I am pretty much set when it comes to getting my American pop culture fix over here in Israel. iTunes and Limewire cover my music needs and TV Shack hooks me up TV & movie-wise.
Then, there’s LOST. If you’re a fan, you know what I’m talkin bout. If you’re not, well then I’m not gonna try an esplain. All you really need to know for this post is that I didn’t want to wait the day or two for it to appear on TV Shack. I needed it sooner. So, I broke out the Big Guns, the Slingbox.
This is an amazing technology my friend hooked me up with. Basically my computer is hooked up to a separate Time Warner cablebox in New York City he has set up just for his friends living abroad. When I connect, I can literally control an actual Time Warner cable box (with TiVO !) and watch LIVE TV as if I were in the United States.
Most of the time I don’t bother with it. I can get what I need with less fuss using TV Shack. But, you know, LOST is different. So, I TiVO’d the 2-hour final season premiere and delighted in some kick-ass, bionic storytelling.
And because there’s no remote control from my lounge chair, I watched the commercials – in English (of course). And the local news promos. OMG – there’s Liz Cho! And (cutie-patootie) Lee Goldberg! I got to watch them warn me like 20 time that a snowstorm was going to ‘foil my morning commute.’ Plus, the promos for ABC’s other network shows that were coming back from winter hiatuses – Flash Forward, V, and the like.
Here’s the thing, why this was significant. In some ways, I am kept very up-to-date on what’s going on, what’s hot, in America. NYTimes.com gives me my news. Perez, my gossip. Mashable, my tech & social media news. And I can watch new episodes of LOST, Project Runway, glee, 24 and other series. But I watch them without commercials. And it turns out – I miss Liz Cho and my rightful husband Lee Goldberg! Seeing my local news team talk about the local stories as if I were still a New Yorker…and watching advertisements in English (instead of rapid-fire, smarmy, salespitchy Hebrew ads, like I hear sometimes on the radio), and seeing the promos for those shows, as if I were still in the U.S. – wowza!, I really saw home in a different way, through this media slice I’ve been missin.
Conversely, you know – it made me realize how much Israeli media I don’t experience over here. It’s embarrasing, but if you ask me about domestic Israeli politics, I really don’t know how to answer. I still read the New York Times; I only know of Israeli news when a headline gets big enough so that that the Times is reporting it. And I don’t have a TV here. Cable is expensive, and why pay for it, when I watch so little TV to begin with, and I can use my much cheaper Internet to get everything I might need? But as a result, I watch no local Israeli TV news (which could really help with my Hebrew language skills) or Israeli pop culture and TV series. It’s kind of really keeping me apart from my new culture, you know?
All that, I got from viewin’ my LOST on the ‘Sling, huh?
I have posted many times about Petey and his pee pee accidents. You’ve all been very helpful, having me get him tested to make sure he didn’t have a urinary tract or bladder infection. (He doesn’t).
Petey definitely knows it’s wrong to pee inside the house (and the stairs and lobby) and good to pee outside. He gets loads of positive reinforcement in the form of treats and praise from me when he does it outside. And, sorry Yoda Jeremy, negative reinforcement from me in the form of smacking his snoot downwards and sometimes holding his face right up to the puddle when he pees inside.
No doubt Pete gets it. Yet he still has accidents sometimes. Usually they take this form: he’ll be shy to come out of his crate, so I lure him out by sitting in front of him and offering a treat. Then, he’ll be shy to follow me out the front door to go downstairs; instead, he’ll stay seated outside his cage and just look at me. It’s as if he knows the times he’s going to have an accident and he’s just trying to avoid putting himself in that position. I’ve been trying to distract him as we go down the stairs, by teasing him with a treat but not letting him have it (sometimes I do break off a piece and he gets that). Then, we leash up in the lobby and go outside. If I wait to leash him until we’re outside he’s started a new thing where he runs away from me, but more on that later. And if I leash him upstairs, the way the leash attaches to the Gentle Leader/Halti so low to the ground makes it hard for us to navigate the stairs quickly. So, I’ve arrived at this unleashed-but-fixated-on-the-teased-treat method going down, then leashed-in-the-lobby method. And most of the time it works. Except for the 1-2 times/week when it doesn’t. And those time are almost always foreshadowed by his not wanting to follow me out of the apartment.
