All bluffing aside, I am now a model for real. I know that it doesn’t make sense because I am petite and my bust-waist-hip measurements are not exactly Cocaine Kate (Kate Moss) material, but hey, this is 2008 and this is Tololy: ANYTHING can happen.

Seriously though, I posted pictures of my hands/nails on this blog at different points in the past. Some of these pictures were a documentation of my ‘good’ nail days, and others were a documentation of my ‘bad’ nail days. I admit I enjoy taking pictures of myself because I am a devoted narcissist as any of my friends and family will swear to you should you ask them, but that’s a topic for another day.

I was contacted by two sister websites: www.unghielunghe.com, and www.nailslong.com to be a hand model for them. Both sites are based in Italy and feature pictures of nails and hands and all things related to them, and it seems they found my nail pictures online and wanted me to join them. I said OK, so I expect my pictures to appear in these sites any day now. Pretty fetishistic and exciting, if you ask me — they’ve got some seriously long nails featured there.

I am, needless to say, flattered and very amused at this cosmic irony. Because right now, my hands look like they have just stepped out of a horror movie called Teeth. But the unexpected flattery of being asked to be a hand model (even if it doesn’t pay) got me thinking I should go easy on them.

Now I am off to pamper my hands by not eating them. People who want my autograph should contact me by email or by leaving comments on this post. Thank you.

Comments on the news:

…

Sharaf = Garaf.

Remember when I wrote about Mansaf and its significance in Jordanian culture? I put three pictures of a Mansaf made by my sister’s mother-in-law, they got everyone drooling and some others having heart attacks.

Well, today I was casually talking to my other sister while she opened some forwards sent to her. And lo and behold!, my Mansaf pictures were among them. Here they are with their respective comments:

I feel proud that my pictures are being forwarded.This must be how it feels like to be the forwards favorite Jameed.

What does he mean by this question?
Oh…what does ‘underlie’ and ‘overtone’ mean?
Hmmff.
Five minutes passed already?
What does he want exactly?
This is so confusing.
This is a trap test.
Why is everyone writing so excitedly?
What are they writing?
What do they know that I don’t?
I studied too!
Ok. Back to Q.1, what does he want me to say?
What does he expect?
I don’t remember what Said said about knowledge and power and hegemony.
Can I make it up?
Skip that question. Don’t waste time.
Hey, did my fall make me dumb? Like damage my brain?!
Blank.
Hmmm… The Sheik, I can do that.
Underlie? Assumptions? What?
Everyone is so into this exam. WHAT are they writing?
Maybe it’s just the smart American kids.
No, Arabs too.
Shit.
Ok, focus. The Sheik…Diana, Ahmed, World War I, projections, anti-feminist…
How do I start this?
Introduction.
Quick! Time!!!
I am not going to look at the time.
“Both the novel and the movie did more to portray contemporary transatlantic anxieties than…”
Blank.
What did I want to say?
What was my point?
None of what I wrote makes sense.
Think. Please. Think.
Jed is writing like a frog on steroids.
They’re nerds, this is a class of nerds.
Did I look like that when I was smarter?
I hate the smarter me. So nerdy.
Why am I not writing?
“…to depict an accurate image of Arabs at the time.”
Progress.
Q.3
Bernard Lewis. Ok, I know Lewis.
“What went wrong?” — relates to Arabs and non-Arabs.
What does that mean?
I am going to write whatever comes to my mind.
Arab victim mentality, unintrusive West, bla bla bla
Hmm. How do I finish this?
Did I really answer the question?
Arabs and non-Arabs? Readers? Politicians? What?
Idiot professor. WHAT does he want?
Why does he have to be so vague?
Why am I suffering to answer a question?
This has never happened before.
Blank.
How do I finish this?
Blank.
I can’t think of anything more to write.
Blank.
Maybe if I stretch my legs a little.
Blank.
He asked for two pages per question. Think!
Blank.
I’ll throw in a little philosophical spice and finish it.
Whatever.
It sucks to be dumb.

