Friday, 31 May 2013

I got up early and got in a good walk and a good work-out.

I went to the bakery and the candy store after breakfast, for challah and cheesecake (to celebrate our anniversary!) and, of course, candy.

I taught 4 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:30-11:00 and 12:00-1:30.

We had lunch at Il Pentolino, eating our usual favorites.

After making Shabbat this evening, we ate about half of our little cheesecake. It's the baked kind, which is actually almost like angel food cake. We were celebrating slightly early; tomorrow is the 17th anniversary of our wedding, at congregation Beth Chayim Chadashim in Los Angeles.

Thursday, 30 May 2013

I got up fairly early this morning but only walked as far as the highway 12 kikar and back. I didn't feel very energetic, it was slightly warm, and there was no breeze at all.

I made some calls and paid some bills this morning, since I had not classes. In fact, I only taught 5 units of Berlitz lessons today: 3:00-4:30 and 6:00-8:15.

We ate lunch at Greg café again.

The weather today was very hot, so we are happy to have great air conditioning in our apartment!

Wednesday, 29 May 2013

I slept well again, got up early, and walked all the way to the gym. I even worked out there a bit, and I did my stretches on the way back.

I taught only 6 units today: 9:00-10:30, 4:15-5:45, and 6:00-7:30.

We ate lunch at Greg café.

I picked up most of the monthly supply of meds at the pharmacy this afternoon. I would have waited until Sunday, but we'll be using the last pill I had of one of them tomorrow morning, and I didn't want David to have any gaps.

We took a short drive up the Arava, as far as Samar, before my 4:15 class, just to be out of the house for a bit.

Tuesday, 28 May 2013

I slept well last night, woke up early, and got a nice walk in. I felt a little tired, though, so I only walked as far as the highway 12 kikar.

I taught 8 units today: 9:00-10:30, 11:00-12:30, 4:30-6:00, and 7:00-8:30.

We ate lunch at Greg café today.

I got some more work done on my orchestration of Ahavat Olam. It's coming together more and more and sounding quite nice.

David got to talk to his sister in Ohio this evening, and they had a good conversation.

Monday, 27 May 2013

I had trouble getting to sleep last night, so I got up and took a Coldex pill and a pill against stomach acid. I then stayed up for a while, and, when I went back to bed, I fell asleep quickly and slept well all night. Of course, I woke up rather late and a bit tired, and so didn't go out for a walk.

I taught 9 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:45-10:30, 11:30-1:00, 3:30-5:00, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

We ate lunch at Kakao, at the Ice Park Mall. I had shakshuka, and David had pizza. Both were okay but nothing very special.

David went out by himself during one of my lessons and made the mistake of trying to go down the front steps. Luckily, he did NOT fall, but he did really scare himself. After that, he just went and sat on the bench by the back of our building. But the experience really discouraged him, and he just feels, not without some justification, that he has very little control left in his life. I am rather at a loss on what to do for him, as well. In particular, his cognitive difficulties make it very hard for him to learn anything, and this can only lead inevitably to a lot of boredom.

Sunday, 26 May 2013

I kept waking up last night, but I did get back to sleep pretty quickly. Nevertheless, I got up late and didn't get a walk in.

I paid the gas bill on our way to lunch today. We ate at Greg café.

I was feeling a little off today because my abs were hurting from the few crunches that I did yesterday morning. This means two things. First, I'm really out of shape. And, second, I'm going to have to get back in shape only slowly.

I did the weekly grocery shopping today. On my way, I noticed how really beautiful and clear out it was. The deep blue of the sea and the sky contrasted so nicely with the warm desert tones. As I arrived at Shufersal, a turbo-jet took off from the airport not far away. When I came out, another plane took off, this one a jet. Just another stunning day in Eilat!

Shabbat, 25 May 2013

I got up early this morning and got in both a good walk and a pretty good work-out, as well. It was quite warm out, even before sunrise, so I work only short pants, socks, and shoes, no shirt.

We ate lunch today at Kakao, which is at Ice Park Mall. We had eaten there once before, quite a long time ago. I don't know why we hadn't been back; we really enjoyed our meals today.

After that, we stopped and fueled up and drove around the short loop.

I did some more work on the expression in my orchestration of Ahavat Olam. It's sounding good, but it's pretty slow going getting it to really be nice.

In the evening, we talked to David's sister, who is still in the hospital. We had to wait until she came back from dialysis, but she says she is doing better and feeling better, too.

Friday, 24 May 2013

I got up late today because I was awake for more than an hour during the night and had trouble getting back to sleep.

I taught 4 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30 and 11:30-1:00.

Between the two classes, I walked down to the bakery and got challah for Shabbat. I also went to the candy/convenience store and replenished our candy supplies.

We ate lunch at Il Pentolino today and had our usual favorites.

We made Shabbat this evening but did very little else today. It was very hot out. The predicted high was 43˚C (=109˚F), and I'm pretty sure it got there. In fact, it's STILL pretty hot on our balcony.

Thursday, 23 May 2013

I got up a little late this morning, but I still walked to the big kikar and back and did a few stretches.

I taught 8 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 11:30-1:00, 3:00-4:30, and 7:00-8:30.

We ate lunch at Chooka at Ice Park Mall today. I had sushi and David had noodles. Actually, though, he only ate about a third of his portion, and I finished the rest of it.

We took a drive up highway 12 between about 5:30 and 6:15, going nearly as far as the second check point (which is where highway 10, which is closed to traffic, goes off to the left). The desert is always beautiful to see!

After we came back, we talked with David's sister in Ohio, who is still in the hospital. Apparently her transplanted kidney has stopped working properly (after only about 6 months), but I guess there's still some hope that they may be able to get it going again. David continued talking with her after I had to go teach my 7:00 student.

Wednesday, 22 May 2013

I got up quite early this morning and walked all the way to the gym. I only went briefly on a couple of machines before starting back, but I did stop near the big kikar to do my stretches. It was also very nice out this morning even though the weather generally has been heating up (with more to come -- the latest prediction for the high on Friday is 45˚C = 113˚F!).

I taught only 6 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 11:00-12:30, and 4:15-5:45.

We had lunch at Greg café again today. I skipped the ice-café today, though, which I'm planning to do most of the time since I think it's been contributing to my unwanted weight gain.

David's blood sugars have been running high recently. The problem started about when he first got the cough around 3 weeks ago, but it got markedly worse when he started the course of antibiotics on Monday. Today, we began to get really aggressive with giving him insulin. Finally, we got it down, but, as is common in such situation, we overshot a bit, resulting in a dangerously low reading of 39 (a serious "insulin reaction"). However, a candy bar brought him up quite quickly, so all is well. Nevertheless, high blood sugars, rapidly declining levels, and lows, especially when they all happen in the same day, are all very tiring, so he is not so surprisingly quite tired tonight. (BTW, any of you out there into diagramming sentences might enjoy doing that last one! LOL)

After my last class (and after we had stabilized David's blood sugar) we went again to Ice Park Mall and had yummy frozen yogurts (and, no, it did NOT mess up his sugar levels much at all).

Tuesday, 21 May 2013

I got up and walked to the big kikar, did my stretches, and walked back this morning. Again, the weather was very nice, and I got to pet and talk to and walk with a couple of friendly outdoor cats.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 11:00-12:30, 3:00-4:30, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

We ate lunch at Café Café at the Ice Park Mall. Shortly before we were finished David needed to go to the restroom, so I asked them to guard (לשמור) our food. The waiter agreed, but when we came back, it was all gone and the table had been cleaned. I guess I should have complained, but I didn't. I did NOT leave any tip, however.

We went on a short drive after lunch, up highway 12 to the pass and back down again. That was about all we had time for before I had to get back to teaching.

Monday, 20 May 2013

I slept very well last night. I got up a little late, but I still walked over the big kikar, did my stretches, and walked back. The weather was again perfect this morning!

I taught only 6 units of Berlitz lessons today (and, in fact, the last one was a no-show): 9:00-10:30, 11:30-1:00, and 7:00-8:30. The small number of units and the no-show were probably due to the fact that it's a holiday in most European countries today, I think.

We ate lunch again at Greg café and then came right back home. David has been feeling very tired, probably due to whatever bug it is that he's got. Now that he's started the antibiotics, he should be feeling better before long.

I did a little work on my orchestration of Ahavat Olam today. I ripped out all the expression data that I had entered graphically because I wasn't very happy with the results. Instead, I went in and put them in semi-manually, and I'm much happier with what I hear now.

Sunday, 19 May 2013

I was awake for more than an hour in the middle of the night last night, but I finally managed to get back to sleep. I woke up a few more times, I think, but eventually slept pretty well. I got up a bit late, though, and I felt tired.

I took David to see the doctor about his cough today. The doctor listened to his chest and prescribed a 10-day course of antibiotics for him, just in case. I filled the prescription this afternoon, so he'll start the course this evening.

We went down to the local barber shop and got David's hair cut. It's much shorter now, especially around the sides and back, but it's not a buzz cut. It looks great on him!

We ate lunch at Greg café today, and there were very few other people there. The Ice Park mall in general was very quiet. I guess everyone's recovering from all the holidays!

After lunch, we got the car washed, which it badly needed after the recent "rain" (actually more like mud from the sky, at least as far as what it did to the car). Rosa looks all nice and shiny red again now!

I picked up David's prescription and then headed on to Shufersal to do the weekly grocery shopping.

I didn't do any more work on my orchestration, but I did take a bit of time to listen to the work I've done so far. Some of the pieces are sounding really nice, and the others are definitely well on their way, too.

Shabbat, 18 May 2013

I slept well last night and took a nice walk this morning. I only went to the big kikar, but I did take time to do some stretches.

After breakfast this morning I took the containers, paper, and plastic bottles to their respective recycling areas.

We spent some time today going through the catalog of the Israel Center for the Blind, planning what to try to order tomorrow when they're open. We came up with a good list; now let's hope that the things we want are in stock, especially the Perkins braille writer.

We ate lunch at Ice Park today. We both had ice-cafés at Greg, and I had edamame, too. Then, we went downstairs and both had frozen yogurt. David had milk chocolate, white chocolate, and strawberries in his, and I had white chocolate, glazed pecans, strawberries, and a little banana in mine. We both enjoyed them very much.

This afternoon we talked with David's sister. We found out that she was in the hospital again. She had gone in last Tuesday night and was pretty sick at first. But she's feeling much better now and expects to be out in a few days. Thank goodness the hospital where she is has WiFi so that we can talk with her over Skype!

I got a little work done on my orchestration today. I experimented with a more graphic way of varying the expression of the instruments. I was aware of this capability in Digital Performer before but hadn't really used it. It should make it easier to put expression into the various instruments with quite a bit less detailed effort required.

Friday, 17 May 2013

I slept fairly well last night, but I didn't get up early enough to take a walk.

After breakfast, I walked down to the bakery and bought a couple of challot to make Shabbat.

I taught 4 units today: 9:30-11:00 and 11:00-12:30. After that, I had my observation feedback session. However, the evaluator had listened to the WRONG lesson, so it wasn't as useful as it could have been. It least this made her a bit apologetic, which served to turn the tables a little, I guess. Of course, she'll now go and listen to the correct one, but she'll probably only send me feedback by e-mail (which I'd much prefer anyway).

We ate lunch at Il Pentolino. David tried penne with Palermo sauce, the sauce I usually order, while I had whole-wheat spaghetti with the Il Pentolino sauce. I think I had tried it once before, but it was a long time ago. We bought enjoyed our meals, but David only ate about a half to a third of his, and we brought the rest home.

This evening we made Shabbat at home. We had intended to go out for a little walk afterwards, but David was still feeling pretty bad with his cough/cold. Mine's not entirely gone, either, but I don't feel bad, at least.

Thursday, 16 May 2013

I slept reasonably well last night and got up in time for a nice walk and even a little work-out at the gym this morning. There was less breeze than yesterday, and I also wore socks and athletic shoes instead of flip-flops, so I was very comfortable today.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today, all individual students (3 from France, 1 from Germany, and 1 from Perú but living in France): 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 3:00-4:30, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30. The one at 10:30 will be listened to by the lead instructor, and tomorrow she'll be giving me feedback. Although I think the lesson went pretty well, I always dread the feedback sessions because whoever does them always seemed to work especially hard to find everything wrong with them that she (they have ALWAYS been women) possibly can and make sure I don't get a very high score. I've had at least 3 different evaluators over the years, and they're all the same, so I think it must be Berlitz policy to make sure no one gets high marks. Of course, maybe I'm really just not that good, but I'm NOT willing to accept that. I'm resigned to it by now, but I still don't like it.