More infrequently is Pete’s other kind of accident. He actually did both kinds last Tuesday. We had been at the dog park, and he had gotten an awesome workout, playing his little guts out. I knew he’d come home and crash on his bed, and he did. I thought he’d be out for 3 hours, but he was up after one. I walked by him to get some coffee in the kitchen and bent down to give him a kiss. That’s when I discovered his entire bed was soaked in pee and he was laying in it. Eww !!! Ask any dog owner – this is not supposed to happen. It is very unusual for a dog to piss his bed; even odder to remain laying in it. I theorized that maybe he let it fly in the middle of a really good dream, woke himself up, and was so ashamed that he was trying to cover it up and hide it with his body. Jeremy Yoda says I shouldn’t attribute that level of emotions and cognition to Pete; that dogs just ain’t that bright to be able to feel shame and try and hide something, etc.
But then what, people – what ??? What am I doing wrong that my dog keeps doing this? I give him love, I pet the hell out of him, I let him lay on my lap and we watch Internet TV together, I take him for hour playtimes in the dog park, I feed him plenty and give him treats. What am I doing wrong ???
Later that same day, he had his more typical kind of accident. Man, he was just having a really bad day, I thought. He just needs to go to sleep and have a do-over tomorrow. Now, because he had started to take a full-on whiz right on the lobby floor, I had to whisk him outside to finish, and there was no time to leash him up. After he finished, the little prick up and took off!
WTF, Pete – you’ve got to be kidding me!
Of course, this worries me very much. He could easily run into the street and be hit by a car. So, I got low to the ground, held out a treat, and called him back. Thankfully, he came running. Now, there was no need to hit him. The main thing was he was coming back to me and would be safe. But I was already worn thin from a day with two accidents (the most recent one still wasn’t cleaned up yet, and until it was, there was a chance a neighbor would see or step in it), and I lost my temper. Big time. I still only slapped him on his snoot, not anywhere else like his ribs, God forbid. But I did it another level harder than I usually do it, and he yelped and recoiled.
You should have seen Yoda Jeremy’s face when I told him that story over dinner. You could practically see him pressing the silent-alarm under the table. That is SO wrong, he explained. He was coming back to you, and you ‘rewarded’ that with a smack. He’s not smart enough to realize the smack was for running away. Next time you try and call him back after he’s run away, he might remember what happened last time and think ‘eff u, buddy, I ain’t fallin’ for that again.’
Of course, you know, I felt really guilty after whacking my dog. And it lingered into the next day. So, after my driver’s test, I stopped into Roi’s pet store and got spent about 300 shekels (approx $81) on treats and toys for him, including some of those plush toys he’s never had before.
It was a lot of fun, presenting him with one toy after another. He didn’t know what was happening, and was enthralled by whatever I set down in front of him next.
Less than ten minutes later, I learned why Yoda Jeremy had said before that the plush toys were a bad idea. Pete had destroyed two of them – in ten minutes!
$30 down the drain
Seriously, though, people – what gives with Petey’s inconsistent, yet persistent pee pee accidents? Is he acting out, because he’s angry if we haven’t gone to the dog park or for longer walks, if I’m glued to the computer writing all day? Is it punishment for that? He doesn’t look like he’s spiting me; he really does look like he doesn’t want to have the accident. But then, why is he? 
On Wednesday I took and passed my driving test! Yay, me. After your first year here, it gets a lot harder to convert a foreign license, so even though I don’t plan on doing a lot of driving (or buying a car) here, I wanted to get this done.
So, that’s it, huh? The whole beaurocratic process is finito? That wasn’t so bad. HaHaHaHa, Silly wabbit – this is Israel ! No, it ain’t over yet… But first, let’s recap my big day:
After the instructor Avi (who only had a stick shift car) gave my paperwork to Elie (who has automatic), Elie set up everything for me – contacted the official driving peeps and got me my appointment. Wednesday at 1:40 p.m.
