My blog this year won so many awards, that I don’t have enough fingers and toes to count them! NOT!! (Didn’t I sound cheesy and dorky like the rest of the bloggers out there?) But yes, my blog won a lot of invisible mind boggling awards. I won people’s readerships. That’s the biggest award I can get as a blogger. I don’t care about best blog, or best writer, or best anything. Who cares? It’s like winning a virtual banner to advertise someone else’s bright idea that started the campaign.

Really, if the prize was money based, then people will be all over it! I would be so all over it!

So, I am gonna list the top blog posts this year by comments, my favorites, and ones that I should have never published, but found their way online cause of my insomnia or excessive amounts of coffee!

Top Blog Posts 2009 | Comments & Reactions

1. April 28, 2009 | It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s a conspiracy theory!
2. June 7, 2009 | The Arab Blogorette
3. June 16, 2009 | I think it is time for change!
4. August 25, 2009 | Why are Muslims turning Atheists?
5. August 30, 2009 | Analysis: It is much harder to get rid of her
6. September 7, 2009 | Arabs marrying non-Arabs
7. September 18, 2009 | Window shopping for a bride
8. October 27, 2009 | Symbols of being different

Top Blog Posts 2009 | Monaism & Love

1. January 15, 2009 | Are good people always the victims of life?
2. March 31, 2009 | How accurate is this?
3. April 20, 2009 | Airports think I am a perv!
4. May 21, 2009 | A way to relieve stress
5. July 15, 2009 | Teaching a child the basics of the internet world
6. September 6, 2009 | No Comment
7. September 24, 2009 | I am sick and tired of looking for work!!! NO MORE!
8. December 4, 2009 | The typicals
9. December 26, 2009 | I am the master of my choices

Top Blog Pots 2009 | Those That Should Have Never Been

1. January 28, 2009 | The blogging world is run by monkeys
2. May 4, 2009 | I thought I held the title of taking things too seriously
3. June 20, 2009 | The media has been following me for over two decades
4. September 26, 2009 | I don’t like talking about sex in public

Yeah baby yah!

The Goodbye

I hate saying good byes, especially when my 2 year old niece starts crying her lungs out and keeps calling my name. “Mona, Mooonaa.. MOOOONAA!!” My heart stopped, and I tried not to cry at the bag check in. It was just horrible. Now you guys know why I don’t like trips sometimes, or having to deal with such situations.

It can get a bit worse you know

On a lighter note, but is actually at a different tangent then saying good byes, something ALWAYS has to happen to me on a plane! Seriously, if I hear the word turbulence one more time, I am going to have a major anxiety attack. Coming from Calgary to London was the biggest and longest flight that I had to ever endure in Canada. It was awful! Above the province of Alberta, it was crazy weather. The plane wouldn’t stop shaking. It got to one point where I didn’t tighten the seat belt enough, that I felt my body lift up from the chair. My sister was going to cry and kept holding my hand in those awful seconds.

Then, when we were above the US State of Minnesota, more crazy turbulence. I didn’t understand how people were sleeping on the plane. The flight was late to leave anyways, it was delayed till 1:15 am local time, and we were supposed to land around 7 am in London local time. However, we reached London at 9:30 am. Ask me why? SURE! I will tell you why, and maybe if you were following my Twitter this morning, I sort of said why. This morning, we landed in Toronto to fill up gas!

A plane filling up gas 200 km further then its destination?

If you are still asking your self what the hell, then I will give you a simple answer, LONDON WEATHER IS HORRIBLE! If it is not raining, it is hot and humid. This humidity and crazy hot weather causes severe fog in the mornings. However, you ask your self, Gas? Weather? Umm? Mona, do tell us!

Ok, here it goes. We flew around London 6 or 7 times in circles. The captain was not allowed to land in London Ontario International Airport, and had to wait 30 minutes till the weather cleared up. Then, after 30 minutes, the captain said, “we will try to land. We were told the weather is permissible and cleared up a bit.” We looked out the window, the flaps of the wings got into position, we dropped in elevation, the plane barely touched the clouds, and two seconds later, VOOM! Accelerated upwards so fast and flew higher up! I felt I was in a rocket ship! I am like great, can’t land! Clouds are too thick and no visibility.

No message from the captain on the intercom. Nothing! I was like, umm, we are way higher up now than before. After ten minutes, the captain goes on the intercom and says, “Umm, we have bad news. We are going to land in Toronto’s Pearson International Airport because we can’t land in London, and we are running out of gas.”

You all know what went on my head in that very second! @#!@$#@!!@$!

