From Pearls Before Swine
I’m in the midst of making lists and running errands, and my brother just sent me a text-message:
Keep the twenty dollars, I’m taking your sunglasses. :) muahaha!
He’s referring to the orange-brown aviator sunglasses that the Lovely L Lady convinced to buy (for eight dollars, for the record) from an accessories stand on […]

[Read more →]

From Pearls Before Swine
My friend just sent me this link - Entire Blogosphere Stunned By Blogger’s Special Weekend Post:
NEW YORK—In what is being called a seminal moment in Internet history, a rare weekend post by 25-year-old blogger Ben Tiedemann on his website bentiedemanntellsall.blogspot.com rocked the 50 million-member blogosphere this Saturday. […]
“Wow, what a special […]

[Read more →]

Oh, God, this is me everyday, and especially on days called “Monday”:

[Cartoon by Dave Walker. Find more cartoons you can freely re-use on your blog at We Blog Cartoons.]
Thank you, fathima, for the pointing me to the link.

[Read more →]

And then the sun came out, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
Clearly, I am highly useless at this one-post-a-day drama.
[+]
Now that this ridiculous work-week is over, I can breathe more easily. I drove to the office this morning while squinting against the sunshine, wearing the orange-brown aviator sunglasses the Lovely L Lady recently approved and made me […]

[Read more →]

“Welcome to the Purple Zone”, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
The last time Z and I shared a meal, it was a year ago. He had switched, just a couple of months before, from being my co-worker to working in Palo Alto, and I drove up from San Jose to join him for jummah at Stanford and […]

[Read more →]

Let’s go home, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
By Tuesday or so, I had already realized this week needed to be over. My GMail status:
Dear God: Please make it be Saturday already, because this week kind of sucks. Thank you.
Love, Yasminay
The responses were hilarious:
Anjum, channeling God:
Dear Yasminay,
*sigh*, I get this request every week from you.
[…]

[Read more →]

From the Textures & Textiles set, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
I’m sitting outside the Nordstrom’s fitting rooms - impatiently checking my watch, hating the idea of being in that specific store, and waiting for my friend, N - when a guy settles into the armchair next to me with a loud, long-suffering sigh. I look over […]

[Read more →]

“Smug expression on the slightly bow-legged bull in center front,” originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
While taking photos at Oakland’s Lake Merritt one gray afternoon, I zoomed in on this pier because I thought someone had spray-painted the word “HOT” on there, which I thought was the funniest thing in the world. Only when uploading the photos […]

[Read more →]

By the way, did you know that the nominations stage for the Fourth Annual Brass Crescent Awards is going on right now? Yeah, I’m kind of outta the loop these days, too.
It goes like this:
“The Awards will take place in two phases. First is the nominations phase, where readers nominate their favorite blogs in […]

[Read more →]

A chessboard awaits potential players in an Oakland park, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
The Lovely L Lady asked me this evening, “So, what do you do during this meditation?”
“Well. I just close my eyes and concentrate on dua [supplications] and dhikr and any other prayers I have memorized.”
“Oh, good,” she said in mock relief. “I thought […]

[Read more →]

Mid-day meditation, orginally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
From Wednesday, September 26, 2007:
D text-messaged me again late on Tuesday night: Can we please go to meditation group tomorrow? She is in graduate school now, and I detected a hint of desperation.
So, we did. And it was beautiful, as always. D drove down from Vallejo, S came from San […]

[Read more →]

Sunshine seating at the New Tandoori Cafe, San Jose, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
I had dinner tonight with two women I met a couple of months ago at a work-related event. They somehow took a liking to me, and expressed interest in meeting up sometime. Sure, I said, thinking, New friends! After some back and forth, […]

[Read more →]

Things to write in: ROCKING, originally uploaded by yaznotjaz.
I don’t even know why I’m doing this to myself, since I hate deadlines and writing under pressure, but I’ve decided to jump on the bandwagon and try my hand at this one-post-a-day drama for the entire month of November. And just look at me and my […]

[Read more →]