Hail Our Googilian Overlords

Someone is telling you about a movie and you want to check the reviews, typically you'd do the following:
1. Type www.imdb.com in your browser address bar.
2. Wait for main page for IMDB to load.
3. Search for the location of the search box (they change it every few weeks to confuse us).
4. Type the movie name you're looking for.
5. Wait for results page (Did you notice that there's always multiple results?... and NO I don't mean the TV series form 1950's called Batman!)
6. Pick the movie you are looking for from list.
7. Wait for page to load.

I've stopped doing that a few months back, thanks to our overlords at Google. I discovered the ultimate trio: a. Google toolbar b. The colon operator c. The I'm Feeling Lucky button. Those 3 if used wisely can mean you do not need to navigate to any site anymore, here's how:
1. Type into the Google toolbar: website name : keyword
2. Hit I'm Feeling Lucky button
3. Wait for exact page you want to load.

For example, if you want to look something up on Wikipedia you simply need to type:
wiki: WWII
A movie on IMDB?
imdb: The Simpsons
Check the latest weather?
weather.com: Cairo

This is very kool specially if you are a fellow nerd who longs to the ugly, incompetent DOS command-line or the seductive, all-mighty Linux shell....*PING*.

The Iron Fesh

So I started going regularly to the Gym as of the beginning of the month. You know, one of those very late New Year resolutions. On my first day, I show up early ready for some serious gyming. The instructor gives me the whole routine: 30 mins running followed by some weightlifting. I finish the running part feeling on top of the world and then I go to the instructor who hands me two 5Kg dumbbells and asks me to do two sets of 20 counts. I do 5 counts. The instructor seems to understand that maybe I am not ready yet, so he replaces 5Kg dumbbells with 4KG ones, same drill 2x20. I do 10 counts......

The instructor clearly amused now with my incompetence waits for a girl, who is literally half my size, to finish exercising with 3Kg dumbbells and then hands them to me. I do 15 counts.

I should be ashamed of myself... I know.

The Simpsons

IT. IS. HERE.
*Mental Orgasm*
*Fesh dies



I'll get to see it next week GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

The Simpsons-1

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?


Answer: A hardcore fan would anticipate the release of the movie and attend the premier, a psychotic fan would instead start a creepy, serial-killerish-type countdown on his blog that would expose many dark secrets about him. In doing so the psychotic fan would lose both his self-respect and his tiny reader base.


Still, IT WAS TOTALLY WORTH IT... it begins tomorrow: 27.07.07

The Simpsons-2

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would have seen all 400 episodes of The Simpsons, a psychotic fan would have seen all of them, at least 6 times each.

The Simpsons-3

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would have some Simpsons merchandise, a psychotic fan will have his very own own Homer doll, even if this psychotic fan is a 26 years old homophobic dude.

The Simpsons-4

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would be familiar with a Flaming Moe, a psychotic fan would have tried to mix it at home (liquor + cough syrup + cigarette ash) and -probably- been hospitalized after trying it.

The Simpsons-5

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would be familiar with the 400+ different characters on the Simpsons, a psychotic fan would have his own. I give you: FeshFesh

courtesy of http://www.simpsonizeme.com (thanks Aku!)

The Simpsons-6

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would know that Homer was made an honorary citizen of Winnipeg, Canada on May 30, 2003, a psychotic fan would know his social security number.

The Simpsons-7

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would off course know Moleman's lesser known first name: Hans, a psychotic fan would be able to distinctively remember at least 10 different situations when Hans was killed off the show, Kenny-style.

The Simpsons-8

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would know at least 15 of Homer's jobs, a psychotic fan would be able to recite all of Homer's jobs in alphabetical order in under 2 mins. All 118 of them.

The Simpsons-9

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A hardcore fan would have read The Gospel According to The Simpsons, a psychotic fan would consider it blasphemous to contradict it at church.

The Simpsons-10

Question: What's the difference between a hardcore Simpsons fan and a psychotic fan?

