Friday 24 September 2010

Far easier to spend our money than to make it

I sat my alarm last night to wake up at 7 in order to go to this conference this morning. Woke up startled this morning as it was really hot and I was covered with sweat head to toe. I realized that I had slept without air-conditioning last night. I had two sleepless nights the last two days. Do not know whether it's due to the new slimming tablets I just started to use or because I am too busy to sleep. So I guess when I went to sleep last night I must have been too tired to check that the AC was not on.

Showered and changed quickly, had my breakfast, left the house and noticed that a white flower is floating on the wee fountain so I picked few more and scattered them around the fountain place, they looked really nice but while doing this I spelled my coffee which I grabbed in a haste to go to my car, so went back home and washed my hands, cleaned the hand bag and dabbed my pants with a towel to clean them from the coffee stains. I jumped into my car, called my daughter in New Zealand, and told her that I miss her. She is coming back for her holidays in a month time, still she gave me the list of stuff to do for her, change her standing order, send more money for the new phone, change her tickets, do her room, I noted these down so I dont forget them; I checked my mail, my BBMs and my messages while driving, it was a clear road. Of course I took the wrong turn on the highway so I had to pass Salic! Reached there and parked on the second level. I always try to park where the alphabets make sense. So my car was in the three rows KLM. Easy to remember I think?

I went straight to the conference hall in DUCTAC and attentively listened to the speaker. Yes I remember him from the previous conference. These are the guys that tell you that you can make 10000 dollars a day by working on the internet and have a 90 days vacation a year and own a home in every country of the 300 that you will spend your vacation in every time. The trick is to give them on the spot some money so they could show you how to do that. Who on earth will have that amount of money on a Friday morning and that too at the end of the month? Unless they tell us on the invitation that we need to carry heaps of cash with us. Of course with my my rush earlier on I forgot to take my water with me so this made me spend 4 dirhams for a tiny bottle of water. There you go, the 10000 dollars just got reduced by one before I even made it! As the french will say, oh la la.

Left the conference, went shopping for grocery at Carrefour, first time I go to Carrefour on a Friday morning, it was like they were distributing hot cakes for free. I don't think Dubai had anyone walking in it's streets as it seemed the whole of the population was at the supermarket. Maybe they are all like me, I mean we don't have time to grocer during the week, so I want someone to tell me when is the best time to go grocering during the week where you can hand pack your apples without hitting the hands of the other twenty people gathered around that apple place. Luckily I had written down a list this time so I don't have to hunt buy. Met a friend (of course shopping like me) and at the same time pushing the wheel chair of his stroke stricken father. The father by the way was a banker who built the best banks in Dubai and had chaired a few before he became ill. I don't want to have a strawberry tart placed on my lap if I was on a wheel chair God forbid, so kiddos be careful don't do that to me! Anyway to make a long story short the trip to the supermarket was over, another reduction in the 10000 dollars by 617 dirhams. I went to have my take away coffee (latte skinny) and of course the girl didn't ask me the size so she gave me the small one, left the cafe with my two pettieboures tucked carefully in one of my grocery bags and here we go again I spelled some of the coffee on my hand and the trolly this time, went to find my car.

Where did I park? Oh yes the acronym came to my mind straight away. KLM. Aha, but the car is not there? Was KLM of ground floor or another floor? So I did it again. I should have said 1KLM to my ageing brain! Went back inside, used the left this time, found my car. Great. Now it seems that the whole population is leaving the mall, cars were peeping and horning and jumping lanes in order to leave the mall, why is everyone in a hurry? Oh maybe Ernesto opened their skull and injected them with the 10000 dollar a day idea so now they are all rushing to get on with it, I think that they had all forgotten that they can be killed in a car crash before they see the first dollar.

I checked my missed calls, oh the first one must be a saudi student who is thinking that if he cannot receive his offer letter on my rest day then life will stop. The second missed call was from my friend, so I talked to her on the way home. Reached home and straight away corrected my notes from the conference and emailed them to my kids, rather than talk to them over lunch about it, nice! I think these ipads are fun. Had I written these notes on a piece of paper then they will never see the light again, typing them straight on the notes pages on the iPad makes it easier to edit and email. Yesterday for example I was in a meeting in Abu Dhabi, I took my iPad out, wrote my notes (believe me I wasn't trying to impress) and straight away sent them to the staff member who was going to action them. Neat, I love Apple, they made my life easy, I am now typing this on the iPad while resting a little.

Anyway, I am not trying to give you my daily diary here, Or how to spend your friday mornings, or to convince you to buy an iPad, I am merely trying to tell you that it is far easier to spend money than to make it.. I have to stop this blog now as my elder daughter is giving me a lecture on why I dont have to have lots of paintings and pictures hung in my bedroom.