I was kinda nervous, leading up to Wednesday. OK, not really nervous, but was there anything I should be doing to prepare? No, I know how to drive already. I guess I was just worried about all the instructions (left…right…stop) being given to me in Hebrew.
I showed up around 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday and waited in line at the little post office they have outside the Ministry of Licenses. This was so I could pay 60 shekels to get some piece of paper I needed to give Elie in order for him to give me my lesson. Then Elie and I had my lesson. Good thing, too. Because my driving habits are really ingrained, and it turns out they do things a little differently in Israel. Like, you’re not allowed to turn your head around at all; you have to use your mirrors for everything. Well, when I learned to drive, it was really driven into me (sorry) the importance of checking your blind spot. Dont trust your mirrors – see it with your own eyes. And, so when I was merging onto the expressway or making a turn, I could not help myself from turning my head around. Over and over, Elie had to remind me not to do this. And it was because we drove around together for 90 minutes first that I was finally able to stop myself from doing that.
Also, you know, I learned to drive, ahem 24 years ago. I don’t exactly put 
my hands at ten and two o’clock on the wheel anymore. Elie had to keep reminding me to use two hands and turn the wheel in that one-over-the-other method instead of, you know, underhanding it with my right hand while I txt with my left. And of course, he kept saying, Liat, liat (slowly, slowly). Apparently, my inclination was to go a little above the speed limit.
Anyway, the actual test was a piece of cake compared to the lesson before it. I had a very nice & friendly instructor, and I had heard stories and been prepared for a much more stoic and formal sort of person. The driving exam was under :20 minutes, and I swear it felt like it could have been :15. There was no parallel parking, and I only had to go on the highway for like two seconds. BTW, the day cost me $450 shekels (about $121) – 150 shex for the lesson and 300 for the test.
So, did I pass? I already told you I did. But – this being Israel – you don’t find that out right away. Elie would call me with the news the next day, and assuming I passed, I’d have to come by and pick up the certificate or diploma or whatever it is – and then mail it into the government and pay another 450-something shekel fee.
Actually, Elie called later that same day to give me the good news. It really did feel great. Next day I went back to the Ministry (remember, this is a half hour local bus route away in Holon, a town south of Tel Aviv), but I had a teensy bit of concern, b/c I’ve always gone there in the mornings, and this was around noon when I was heading over. I took my lesson and test around the same time the day before, so I should be OK…but I had a nagging worry that they could be closed.
And they were. Should have called or checked online, but that’s not always a piece of cake if an English translation isn’t available. When your day is scheduled to within an inch of your life, as mine permanently are, this really sucks.
.בסדר I’ll go back tomorrow morning and inch closer to completion.
New column up at ROASTe’s biscotti blog. Learning to write with keywords in article title and every paragraph that make the post more searchable by Google, also meta tags and making sure hyperlinks are only on words that have to do with the content they’re linking to (not how i did the hyperlink here).
Because, quite frankly, I am approaching lard-ass status, the time for drastic measures had come. I’ve shared on here many times that I likes the candy bars and ice cream and cookies and cakes, but that since i work out a lot, it just wasn’t impacting my body negatively; wasn’t I lucky?
Not!
I have this former friend, Kfir, who owns a kiosk (translation, NY’ers: bodega; translation, everybody else: convenience store). Last week I stopped by his store, and he doesn’t tap dance around nuthin’ – he’s like Eh, Scotty, you look a bit, eh, larger, no? [moment of truth] Me: Um, whaddya mean? Kfir: Well, yeah – in your stomach and…..[wait for it]…..your ass. [desperately clinging to denial] Me: What? Maybe it’s this sweatshirt, which is kinda baggy. [remove sweatshirt, turn around for Kfir, modeling ass] Kfir: No, sorry, Scotty, don’t, eh, hate me, but it’s only the truth: I have lost weight, and you have gained it in your stomach and…[no, not again, Kfir - please, not again]…your ass.”
