mercredi, mars 07, 2007

My weekly bike ride from Beirut to Jbeil

After a hard week of work, what’s better than enjoying the gorgeous panorama along the Lebanese coastline, on a sunny Sunday? As almost every Sunday, especially after I recovered from the knee injure and the week quadriceps, we went along with Otter and Arne for a road bike ride from Beirut to almost Jbeil and back, after few flat tires, of course. I’ll leave you with some of the pictures from the ride.
Here is my woman! "Tommaso" bike (Or Tomato, as Otter likes to call it)


This is me back to Beirut (I think I was near Zouk Mikael)



I think these 2 pics were taken in Jounieh

near the sea road, trying to catch up with Arne.

Near Halat, after a couple of flat tires!

(From left to right: Arne and his Raleigh bike, Me and my Tommaso bike

and Otter's "Seven" bike (Otter was taking the pictures,

Many thanks to him)

jeudi, mars 01, 2007

My occasional encouters with fancy restrooms

What’s with the restrooms in the restaurants, gyms, hotels or night clubs? I know that the designers spent a lot of their time and creativity to come up with the most sophisticated, stylish, original sinks, basins, taps, of course after the owners had squandered lots of resources, so that their institution will grow in reputation, as if the main indicator for measuring the success and the pride is how fancy and sophisticated the restrooms are.
Maybe it’s a way to make of this repugnant, disgusting dump of all the bodily-related excrements and related odors a less repulsive place for all of us.

Anyway, I will disclose something. (In fact, I’ve noticed lately that I disclosed too much over the net, unlike the real life where I’m not that really talkative person, and I’m more reticent in divulging anything personal, even political stand)
Back to the restrooms, each time I have to go there to do what I have to do, I sink in a very challenging (at least for me) attempts to discover the way to use the tap or the shower.
Not to mention the fact that, sometimes, I can be totally or partially wasted. This straightforward operation for some grows to be the most difficult of the puzzles.

Many questions arise while confronted to this stupid tap/shower, whatever.
How to activate the water?
How to switch from hot to cold water and vice versa?
Does this tap have sensors or we have to open it manually. (Just try to figure out what does it look like when you try to pass your hands under the tap, waiting for the water, where in fact, it has a manual mechanism.
Seriously, how to open the tap? I came across tons of taps in my entire life, but still, this is the first time I see this kind of taps, because each restaurants/gyms/hotels/night clubs strive to be matchless and innovative. And it’s recurrent…

Does this explain the fact that women go in pairs to the restrooms? Have you noticed this strange phenomenon? I think this is it. I can now declare that I finally unveiled the secret behind this fact. Women go in pairs sot that they will brainstorm before each encounter with a tap, trying to find out the proper way to deal with it. Two minds together are better than two minds working alone.