Answer: A psychotic fan is sexual aroused by the mere thought of The Simpsons Movie opening up in 10 days, while a hardcore fan is not.

The BEF's Secret Wish

We BEF brothers spend a great deal of our time in airports and specifically in security lines, last time I was in Frankfurt I had to:
1. Pass my check-in luggage thru an x-ray machine before I even got my boarding pass.
2. Pass a security point where my cabin baggage was x-rayed, my laptop sniffed and turned on.
3. Pass yet another security point on my way to the gate. This check-point didn't have a metal detector so the security guard had to ask each and every passenger to spread their hands and legs and he scanned them with a mobile metal detector.

I have to go thru this every time I am traveling, so technically I invest around 4-5 hours a month, each month in security lines. I do this gracefully and I never ask for anything in return. Yet deep inside me, and deep inside every Brother we all wish for this one time, just one time...

It's a crowded European Airport, crowded security line, it's raining outside. Appears like there is some disturbance at the front of the line, one passenger is refusing to take off his shoes. There is some yelling, can't make out what they are saying, suddenly the passenger hits the security guard with his carry-on bag and dashes to the nearest emergency exit. All at once the hall is flooded by security guards who are running after the alleged "shoe-bomb" terrorist, they are yelling something, seems they are giving him a waring ...*BANG* *BANG* the pursuit is over.

We BEF Brothers carry this dark and terrible wish within us every time we fly. Wishing that one day, all the time we invested in the security of the planes we fly in will pay out. The feeling that maybe today is the day this scenario unfolds keeps us going from Plane to Gate to Plane....everyday.

You've Been Tagged

I have recently begged my way into being tagged by nilegirl to complete this Sports Meme. Basically the way it works is that you answer those questions about yourself and then tag a few of your friends and they do the same. So here goes:
1. What is your sport?
This is a tough one, since I'm your standard issue couch potato. But in the Elder Days I used to play different sports:
School: Football
University: Badminton.
Work: Foosball.
2. Why do you like this one?
Well specifically for Badminton I think what I love about it is that it's very much like Tennis on slow motion. So whenever I watch those Wimbledon matches I am really amazed by how those dudes are running over and changing the ball direction and all that. Since in Tennis I can't do that, I opt to play badminton so that I CAN.
3. How long are you doing this for?
I played Badminton in University for around 2 years with my buddy: Pigeon. (I know, but that's another post).
4. Most painful experience.
This one is from my football-playing days, actually it's your typical football story: Free kick, not looking at the ball, ball approaches the speed of light and *BAM* .... sheer pain... and yeah it didn't hit me in the face if you were wondering...
5. Most memorable experience.
Well I guess the ball in the nuts is definitely memorable but on a more happier note 2 years ago I organized a Foosball Summer tournament at work. I had 14 teams participate, each composed of 2 players. My most memorable experience is that we made it to the FINAL game and the way we played it is that we played best out of 5 sets. So basically the team that got 3 sets won. So we lose the first set and then we have an amazing come-back winning two consecutive sets. So at the score of 2-1 the other team's captain called for a break and we never continued this game. Strange right? BUT if you consider that the other team's captain was my boss AND that after he called for the break he -probably- went to bathroom and cried like a 6-year old girl and later on avoided to continue the game at all costs it becomes very interesting :D
(6. Add tall tale or new question to Meme. So I guess I'll add a question)
6. Worst sport ever?
Wrestling, something about a dude in spandex trying to pin another spandex-claded dude to the ground in what seems like a popular sexual position is just not right. Yes I'm a homophob.
7. Tag 3 or 4 people.
hmmmm... okay so seeing I don't have a lot of readers here I'll start with tagging Forsooth and Munqy and anyone else who wants to be tagged just yell: I'm a little piggy oink oink.