Kfir also trashed my hair. What is with your hair? It looks like a mess! Hey, diff’rnt strokes, Kfir – I’m growin’ it out. But that’s another post. Anyway, Kfir may be a typically direct and unsuble Israeli, and plenty of my friends chimed in on facebook when I made this my status update that he was a jerk – but, he was right. And I’m glad he said it. And he really did say it in a lovingly way. Candy bars not affecting me - c’mon! The ironic thing, I went in there to get some candy bars.
#FAIL
So, anyway, this was the ammunition I needed to begin cutting out the junk food, which I have succeeded in doing. Before, I had no defense against the ‘call of the junk’, but now I just conjure up:
…and it works great. I’m able to put it down.
Now, to the other part of the equation: burning fat. The issue isn’t muscles. I’ve got those. I just need to do more cardio so they not buried under as much body fat. And I’m a 12-time marathoner, so this shouldn’t be hard, right? Actually, it’s harder than you think. I have a chronic shin injury from years of running, so for me – even a casual little jog is kind of a huge production. There’s the stretching before & after; then I have to ice down my shins for ten minutes (to prevent my compartment syndrome from giving me the pain similar to shin splints even when I just walk, 24/7 for the rest of my life). This is annoying enough when jogging in the park, but in the gym, it makes it impossible for me to do intense cardio on the treadmill, unless I bring a little cooler of ice like I’m carrying around an organ transplant or something. I can do the elliptical or stairmaster instead, but at my gym only the treadmills have individual TVs on them, and I cannot do lengthy amounts of cardio without the distraction of TV.
So, my friend Nir told me he lost 13 pounds 6 kilos in part by just doing intense walking (also, Weight Watchers, but I can’t afford that right now). So, I asked my bestie Anna if she wanted in on crazy early morning speed walks in the park, and she said Sure, Scotty!
So, we’ve done two of them so far. And they are the totes funnest. We don’t take it to the extreme power mall-walker level, where we look like spazzes with our legs all rigid and hips freakin out like a bizarre chicken-walk. But – we do walk fast, while we gab like girlfriends. And we’re suited up in unnecessary-but-fun super Sporty! sportswear.
Towards the end of our first walk, that’s when we saw it: The Playground. It’s really a nifty outdoor gym where all the weights machines are set up so that you lift your own body weight. It’s really cool. But for Anna and me, it totally feels like we’re at the playground, and we just get a good strength training workout in the middle of our cardio. We’re both lovin’ it, and I bet you we see some real results from this.
Feast your eyes, bitches:
Me in a few years? NOT.
I haven’t done a great deal of training with Petey. Regular G-Fish readers know he’s housetrained, albeit with certain ‘excitement issues.’ Plus, he totes knows “Sit.” But that’s about it. Yoda Jeremy’s like, Just work with him a little bit at a time, when you come in from a walk. But I haven’t been.
Until recently, when I started ending our walks with some training on the
Stay! command. I’ve been telling Pete to sit down on the step in front of our building’s front door, and rewarding him with a treat. Then, I’ll put my hand out in, like the universal STOP command and say in a firm and slow voice, Stay!
I’ll repeat myself as I back up while maintaining eye contact. Then, I fold my arms in front of my chest and stare at Pete, periodically repeating the Stay! command with my “talk to the hand” gesture. Finally, I release him by excitedly yelling, Come! And he comes running and gets rewarded with another treat and lots of praise.
It was not easy at first. He just has so much damned energy and excitement about him, that starting any new training feels like such an uphill battle. Plus, there are kittens who live in our front garden, and sometimes they pull Pete’s focus away from me. And sometimes, my boy just gets so antsy or excited that he can’t wait for my Come! command and just bounds forward on his own. When he does that, he doesn’t get a treat, and I plop him down back on the step, and we try again.
After only 3-4 days of this (averaging a few tries per walk, which we go on 3-4 times/day), he seemed to get it! No more bounding forward before I gave my Come! command. Even if I waited an extra long time, or went around a corner/out of sight. He got it! I was really proud of him.
Then, I thought to try it out in a different location, like on the path next to our building, and it became clear he hadn’t quite gotten it. Sometimes he’d still bound forward before he was called. So, we’re continuing this training, and whenever possible (no distractions, safe areas where he can’t run away) we’re doing it in different environments. Still very proud of Pete.
