Vegan Cats

Someone I vaguely know was in desperate need of a babysitter for her two cats while she would be away for over 2 months. My son and I are great cat lovers and I emailed her to say I'd take them.

She came a few Saturdays ago to see my place, with her Palestinian friend/cab driver who didn't want to come up to my apartment at first but when I insisted, he did. I wanted to impress him and offered him Arabic coffee, but my coffee failed to impress, and in fact was weaker than I usually make it. A big no no here.

"You have to add sugar first." He told me. Man, you really have to teach these Israelis everything. He told me where to get "real" Arabic coffee and when I run out of this package, I will.

But getting back to the cats, their owners are Vegans. The two cats have been in my house since Thursday night, are petrified of their new surroundings and hardly venture out of their soft cage where they prefer to sleep. I don't know what's wrong with them. I don't my son, they're retarded cats. I actually put chicken fresh from my chicken soup onto a plate and put it up to their noses. They sniffed and didn't budge. I mean what normal cat doesn't lunge for delicious, fresh chicken???? I think they might be vegans too and are probably horrified that I eat chickens and beef. They haven't touched their cat food either and I think they're on a hunger strike.

But they sure know what ticks me off. Saturday morning around 4:00 am, I hear them howling away. It's my one day off, for Fuck's Sake and they're howling and howling. I walked out of my room to see what was wrong about 5 times between the hours of 4:00 and 6:00 am. I think one cat was looking for her friend who wasn't with her. Then when the two found each other, they both howled. They probably miss their owners, but HELL, I hope they get used to me soon. I won't enjoy this 4:00 am wake-up call each morning, if they don't.

Hot times in the City

At the beginning of the month there was a Sextival in Tel Aviv. I laughed at the headlines in some of the news articles: "Sex Festival Penetrates Tel Aviv" - "Make Love Not War"..... Of course I didn't go even though I was tempted to take a voyeuristic peek at the goings-on and who goes to such places. With my Hubby being in Canada, it was hard (no pun intended) to find a partner-in-crime. It would have been actually fun to go and then bump into all these people whom you know but that you wouldn't have expected them to be there.

Then my HOT Cables were not behaving internet-wise and twice the internet stopped working - even now as I'm staying late at work not to work but to blog because I have no internet at home. My son is fighting me for the TV as he's "bored" without his internet companion.

My soldier daughter had a fit at my son and slapped him across the face for not helping me out one Friday. Then there was a whole lot of yelling and screaming which prompted my only neighbor on our floor to quickly lock her door, in case the war spilled over to her apartment. Did she actually think we were gonna just run and chase each other in her apartment? Probably. So much for our wonderful reputation in our new apartment.

And last week it was so warm, the almond blossoms were beginning to bloom, and I had put away my heavy winter coat in the closet, only to put it on again today. They say it'll snow again in Jerusalem.

We could use a bit of cooling off here, I think.

designer racks

My birthday passed uneventfully yesterday. My daughter, the one who does absolutely nothing (I asked her ONCE to take out the newspapers to the garbage outside and she dutifully took them outside our apartment and dumped them in the stairwell!), took me out for breakfast and made fish. She actually cut up some veggies and made Nile Perch for Friday night dinner. Breakfast was lovely at the Mizrachi restaurant in the shuk, which was decorated with balloons for someone else's birthday and Rolling Stones' music played in the background. I didn't want to leave. But how much breakfast can one eat?

Then I got assorted FaceBook messages and overseas phone calls from my sister and Hubby wishing me a happy one.

Bored out of my mind with staying home with nowhere to go since Tuesday evening, two cute salesmen from the Yes Satellite company convinced me to switch loyalties from Hot Cable Television. I had been with Hot for 12 years, and never faced any major problems with them at all, but I needed some excitement in my life right now and, unfortunately for me, switching from cable to satellite might do it.

Then with 100 or so extra shekels in my pocket after shopping in the shuk, I bought what every Israeli has in their home because mine was shattered.

The shattered rack:


A clothes drying rack. No one here uses an electric dryer. We all have one, of course, but we don't use them. Not unless it rains for 3 weeks straight and there is no way the clothes will dry indoors on these racks. But with the luxury of central heating, clothes did manage to dry indoors on those racks.

I went into the Iranian store where I got my Breville, praying I won't get ripped off. I saw the cheap drying racks that I had bought before and chose one over double the price. He wanted 175 NIS at first for it telling me that "it's Italian".

"It's plastic!!" I protested. "I don't need Italian designer clothes drying racks. I really don't. I don't care where they make the damn thing, I just want something strong that won't break!!"

"OK, for you, I'll make it 135 NIS"

It was 10 NIS less than where I saw it at another place. I had the cash. OK I'll take it.

In the end, I bought my Italian "designer" clothes drying rack, and made my daughter carry it home for me.

The Italian designer rack: