http://blog.haniobaid.com The Power of N Sat, 19 Jul 2008 09:05:43 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en On my way home Wednesday, my taxi driver was commenting on the prisoner exchange between Israel and Hezbollah. He thought it was too good to be true, and that Israel must be getting something else behind the scenes. I think the problem is that like many who celebrated ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/07/18/is-this-victory/ Music is my mood-altering drug of choice. Even in school, when a teacher would occasionally assign students to memorize and recite a poem. I found the poetry boring by itself, and would take the poem home, come up with a tune to go with the words, then go to class ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/06/28/my-life-in-music/ What is Spyware: The administrator of any site you visit can find out your IP (then your location, place of work, ISP), hostname, language settings, operating system, browser/version, screen resolution, referrer (site you came from), and exit page (site you left to). A prolific advertising system can find out even more ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/06/17/spyware-101/ I am answering MMM's tag by listing 6 of my quirks, but I'm going to restrict myself to one topic, television! 1. Viewing Time: On average I watch about 20 minutes of live TV per week, and even then only because I happen to be in the living room when one ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/06/07/tvhead/ I was napping when I heard a knock. I reluctantly got up, and opened the door only to find a total stranger. He introduced himself and explained he's from out of town, and works with my sister. We shook hands and then without further introductions he asked me what I ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/06/04/some-questions-are-better-left-unasked/ In January Tala reported that google sent a delegation to Jordan university to discuss the possibility of a new regional office. This month, Google posted 3 Job Positions in the (Middle East) region. These are under a separate category from job listings for its existing offices in Egypt and UAE. ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/05/31/google-leaning-towards-a-new-emea-office-in-amman-jordan/ One of the new words I learned when I started working in Amman is (Asfeen). My colleagues define it as (anyone who says something negative about another employee to their supervisor). Personally I would qualify that definition to (anyone who complains to the employee's supervisor without first trying to work ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/05/24/asfeenology-101/ I was born in Jerusalem. My father was born in Hebron, and my mother in Nablus. I lived half my 31 years in Ramallah. My full name is Hani Yaser Amer Ali Ismaeil Obaid. The Ali Ismaeil part repeats 13 times. The last Ali-Ismaeil-Ali trio moved to Dubai a few ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/05/14/memories-of-the-old-country/ The following is a mixture of science, fiction, voodoo and an over-active imagination. Natural Selection is the term Darwin proposed to describe the idea that favorable inherited (genetic) traits would become more common after several generations, because the unfavorable traits would make it less likely to survive. Keep in mind that ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/05/10/unnatural-selection/ Yesterday, 3 colleagues and I were on lunch break and headed for a restaurant. It was 1PM and too hot for my taste. On the way, we saw a horse tied to a tree. The horse seemed to be looking directly at us. For a moment I could have sworn ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/05/01/horse-donkey-mule/ A. The eyes are no more. My name is Bugs, king of Rabbits, Look upon my ears, oh ye mighty, and despair! Why does a rabbit need gloves ? B. Yellow Rubber Ducky Why is the duck smiling ? Why is it yellow ? How does an infant know what to do with the ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/04/26/bleh/ Before answering a tag, it is customary to say who tagged you, but then you will be ungrateful to the person who tagged them, and the person who tagged the person who tagged them, and the person who tagged the person who......you get the picture (it all goes back to ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/04/01/tag-241-why-i-blog-10-random-facts/ 1. I read this in a poetry book I got as a present There was a guy named Bill Who swallowed a nuclear pill The doctor said "cough" And they found his head in Brazil 2. I will practice on Dave, because he's easy to rhyme There was guy named Dave Who found photographers must be ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/03/21/kvorlons-shmorlons-attack-of-the-4-liners/ 10. We have a thing for coffee kettles! 9. Safe-haven: Do you speak Arabic ? Has your country been invaded, attacked, or torn by civil unrest ? Have no fear, Jordan is here. 8. The water is so clean, Jesus came here all the way from Nazareth to get baptized! 7. We have ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/03/12/top-10-reasons-to-love-jordan-bajo/ 1. Myth: Anyone seeking a cease-fire in Gaza is a sell-out and a traitor: A cease-fire is first and foremost about stopping the killing of innocent people. Let us define innocent as unarmed. Fellow blogger Fadi wrote appealing for moderation, and in return he was bombarded with a deluge of hateful ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/03/06/gaza-myths/ Two things I've always admired about Roba's blog are the ajax plugin which adds the comments inline without refreshing the page, and the custom anti-spam words. In the past few months, I've tried a dozen different ajax inline-comment plugins and couldn't get any of them to work with my theme. ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/03/02/custom-anti-spam-words-on-wordpress/ 1. Whenever I'm talking to my friend X in public, and a beautiful woman passes by, he could be in mid-speech, and he would stop and stare at her from head to toe until she's out of sight (think of the scene in cartoons where the eyes are popping out), ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/02/28/obsession-and-euphemism/ US Modifies Surface-To-Air Missile To Target Objects In Space The US sent official diplomatic notice in January to over 200 countries announcing that one of its spy satellites (US-193 / NROL-21) would soon drop out of orbit. The bus-sized satellite was launched in 2006 by Lockheed Martin using a ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/02/15/quietly-resurrecting-the-cold-war-or-worse/ Prologue: On reading this post written by Fadi, I started thinking about racist jokes, and how some don't seem to understand why they can be offensive. Others insist they aren't because someone from the race being ridiculed laughed at it, or repeated it. Others still will tell those offended they ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/02/09/racist-jokes-and-kvorlons/ This morning my Heating Fuel distributor (Abu Nabeel) called me about 30 minutes before he was scheduled to arrive. He explained that prices went up last night, and that 1000 Liters would cost 563JD ($794) instead of the usual 323.5JD ($456). It was like hearing someone had died, when they ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/02/08/can-you-pay-my-bills/ I love to sing, but I don't have a great voice. So I prefer to sing-along instead. I try to do this with the doors closed so as not to disturb anyone ! All it takes is the lyrics, and some method to highlight the line currently being sung. You ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/01/27/dalida-and-how-to-do-karaoke-with-mp3s-in-any-language/ In computer science we often have to take a real life scenario and translate it into cold machine logic. For the diciest situations, we invented things like fuzzy logic, and so-called Artificial Intelligence algorithms. These terms obscure how little progress has been made in this field. The ability to mimic ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/01/14/hello-my-friend-hello/ Fellow blogger Mkilany recently introduced me to a new term "Byzantine Argument". He explained it is an argument just for argument's sake. I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing. To find the truth, both sides of an argument must be represented. This is a basic debate principal, and ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2008/01/05/111/ Food & Family (click photo to enlarge, click again to reduce) Me and my brother Sami (right). Sami is saluting. Lucky for us he didn't join any army. The four of us The goat outfit. I am told it was very difficult to get me to pose for this photo, and that payment (candy) ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/12/26/show-tell-the-two-big-fs/ Why is this the best time of the year ? Is it because it's Eid-al-adha ? Well, the official definition says we're to celebrate Eid Al-Adha because Abraham was willing to sacrifice his son to affirm the strength of his faith in God. Some of the Muslim, Jews, and Christians ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/12/25/the-best-time-of-the-year-for-me-the-janitor/ I was scheduling a conference call with a customer, and if memory serves, the conversation went something like this: Customer: I'm sorry, was your name Honey? (heavy southern accent) Hani: Hani, it's like Danny but with an H. Customer: Alright Hahny, so what time-zone are you on ? Hani: I'm on GMT+2. It's 5:30PM. Customer: ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/12/16/what-is-the-correct-response/ Have you ever needed to express yourself, but couldn't find the right word ? Did you then try to find it, but fail miserably? What then ? Did you give up ? What if you could invent new words ? Why am I whatifing ? (what + if + ing) Aren't we already creating words ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/12/08/do-you-speak-engliki-or-baggism-101/ A lot of new laptops come with fingerprint readers. They let you authenticate without a password not only to logon to your machine, but also to websites like gmail, hotmail, etc... My sister Mona got such a laptop, a Sony Vaio, and I was setting it up for her. Hani: See ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/12/03/ultimate-pessimism/ In 1990, my parents sent their 12 year old youngest son (me) to summer camp in Alexandria (Egypt). It featured the usual activities found in such camps: lousy food, uncomfortable beds, sports, and singing (the fun part). This camp also specialized in Computer programming; really just an excuse to call ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/11/27/killer-commas-camp-horror-stories-good-intentions-and-other-minutiae/ November 19 is World Toilet Day ! The average person supposedly spends 3 years of their life in the bathroom. More for women I think because women's restrooms tend to be more ummm pleasant. Still, That's like an hour a day in the most boring room in the house. So ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/11/16/bathroom-soiree/ Warning: The following may contain views contradicting your own. If you are under 10 years of age, cannot deal with differing creeds, or are scared of the big bad wolf, please take the nearest exit. My good friend Issa joined my family for lunch, the next day we had this conversation: Issa: ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/11/03/god-should-have-studied-marketing/ As a not so young man of 30, the subject of marriage is often brought up. Sometimes this is not so subtle. Have you ever been in a situation where you meet someone for the first time, then as soon as they find out you're single, they introduce you to ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/30/marriage-counter-sales-pitch/ In random order Original (O1-O31): Are they capable of uttering these 3 phrases: "I'm sorry", "I made a mistake","I don't know". How do they treat: the waiter, the garbage man, the cashier, the maid, the doorman. Are they a good listener ? How do they react to opposing opinions ? Do they raise their ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/17/people-meter/ Next week I will be flying to the US on a business trip. The itinerary includes at