We went to Greg café again for lunch today. David celebrated the 2nd day of Shavuot (which we actually do NOT do here in Israel, but they do everywhere else in the world) by having cheesecake again. I had their delicious fatoush salad. The mall was REALLY busy today, and we were lucky to find a parking place.

Wednesday, 15 May 2013 (Shavuot)

I slept well, got up early, and went for a walk. It was a bit cool out, though, so I kept going and didn't go any further than the big kikar. I was only wearing shorts, flip-flops, and a t-shirt (at least I hadn't opted for the tanktop!).

I was mostly lazy today, but I did make some progress on my orchestration of Ahavat Olam. I had originally given all the melody for the first time through (before a key change) to the oboes, but I switched parts of it to the first violins, playing in octaves, and it creates a nice contrasting antiphonal effect.

The big news here in Eilat today is that a U.S. warship is visiting and is docked in our port. In the first information I read about it, it was referred to as an "aircraft carrier", and it does, in fact, have aircraft on board. But when I looked its name, USS Kearsarge, up in Wikipedia, I learned that it is actually an "amphibious assault ship". Anyway, if I climb up on the low wall of our balcony (and, don't worry, there's a sturdy railing to lean against!), I can see part of it from there! We also drove down near the port to get some better views of it.

We ate "lunch" at Greg café today. I put that in quotes because only had cheesecakes and ice-cafés. Hey, Shavuot only comes once a year! :-)

In the late afternoon, before sundown, we took a lovely drive around the short loop. It was a very beautiful, clear day out today, so it was a nice trip. The desert is always so wonderful, especially when the sun starts to get low in the sky, bringing out the contrasting colors of the different geologies.

Tuesday, 14 May 2013

My cold has "progressed" from my chest to my head (although it hasn't really left my chest completely yet, either). I hope it moves on to its demise, and soon. David's still seems to be mostly in his chest, but it, too, is also going to his nose and sinuses. We're both anxiously hoping that these colds will pass quickly, but, so far, they've definitely been taking their time.

This morning we picked up David's תעודת עיוור te'udat iver (certificate of blindness). Now we can try to get some things for him, especially a brailler so that he can relearn and practice his Braille. However, the web site of the Center for the Blind is Israel now seems to have completely disappeared (I get an unknown address error for it consistently!). I called their phone number but only got a recording giving their hours and some other information. I only caught about half of it, but I left a message telling them about their missing website, leaving my number, and asking them to call me. Of course, it will be at least Thursday before that happens (if at all), since tomorrow is a holiday.

I taught only 4 units today since it's the eve of a holiday (Shavuot): 10:30-12:00 and 12:00-1:30. We ate lunch at Il Pentolino.

We talked for quite a while in the late afternoon with David's sister in Ohio and her husband. They told us all about the trip to Kitty Hawk and the outer banks of North Carolina from which they had just returned. This was the first time she had ever seen the ocean!

David and I sat for quite some time this evening as it was getting dark on the bench just outside our building, facing the parking area. It was so lovely out!

Monday, 13 May 2013

I slept fairly well last night, but I was also awake quite a bit.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30, 10:30-12:00, 3:00-4:30, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

We got some good news today. The city social worker called to tell us that David's te'udat iver (certificate of blindness) has arrived. We will go over and pick it up tomorrow morning at about 9:00. The process of getting this has been going on now for MANY months! After going blind nine and a half months ago, it is finally officially recognized.

We ate lunch at Greg café today, and they had everything that we wanted (unlike yesterday).

My 5:00 student had to leave half an hour early due to a doctor's appointment, so David and I took the opportunity to walk over to the green strip. We sat there for quite a while, enjoying the lovely evening. But when we started walking back home, David was very tired and slow. Finally, about half way back, I left him leaning (really half sitting) against a wall, went and got the car, and came back and brought him home. He continued to feel very tired the rest of the evening, but he was okay.