I am living proof that things can ALWAYS get much worse. As if all the suffering I have gone through since the start of 2008 was not enough, today more bad things happened.

I woke up with a badly sore throat and muscle ache all over, but I helped clear out a room that we wanted to paint. I kept going back and forth in the house to transfer objects from this room elsewhere. I hadn’t had breakfast yet because we were in a hurry to get the room ready. When the room was cleared out, my brother was dissembling a bed that remained there. I happened to walk by as he was working on the other end of the bed, and BAM!, a large wooden board fell on both my feet. The pain was excruciating. I remember leaning my hand against the wall and saying ‘it’s okay.’

When I woke up, my vision was blurry and my head hurt like a bitch. I saw my mother’s face, with tears in her eyes, and then I saw my brother wiping a damp cloth on my face and on my feet. I thought I was dreaming. My feet were killing me, and my head was buzzing. I asked them, ‘what happened?,’ and they just told me to stay still. I was very hot and I was trying to move the turtle neck I was wearing away from my neck. Everything hurt and I was very confused. Then I started crying.

Later on, I realized I had fainted and fell on the floor head-first. They tell me they thought I was okay when I leaned against the wall but that I suddenly seemed to want to stand tall and instead just dropped to the floor. When my head banged against the floor, I opened my eyes, then I was gone. Luckily, I didn’t bang my head on a sharp angle or any object. I got up after a while, bruised and shaken. I guess my system shut down because I was in a lot of pain, and the stress probably helped.

So, you see, 2008 is not my year. In addition to that early morning incident, which I remember every time I look at my blue-purple feet or try to move, I had a presentation to do at school and I did it because I did not want to lose the grades. I also learned that fixing my car will cost me 700 JD, which is obviously a fortune. Also, I have a research proposal to submit tomorrow and a midterm exam the day after.

I am extremely hating my life right now.

ANYONE who dares call me a pessimist as if it’s a bad thing will get bitchslapped by me until their nose bleeds maggots and their head becomes a hallowed ashtray for the butts of my cigarettes. That is a promise.

Lately, all the sleep I have been getting has been a series of absurd and torturous nightmares ending with my waking up struggling to breathe. That’s if I sleep at all — I didn’t sleep last night because of some stupid stupid overthinking that I did NOT ask my brain to do, and which caused me to stay home today because I could not zombie to work because then I would not have produced anything of value.

Then, amidst all that sleep deprivation and mental anxiety, I have to perform at school. I have reports and term papers to write, I have a presentation that’s worth a ton of grades to do, I have to think and write and act normal when all I want to say to all the people in my classes, professors and students alike is: Sod off! I do not care if you want to write about the social positions of students in the classroom, and I do not care if the professor thinks it’s a good idea, I do not care about the history of the American economy, and I do not give a rat’s ass about any of the babies in your bellies –you pregnant students– or your wedding plans –you engaged ones– and most of all, I do not like how bitchy uppish you have become JUST because you will graduate this semester, as if that gives you an automatic god status. So yes, don’t talk to me during breaks. I like it that way. Bitches.

But something tops all that. In the past two weeks, I have had THREE major bad things happen to my beautiful car. First her battery died, then I gave her side a good rub against a trash can I did not see while parking in the garage and thus she needs a paint job now, and today it seems I have to replace the whole transmission system which will cost me a fortune and which was not among my foreseen expenses for March. Interestingly, it all happened after a certain group of people known for their ‘evil eye powers’ saw her for the first time. Am I being irrationally superstitious? No, just stating the facts. What are the odds of your car getting thrice wrecked like that within the span of 14 days from the day a certain group known for their evil eye saw it? I don’t know, you tell me.

And let’s not forget my computer troubles. First I lost everything I had on it upon installing Ubuntu Linux. Then I couldn’t properly install it, so I had to ask for help and then it was properly installed. Then some idiot gave me a malicious command on the SUPPORT FORUMS, and he did it on purpose, and it erased everything on my hard disk AGAIN. That unjustified sick behavior really got to me, it even made me think of extreme ways to vindicate myself.

