Almost to the halfway mark

We're getting through the second week of Ramadan. Here's our news:

• Ibrahim is bored and that means he's picking on everyone and causing trouble. How much longer until school starts again? 
• Nora's been working from home because her employer says the security situation is too unstable at the moment for employees to go to the office.
• Yusef's miserable because he's craving cigarettes which in turn is making everyone miserable. Ramadan and cigarettes don't go well together.
• Jenna sleeps all day. The life of a teenager!
• Sara's inventing new dishes and trying out recipes she's found on the internet or seen on TV- thank God there's one cook in the house. I used to be an enthusiastic cook, but when you are forced to feed 7 or 8 people everyday cooking becomes more of a chore than a pleasant pastime. 
• Hubby's grumpy and depressed - he's been watching too many Libyan news channels.
• Me, I'm fine. We're into the second week of Ramadan and I'm up early in the mornings and keeping myself busy working on some projects. 
• The garden is looking good. We still need to have grass put in the side garden in the spot that we were saving for the swimming pool, but I think it will have to wait until after Ramadan. We've decided against the swimming pool - too much headache with all the sand here. We have an above ground pool that we put up in the summer next to the terrace and take down in the fall - that's working out fine.
• The electricity - it's off about 4 hours every day lately which is not so nice when the weather is over 40C.
• Internet - slow as usual and off when the electricity is off. 
• Mobile phone service - spotty... I suppose this is due to the power cuts.
• Gas - there are still lines at the gas stations and the lines seem to be getting longer as there are rumors that the gas supplies aren't going out because the drivers of the supply tankers are being kidnapped - more than likely just a rumor, but that's all it takes for the lines to start forming. I'm topping up whenever I get a chance. 
• Banks - I see crowds of people in front of the banks in the mornings as I pass by. Not a good sign... 

I'm my last post I mentioned that we had two new pets, but then only wrote about one of them. The other one is a spiny-tailed lizard that we named Spike. Spiny-tailed lizards come from north Africa and are kept as pets all around the world. They're vegetarian so no need to worry about providing insects for them. Spike likes vegetables and weeds I pull up from the garden and a bit of cacti. The kids put him out on the small balcony next to  my desk. Our house is starting to feel like a zoo. My kids came home a few weeks ago saying they wanted a monkey that they'd seen somewhere.  No! I draw the line at monkeys... but I wouldn't mind a parrot. 

Ibrahim with Spike