Hello all.

Well Friday ended badly. I was leaving and some numbskull thought it was ok to hit my car right in front of me, nearly gassing me away aaaaaaand *tried* to drive off. O snaps Madame Henia was not having it. I throw my purse at their window trying to get them to stop. I should threw a rock. Cursing (astagfurullah) as mad as I was... the situation let's just say got sticky and the police were no help either. I am so pissed. Nice car blemished now.
I am starting to get sick too.
Well 2 threads closed, not sure why... but I am not even going there. I think I donnot really want to know.
Still did not buy a %*(&@ printer. Went to Best Buy, and hahaha seriously there are NOT the best buy. I found a nice printer that was a 3-n-1 copy scan and print for $50, saw it for $40 at Wal-mart...but ^(*^% you have to buy the USB cable and ink, so it comes out to be $90... ye right...no deal there. Going to Big Lots and all the $1 in my area to *try* a USB cable. I saw them several times at the $1 store...(stupid me never thought to buy one)... for sure I am NOT going to pay $40 for a ^%)(*^ cable.
And of course I ran off time and did not get my passport style photos (Doooh!) Snaps, I really need to send that visa app...I am really going OUT of time now.
But on a happier note: I bought my daughter a (cheapy) Mp3 player and some software to get her ready for 3rd grade (yea!)...

And for the person who asked about DHL: I have used DHL in the past and paid about 90$ for thin letter sized envelope to be delivered to Algerie. Arrived without any complications. Alos have used UPS, paid about $40 for the same sized letter and had no problems with delivery either!

OK, now I am going to bed.

Henia, sorry to hear about the accident that just stinks!!!! I hope you can get your insurance to cover the damages though.

I actually went out tonite for the first time in ages, months even. A friend invited me to a Devils game (hockey - NJ team) and then we had dinner. I just got home, just in time to get comfy and give my sweetie his wake up call for work.

Tomorrow I'm going to hang with my Jordanian girlfriend and her family, she's gonna teach me to make a couple dishes. That's one of the projects I assigned to myself is to pick up a few new recipes. I've been one to eat out 4-6 nights a week, which is expensive and not healthy. I want to get in the habit of cooking more often at home.

I hope everyone has a great holiday weekend (prez day on monday). Enjoy!!!

Oh, that's not good! But it could have been worse maybe? I always try to see the bright side, even as i I am yelling some serious curse words at someone Or maybe I'll try to see the bright side in a week or so anyway

Beautiful orchid Julianna

Thanks, it lives in my diningroom this time of year.

Henia

*hugs* for Henia.

Saturday is beginning with a nervous breakdown, waiting for Ahmed to get here. Ive been cleaning the house for four hours to keep busy, but I havent heard from him yet. I checked Lufthansa's website and his flight to and from Germany have come and gone, but he hasnt called. Im just hoping he was hurrying to the gate and made his flight, but didnt have time to call. Its amazing, however, all the ridiculous incidents the female brain can think of LOL.

Psst, my irrational fear is my Dh will get lost in O'Hare and have to live there forever, eating fries out of the trashcan by McDonald's in terminal 5 and not be able to call me, and grow old and die and be burried in one of the planters. I KNOW this will never happen but I keep thinking about it LOLOL!

Exactly! My brain is one big tangled ball, rolling around seeing how many crazy messes it can start. I told him that its more important to make his flight than stop to call me, but Im still a worrywart. And unfortunately, the airline isnt allowed to tell me if he's on the flight. Poo. He's arriving in Ohare in about 8 hours, but Im not too worried about him getting lost. I went through there a week ago on my way home from Morocco so I was able to give him good instructions. Ohare was pretty nice to me too.

That's right! We have a "sweetie watch" tonight!

Its comforting to be able to come here and know there are others watching our progress and ready to lend an ear(eye) when Im stressed. I appreciate it Im gonna try to hit the sack now, Its almost 230. Incha allah I will see my sweetie in a little over 12 hours.

Woo! I hope he gets through Ohare easily! I keep making a mental map every time I go there

Thanks Green Eyed Girl and Gabi... I really needed that.