How to Make a "Bomb"

Ingredients:
1 water melon
1 bottle of vodka
10 crazy straws
10 tea spoons

Instructions:
1. Slice off the top of the melon, just enough to have a hole 4cm in diameter.
2. Use a spoon to cut the reddish part of the melon into little pieces.
3. Empty vodka inside the melon, stir lightly.
4. Put sliced top back on.
5. Put back in fridge for a couple of hours.

Serving Recommendation:
Remove top, insert crazy straws and encourage guests to eat the melon pieces with the tea spoons. The "Bomb" is most potent if severed when everyone is already drunk.

Dose:
Adults are encouraged not to try the "Bomb". It's a Machiavellian device that first lures you to suckle on the sweet juices and the sugary melon pieces that have been dipped in the best vodka there is and then 15 mins later hits you.

Disclaimer:
If it's your birthday and your friends offer you a toast and you don't have a drink at hand... do not, I repeat do not pick up the "Bomb" and drink from all 5 straws. Serious hang-over...ugh...

Happy FeshDay

Historical speaking, The Day of the Fesh has been first celebrated by the ancient Egyptians in the year 5007 BC. Now, almost 7000 years later the whole world still celebrates the 7th day of the 7th month of the 7th year of every millennium, in pop culture it became known as: FeshDay.

If you ask me, I think the whole thing is just too much publicity. I don't need all that attention at the time being..... I know, I know... it's very flattering that the ancient Egyptians foresaw my coming and prophesied about it and kept on celebrating the day for thousands of years, but at the end of the day I'm just an ordinary man. Maybe with a very kool birthday (07.07.07).... but still an ordinary man just like the rest of you ordinary mortals.

Anyways Happy FeshDay.

The Culture of Busyiness

In any corporation right now, there's only one rule: If you ain't busy, you aint kool. So for you unkool people here's a quick 5-point guide:

1. Whenever someone is passing you in the corridor and says: Hey, how's everything? always answer: Busy, busy!
2. Don't answer mails on time, and when someone asks you about the mail they sent you, complain for 5 mins about the 700 mails you get daily. They don't know you get 10 messages half of which is spam.
3. Don't get back to voice mails, you will sound very needy if you answer back, and what are you going to say: I'm returning your call! That's just a reputation killer.
4. Always block your calendar even if you don't have meaningful stuff to do. For example: 9:00-10:00 stare at the screen mindlessly; 10:00-11:00 think about my happy place ...etc. Makes you seem very busy for people wanting to book you.
5. Most importantly, always, always show up late for meetings. Come in with a pill of papers and spend the first 5 mins explaining how today is a "crazy day".

But seriously, why do people do this? I can understand that as you go up the corporate ladder your responsibilities increase, but this does not mean you become less efficient at your basic time-management skills, right? I work with senior people and some of them are usually very prompt in: getting back to mail, answering calls or attending meetings, yet others are not. Some would argue that some positions attract a lot of mails or calls versus others, but again isn't the ability to filter thru and identify really important messages, calls and/or meetings a skill you need to acquire to climb the corporate ladder? The way I see it, we should be promoting people who can coupe with the increase amount of mails, calls and meetings and not we promote people and hope they could.

Finally, please feel free to do any of the above first 4 points with me, it's your choice. But please, please when I ask you: How's everything? spare me ANY statement that has "busy" in it. I get it the whole world is BUSY and I'm the last person on earth who has some spare time to say: Fine, how about you?

The Fesh: Defeated

You attend that many corporate trainings and this introduction piece (name, current assignment, hometown, expectations and one unique thing) becomes fairly easy. I have developed my standard answers for those and for the unique thing I usually say:

My passion is traveling...*pause for dramatic purposes*...so far I have visited 36 countries out of my personal target of visiting a 100.

It has always worked for me, usually I get some interesting comments... until today. The trainer, a dude in his early 50ies, looked at me and said: How many countries?

I smiled and said in a confident tone:
THIRTY-six

He replied in a cold tone:
FORTY-EIGHT.

.....I have been defeated in my own game.
*Fesh dies.

