bread mold is healthy, right? like penicillin?

I went to work again this morning. Organizing/editing wasn't as simple as last time, mainly because I finished the first few catalogue pages I was given, and more had to be printed out, except the new ones were kind of backwards, and still had the tags for html all over them. So that was fun. In short, I've now gone through boxes 1, 2, 3, half of 4, half of 6, 9, 10, and 11, which leaves four and two halves boxes to do on Wednesday and Thursday. That's pretty good progress I think. Then I can (hopefully) get on a computer and actually make the edits for real, instead of just on paper with a pencil. The library was also freezing this morning. I was wearing real shoes and socks, not just sandals, and my toes were numb by the time I was leaving.
Classes were fine today, except for some minor angst in my ling class regarding extra points awarded to those who showed up for class last Thursday instead of going on vacation. A fair point was made by a classmate, who brought up the syllabus and pointed out that we can all miss three classes without being penalized by the professor, according to 'the contract' that we are all a part of, including him. I think the argument was pretty reasonable, but it basically got shot down, with the professor overruling 'the contract' as if it didn't apply when he didn't want it to. That's his prerogative, he's the teacher, but I don't think I agree with him.
Okay, remember Sons of Admirals? I posted their video for 'Here Comes My Baby' a long time ago. Now they are apparently an internet sensation, according to the Sun newspaper. The had a live performance at the Sun, and recorded some acoustic songs, my favorite of which is posted below. Please watch the video, because it will make you happy. Or it will if you like these guys:

And these guys:

Sons of Admirals singing the theme song from Arthur? Yes please!
So, basically, hearing this song at school made my day. And then my day/month/year/whatever was made even more awesome by hearing what the teefury shirt for today is. In case you don't know, teefury is a website that sells a different shirt every day, for that day only. Once the day is over, you can't buy that shirt ever again. And this is today's:

Yes, I bought it. How could I not? Really? Of course, I won't actually have it for a while, since risking it in the mail to Egypt is not a good idea. I'll get it when I get home. A welcome home gift to me! And something to look forward to when I discover it again after I forget all about it in the next eight months.
The bus ride home today was interesting, because I got one of the very last seats on the bus, right up at the very front. I took the opportunity to film a bit of average Cairo traffic for you. Actually, this is quite a bit tamer than average, since at some points, you can see the road.

When I got home, I decided that instead of buying dinner, I would just eat some of the pita bread that I bought at the grocery store. The good news is, it tasted really good. The bad news is, I got through half a piece before I realized that what I was tasting was mostly mold. Oops. I don't know why I'm grossed out by stray cats but not by eating mold (at least not that grossed out), but I am. Go figure. Just in case I have to say it, I did throw the rest away when I found the mold, promise.
As a special treat to those of you who love Arthur, here's another classic. [warning: do not watch this video unless you are prepared to have a fairly annoying, if entertaining, song stuck in your head for a very long time.]

Also, if anybody noticed, sorry for the late blog tonight. I went out with friends and had fun instead of staying home and doing homework. I might have to make a habit of this, actually, since I had a great time. And now I'm friends with a bunch of Europeans who I never knew before. Good times.

pay the cabbie the right price or take evasive maneuvers

This has just been the best weekend ever. Honestly, I got my work done, I got to be as lazy as I wanted to, and I got to hang out with my friends. I wish all my weekends could be like this.
My friend Geoff and I made plans to go visit the pyramids at Saqqara, which was an adventure, because it was the first real time I'd gone tourist-ing around Cairo without being part of a huge tour group. Both ways are fun, and both definitely have their advantages and disadvantages. For example, school tours cost more, but remove all the hassle of planning transportation and everything else.
Geoff and I caught a black taxi outside the dorms, told the driver where we wanted to go, and when he agreed, we got in the cab. We didn't bargain for a price, because it's really not necessary until the end of the ride. Plus, we'd spoken to a nice lady at the front desk who told us that a fair price to Saqqara was thirty pounds, so we figured we knew what we were doing. Haha.
First off, the taxi driver let us know that we'd have to hire him for the ride back too, because there weren't any other taxis to hail in Saqqara. This part turned out to be true, so I'm glad he mentioned it, instead of just taking our money and leaving us stranded there.
Secondly, he didn't actually know the way to the Saqqara pyramids. Go figure. No one in Egypt will ever tell you they don't know where something is. I have it on good account that if you ask an Egyptian for directions to the Egyptian consulate (which is imaginary), they will give them to you. In gloriously imaginary detail. Our cabbie pulled over a few times to ask for directions, and didn't really get much help until a nice old man came over and explained it to him. At this point, we'd been driving for an hour (the trip should have only taken half that), and we'd made 5 u-turns. U-turns in Cairo are scary. Generally they involve crossing about 3 lanes of traffic, pausing for a moment, then swinging right back out into the lanes going the other direction. Eventually we made it, though.
Our tickets into the pyramid site were 30 pounds each (yay for discount student tickets!), plus an extra 2 pounds for the taxi, don't ask me why. Our first stop was a new museum, dedicated to Imhotep, the architect who designed the step pyramid at Saqqara for the pharaoh Djoser. It was actually a nice little museum, very well laid out, and with lots of cool stuff, including Imhotep's actual wooden sarcophagus. So that was cool.
When we were done with the museum, our taxi took us up the hill to see the tombs of nobles near the step pyramid. We went inside a few, and thwarted the attempt of a man to get us to give him tips for pointing out things that were in plain sight. No, thank you, I can see it for myself.
I would have pictures of the tombs to show you, except it was at this point that my camera decided to fail me for the first time in its life. When I tried to turn it on, it beeped four times, and the message 'lens error, restart camera' appeared on the screen. Restarting didn't do anything, until Geoff suggested that maybe it needed a time out, so I left it alone for a little while.
After seeing the tombs, we visited the actual step pyramid of Djoser. It was pretty impressive.

step pyramid

scaffolding = apparently they're still working on it?