New biscotti post is up at ROASTe.com. I brewed my first-ever cup of coffee using a French press (vs. a drip coffee maker). Woah, big difference – for real!
After working so hard to get my green form, I was a little nervous about leaving it behind with the woman behind the counter, who told me I had to have a doctor sign-off that the medications I take don’t make me a menace behind the wheel. She said I’d get a call to come pick it up in a week, but T.I.I. (This is Israel, meaning anything can happen here), and there was no phone number for this one window that handles driver’s licenses at the Ministry of Licensing, and even if there were – the voicemail system would all be in Hebrew, and well….you can see why I was reluctant to fork it over.
But I did, and yay – I got a call this week that the form was ready for me to come pick up. So, I did, and then I called Avi, the driving instructor I met last time at the Ministry with Jeremy. He met me in the parking lot and took my green form and told me he’d schedule my lesson and road test. It was funny, he actually showed up as the passenger in his own car, while another student was having a lesson with him, and told me to get in. So, there I am talking with Avi while some other guy is practicing his driving. And then before they drop me off at the bus stop for me to go back to Tel Aviv, I think to say to Avi, “This is for an automatic [transmission], right?” Avi’s like Automatic? No, my car is stick shift. You need automatic? No big deal, he told me he’d give my form to another instructor, Elie, who has an automatic car and would call me with news of my appointment time for my lesson and road test.
Same deal, re: worrying about leaving my green form “in the cloud.” But I did, and Eli called this week, too.
Wednesday, I take my driving test to get my Israeli license!
I realized this week I am a little bit depressed. Nothing clinical – I can still get out of bed, and all. I wonder what brought it on though – was it that Cellcom rep who called me this week and offered me a better plan? It really was a better plan, so I took it – but she did tell me it was for 18-months and I’d be penalized for opting out early. I’m not going anywhere, and I’m happy with Cellcom, so I had no problem with that restriction.
….or did I?
This could have something to do with turning 40 recently, also.
Look, here’s the thing: I feel my career ran its course back in New York. I don’t want to return to the field of public relations. If I did plop back down in NYC – what would I do ??? While I want to choke my fucking boss who I can’t stand am ready to move on from my primary job, I am quite excited about the direction of these new developments – doing social media consulting for ROASTe and hopefully soon also for Seital. And, when I get enough of this new work to free myself from the hell that is my main job, I’ll have more time to work on my memoir about moving to Israel. Plus, the weather is great here, I like living among so many Jews, and I feel a strong, Zionist connection to Israel.
But for sure, the novelty of being here has worn off. Things that were at first so exciting and fun – Riding my bike around town like a 12-year-old, which I haven’t done since 1984, Whee! – are now completely whatevs. All the other things, too – now that they’re not new, but they just are, I’ve realized that emotionally, I feel right where I was back in the fall of 2008 before I left New York: wanting a husband and to start a family…wanting to be in a higher income bracket that would finally allow me to travel, live in a nicer home, dine out and actually, you know, buy things when I’m out and about (I think they call it shopping?)….just a general feeling of not being satisfied anymore with my simple life of work, gym, AA, net surfage, a diet of mostly frozen food (with assorted junk binges), etc.
I did move to Israel very quickly and with a certain degree of spontaneity, but it never felt blind. I thought about it a great deal, and it felt very organic. I had ‘done’ New York after 17 years, and with my job in jeopardy, I felt a window closing for me there….and one opening for me here with new opportunities and choices.
In AA, there is an expression of ‘taking a geographical cure’ as a method to control your drinking. You know, if I just move someplace else, things will be different and my drinking won’t be a problem anymore. The problem isn’t with me….it’s with New York. We call the shorthand for this: doing a geographic. I certainly never felt as though this is what I was doing with my move to Israel. But hell – now that I’m at where I am emotionally, it makes me think:
Was this move all about doing one big geographic?
There is no escape from yourself, though. Wherever you go….there you are.