least 3 flights each way. I've flown plenty of times of before. I know that statistically, I am safer up there than riding in a car (particularly in Amman). However this safety factor ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/15/flying-ww2-style/ Earlier today, my brother handed me a book he just finished reading and recommended it as "similar to Clancy". It was the New York Times Bestseller Spy by Ted Bell. So I did what I normally do when someone hands me a fiction novel. I turned it over to read ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/12/when-will-the-villains-stop-speaking-arabic/ As we all know most guys hate shopping, this is partly responsible for our tendency to be loyal to a specific brand once we found one we like (lucky for the wife), and why commercials tend to target women more. Even then, nothing is worse than having to shop for ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/09/male-shopping-strategy-101-the-underwear-shortage/ After reading Nasim's post about smoking. I was pondering the instances where I dabbled with addiction. Smoking: When my grandfather died many years ago, people came to our house to give condolences. As is apparently customary they were served black coffee and cigarettes. All known brands of cigarettes were available. My ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/10/06/falling-of-the-wagon/ Whenever my mom is visiting she gets on my case to "trim" my unruly eyebrows, and once even threatened to take a pair of scissors, and cut them in my sleep ! Like Samson, I fear losing all my magical powers. Aid comes from an unexpected source ! Me: but mom, ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/30/browless-wonders/ Here is Abu Mahjoob's Ramadan Production Line: For the past week, here is my "Ramadan production line": 12AM: Sleep 7AM: Shut off alarm 7:30AM: Actually Get out of bed 7:30AM: Breakfast 8AM-12PM: Connect to my office PC from home to work 12PM: Exercise on Treadmill 12:30-1:20PM: Free Time 1:20PM: Wait for heating system to heat the water 1:30PM: Shower 1:45PM: Prepare ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/27/send-in-the-clowns/ Normally, I'm not a superstitious person. I'm agnostic. I don't believe in astrology, aliens, or conspiracy theories. I am Scully to anyone's Mulder ! Yet there is one bit of mumbo-jumbo I do believe in. I consider the letter N very lucky, and attractive ! The more N's the better. ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/23/an-n-by-any-other-name/ I got my power bill yesterday. It was handed to me by our building's caretaker Shnuda. A note within read: "Power will be cut without notice if not paid by: (Today's date)" It was Saturday, and the banks were closed, so it's only possible to pay at the power company itself. ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/23/an-adventure-at-the-power-company/ I was going to the safeway (Dwar Il-Madeeneh) on my way back from work yesterday, and I noticed some graffiti on the pedestrian bridge. It was asking workers to "Not settle for 1 day off a week, and demand their right to a 2-day weekend from their employer". My first ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/21/3-day-weekend/ It has been some time since I wrote a serious entry. So I thought I'd tackle one of my most controversial opinions. This word Tatbee3 (التطبيع) has become a dirty word. In the Arab world it seems to have lost all other meaning, and now only refers to normalizing relations ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/21/tatbee3-normalization-the-dirtiest-word-of-them-all/ In this post, Jad suggested Linux as an alternative to expensive OS like MAC/Windows. While I think Linux makes a wonderful server platform performance-wise, when it comes to learning-curve, and user-friendliness, it doesn't measure up. So I would not recommend it to anyone none-technical. This made me recall an exercise I recently ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/19/it-setting-up-multi-instance-mysql-on-windows-vs-linux/ I got tagged by VA. So here are my thoughts on 15 words of her choice. Loneliness: The default emotion. You don't have to be alone to be lonely. As much as I'd like, I'm neither a rock nor an island. I need people. Fear: Something we must master to have courage. ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/18/homemade-tag/ As you may or may not be aware, I am not very fond of children. However I dwelled on this post by Hamede. He was feeling guilty because he swore at his mother's father when she hit him as a child more than 37 years ago which prompted his ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/18/innocence/ Induction: (knock on room door) *I open the door to find our maid holding something in her hand* *Maid Hands over a 50JDs ($70) banknote along with a USB flashdisk* Maid: Sir, I found this in your pants, It's still wet! *I take them nonchalantly, and restrain any reaction* Me: Ok, thank you. *Maid goes back to ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/17/of-honesty-hungry-washing-machines-and-linguistic-geometry/ It all adds up to 900 cals (500 if you go for the English variation). As alway, please consult your Mom, doctor, or astrologer before embarking on any life changing (or ending) steps. Muhahaha ! Breakfast 8-9AM: Two cups Elle & Vire Light 0% Fruit Yogurt, pick the flavor you like ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/16/the-spartan-singles-diet/ Welcome to my Inner Sanctum. This is the only Perfume I use. Its called Issey Mayaki. It has sandalwood, cedar, cinnamon, and nutmeg among other things. Its a bed, in some parts of the world, it is used for sleeping. Duh, what else would you use it for ?The plan to ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/14/show-and-tell-the-bedroom-tour/ So I haven't fasted since I was 9 years old, and even then I would sneak someplace dark and deserted and have my continental breakfast (a bag of chips) underneath a heavy piece of furniture. Now that I'm grown up (at least according to my shaving mirror), I don't sneak, it ... http://blog.haniobaid.com/2007/09/13/to-fast-or-not-too-fast/