 The temples and building surrounding the pyramid area were interesting too, but we didn't have much time, so we didn't explore them as thoroughly as we might have. Here are some more pictures, though:

the fence matched the pyramid!

we stole pictures of this camel while its owner was gone.
if he'd been there, he would have made us pay for them.

guardian cobras on the temple wall

there are a lot more trees outside cairo than inside

We got back from Saqqara around 5:00, and paid our taxi driver 70 pounds, which we figured was a reasonable price, accounting for the price there and back and a little extra for the time he spent waiting around. Apparently, he disagreed, because as we headed into the dorms, he actually got out of his cab and started to follow us. We skedaddled, and I don't think he hung around for very long.

It made me feel bad, though, because I honestly think that was a fair price, especially since he got us lost. If I find out that it wasn't fair, I'll do my best to make it up to another cab driver another day.

I meant to get together with some more friends and go out to dinner, but it didn't work out, so instead I ordered in by myself. Pizza Hut delivered my small cheese pizza in about 20 minutes, and somehow their delivery guy managed to slip past me to the guard desk, even though I was sitting outside waiting for him. It worked out, though, and I even got change from him, which is practically a miracle. No one in Egypt likes to give change, which really sucks when all the ATMs here only give out 200 pound notes.

my delicious dinner

Guess how much my dinner cost me? For a Pizza Hut pizza, delivered by motor bike, in Cairo. 17 Egyptian pounds. For those of you not fluent in Egyptian currency, that's less than four dollars. Yeah, I'll probably do this again.
I don't know if you're getting sick of me posting music by the same people over and over again, but I'm not, so I'll probably continue in this vein until someone asks me to stop. That said, here's another hexachordal song, this time a cover of The Magnetic Fields' All Your Little Words:

alternate universes, some with socks (and porphyrophobia)

In a thousand thousand alternate universes, I'm climbing Mt. Sinai right now. Of course, if I'm going to go quantum here, in a few thousand universes, I'm wearing socks, or didn't do my laundry today, or slept in till noon, or didn't choose to listen to wonderful music on the internet all day while I did my homework. None of those things are true, and I can say I'm pretty happy that's so. Except for the socks, it's kinda cold in here.
Okay, now I've got socks on.
I've decided that if a song can make me laugh at the beginning and cry at the end and be 1 minute and 38 seconds long, it should be posted on my blog, and possibly be my new favorite song. So here. And here.

I don't really know why it made me cry, honestly. It's sad, but it's cheerful, so I'm a little bit confused. Maybe that's why.
Today was a good weekend day to spend at home and not on vacation. I got all my laundry done in a timely fashion, except for the last bit that I left in the dryer for 45 minutes too long. Oops. Thankfully someone was sensible and put it on top for me, so I didn't feel too bad. I used the sixth floor washer and dryer today, marking the first time I have done my laundry all on one floor. The sixth floor washer has its  quirks, just like the fifth floor one does, except instead of the door not opening properly, on sixth floor, it doesn't close. I tell you, every day is an adventure here.
I got all my homework done today, and managed to catch up on my television shows too. Big Bang Theory is excellent, as usual, and so is House, but Bones leaves a little bit to be desired. Can they finally just get together already, please?
Aside from work and tv and laundry and cleaning, I really didn't have anything else to do today, which was a little disappointing. My friends were busy, so I couldn't go out, and today just wasn't the right day for me to wander around getting stared at and possibly harassed all by myself.
Here is another song for you, one that I've been waiting to post forever, because it has obvious spoilers for the Doctor Who series 5 finale, so I had to wait until Maggie finished watching the series. She'd watch it anyway, spoilers or not, and I'm strictly anti-spoiler, so that just wasn't going to work. But now she's done, so (finally) here is The Big Bang 2, by Charlie McDonnell:

Listening to this song honestly makes me miss my ukulele. Out of all the things I left at home (sunscreen and extra peanut butter included), my uke is the one I most wish I had brought with me. I was worried about packing it, and taking it on the plane, which is silly, because now I would gladly risk it on a plane, just to have it here now. That would give me lots more to do in my free time than take naps, and would have the benefit of being entertaining and productive for me, and simultaneously horrendously annoying to anyone within earshot. Win-win, right?
Anyway, I really want to learn to play Big Bang 2 when I get my uke again (hopefully at winter break), and I've actually already learned all the chords for it, that's how pathetic I am. Sad. I can wait three months, though. Since I have no other choice. Unless Geoff lets me borrow his mandolin... (Just kidding! I can't play mandolin.)