Cinnamon Zone: Thoughts

The Early Signs of Workaholism

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 23:53:00 GMT

As it turned out, traffic lights seem to be my new venue of inspiration

As I was leaving work today, as usual, I had to stop at a traffic light, and since it was Sunday and the traffic was heavy I had to wait a bit longer. So, I started to get bored and I had that feeling or urge or whatever that I can't be just sitting around waiting and listening to the radio, I had to do something, so I fished out the scratch card I'd bought earlier to recharge my balance, and a piaster to scratch it with, you know how they keep giving you piasters with change especially those big super makrkets, someone should put an end to that! Nothing must be sold for a price that's not a multiple of 5! Anyway, fidgety concerns aside, I scratched the card, picked up my mobile and started to recharge the balance, all the while sneaking a peek every other moment at the traffic light to see if it's time to move, and before I knew it I found myself racing to type those numbers and hit the button, and that's when I stopped and asked myself: What am I doing?

I started wondering, was it really about wanting a pastime while I waited or was it about the thrill and exhilaration of meeting a deadline? Or perhaps I feel that I need to actually do something all the time. Whatever happened to relaxation and contemplation? And if it was about doing something, anything, then what about those non-work-related things I've been meaning to catch up on or even start with but never got around to doing them? And I'm not saying that there wasn't time, there's always time, it's just that I use it to do other things.

Recently I've been favoring work with much of my time. The other day I was too preoccupied with it that I actually dreamed about the file I was working on and I hadn't finished yet. That's another sign I guess. And, you know recently when I had the occasional toothache that crippled me for like 20 minutes if not more and I couldn't do anything until the pain subsided, do you know what I once thought? "How much work time have I missed during that painful spell?"

So, if you have any similar symptoms you are strongly advised to kick back before you kick off. Other signs may include admiring career obsessed TV characters, working late on weekends; underestimating the importance of sleep and feeling like your eyes are filled with sawdust.

Bottom line, work is great and everything, but when it starts to turn into an obsession and starts to take the place of other things in your life that are no less important than it, then you better nip it in the bud

Get well soon

Here's a Third Space for you

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 00:41:03 GMT

Ever since 7iber.com announced the Third Space photo competition I've been carrying my camera around most of the time. So far I haven't captured any photo that's contest material but this morning as I was racing up and down the streets trying to get to work "in time", I thought this was interesting.

I wonder how much does a person spend on a lifetime stopping at traffic lights, still prefer them to circles though! Sometimes...

Top (something) reasons not to talk to people

Thu, 04 Jun 2009 00:26:00 GMT

1. Because they are boring

2. Because you are boring

3. Because they don’t listen

4. Because they talk too much about themselves

5. Because they want you to do all the talking

6. Because they are too pessimistic and grumpy

7. Because they are annoyingly optimistic

8. Because you have so little in common

9. Because you don’t know what to talk about

10. Because you’re afraid that you might “spill the beans”

11. Because they are too vulgar

12. Because they are too refined

13. Because they are too opinionated

14. Because they can’t have a say in anything

15. Because they lie

16. Because you don’t want to lie to them

17. Because you can’t stand them for some reason

18. Because you have great chemistry and you’ll afraid to fall in love with them

19. Because they are crazy

20. Because there’s no time

21. Because they don't understand...

There’s always a reason…

I Dreamed a Dream...

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 23:49:00 GMT

Dreams are a fascinating thing. Sometimes so beautiful that you feel like crying when you wake up and find out it was all in your head, and sometimes so bizarre that your sigh with relief as you wake up with your heart pounding like a sledgehammer. Between those two extremes however, the weirdest, funniest, most beautiful curious things can happen.

As a child, I used to have that recurring dream and that I can still vividly remember. The sky was pink, an Israeli soldier was running after me, then comes my salvation: a ladder that leads to a cloud on which was the Egyptian actor Sameer Ghanem. Yes, I admit it, I was a fan of Fattuta (in my defense I was 5 years old or so). Have I bothered to figure out what that means if it means anything at all? No. Why am I telling this? Because it’s the oldest dream I can remember and in retrospect I find it a bit weird, I mean come on, the sky was PINK!