During the break in my last class (around 7:45), I went out onto the balcony to change the cats' water and clean out their litter boxes. As I was finishing and heading back in, a strong wind came up, and when I looked out it seemed that a dust storm was just arriving, so I quickly went around and closed all the windows (which had been open all last night and all day today). Later, while I was teaching, I happened to notice a flash of lightning out my window but not close because I heard no thunder at all. Nevertheless, I was still surprised when I finished teaching to see that the bedroom window was wet from rain! I looked out, and, sure enough, there was actually water running down the street (but it was not raining by then). This is COMPLETELY crazy weather -- it should definitely NOT rain AT ALL in May in Eilat! But, of course, much of Israel (especially the North) has been having rain about every third day for MONTHS now, which is also NOT normal. Hmmm, climate change?

Sunday, 12 May 2013

Not so surprisingly, I didn't sleep as well last night. I eventually got up and took a Coldex pill, and in the later part of the night I slept better. Luckily, my shoulder pain didn't cause much trouble, so I think it's gradually healing.

Both David and I have a chest cold and so haven't been feeling very energetic all day. David has now had it for about a week, and I've had it for several days, too. I got some syrup today at the pharmacy that should help us make sure our coughs stay productive (and not just dry). That's the only way to get through the colds, I think. One of the additional problems for David is that this cold (or whatever it is) seems to be causing his blood sugars to run high, even when we diligently cover what he eats with the usual amount of insulin. This, of course, does NOT help him to feel any better!

I got a little more work done on my music today. I started the process of orchestrating my arrangement of Ahavat Olam (the waltz-like version that is sometimes used at EVS). This will actually be a fairly simple process compared to some of the others.

We ate lunch at Greg café today, but we were a little disappointed that they didn't have ice-café. This is about the 3rd or 4th time it has happened. The next time, we may just very well go down and around and see if Café-Café has any, and, if it does, eat there instead.

I did the weekly grocery shopping late this afternoon.

Shabbat, 11 May 2013

I took the last sleeping pill last night, slept very well, got up fairly early, and walked over to the big kikar and back -- another lovely morning!

I did quite a bit of work on my music today. I filled in the orchestration and made several improvements on Avinu Malkenu. I also did a quick orchestration of a piece, based on Mode Ani, from my latest organ album. This is a somewhat experimental composition, a little in the style of Philip Glass, that includes a sustained bass note running through the whole piece (played by the basses, of course), imitations of birds singing (the first flutes, naturally), an Alberti bass figure in the cellos, and the tune of Mode Ani running very slowly in the violins, overlapping with a faster version of itself played by the second flutes. As I mentioned, I originally wrote it for organ. I found the tempo too slow, so I've already speeded it up 50% for the orchestral version. I'll probably made some additional changes, as well, but it already sounds quite interesting.

We ate lunch at Greg café today. I ordered their breakfast, and David had a fruit salad. He ate a very small amount of the bread that comes with the meal, and he only ate about a third to a half of the fruit salad. I ate everything else except for the chopped Israeli salad that came with the breakfast. Somehow, I just feel like eating that today, although I usually like it quite a bit.

Other than these things, we just spent a quiet Shabbat here at home. Just as the sun was setting, we got a few stray drops of rain, not enough to even get the ground wet. But the cool breeze that preceded and accompanied them was most welcome!

Friday, 10 May 2013

I took a sleeping pill last night and slept very well. This morning, I got up early and walked over to the big kikar and back. It was really nice out!

Before my one class of the day, I walked down and got a new battery (2032), challah, and some more candy.

I taught just 2 units today: 10:00-11:30. It was the last class for one of my favorite groups, which consisted of 3 salesmen for Canon in Poland. They are hoping that they'll be able to get their company to pay for more lessons, and, of course, I hope so, too.

After the class, I went to the pharmacy and was able to pick up the prescriptions that they had had to order. I also made sure that they ordered them right away for NEXT month, so we won't have the same problem again.

We had lunch at Il Pentolino, each of us eating our usual pastas and sauces.