After one minute, we saw Toronto’s CN Tower, and I thought, “yah, took him that long to spill it out that we are in Toronto. Someone would have panicked looking outside within a second of seeing that!”

So, we landed at the Toronto airport. However, we did not land in the domestic flights area, but in the international section. The captain came on the intercom and said, “well, we are in Toronto, but in the international section because we couldn’t land anywhere else. And none of you can get off the plane in this area anyways. So wait till more news.”

“Oh GREAT,” I thought. “I am in Toronto, and was supposed to be at home by now! I AM TIRED! NO sleep! I am scared shitless and I HATE planes!”

Fifteen or twenty minutes pass, and the captain comes on the intercom and says, “I would tell you guys Welcome to Toronto, but I don’t want to be here and none of you do either. We are going to fill up gas now, and be on our way back to London.”

Wohooo!!

The flight took 20 minutes, and we landed in London’s humid weather around 9:30 am. My hair went kaboom in two seconds!

The mother is back!

When we got home, mom started lecturing me on work, and told me to go study something else, or something extra, or whatever. I got instantly mad, since I have only been in the house for like fifteen minutes, and I said, “Listen, I don’t want to spend money now on more courses or whatever. I don’t have an income. The plan backfired mom. I need to start something on my own. There are no jobs. The economy is horrible. People are losing jobs left and right, and I am sick of going to interviews in companies where the owners are jack asses who had a simple plan, and became rich off of it. I am ten times smarter then them, and I am sick of this life and all this job hunting crap. No one wants to hire me! I will HIRE MY SELF!”

Mom wouldn’t stop arguing back, and from the lack of sleep and no food, I couldn’t move anymore. Then, I felt dizzy and extremely light headed. Unfortunately, the worst thing happened, and I was hoping I would not experience that again. I starting having uncontrollable heart palpitation. Did I tell you guys that I will die from a heart attack soon? I give my self another 10 years. Give or take a few if I CONTROL my ANGER!

So, I went to the living room and put my hand on my chest, and I tried 4 or 5 times to take deep breaths. The awful plane ride, the crazy weather, and crazy mother, have really put me on the edge. I stayed calm, and after a minute or two, my heart beats went back to normal. I think I had a lack of oxygen in my system.

Anyways, enough is enough. I am back, and ready to take over the world. One blog post at a time.

I am flying out tonight. First to Calgary, then back to London, Ontario tomorrow at dawn!

I miss London. (Never thought I would ever say that!) lol

Oh, the woes of a web designer.

Just on a side note: the heat here! God, it is so HOT in British Columbia. Now people will change their opinions about Canada! It gets pretty WARM here in the summer people! It’s going to be 38c today. I am super tan now, and I think I need to start putting sunscreen daily and not just to the beach. I may become a case for skin cancer at this rate. The sun is much closer here, and not so friendly. It is not even friendly to an Arab that was born in the desert!

My vacation is extended till August 14.

I have so much ranting to write on here. My blog is dying I tell you! People are complaining where I am! I am here, but I have been too lazy to write. I apologize to the masses.

I will be back later to write about other issues other than my long ass vacation!

The highway to Vancouver was through the mountains. It took over 4 hours because we kept going up and down and taking too many twisty turns. One minute we were in a low elevation, and the next minute your ear would be popping from almost at the tip of a Rockie Mountain we were driving in.

What amazed me is the snow covered tips on the mountains in the middle of July. The temperatures on this side of Canada are much higher than Ontario. It goes up to 35 or 38 degrees Cecilius. However, it is tolerable because it is dry and not humid. If it was humid I would have been melting by now, literally.

We arrived at Vancouver city 4.5 hours later almost, and the first stop was the Vancouver Science Centre. I love science and that little science dome was so much fun. I know it is for kids, and we had a couple of kids with us, but seriously, it was FUN!

Wasn’t that Beaver cute?

Afterward, we went to Vancounver Aquarium in Stanley Park. We couldn’t check into the hotel till after 4:00 pm. So we had to spend the day out doing something. And obviously, where else would you find Mona at? An AQUARIUM with fishies! I love aquatic and exotic marine life.

The best part of the Aquarium was seeing the Baby Balugas. I loved them! However, we had to be super quiet because there were Researchers Offices around there, and we couldn’t use the flash on the cameras. So this was the best picture that I was able to take.

And we cannot forget the crocodile! LOVE IT!

The next day we went to many mini trips in the parks and seeing how beautiful nature is. I snapped some pictures live with my mobile phone, and sent them to my Twitpic album if you guys were keeping up. I got internet all over Canada with free emails, so I am abusing it big time! So keep up with me, you never know where I am at, and what I will snap and send!

