Random Thoughts of the Week #2

*My muscles surprised me by how cool they were after a two hour workout at the gym last night! Considering it was my first time ever..!! I thought I'd be in bed for two days due to muscle cramp!


*Dear Mr. fly,
You have made a really powerful enemy this morning when you woke me up at 7am with your buzzing. 
If you were a mosquito, your behavior could have been justified, but what on God's green earth do you want from me!?  


*We all know you're a busy person. Your schedule is packed. You barely have time to call friends and relatives and connect with them. You order take-away instead of cooking.. that's how busy you are. But I honestly believe you have enough time to actually pronounce words instead of their abbreviations!! Saying PB&J instead of peanut butter and jelly will NOT save you precious time you cannot afford to waste!! Nor will EVOO instead of extra virgin olive oil!! And saying BTW instead of by the way?!?! Really??

*Someone emailed me yesterday and told me that my blog header had a spelling mistake. Now I'm going to have to remake the header all over again.Yippee. Or.. I could  just leave it like that. Who cares really. 

*Thank God I'm not the only one who thinks Giada De Laurentiis is a phony and should be charged with fraud.

New Cover for SISTERS

This is the new cover of SISTERS magazine.
Some voice inside me goes all "Oh! Look!! This is my photo!!!" every time I look at this!
Yes, I know, I should get over it.

Commercials and Ads Are Evil

I don't really watch TV. Especially Arabic TV, and on the rare occasions that I do, it would either be National Geographic Channel, Jamie Oliver, or BBC's Top Gear (yes.. top gear). But.. you don't have to be a TV-aholic to notice the evil commercials and ads on there.

One ad that seriously gets under my skins is the Fair&Lovely ad. More than one actually, they keep making new ones every season.

So basically this is how it goes in all of their ads. A girl with a natural olive complexion and dull hair (notice how this isn't a shampoo ad) is pictured as being miserable and unsuccessful in whatever she does. She starts using fair&lovely, and suddenly.. she gets the dream job, everyone starts liking her, she starts smiling, her hair becomes gorgeous, and lets not forget her confidence and self esteem!!!!
Their advertising line is "Say yes to life!". So unless you're very white and very beautiful (good looking is not good enough), you have no life. You're worthless.

Now please tell me... what EVIL is this?!

This isn't about a company that wants to make more sales, its about making women feel uncomfortable in their own skin, and when I say skin, I don't mean the layer of soft tissue that covers their muscles and what not, I mean making them hate their surroundings and blame their failure on their lack of  unrealistic-beauty that is shown in most ads and commercials.

This would lead them to use more of the products that are being advertised, which are poisonous and do more harm than good, live with an obsession of being beautiful (and I think we've all seen where that could lead), etc.. etc.. and therefore living an unnatural, unhealthy life, unable to focus on bigger goals. Not to mention the emotional struggle they have to live through when comparing themselves with the models of said ads.

Why I mentioned the Fair&Lovely ad is because it's extremely obvious, pardon me, but you'd be a giant idiot if you didn't notice.

 I don't understand why no one talks about this??!!! Where is all that talk about empowering women? Where are all those silly feminists? The women's rights activists? The WORLD?! And they have the nerve to call hijab oppressive!!!!???
People are either seriously blind, or they can see, but they don't really care.

I could write three more posts about how this particular ad can harm society, including how a husband would look at his wife after seeing the ad and despise her for not looking as attractive as the model. How women would get judged based on their looks.. etc. (yes.. some people can be that superficial, even if it was only deep in their hearts), but I'd leave that to another day.

P.S I hope no one felt offended by the word "giant idiot", that was a metaphor, and I don't mean "you" per se, I mean people in general. Besides, when one is ranting on their blog, they have the right to use such words.

A Draft

I found this unpublished post in my drafts folder. I can't remember where exactly I wanted to go with this.. but I thought I'd share.

"Ever heard of the slogan "live the moment"? I'm sure you all have. Some of you might even use it. But have you ever felt it? Or lived by it? I hardly think so.
We live as if the present does not exist, as if we are living for the future, waiting for moments to pass so we could move on to the next. Hoping that perhaps future moments are the ones worthy of living for, but.. the cycle begins again."

Hmmmm.. I wonder what was I trying to say here...

Random Thoughts of the Week

*Why is it that the best ideas only come to me when I'm about to fall asleep? And for some odd reason, they don't sound as good as they did the night before?

*I just don't understand for the life of me why people here don't celebrate Eid the way they celebrate christmas, or even valentine, even though this is supposedly an islamic country!! No decorations in malls or hotels, no gift giving, no festive spirit, no greeting cards.. why?! While christmas, easter and other christian holidays get all the attention... does that make sense?

*Why haven't they invented a cleaning, cooking, laundry doing, dish washing, litter changing, cutlery polishing, robot yet? And a hair dresser too while they're at it. They have the technology!!

*Oh November!! I love you, your candy-blue skies, your fleecy white clouds, your peppermint-fresh breeze.. please don't leave me!! I will miss you so!!

*It's Eid tomorrow.. how did time fly so fast?!

Happy Eid everyone :)
May Allah shower you all with blessings, and may your dreams come true!!

I knew it!! I just knew it!

So.. my theory proved to be correct. Even if you decided you want to live in a cat-free environment, the decision is not yours to take!!

It is not up to you to decide, it just simply isn't.
The little rascals would know you have a soft spot, and they sure do know how to take advantage of that!!!!
Those illegal immigrants have settled right in front of the kitchen door, and now they live there.
They're a family of four feral kittens.

I think they came as a gift from God. Feeding them and caring for them (even if they just live in your backyard) is a blessing that I should be grateful for. I just worry about their future. Because I know that every cat-love story we lived did not end well. No happy endings.. (although Babyface and his family did end up in a loving home, the unhappy ending was on our side.)