I did more work on my orchestration of Avinu Malkenu. I've now gone through the whole thing, but I'm definitely not yet satisfied with it. In fact, it may take quite a bit more work before it achieves the kind of effect it should have. I have several ideas I can try, and so we'll see what happens.

Thursday, 9 May 2013

I took the sleeping pill last night, but for some reason I still woke up in the middle of the night. I was having trouble going back to sleep due to the pain in my left shoulder, so I got up around 3:00 a.m., took 600 more mg of ibuprofen, stayed up for about half an hour (to allow it to take effect), and then went back to bed. I managed to get back to sleep after that and didn't get up until around 7:00 (although I woke up somewhat earlier).

I only had classes in the evening today (4 units: 5:00-6:30 and 6:30-8:00). This morning I took out the plastic bottles and the various containers to their respective recycling places.

I also got some more work done on my orchestration of Avinu Malkenu. It's fairly slow going because, obviously, this piece needs to be very expressive, and that means a lot of rather detailed and painstaking editing. For those of you who aren't familiar with this prayer, it's part of the liturgy for the High Holy Days where we plead with G-d for mercy and compassion ("Avinu Malkenu" means "our Father, our King").

We ate lunch again at Greg café. After that, we took a drive around the short loop.

Wednesday, 8 May 2013

I took another sleeping pill and again slept well. I hope I won't get the least bit addicted to them, though. The doctor gave me 14 of them, I think, which should mean that one can take them every night for 2 weeks without any problems. Still, I'm just a little skeptical.

Let's start with what I forgot yesterday. I watched the video for the Data Science class that was supposed to help me with the first assignment, but, instead it convinced me that there was no way I would be able to do the class. I'm just not that fluent with the modern programming languages and, more importantly, the various ways of accessing them and working with them. I'm sure I could learn it, but not fast enough. The work-load for the class also seemed to be quite heavy, even for someone who IS up-to-date. The bottom line is that I decided to drop the class. I felt a little bad about it, but mostly I just feel relieved. I certainly don't regret the time I spent getting acquainted with Python, though -- that was actually a lot of fun in itself!

I got a little more work done on my music today. I'm currently working on orchestrating Avinu Malkenu.

I was scheduled to teach 6 units of Berlitz today (9:00-10:30, 4:15-5:45, and 6:30-8:00). However, in the end, I only taught the morning class. For the last 2 or 3 days, I had noticed that my the monitor on my PC (my Windows XP machine that I use only for Berlitz) had begun taking longer to come back up when I pushed the button on the PC to wake it from sleep. Last night, in fact, I was worried enough about it to leave the monitor on all night. It's probably a good thing I did because, when I tried to bring it up this evening for my 4:15 class, it NEVER came up, and so I lost both my evening classes. Alex, the Berlitz tech support guy thought that it was probably the computer that was bad, but he did estimate that there was about a 30% chance that it was the monitor. I took computer to a local computer shop, and they plugged in one of their monitors and were able to bring it right up. So, the problem was clearly with my monitor. I bought a new one from them. It cost me 750 shekels, but it's worth it because it's a very large monitor and it's LED which, according to what they told me, uses about 1/10 of the power of an LCD monitor.

We ate lunch at Greg café today, and after that we drove up to Yotvata and bought 2 more kilos of dates (which we eat every day for breakfast).

We got back at right around 4:00, and so I immediately tried to get into the classroom for my 4:15 class. We can enter up to 15 minutes before the start time. Of course, I was unsuccessful, but I was very busy trying everything I could think of, including even the possibility of using Windows XP running under Parallels on my Mac. Obviously, it was all for nothing.

As if that weren't bad enough, when I unplugged the computer and started out with it to get it checked, I discovered that David was lying on the bedroom floor and had obviously fallen. I had been so busy with trying to get my computer to work that I hadn't heard him at all. He was conscious and not injured, other than feeling sore and complaining of a headache. Of course, it's never easy to get him up, but I did finally manage to get him onto his knees, then got his hands up on the bed, and then he was able to stand up. I guided him to his chair in the living room. After checking him thoroughly, I told him to stay in the chair while I was gone. I even brought the urinal in case he needed to pee. I didn't want him getting up and falling while I was away. And, sure enough, when I came back (with my computer and its new monitor), all was well with David.