I miss my family, but that is not the kicker. I speak to them (in Philadelphia) about as much as I did when I was living in New York. Don’t take this personally, Mom, but What I really miss is being around my deep bench of sober, gay AA friends in New York. I see and interact with them all on Facebook and many of them on Twitter, and thank God for it. It is no small thing at all; you know who you are: we comment on each other’s photos and statuses daily and 8,000 miles and a whole bunch of bits & bytes away, you are still my support system, and I love you. And I have a real & true & loving support system here, too, I do: Anna, Leah, Jeremy, Danny, Nir, Liron, Abi, Lawrence, Ronnie, Junie. I’m grateful you are all in my life. There were just more of you in NYC, that’s all.
כל יום ביומו.
“One day at a time.” That’s what the above phrase says. I have it tattooed on my arm. So, there really is no need to figure out “where I am going to be for the rest of my life.” But if I think of how freakishly cold Israeli apartments are in the winter, and their small sinks and mineral-heavy water….or everyone and their mother parking on the sidewalks, or having to seriously improve my Hebrew because this Hebrish crap just ain’t cutting it, or buildings here that just look so Third World that they appear as though they might crumble any second (and many more things native to Israel), I can easily answer myself with – Uh-uh. No way. This isn’t forever. I miss First World development & feel…places that are big & clean & spread out, that just look as though they belong in the 21st century and not from 1930 or 1860. I may not enjoy many things about my New York City neighbors who aren’t just like me, but maybe that’s something I need to work on, you know?
As for my new career as a social media consultant, there is something to be said for the fact that Israel is a very small pond (7.1 million people, less than all of New York City), and it’s a very good & safe environment for succeeding and rising to the top of your field if you are good at what you do and work hard (which I am, and I do). Not that I couldn’t make it in New York, too (isn’t that how the song goes?), but as a person who’s always been a Late Bloomer, maybe I could really benefit from doing this work from over here. Plus, the economic recovery in the U.S. continues to be fitful, and I know plenty of people out of work; do I really want to return NOW and jump back into that (economically) depressed environment? That’s another argument for remaining here, at least for the next few years.
My friend Junie said of course I’m depressed; it’s because I’m working too hard. After she said this, she went for coffee with some more of my friends, while the other people we were hanging with went to a street fair on Rothschild Street. I went home to go to work for a few hours, even though Friday is the weekend here and no one works in the afternoon. I proved her point immediately! It’s true. I may go out to a bar or club once a week, and I typically meet my friends Anna and Leah for coffee once a week, but other than that – it’s ROASTe work, memoir writing, job search efforts, errands and cleaning in the mornings, then my main job from 2-9pm, then the gym, then unwinding for a few hours online with Facebook, Mashable, Perez, Atraf, TV Shack and NYTimes.com, then sleep. Even my main break from work is getting boring – taking Pete to the dog park. Good for him, and I am making some regular friends from going there, but it ain’t enough.
No tidy summation from me at the end of this post. Just feel like I’m done musing for now. We’ll see how I feel when I read it over after hitting ‘publish.’
Maybe I’ll move to San Francisco…
UPDATE:
I swear to God, what song do you think came on my iPod immediately after hitting “publish”? Leaving New York from REM’s album Around the Sun. What does that even mean, God?
My birthday is so last week, I know – but one more thing about it. The gym locker I like to use happens to be # 39. Forty, of course, is right next to it, but the metal part where you put your lock is broken off. So, I’m going to continue to use # 39, if that’s alright with you.
Also, on the night of my birthday, literally when it turned 12:00, I was out on the street, having just exited the gym. I know I’ll be 40 all year, but there’s only one moment ever when you turn forty (now, technically I wasn’t 40 yet; as several friends pointed out, since I was born on the east coast of the USA in EST, this was a unique window where it was my birthday in Tel Aviv…yet I was actually still 39). But anyway! So, since there is only this one moment to mark when you’re actually turning 40, I decided to really mark it.
The street wasn’t packed around me (it was midnight), but there were some people. I’m brave – but not that brave – so I waited until the light changed green and traffic started rushing by to yell
I’m 40 !!!
…really loud (yet, not at the top of my lungs, and kinda not very enunciated).
Still. A cool moment. My friend Marko tweeted right back after I tweeted about it this to wish me Happy Bday…and call me a Mess. Love him!
