Ehlana and Ethan:
Happy 25th Birthday, Jillian Sparks!
Happy 11th Birthday, David Burroughs!
As we’re writing this update, Cassie and Michael are starting their Tuesday with an early flight from Somalia to Ethiopia; and they’ll be in and around Addis Ababa for their Tuesday and Wednesday. They had a challenging work day in Mogadishu and walked away from one deal that was another case of bad guys trying to take over a legitimate project; and they also quietly dealt with the goons sent by those bad guys when they wouldn’t accept the loss of what they thought would be easy money. Losing opportunities that can help people is sad, but Cassie and Michael can’t be pushovers and get taken seriously; so they took care of themselves both in the conference room and on the ‘mean’ streets.
Here at home, we had a little gift for David and best birthday wishes while at school, but left it up to his friends and family to help him out with the main celebrations. Mom had a visit with Jillian today, but we didn’t see her; and left it up to Mom to pass along our best wishes for her too. We’ve been busy-enough with our academic adventures, practices, and a work-play evening at the lab or archives. There isn’t really much news to offer from any of that; and we’re tired after a long day that included extra time-phased hours. The weather was still nice today with a nigh near-seventy, but the next cool-down is only a day or two away from returning us to more-normal temperatures. I’ve skipped over the meals and morning Tai Chi, but that wasn’t newsworthy either; so let’s wrap this up with the world news report.
Everyone is waiting for the trilateral talks between America, Russia, and Ukraine that will be starting soon local time in the Middle East, but we don’t expect anything and hope that nothing worse will happen – like having those talks get disrupted by the conflicts in the Middle East. There are risks for that – especially when the threats continue to fly between America and Iran, but there is so much anger in the region that we don’t even know why they’d choose any city in the region for those peace talks. There is certainly no talk of peace with Iran, Yemen, Lebanon, Syria, or with the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. Saudi Arabia continues to be on the wrong end of missile and drone attacks – including one against an Aramco office skyscraper. It continues to be a challenge to get decent information; since many of those countries have very restrictive laws against media and social media sources. We do know that the damages and costs continue to rise; and recovery after these conflicts eventually end will take longer and be more-expensive.
Let’s stop there. We’re tired; our week is only going to get busier; and we need the sleep when we can get it.
Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!