Tuesday, 7 May 2013

I took the sleeping pill and again slept quite well last night.

I taught 8 units of Berlitz lessons today: 9:00-10:30 (but this lesson was a late cancellation), 11:00-12:30, 4:30-6:00, and 6:30-8:00.

We ate lunch at Il Pentolino today.

This evening, we talked with David's sister in Ohio. He continued talking after I had to go to my 4:30 class.

David has been having trouble with a cough the last few days. If it doesn't get better, we'll have to try to take him to the doctor tomorrow to have it checked out.

Monday, 6 May 2013

I took the sleeping pill last night and, not so surprisingly, slept very well.

I taught 10 units of Berlitz lessons today: 10:00-11:30, 11:30-1:00, 3:30-5:00, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

We took a short drive during my midday break, including a stop at Ice Park to pick up David's bag from lost-and-found there. He had left it in the restroom there yesterday. But we ate leftover pizza at home for lunch.

I managed to watch a couple more videos for my Data Science course. I'm still not sure whether I'll really be able to do all the work for this course, but I think it will be interesting anyway.

Sunday, 5 May 2013

I only took a Coldex pill last night (NOT the prescription calming pill), and I didn't sleep as well. But, again, in the end I think I got nearly enough sleep.

I had a rather frustrating morning getting all the meds. I had to wait to see the doctor, because he hadn't written the 3 missing prescriptions because he couldn't find them in the computer, for some reason. When I finally got in to see him, he somehow managed to find them and print them out. Then there were lots of people at the pharmacy, so I had to wait there (as I expected that I would), and they told me that I have to call a week ahead to get those 3 medicines, so that they can order them since they don't carry them. The whole process was just very annoying!

We ate lunch at Greg café, then filled our car with gas and got it washed at the Paz station right by the airport. After that, I bought cat food and cat litter at one of the pet stores (my favorite, Zebra), and we continued to the Golf store at Mercaz Big, where we got new sheets for our bed.

Later in the afternoon, I did the weekly grocery shopping at Shufersal.

I also managed to finish the modules I needed to go through for learning the Python programming language. I feel fairly confident in it now (and I'm impressed with how powerful yet simple it is!), but I'm sure I'll forget some of the finer details of the syntax, and the reference page doesn't seem to be as well-organized and succinct as I would wish. So, we'll see how it goes. I have yet to even fully undertand the 6 or 7 problems that we are supposed to be doing for homework in my Data Science class.

Shabbat, 4 May 2013

I took the sleeping pill last night and slept VERY well.

I spent most of the day today learning the Python programming language, using the online tutorials at Codeacademy. It was a lot of fun, and I'm pleased to see what a powerful and handy language it is. The reason I'm learning it is that I have to use it for the Data Science class that I'm taking.

We had lunch today at Greg café, and then we drove up the Arava as far as Samar (just short of Yotvata) and then turned around and drove back.

We also took a little time out this evening to walk over to the green strip and sit a while on the bench there.

Friday, 3 May 2013

I didn't sleep very well last night even though I had taken a Coldex pill. Again, though, I think I got enough sleep overall.

After breakfast this morning, I went down and got us challah for Shabbat. I also stopped by the candy store and replenished our supplies in that department.

I had a little more time before my first class, so I also took out the plastic bottles and the containers to their respective recycle places.

I taught 4 units of Berlitz today: 9:30-11:00 and 11:30-1:00. After that, we went for our now-traditional Friday lunch at Il Pentolino.

Nearly every week, there's a free small-format advertising magazine that is put in our mailbox on Thursday afternoon or early Friday morning. It's called מה נשמע Ma Nishma, which means literally "What is heard?" but is actually a common Hebrew greeting that means, roughly, "What's up?" Some weeks, there are a couple of other similar rags, but they don't seem to be distributed as regularly.