Wow Julianna always wanted an orchid but just not sure if I could handle taking care of one...is it hard?

Alots of prayers for Gabi's SO to arrive safely.... Start the clock countdown plz......

Unfortunately, time moves much slower than this when you're waiting for your love.

Just depends on your conditions and which orchid., The easiest are phals or anything in that alliance, they require similar care to African violets.

Hmmm I will have to look into that, but I live in a really cold state so not sure without some hothouse type holding area if I would have an orchid.

Unless you keep your house under 60* and only have north-facing windows, then I think you should be fine.

Happy Saturday everybody! Hope you all have a good one.

Ohare might have delays today. It has snowed all night and still snowing. Have a wonderful reunion with your man.

The only green thing I can keep alive is bamboo. Is that a weed? or a plant? I really envy you Julianna. I like plants. They just don't like living here.

Jackie

I loooooooooooooooove orchids. There is a nursery in Dallas/Richardson that specializes in orchids and a wander thru their greenhouse is wonderful. I am afraid to buy something really fancy because I think it will just die or get knocked off the plant stand. Although, I think I might consider it again as the kitties are all past the kitten stage of pulling everything down. LOL, I bought myself flowers for Valentine's day and they are still OK. I do have a nice plant light that is going to waste right now. hmmmmm, do I have time to go to the nursery today??? It is not far from the grocery and on my way back from the pedicure/manicure lady, hehe!!!

Henia, I just bought that printer at Best Buy. You can get the same cable at Target for $10 - I did!

My DH did get lost in O'Hare. Luckly, he found an arabic speaking janitor to point him in the right direction. Make sure he has plenty of time to switch flights.

We went to dinner at my daughter's last night. Going to seattle today. Sun is finally out. Ready to go eat breakfast now, which I hope my dear Omar is going to make.
Henia: I hope you are doing ok. I know even though you weren't physically hurt, it is an emotional ordeal to go through.
Gabi: Call me when you wake up..Omar and I are watching for your news.

Have a good Saturday everyone.

Oh how many hours now until he's here????????


Henia I am so sorry hon. I hate car accidents. $90 for a letter though???? That's a bit steep for me.


I'm so frustrated this morning. Last night I was trying to book my trip to Egypt on Alitalia and after I finally signed up for their frequent flyer plan and entered in all my info their website went down. Now all this morning I've been trying and I endter my info, agree to the terms, pick my seat and then BOOM it brings me to the first page again. It's like an infinite loop. I'm tempted to pay the $10 or so extra and book it through orbitz instead but I'm afraid that Alitalia will now mess it up and now I'm second guessing flying with them at all. Thing is it's just about the cheapest option. $1,300 round trip and the arrival times are wicked good with only a little under 3 hours layover each way. The other cheapo is Iberia but on the trip back there is less than an hour layover on one leg (two connections) and that's just not enough I don't think.

UGH. My oldest came home from a sleepover this morning and she is one cranky little ten year old.

On the bright side my belly dancing tape came in! The hubby keeps asking me to show him some moves so I'd best get cracking. lol

When are you looking to go doodle? Even when I went in June and August, my ticket was always $1200 or less I think, and you should have it cheaper out there on the east coast.

July 20 to 29. The cheapest on all the sites I checked : cheaptickets.com, kayak.com, airgorilla.com, priceline.com (even tried bidding), hotwire.com, orbitz.com, hotels.com, expedia.com, was Iberia for $1,000 (9something but I can't remember so I rounded). The next is Alitalia at $1,300 (again rounded). After that is Air France at $1,300 but with less than 2 hour layovers so no way jose, then it jumps to about $1,500.

Oy. Maybe I won't be going with the DH back to Egypt when he goes to visit his family. There's a lot of things I could buy with $1000!

Oh btw I'm such a Rahma wanna be. lol.

I've started a blog of my own. It's soooo addicting but fun and I think more productive for me than living here all the time. I'll just live here 50% of the time now.

check out the cool name that was available too!

http://bostonmuslimah.blogspot.com/






yeah airfare is steadily on the rise. I listened to a special on NPR a few weeks ago and it's not going to get cheaper anytime soon if their predictions are correct.