Later that afternoon we took a fairy to cross the docking area to Granville Island. We were at the edge of it at the Market. I love the scenery and people. All kinds of people from all over the world. I felt I was in an international market. Did I ever mention that I felt like a foreigner in Vancouver? 90% of the people there that I saw were either of Asian decent or Indian. It was weird. Even in Vancouver, there were hardly any Arabs.

And since I am in the other part of Canada, I had to obviously snap some picture of the Pacific Ocean. It was breath taking!

During the ride in this entire trip, I couldn’t stop talking. I get bored easily, and I have to talk about anything. My brother noticed how much I changed, and how much I talk. I used to always be quiet and not say a thing. However, this time I saw his dark hair turn grey every time he screamed at me to shut up in the car. He couldn’t stand me anymore and told me to be quiet or kick me out of the car while he is driving at 120km/h or up to 140km/h.

He can be mean sometimes. He just doesn’t like me talking or having an answer to everything. I can come up with any answer to any topic. I do talk a lot eh? Give me a topic! Any topic!

Finally, because it seems that everyone loves that little rascal of a niece that I have. That little 23 month old that has more energy, charisma, and too smart for her age, drove us crazy in the car. However, I managed to snap a shot of her while she was at her best. Her cute little face and poses are priceless! She says, “Hi! Google!”

Before we took a dip in the lake, we barbecued. I don’t eat meat, except for shrimp sometimes. So, feeding me here has become a challenge for my brother, but great for me! Hehe. At restaurants I am so picky, and the waitresses say, “yes, we make sure our sauces and food are made for vegetarians with no animal products.” Awesome eh? I love being picky!

Anyways, while we were cooking the food over the coal BBQ, my niece kept wanting to strip off her bikini underwear part. The bikini was too big on her, and she is very skinny and tall for her age. She is almost at the tallest mark for children her age. She is gonna be a tall girl like me! Yay! Anyways, she stripped about 3 or 4 times because she couldn’t run around properly. She hated it, and she kept getting smacked on her hands for doing so. Unfortunately, she is the most stubborn child and didn’t care.

Moreover, the beach was all rocks and sea weeds under. I didn’t like swimming in it because it hurt the bottom of my feet. It was annoying and I just kept floating. However, I wouldn’t have traded the view and the clean water for anything else. It was amazing!

The latest news now is that 40% of the fire has been contained in West Kelowna, which is right across the bridge, 10 min from here. The sky is red and smokey, and smells bad. I was reading the news from my cell phone along the way when I had signal. A lot of times I did not have phone reception when we were driving in the mountains. We started seeing the smoke across the mountains about 180km from Kelowna.

This is a picture I took from the highway near Vernon while we were driving.

Half of West Kelowna was evacuated today.

You know what else I noticed? It only rained once since I got here, and barely for half a day. No wonder fires spread fast here, it is dry!

I got a picture from Castanet.

I will talk about my trip to Vancouver and share some pictures tomorrow. Today, I am dead tired!

Unfortunately, I won’t be able to blog and share good quality pictuers till Sunday. I will Twitter a lot and send pictures to my Twitpic album. I will be leaving to the city of Vancouver tomorrow morning. It is about a 4 hour drive to there. The reason it is such a long way because the highway cuts through the mountains. So it is not a straight line.

Tonight, we are going to the lake to swim in the beautiful clean water at a regional public park. It is about 10 minutes away! And no, I don’t wear a bathing suit. I wear shorts and top! So don’t ask you weirdos and I am not afraid of water or heights either!

My brother is hilarious when he starts swearing at that little angel devil of a daughter that he has. The girl is hyper and full of incredible energy. She is tall and skinny for her age, and very flexible. If she breaks one thing during the day, then that is fine. My old laptop that died yesterday, she had fun with it since the day I came here by continually removing the tab key. I think I should blame her for the death of that laptop. Anyways, the tab key was easy access for her to steal. What’s worse, that she came close to my new laptop that I bought yesterday, and she almost took out the back space button. My brother screamed because it tilted out. I told him to not worry, and I re-adjusted it. Children. Blah!

Anyways, a couple of days ago, Saturday July 4, we went on a steam engine choo choo train ride inside the mountains. I was so excited because I have never rode a train before in my life, and my first train ride was in something so historic! I loved it! The scenery was amazing, and I kept snapping pictures like crazy.

I would so do it all over again. I loved the ride and the amazing scenery! I love it! I wish all of you were here as well to see it. I love this part of Canada. I am so thinking of moving here! It’s breath taking!