I usually leaf through this little magazine pretty casually. It is mostly advertising, of course, but there are always a few articles, too. I rarely read them at all, but one definitely caught my eye this time because it was about a couple of young gay guys, 18 and 21, who want to establish a branch of a gay youth organization called "Iggi" (or something like that!) that apparently exists in many other cities in Israel. I took the time this afternoon to slog through the article (my Hebrew reading is still pretty slow). There were a few words I didn't know (and which I also didn't take the time to look up), so I didn't get all of it, but it was generally a good article (though a little longer than it needed to be, I think). It seems that this organization works in coordination with the national Education Office, a part of the government. I hope they are successful. I'd help them out if I could, but I'm afraid my limited Hebrew conversational skills might be woefully inadequate. I'd probably also run into scheduling issues due to Berlitz's control over most of my weekly schedule. Anyway, it's good to see such things, and it's particularly gratifying to see the issues discussed so well in something that goes to every apartment in the city!

This evening, David and I finally made it to Kabbalat Shabbat prayers at Tagel Arava, the Masorti (Conservative) congregation here in Eilat. The community is very small, mostly our age or older (it appears), and mostly Spanish speakers (including the rabbi). The prayers dragged on a bit, and the rabbi spoke too long (although it was interesting to hear how supportive he was of the Women of the Wall). At least his Hebrew is quite clear so that I was able to pick up a great deal of it. The only young people there were a cute young couple of new olim (immigrants) from Cuba!

Thursday, 2 May 2013

I took one of the prescription pills last night and so, of course, slept very well.

I went over to the doctor's office this morning right after breakfast to pick up the prescriptions (the ones I couldn't get yesterday because of the power outage when I was there). I had intended after that to go directly to the pharmacy and get them filled. However, the doctor hadn't gotten the anti-HIV meds into the list of continuing medications yet, so he hadn't given me prescriptions for any of them. And one of them was the only medicine that we were actually out of. Because of my schedule, I now won't be able to get it until Sunday morning. It's a little frustrating, but in the long run it shouldn't be too serious.

I watched some more videos for my Introduction to Data Science class. This teacher is good but not as polished as the truly great professor (Loudon Stearns) who taught the Introduction to Music Production class that I finished recently. Still, it's going to be an interesting class, and I'm sure I'll learn some cool and even useful things.

I taught 8 units of Berlitz lessons today, all individual students in France (although one of them is originally from Perú): 10:30-12:00, 3:00-4:30, 5:00-6:30, and 7:00-8:30.

Maya, David's mobility instructor, came a little after 1:00, talked with us a bit about plans for David, and took him for a short walk in the parking lot area. David felt a little discouraged, but actually she has identified a route out in that direction that I think he'll eventually be able to use to go to the green strip even by himself. I still will need to go many more times WITH him on the route for him to learn it confidently. She won't be returning again until 3 weeks from today.

I ordered pizza right after Maya left, and we got it just in time to eat it quickly before I had to start teaching my 3:00 student.

Wednesday, 1 May 2013

I didn't sleep as well last night. Of course, I hadn't taken any pill to help me, either. In the end, though, I think I got enough sleep.

I taught 7 units of Berlitz lessons today (although no one showed up for the first class, probably because of the May Day holiday in Europe): 9:00-10:30, 3:00-5:15, and 6:30-8:00.

I discovered that we were out of one of David's meds this morning, so I called right away to get an appointment to get new prescriptions for all our meds. Luckily, I was able to get an appointment at 10:50. Unfortunately, just as I was starting to talk to the doctor, the electricity went out at the clinic, so he couldn't get on the computer. I waited a bit and then decided to leave, at which point the power came back on, so I stayed a bit longer. However, before the doctor's computer had even finished re-booting, the power went out again. With that, I just left our cards with the doctor so that he could print out the prescriptions later, and I returned home.

I filled out a couple of pre-class surveys and watched the first video for my next class on Coursera. This class is called "Introduction to Data Science". It's going to be quite interesting, I think, but it will probably be more challenging for me, too, since my programming and (very limited) data processing skills are so very out-of-date. Still, I DO know how to program, and I even TAUGHT programming a couple of times (using the Pascal language) many, many years ago.

We ate lunch at Greg café today. David had half of an omelet sandwich, and I ate the other half, together with the Israeli side salad that came with it and an order of edamame (yum!). Again they didn't have ice-café, though, so David had a chocolate milkshake, and I had a mixture of carrot and orange juice which was interesting and quite good.

This evening, David had a long conversation with his sister in Ohio. I joined in here and there, as well.