Now if I could only get the Alitalia website to work!! Hope their planes are more reliable!!

I was having a lot of fun with my blog, but now my work filters out blogger

Did you try looking at the ads in the travel section in the local paper? Sometimes the local travel agents (owned by ME and others) that deal with the ME crowd have tickets that are very cheap. Would be worth calling a few local agents to find out.

I'm thinking about having this Sunday be an all Moroccan food day. My only problem is that I don't really know a typical meal plan in Morocco. I have dinner ideas, but I am completely lost on lunch and especially breakfast! Does anyone know of a place to find out about typical Arabic dishes for an entire day? I think any region would be good, not just Morocco.

Besides my Sunday idea, I'm just defrosting from the winter storm this week. It is finally above freezing!

I don't get the local paper normally but because of the fact that my town had the first female death in Massachusetts from the war in Iraq, they sent it to everyone for free. I'll go dig it out of the trash and see what they have. Meanwhile though I actually called Alitalia and they confirmed that their website is having technical problems. The woman was super nice and let me put a hold on the flight until April for $1,288. I tried to pay for it but they wouldn't take a debit card, only a credit card.

Ok is he here yet???? Doesn't his plane land at 2pm?

Morrocon day sounds fun! Too bad I have two girls who are uber picky eaters and only like pizza and chicken fingers. I can't even cook any type of fish in the house when they're with me unless I want to hear "eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeew" all day long.

Try ASAP travel maybe they can help you. Web site is www.asaptickets.com

Where's Gabi?

in morocco, at least my fiance's family and the other families i've stayed with....

for breakfast they eat light. a croissant, bread, with jam, butter, laughing cow cheese, and sometimes amlou (depending where you're from) tea

lunch is the BIG meal! a tagine, salad, and bread. or couscous. then fresh fruit for dessert.tea

a snack in afternoon. tea and cookies. nuts. dried fruits. little things.

dinner is smaller. maybe some kefta, kebabs, salad, and bread. fruit for dessert.tea sometimes a big tagine too.

of course all families are different but these are basically the typical meal plan i've seen on an average day!

that's abt how it was for us too, Jen... but at home we mostly had either couscous or some sort of tagine w/ bread and salad for lunch or dinner (not so much kefta/kebabs). We also ate lentils and harira frequently. I miss my family there .

eta: I'm preparing a tagine right now!

LOL Bamboo outside? Depends on if it's running bamboo and you like your neighbors

Here I am! And I got my honey! EEEEEEEEEEEEE Im so excited! I picked him up at the airport about 3 hours ago and took him to Don Pablo's for lunch, he really enjoyed it. After I brought him home and gave him the 10 cent tour he is currently enjoying his first American bath .

Thanks to all who supported me through this very trying process and helped me survive until I could bring my sweetie home. Hamdouallah!

Best Wishes enjoy your times

Mabruk Gabi! Been checking in for you all day... soo glad he's here safe & sound. You'll have to give a full report later when you've both recovered!

congrats and best of life for both of you

mmm what kind of tagine? my fiance says he can't wait to get away from moroccan food. i'm going to bombard him with american, mexican, japanese, italian, etc until he wishes he had a tagine again. hehehe....

speaking of harira, i have my soontobemominlaw's harira in my freezer right now. she used the mutton from eid to make it and i'm saving it for when my mama comes to visit me so she can try it.



p.s. say what? bamboo forest, julianna? hehe

WOO HOO!!!! Have fun guys!

it was a tomato, carrot, red/green/yellow bellpepper & turkey/chicken sausage (no pork casing!) tagine - and it was really good, but I forgot to put preserved lemon in it and it really does make a difference! We had it w/ whole wheat french bread - tasty!

Cool..thanks... I thought it would be cheap at Wal-mart but no....but I will check Target




Elhamdullah he is here and Mabrouk'

Where is everybody??????

Have fun!!!!

insomnia sucks!!!!!

I'm staying up half the night to spend some time with my hubby when he wakes up.

Time differences suck!