7 Quick Takes Friday #3

It's Friday! It's Friday! Thank God, it's Friday! Here is my contribution to the quick takes Friday meme. My first quick take will tell you why I am so happy that it is Friday.

1. I have to travel again on Monday, returning on Friday, and leaving again on Tuesday. I figured that would give me a full day at work today (minus a heavy load of meetings, of course) plus a full day a week from Monday to catch up on all my paperwork and email. Silly me! Next Monday is a holiday; there is no work! (I have to write in my calendar book: DO NOT COME TO WORK. Otherwise, I forget it is a holiday. No wonder my neuroscientist daughter says she is worried about my brain!) So, I stayed and finished everything! I got home after 11:00! Worth it, though. I am going to have a real holiday in a week! It reminds me of the time that my boss called me at 2:00 in the morning, then asked what I was doing up so late! My response? "Talking to you!"

2. Friday is a great day not only because it is the last working day of the week but also because it is the Muslim holy day. Since I have many Muslim friends, I frequently enjoy Friday. One of these friends took me to his home for lunch. All his family had gathered, as they do every Friday, for a family meal of couscous with vegetables and chicken. Yummy! And amazingly, we managed to get there, eat, relax with friends, and get back to work, all within the allotted lunch hour.

3. Today was a day of discovery. First, I discovered that there were some problems with my travel arrangements for the next two weeks. From that I discovered that I should enroll my admin assistant in a geography course. Looking at my arrangements for next week, the flight was excellent: comfortable departure time from California and arrival time at Reagan National Airport in Washington, DC. Then I noticed the hotel: it was in Seattle! (Wrong Washington!) After that, I figured I had better check my arrangements for the following week in Nebraska. Good thing that I did! My flight flew in very nicely to Omaha, but the hotel was in Iowa! Yes, indeed, I am looking for a course in geography for my assistant.

4. I don't normally get much relaxing time during the week, but last night was an exception. My co-teacher for catechism came over so that we could plan our lessons. Since we have the same age group (teenagers in first-year confirmation) as last year, we have a lot of materials that have already worked successfully, so it took us very little time to work out the syllabus for the year. Then, we ordered in pizza, looked at my pictures from Korea (laughing at my Tae Kwon Do lesson -- short, uncoordinated people attempting martial arts moves look funny in pictures), and had a long discussion about just about everything under the sun with Donnie. I discovered that co-teacher had a friend who has an autistic child, and since I have a friend who is both mother to an autistic child and a PhD holder with a background in special education, I was able to network them. (I love closing those links to make chains that help people!)

5. I got a good lesson in remembering everyone, not just some folks, on my trips abroad when I dropped into the parish office on Thursday enroute to work. I always bring little things to my secretaries and chocolate for Fr. Ed. This time, the parish staff oohed over the German chocolate I brought Father. They clearly would have liked some. One of the staff was actually leaving to visit her brother the same day (!!) in the same part of Germany (!!). I told her where she could get the same chocolates so that she could bring some back for the staff. Next time, I will bring chocolates for Fr. Ed (who is addicted to them) AND for the staff!

6. Cats in Jordan talk. I am serious. They have about a dozen different sounds: differing ones for jumping up, jumping down, wanting attention, expressing dissatisfaction, requesting food, and so on. American cats just miaow -- or so I thought until recently when I noticed that the abandoned cat that we took in from our local streets has now developed a "vocabulary" of 5-6 words. It seems that Murjan (Arabic for coral; he is white and red, like coral), our alpha cat, has not only been grooming the little girl; he has also been teaching her to talk! What a great big brother!

7. When I am done with this blog, I am going to answer one of the emails I read today. It came from the vice president of an organization over which I presided (as president) 15 years ago! He wanted to know if I was still working at my organization. How well he knows me! I have a considerable amount of wanderlust in me, so it is an immense surprise that I have been in my present position for four year. A surprise and not a surprise because for some reason God clearly wants me in this job.

And now I am going to go contact my old friend and former veep. I wish you a weekend full of good times with good friends! And if real people are not around at this time, then remember that a good book can be a good friend, too!