More Random Stuff (Now, Improved With Picture!)
I’m so lazy. I didn’t get anything done, and tomorrow I leave for Tashkent for a few days. Been really busy with wiring and connecting the new Bullpen in our construction project for the trades guys to work out of. So much to do, and so little planned properly. At least my wireless stuff came in so I can get started on that.
Some of the locals complained about getting shot at while working, so we put up a sign.
I was talking to some of the kids from the warehouse the other day. I’ve been messing with them for a long time. It’s my plan to make them think I am totally crazy. I am not sure I have them totally fooled. Then every so often I give them a peek at the real me. Of course, my backup plan is for them to think it’s all an act so then when I do act bizarrely, they don’t think it’s real. I win either way! Whoohoo! Go me! 
Oh yeah, anyways. I was talking to Lena and she kept laughing because I speak slowly. Hello, not my native language! I take the extra time to think about my words because I have to think about each thing I need to say, and want to do it correctly. 5 minutes earlier when she was trying to get me to say I hate Commo Jack she’d misunderstood me. She didn’t hear me say “Ya Ne Nenavizhyu Evo” which is “I don’t hate him” and dropped the first “ne”, which is of course the “don’t” part. But even when I lose I win, so I pouted and made her feel bad today like she hurt my feelings. She didn’t, though I did find it strange, to be sure. It didn’t strike me that funny. It was complicated enough saying we worked together and weren’t best buddies but I had nothing against him, and trying to be clear on the meaning. BAH! Foreigners! (Gotta love ’em, that is!) They made me talk too much yesterday — it’s weird when you are trying to explain something to them, but maybe don’t know a word, so you explain the concept and try to use analogies…and 10 minutes later they come back with the word you’ve been asking about all along. “Is the word for soandso thisorthat?” 10 minutes of conversation later, “Oh, you mean thisorthat!” Had I not been actually saying the correct word repeatedly (and correctly) I would understand. 
I was asking for the noun form of “to act” or “pritvoryayetcya” which I thought would be “an act” or “pritvoryeniye”. The patterns are there to deduce these, but you never know when they will turn out to be exceptions. It’s only a simple 10 minute question. “I know the goddam verb, what’s the corresponding noun!!!! Is it thishereword?” Life’s funny. 
October 7th, 2003 at 6:33 am
I suppose it’s really more of an issue of not hitting the incorrect clearly labeled button at that point….
Just got back from Tashkent, trying to get up from the mountain of email and idiotic requests. “Everybody missed you while you were gone. PS, my shit is broke. Help!”
They love me.
Anyway, I may have some safe pictures for posting. Got to get with Don and check, we switched off with cameras a few times. It was pretty funny, we were wandering around apparently looking badass or something, the militia guys totally didn’t beleive we were Special Forces guys. “Oh come on, you’ve got weapons. Spetsnaz, da? You have a pistol, don’t you? Maybe a knife? Where is it? How much did that camera cost? Is it a good one? Is it a weapon?”
October 23rd, 2003 at 6:26 am
You know what’s funny, head like a hole? I was just thinking about that song a couple of days ago.
And yes, I am busy. :evil_wp: Things weren’t so bad til I got back from 4 2/3rds days in Tashkent and got slammed within 2 minutes of getting back here. I have however acquired a slave so I will have someone to push things on to. I even got a collection of safe pictures ready to go, just having trouble uploading them. One decent speed network blocks FTP, the other lets it through with an approximate priority of -1. Found an HTTP upload script for the first, haven’t had time to play with it yet.
Did party with some embassy staff though, if it makes you feel any better. Add Embassy Joe to the list of Joes wandering around.
Will try to get some stuff up within a week or so (almost said this week, but a look at my watch doesn’t give me enough “just in case”) but it will start with August R&R — gawd I’m so far behind.
October 3rd, 2003 at 6:32 am
From Eagl:
Yea, the same thing happened to me just the other day, when…
Well, not really.
When I get confused at my job I just look for the clearly labeled button that does what I want done. Finding that clearly labeled button is pretty darn difficult sometimes because there are an awful lot of them, plus shiny switches and knobs that you can turn, but it’s the clearly labeled buttons that cause the most trouble. But then you find the right one, press it, and then everything is ok. Just like in your story, see?
edit – what happened to the pictures of the girls?
October 22nd, 2003 at 11:08 pm
From texas jackass:
i’m suffering from a severe case of Uzbekistan withdrawal. where are the new posts, Rob?
and don’t give me that “i’m too busy crap”–we all know that you fat-cat Halliburton boys are just kicking back raking in the billions with your nefarious schemes, dancing on the backs of the bruised*. :twisted_wp:
well, at least that’s what CNN, the NYT, Slate, the New Republic, the WaPo, NPR, and the rest of the, ahem, “left-of-center” news sources tell me. don’t lie, man, Dick Cheney parties with you guys all the time down in Tashkent, right?
*name that song! (it’s too easy, i know)