. We will clean up the mess, don't worry."

The first thing out of Mama's mouth is, "no, you have to put a little bread in the ball and it will make it stick together better."

It is great. I love Mama. She understands us.

Happy Father's Day to All and to All a Good Night?

So Father's Day was fairly interesting day this year. I am a father! sortof. It's a peculiar thing. I have a son. He kicks and squirms and gets the hiccups, but I don't have any fatherly duties really. For me, he's a pretty low maintenance kid right now.

Sidenote: Here they don't celebrate Father's Day. I was stupid enough to ask a women why? Her reply was, "In this culture everyday is Father's Day. The men just sit around and don't do anything everyday. Why do they need a special day to do it?"

right... of course.

So I don't ask her many questions anymore.

But anyways, I hope you had a great عيض الاب this year.

Noah's Busy Day

On Wednesday I woke up to B crying. Despite being pregnant B doesn't cry much and never before 9am, so I rolled over to see what was the deal.
Apparently B was plugging in our washing machine and slipped and slid her finger onto the plug as she was plugging it in. The results were painful.

*Before I go on, I want to point out two things. One, this was a fluke thing that you would have to try really hard to do. We may live overseas, but we do not have live electrical wires just lying around our house. Two, we are on a 220V system here, so all you pansies in the States with your little 110V shocks need to realize that 220V hurts twice as much!

Anyways, B had electrocuted herself. It burned her finger underneath her wedding ring. It was a pretty bad shock. She was okay, but had a headache and was nauseous.

We then began freaking out about Noah, so we called the doctor and rushed to the hospital. Come to find out everything was fine. Praise the LORD. Noah was doing just fine, his was a little more twitchy than normal and his hair stood out a little straighter on the sonogram, but he was fine.


So in Noah's Book of Firsts it now reads:

Minus 6 Weeks Old: I survived being electrocuted.


Not bad for a little guy his age, but apparently electrocution does a number on the wee ones, because on the way home B tells me that he had the hiccups for the first time.

So in Noah's book of firsts it now reads:

Minus 6 Weeks Old: I survived being electrocuted...

and it gave me the hiccups.

Where Am I?

Two things are for certain in the Arab World.

1.Nothing will ever be done when they say it will be done.
2.When they finally get around to doing it, it for sure will not be done efficiently.

Keep these things in mind.

Where Am I part one.
So we don't drink water from the tap. It ain't as bad as Mexico, but it's no spring water either!

Because of this we have bottled water delivered to the house in 5 gallon bottles. When you run out you call them and they bring more. This could take 3 hours or three days depending on the wind, or the weather, or the alignment of the stars.

This week we ran out of water and I called the guy and he said he would be there in a little bit, so I figured by tomorrow.

Ten minutes later a guy is at my door with water.

Where am I? This ain't the Middle East I know.

Where Am I part two.
So we ordered internet on Monday. First the telephone company has to come make sure the line is installed properly or run a new line. They told me that it would be done sometime the later part of next week.

The kicker is after the telephone company comes, I have to call the internet company and after three or four days they will send someone out to give me my user name and password. You can imagine in Arab time how long that meant.

So we were planning on getting internet for Christmas.

Wednesday about 7pm I get a call from the telephone technician and he was wandering if now would be a good time to come set up the internet line. I told him sure, so an hour later he shows up and fiddles around for about 30 minutes, hooks up a modem, gives me a username and password, pulls up Yahoo.com and is out the door.

I sat at my desk staring at my computer. Yahoo? It can't be. Then B walks in and says, "Is that the internet? We have the internet?" All I could say was, "Yeah, I guess so. Maybe he messed up."

Again, where am I?

Things done in a timely matter and semi-efficiently?

Complete Catch-Up

So, I realize that if this were a mid-afternoon sit-com then it would like one of those that you rush home from school to see (Saved by the Bell, Full House, etc.) and it would be one of those episodes where Zack and Kelly break-up and you are freaking out and then the big "To-Be continued" flashes on the screen and you get mad and through the bag of "RRRuffles with RRRidges" at the TV and scream, "AW man! Come on! Don't do this to me!"

But then you come back the next day and nothing comes on and then the next day and the next day. Nothing. Saved by the Bell communication black out!

I apologize completely. Although I highly doubt any of you are rushing home from Jr. High to read the blog everyday, I feel like I've brought your posting hopes up with Signal's final game, The All-Star game, the Parents coming, and the New House and then.......

nothing....

You've come day after day looking for the resolve of "Zack and Kelly's relationship" and....

Nothing. How rude of me. I realize that none of you are losing sleep, but still it's the principle of it. :)

So this is a "Previously on Two Bull's"

SIGNAL
Signal loses our last game to the number one team (you remember them. The steroid enhanced players of Cozmo) only to team up with them in the All-Star game the next week.

Sidenote: You should have seen our guys with their guys. It was like men teaming up with boys.

But the steroids of Cozmo were no match for the well balanced play of the "Pharm Cord" (the Pharmacy One/Baby Cord mix). We, the Mighty Mighty Sigmo, were defeated in the bottom of the fifth.

Second Sidenote: Haitham, our runt, showed up about half way through the second inning in full uniform, ready to play. Downside: Haitham, while being the most improved player, was not chosen for the All-Star team. I wanted to choose him, but I just couldn't. Too many others on the team deserved the All-Star spot. Sad day. I had to explain to him that he couldn't play in this game, but he was an All-Star in my book. Again, sad day.

THE PARENTS COMING
I am approaching this section with fear and trembling. Between Mom and Dad and their time here I have so many ridiculously hilarious stories. BUT if I were to share them I would embarrass my parents and they in turn would share stories of me from my childhood or post naked baby pictures of me on the web.

Therefore, I will bypass such shenanigans and say that we had a great time. Mom and Dad, thank you so much for the visit. It meant the world to B and me. We look forward to seeing you again soon Lord willing. It was wonderful to have you here and experiencing our world.

THE NEW HOUSE
We have been in the process of moving from a furnished apartment to an unfurnished apartment meaning that we are slowly buying furniture for the house. Example: we've been in the house for two weeks and today I just got a mirror. I walked into the bathroom at Hardee's two days ago and just about scared myself. Me just throwing gel in the hair and shaving without a mirror does not go over well. Trust me.

Last week I had to go to about five different places to pick up a hundred different things, so I had to rent a truck and some movers. Here you don't rent a U-Haul and drive it yourself. You go down to the empty lot where men with big trucks are and you rent them and a couple of Egyptians to do all the work. Well about half way through unloading all of it at the new house I got of good whiff of all the "cigarettes" they had been smoking. Yeah, it was pot. Yeah, I was wondering why they were all in a good mood.

Between the pot smoking movers, the water shooting out from the bottom of the toilet, and the Internet company's, "yeah we are coming tomorrow" for the last week, it’s been a great experience, but the LORD has been good. We are very thankful for the new place. Seriously, it's move than we could have hoped and definitely more than I deserve.


So I hope that catches you up before we start the new season of Two Bulls.

I will do my best to get more posting up once our internet gets working at the new house.