My 7-Minute Meditation

As a spin-off of my last post, here's an interesting habit that I developed due to my travels. I can now rate how easy/hard it is to get into a country (i.e. the immigration part). So on a scale of 1 to 10, here goes:

The Swiss (1/10)
They don't even look at my passport, they just look at my residency card and let me go, one of the few countries in the world that doesn't even stamp my passport. Me likey.

The Schiengen States (Germany, France, Italy ..etc) (3/10)
They usually ask one question: How long are you planing to stay? I always like to confuse them by answering: I'm leaving next Thursday. I then pause and watch the officer trying to do some quick math to understand how many days is Thursday from today. It's very entertaining.

The Americans (6/10)
Very detailed, lots of questions: Why are you here, how long, where are you staying...etc. They are however very professional and the whole process takes under 3 minutes. I don't joke there, not after 9-11.

The Polish (9/10)
The mother of them all, basically I live and work there but still anytime I am entering OR exiting Poland I go thru a 10-minute process. This is how it usually goes: after the initial exchange of documents and Good Mornings, the immigration officer would then type in EVERY single detail of my passport and residency card into the Communist-era computer system. Then comes the dreaded 7-minutes of awkward silence, during that time the immigration officer would be mindlessly tapping on the keyboard until the Orwellian Central System would blurp an ACCEPTED or REJECTED on the screen. I haven't seen the screen but I'm assuming they'd go with the cliche big red/green bold letters.

Initially (the first dozen or so times) I was extremely annoyed by this wait, but later I started to appreciate this wait, it started to be my own little time where I meditate. It's as close to an Out of Body experience as I have ever gotten. Every single time I am waiting I am imaging the different scenarios of how I'm gonna go koko on the one immigration officer's ass who's going to make the fatal mistake of stopping me from passing based on a glitch in this crappy Communist-era system. Oh I pity that fool.

99 Cities in 36 Countries

As the end of the Fiscal year approaches, I am restating my balance sheet of countries visited. Previously, I was using a list of all the countries that I got off a website and based on that I had visited 37 countries. Now I found this ultimate Facebook gadget from TripAdviser that uses Google Maps and let's you put little pins on the cities you've visited and then it automatically calculates how many cities/countries. Based on this one, I have 99 cities in 36 countries.

My personal target for countries visited by retirement stays as 100 (amazingly tough, I know :S) but the interesting thing is that I never either counted the cities or had a target for them. Statistically, I've visited 3 cities per country. But practically a lot of those cities are either in the bigger countries I've been to (e.g. US) or Egypt, where 2 years of working with our Distributor network took me to the final frontiers of Egypt. So I have decided to set my target for cities at 200.

This means 64 countries and 101 cities to go, which is 1.8 new countries and 2.9 new cities per year as of this year and till I'm 60...... and yes I have put a lot of thought into this.

My Name

So I have my "special deal" comedy club tickets, right? It's the same night I got booed, in case you're a die hard fan. Turns out those tickets basically make you sit in the first row, or as it later became known to me: The you'll-definitely-be-picked-on-doesn't-mater-how-hard-you-try row.

It all happened so quickly, suddenly the guy started to ask all the people siting in the first row about their names and what they do. He then picked out something and made fun of them. So here I'm sitting there waiting for my turn to be picked on, my mind racing on how not to give him any leads to pick on. This turned out to be harder than I expected:
1. I'm Big (shut up)
2. I'm Arab (...*ahm*....and proud of it?)

So I'm thinking: do I really want to tell him my full first name and add a 3rd reason for him to pick on me? .... too little time, he's approaching .. I panic... and I hear:

What's your name?
*I'm sweating..
ahh... Al...

... So he ignores the fact that I'm big (maybe it's not that noticeable :D) or that I'm Arab (who am I kidding :S) and he exactly knew what I was doing with my name .... damn those telepathic stand up comics, he went on and on on how I was giving a short name because I am thinking if I give my full name, no one will understand anything and the whole club was laughing at me.