As I grew up I can’t say my dreams got weirder but let’s say there were different new features. Once I heard that there are two things you can’t do in a dream: switching the light off and turn around. So, there you go, I decided I should try it. And I did, I went to sleep and the next thing I knew I was in my dream, knowing that I was dreaming, trying to turn around and switch the light off. I know you might be wondering it worked. Well, it didn’t, but we can never be sure because the subconscious could be so tricky.

One of my all time favorites was that dream where my cousin and I were in a store and somehow we find ourselves in a situation where we were allowed to take everything we want for free. As we, in the dream mind you, were so busy packing things my sister stopped by in a go-kart-like car and told us that we were dreaming (what a buzz kill!). My cousin, in the dream mind you, was bummed. She was like: “Nooooo! Pinch me so I make sure” and so I pinched her and she was like: IK don’t feel anything! We are in deed dreaming!

That was something!

In another dream that I can’t remember anything of except the last part, my cousin and I were running and all of a sudden we realized that the dream came to an end, so I told her to stop right where she was so we can continue the adventure in the next dream.

But my favorite series of dreams was the one following Tawjihi. You know how everyone dreams that they are having exams after they finish school or college. In my case, it was freaking me out, seriously! Creepy nightmares in which I didn’t know the answers or couldn’t do the tests for some reason or another. So finally I could take it no more. I said to myself: next time, I will remember that it’s a dream. And so there I was a sleep and seeing myself in a room where my teacher was giving me the test paper. And then, before I started doing the test I stopped and said: Wait! This is a dream, I know it! I finished school! And so he smiles like sheepishly and says that’s absolutely right!

But recently, I must admit the most amazing thing happened to me in my dreams. A dream I had told me what I wanted. It told me what I was thinking, something I wasn’t aware of. It opened my eyes to reality. And that’s in my opinion is the greatest thing about dreams; they tell you the things you’re afraid to admit. They expose you to your own self. Your own fears and feelings. Not always pretty, but unlike reality, you cannot escape it and you have very little control over it.

Just don’t stretch it or over think it, and relax, I believe Paulo Coelho was being symbolic! So, Don’t take the next plane to Malawi or start digging in your Grandma’s backyard. After all it’s a dream, enjoy it while it lasts…

My First Rainbow

Sun, 29 Mar 2009 19:17:46 GMT

It’s the rainbow season in Amman. You know with the rain/shine weather people are starting to see rainbows more often here and there, I saw more than one post in the blogosphere about this, which made me think of the first time I saw a rainbow.

Rainbows are fascinating things, a colorful illustration of nature and a great symbol of how there’s always something good to look forward to after every adversity. Yet, most people I assume come to be familiar with rainbows as children through cartoons. Personally, I haven’t seen a real rainbow until I was probably 10.

It was a stormy day. My mother’s aunt had just passed away and my parents were at the wake, leaving my sister, brother and me at home. I can’t remember what year exactly was that but I’d say my eldest sister was around 13, I was 10 and my brother was 6, something in that vicinity.

The storm began raging outside, the rain was pouring and the wind was blowing against a small window in the laundry room. We started to panic, I don’t know why exactly but we were really scared and before we knew it we were crying like we’re in the middle of a nuclear war. We were utterly terrified, I remember that my sister was weeping and saying: “Our science teacher died this week, mom’s aunt died this week and it seems like we’re going to die too!” NOT HELPING!!

Well, looking back at this I think that either she was terrified of the concept of death due to the death of her teacher, or she was enjoying seeing us suffer. Well, I think that in this context the former explanation makes more sense, although we enjoyed seeing each other suffer as kids when we thought it would do no harm.

I can’t remember exactly whether the storm had subsided before my father came home or the other way around. All I know is that the weather calmed down just as we relaxed, had lunch and watched a movie we already recorded on tape, it was called “Buried Alive” or some such horrifying name, then we huddled over the window to see, for the first time as far as I’m concerned, the beautiful rainbow that was formed as the storm bid us farewell. It wasn’t like the one we used to see in “Sunbol” but it was truly a sight for the sore eyes, which makes me think now that it’s probably not the rainbow alone that puts a smile on your face, but the storm that preceded it, and the harsher the storm is, the more beautiful the rainbow is in the eye of the beholder.