Oh, yeah, and let’s not forget that in January I lost my bellyring. I had planned to go to NYC in the summer to get re-pierced, but that is almost impossible now thanks to the above mentioned catastrophes that I have had to endure for the past three months since the start of 2008. There’s no going anywhere for me this summer. No break from social censorship, no spa for my sanity, nothing.

That’s not all. I am under a lot of pressure to magically know exactly what I want to do from now until the day I die, and I am supposed to make a huge decision which I am not equipped to make and which will affect every aspect of my life. I am even tired of complaining to people I know about the enormous shites I am facing. I see no point in talking about what’s bringing me down at a single moment, because I know in the next moment something more severe will happen to me and I will complain about it too.

I hate 2008 with all my heart, it is an anathema to me. This March has been worse than last May. As far as I see it, 2008 has been the worst year in my life thus far. And people DARE call me a pessimist with a sneer, as if I am rejecting the joys of life which are flowing into my lap at all times and choosing to be a brooding grump, as if pessimism is a disease of some sort. I call optimism in my case a disease, an obvious state of disconnection from reality. I don’t live in a bubble, you optimists you, I live in reality. Now go ahead, call me a pessimist and curl your lips, if you dare.

This is my heart-shaped clock. I bought it a long time ago, and discovered it recently still unused and in its package. It makes a loud ticking sound which I love, but I don’t love ‘time’ itself. Since the clock is heart-shaped, you get the irony. Nevertheless, it goes really well with some quotes on love and time, and my mood today.

I cannot promise very much.
I give you the images I know.
Lie still with me and watch.
We laugh and we touch.
I promise you love. Time will not take that away.

- Anne Sexton

From Visual Compen…

Love vanquishes time. To lovers, a moment can be eternity, eternity can be the tick of a clock.

- Mary Parrish

Painting? No, it’s Samara.

Puppy.

Scrabble. Over and over.

Lizard! No chameleons this time, sorry guys.

Every single bone, joint, and muscle in my body aches. I am too used to sitting all day staring at a monitor and frying my brains typing things on the keyboard. The great outdoors were once my thing, before I became a digital hermit. And now, badminton, mountain climbing, chasing after lizards, racing kids, throwing Frisbees, all mean one thing: PAIN.

I discovered that the more active I am on my blog, the less frequently I write in my diary. I risk losing a lot of memories this way. I must stop before it is too late.

I discovered that I think too much. I overthink, if there is such an activity. It’s not my fault that I can overthink. Lately, I have been overthinking above my average overthinking rates, and it’s giving me difficulty-breathing nightmares and skin-picking fits. It’s not a happy state.

I also discovered that what I have been suffering from for years and years is actually a form of mania. It’s called Dermatillomania and I have it. The knowledge that there are other people who have the same feelings is comforting. The knowledge that I have a mental disorder, a form of mania, is disturbing. I guess it’s romantic in a really skewed way, but whatever, who’s got time to be romantic these days? I want it to go away. Been wanting it to go away for years. It’s still here.

I am wondering why I am still awake looking at pictures when I should have been sleeping for the past three hours. I must wake up early tomorrow to go spend the weekend in Karak. I am promised lots and lots of BBQing and Pepsi, and many siestas. Maybe a chameleon or two, if I am lucky. Maybe I will fall and crush my skull on a stone, who knows.

I want to take a break that lasts a few years. I do not want to socialize with anybody during this time. Just relax in a library overlooking a beach and have an infinite supply of flavored soda and shrimp. I also want to have a fast internet connection and a personal masseur who looks like Craig Ferguson or Johnny Depp or the guy I had a crush on during my freshman year at college.

Then there is the question of personal destiny. People assume, if you are outspoken and independent, that you know exactly where you are headed. They wait for you to make decisions pronto, and they expect you to understand them fully. Little do they know that you are playing it by ear, just learning the ropes like the amateur that you are, all of your superficial extravaganza aside.

And what do you do? You feel stuck, uncertain, unprepared. Then you moronically blog about it.