You might have won this battle Random Stand Up Comic Guy, but your time will come.

Max Weight: 1000 KG

What's with the obnoxious "Maximum Weight" signs that are in every elevator? And why do they always mention the maximum KGs and then translate this to how many persons? Isn't this in a way the elevator telling me that to be counted as one person here you need to have an average weight of 76.9KG!

And why do we need the maximum number of persons on the sign? Did you ever see 2 people walk into an elevator that usually fits 8 people and the elevator's overweight buzzer went on? Doesn't the buzzer always go on as soon as one last person squeezes into the elevator? So maybe, just maybe that weight and volume are linked somehow? I know it's a crazy idea, but hear me out: if an elevator is designed to take the WEIGHT of 8 people then by the laws of Physics it's more likely to have enough VOLUME for 8 people, right? Because even if you have people who are taking more than their share of weight, they are doing the same to the volume!

That said, I hereby demand that all the evil elevator corporations increase their weight / volume ratio and therefore remove the offensive Max Weight signs from all elevators. Let's however keep the overweight buzzer, it can come in handy if you are transporting your Gold bars in the elevator.

The Missed Call MoU

I think we all have the right to not pick-up our mobile phones whenever we want to and regardless of whomever is calling. This right however is largely neglected, so I propose a Missed Call MoU (Memorandum of Understanding) to be put in place immediately. This can be distributed with new mobile phones if necessary:

The Missed Call MoU

The party that is making the call shall be hereafter referred to as Silencee, The party that is avoiding the call shall be hereafter referred to as the Silencer.

Article I: The Silencer has the right to silence any calls without the prior written or oral consent of the Silencee.
Article II: In the likely event of a silencing, the Silencee is encouraged to accept this gracefully and is instructed to hate the game, but not the player.
Article III: If the Silencee has some urgent information that he needs to pass to the Silencer, instead of continuing to mindlessly call back, the Silencee is instructed to text the Silencer with the information.
Article IV: As a Silencer if you receive urgent information from the Silencee via a text message, it is acceptable that you call the Silencee immediately after receiving the text.
Article V: As a common code of curtsy the Silencee is not supposed to make an reference to the Silencing. Only the Silencer is allowed to bring it up and use a lame excuse of why he couldn't answer, such lame excuses as "I didn't hear the phone" or "I was asleep" are recommended.

Signatures:
1. The Silencer
2. The Silencee

My Bed

After I broke my bed, I decided to do some thinking and build-up my stories, I have two leading stories. I'll share them with you and you tell me which is more believable:

Plot A:
Usually on Friday's I head to the hottest club in town. As I was sitting there enjoying my time with my friend Jack(tm), this Swedish Goddess approaches me and she's like: Wassup? I'm like: Nothin'. After a couple of trials from her side, I finally decide to entertain a conversation with her. Before I could notice it, my charm has overwhelmed her and we were in a taxi to my place. As soon as we get in, we head to my bedroom. There and before things get blurry she mentioned that she was an Olympic Gold medalist..........and that's how I broke my bed.

Plot B:
I am such a nerd, that on Friday nights I spend it Hoovering the bookshelves in my bedroom. Seeing that I am an uberNerd, I have multiple shelves in my bedroom and therefore to Hoover the top one I need to stand up on a chair that is positioned on top of my bed. Having my Hoover on one shoulder and trying to clean the shelve I suddenly lost my balance and *BAM* hit the bed with the Hoover ontop of me. As soon as I hit the bed and after the -literal- dust settled I heard a low creaking noise and *BAM*.... and that's how I broke my bed.

So let's get the voting going, which is more believable?

The B.E.F.

The Brotherhood exists, whether you want to believe it or not. We Brothers roam the world like sleepless zombies, we meet each other all the time. I've sat behind, next to and infornt Brothers before but we never spoke of it. We all silently acknowledged our common belonging. A Brother, if he has the Window seat, will always place his bag and his jacket in the overhead compartment before he asks you to get up. A Grand Master Brother would also get out his Laptop and Book and take them with him to his Window seat. Not only this, a Brother sitting in the Window seat will also acknowledge that he has no right to accessing the overhead compartment during the whole flight, unless you (the Aisle Brother) is in the bathroom.

It's easy to spot a Brother sitting infornt of you, for this Brother will never move the back of his seat, even after the "Fasten your Seat belt"sign has been turned off. It's because he knows that the 2 inches the back of his seat moves will not magically turn his seat into a bed. More importantly he realizes that those 2 inches are the only remaining two inches for you (the Brother sitting behind) to breath.

This is but only a fraction of what we do, for we belong to the Brotherhood of the Economy-class Flyers: BEF.

Dumb Fesh

Recently I watched The Good Shepard and The Departed. I just wonder, why is it a trend now that all the "good" movies, the ones that win all the Emmy's and Oscars have to be really hard to watch? Seriously my brain hurts after watching those movies. First, there's the constant jumping of time: 10 years ago, following scene: present time and then the scene after: 7 years, 4 months and 3 days ago? Really? Could you at least spare us the days? Second, there's the so-many-twists-oh-God-make-it-stop tactic that they all employ now. Where are all the good old movies that had just one twist?

I don't like them movies. They make me feel dumb.

Angry Demons

Whenever you see an exorcism scene, the demon is always angry. This is supposed to scare you, along with the wall-climbing, green vomiting and all of that. I don't know about you but this whole angry thing is losing it's appeal with me. After all, we expect the demon to be angry, right? And the whole scene is very predictable: priest comes in, demon is mad, priest splashes Holy water on the demon, demon goes away. Not scary.

Now, if as soon as the priest walks in, the demon gives him an uncaring look and continues whatever he's doing, you should be worried, because that's one psycho demon you have there. The kind of demon who after the priest commands him to depart, would look the priest in the eye and in his best DeNiro impression would say: You talkin' to me?

....now that's freaken scary.

Facebook's Hypocracy

Did you notice how everyone who knows your name is adding you on Facebook?! Shouldn't there be like a bare minimum of what qualifies as a "friend" is? Like for example:

- A friend is someone who you have met at least 5 times in your life?

Or

- A friend is someone who at some point in your relationship you used to say something apart from "Good morning, how are you doing?"?

Decaffeinated Fesh

It's official I'm off the good stuff for over 3 months now. It's not that I don't drink coffee at all now, off course I enjoy the occasional cup of coffee with a friend. The achievement however, in my humble point of view, is that I cut down my coffee intake from 4-5 cups a day, to 1-2 weekly. Letting go was not easy, I mean Coffee has been an integral part of my University years, when bumming the lab and working of THE ULTIMATE NEMESIS required massive amounts of coffee. And then came work, I must say coffee at work is essential for 5 main reasons:

1. When you come in the morning, you know your corporate laptop will need at least 20 mins to start up, right? Yeah we all know that Big Brother from Computer & Communication department has loaded our laptops with too much spying software. So a morning coffee is not an option, it's needed.
2. Coffee break is the venue for the office gossip: who will get promoted or fired in the upcoming weeks IF NOT DAYS!
3. If you want to catch someone on a short notice (and as usual everyone is busy), there's a 50% chance that proposing to "talk this over coffee?" will work. Sure beats sending a meeting invite that the recipient will not even entertain with a decline.
4. Simply to have "your thing" with your other non-smoking (read: loser) office buddies. YES smokers you heard us, you go outdoors and enjoy your smoke break, damn it we enjoy our coffee breaks too!
5. Finally... *ahm*.....BECAUSE IT TASTES NIIIIIICE AND THE SMELL OH MY GOD WHY DID I DO THIS TO MYSELF... I JUST NEED ONE LAST CUP AND I PROMISE I WI....

*Two guys from the rehabilitation institution come out and restrain the raging Fesh, injecting him with the decaffeination serum to tranquilize him........