Ehlana and Ethan:
Happy 10th Anniversary, Isabelle and Andrew Jennings!
We delivered a card and gift for one of our favorite teachers this morning before first classes, but that was the totality of our involvement in that anniversary celebration. Violet and Dillon are helping out with giving his sister and brother-in-law a kid-free night; and we do not need to comment on that story at all! ;^)
As for our own adventures, we’ve kept busy with our exams studies; Ethan and I hosted the after-school and evening study session that included feeding our gang of teens; and we missed out on game night at the Inn while busy with our friends. That probably doesn’t sound exciting, but we are happy tonight; and we are glad that we can help our classmates with getting as ready for those exams as possible. Since we didn’t have any major interruptions tonight, we wrapped up the work by around ten o’clock; our friends headed out for their own homes; and we took care of the clean-up while multi-tasking a post-gaming visit with mom and Dad after they got home from the Inn.
Ethan and I are busy with the wrap-up twin chat and computing; we’re getting tired fast; and our world news report is going to be short again tonight. Let’s begin with the weekly oil reserves update, and our national reserves dropped by another eight million barrels last week. That is a slower draw from the previous two weeks, but unless the reductions slow a lot more; we’ll be hitting new lows by the end of June; and could close in on minimum levels by the end of the summer. That reality hasn’t hit market prices yet, but it will get there eventually; and it could take a decade or more to rebuild reserves – especially when that is going to be a problem for all of the major countries that are also depleting their stockpiles of petroleum products.
In the Middle East, Lebanon is still under attack from Israel; ditto that for the Palestinians and Syrians; and there is no sign that the Israeli military is going to stop their killing and destruction. That stance will not make peace with Iran possible, but then our leaders aren’t really trying to negotiate for peace anyway; and threaten and bully instead of actually trying to negotiate anything. The battles in Ukraine continue to rage along the front lines and beyond; there are multiple points of contact that are collapsing for Ukrainian defenses; and there are many reports of serious problems for the Ukrainian soldiers as supply lines collapse and Russian forces create new cauldrons and cutting off those troops even from chances to retreat. Many people in the west would not know that is happening; since ‘our’ leaders and media do not report very much of the bad news from Ukraine while also pushing narratives that are often total nonsense.
I’m keeping this going longer than we wanted; so let’s stop there. Ethan and I are looking forward to the weekend even though we’ll continue the exams studying along with the usual chores and the start of the baseball season. We’ll try to have some fun to write about along the way too, so stay tuned for that; and we’ll go get some sleep so we’ll be ready for all of that work and fun.
Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!
