The high-low
September 11, 2005
While others commemorate and comment on other events today, I would just like to take a moment recognize the Israeli Goodbye to Gaza . (Don�t forget to check out the lovely reader comments.)
I just hope it�s �for real�.
I re-watched Promises with my family last night. If you haven�t had the chance to see this gem of a documentary, then you should. Aside from being really solid and touching, the DVD has some of the best extra footage I�ve ever seen on a DVD.
I had an excellent morning during which I met up with a Penn friend studying Arabic in Egypt now, and her former flatmate (I was first directed to her site a couple months ago by Greg. Thanks!) I also got my travel bag off of Teej, and went to the bookstore armed with your reading suggestions, only to walk out with some fairly tongue-in-cheek purchases because apparently all the Murakami and Lahiri had been snapped up already. The first book I purchased with Pamila�s encouragement�it�s called Dublin, and is basically a somewhat trashy historical novel. I really don�t know now if I�m going to actually read it�especially not while I�m actually in Dublin. Then again, I�m dumb and have a really hard time reading straight history texts, so this might be a good way to get in some more Irish history.
The second book I picked up because it has a picture of the kind of flip-flops I�ve been looking for on the cover.
As you can see�upon closer inspection�it also just happens to be a collection of stories by Ireland�s top women writers. And it�s called Travelling Light. And it�s a bunch of stories about women traveling alone. (Am I the only one amused by this? Probably.)
I�ve resolved not to actually start reading it until I�ve boarded the plane with my one backpack. I�ve flipped through it though, and it looks like it will be pretty interesting. In any case, the royalties from the book are being donated to a children�s hospital in Uganda, so even if it�s not very good, at least it�s for a good cause.
To top off my happy and productive morning, I came into work to find some excellent news, or Nuacht mhaith (Irish for �good news�) as it was put to me, waiting in my inbox�Mr. Inkwell is going to be in Ireland at the same time I am! The buzz from the happy news that I�ll be seeing one of my best friends for the first time in 1 year and 8 months (as he put it) lasted for a couple of hours.
Unfortunately, I have since plunged into a strange sort of funk. Welcome to PMS hell.
And on that happy note