Four Times the Fun

It’s been (another) busy day.

It began with an early wake-up call at 5:10 from Duke. Shana happily answered the call.

Later while driving the Dude to school, we experience a bit of role reversal. It’s usually my job is to boost him up, make sure he gets up and out and to school in a pleasant state of mind. Today he brought up an interesting topic: How humans are the most dangerous species on the planet. We are destroying Brazilian rain forests along with endangered species at the rate of 5 per day or something.

I just mumbled and nodded. I didn’t want to discourage his environmental empathy – but this was a time when I should have channeled my inner Archie Bunker. Really – at the risk of sounding like some sort of right wing jingoist – how can one get through the day with such a dismal view of humanity, and by extension, yourself?

As we arrived at school, the discussion had taken a more political turn, praising British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and criticizing President Obama. While he didn’t know Brown by name, I was quite impressed by how he even knew they had a PM. Anyway, apparently the Brits have passed a law restricting packaging on DVDs, CDs, etc. The Dude thought that was great. Then he says, “Yeah and what does Obama do? Pass laws making people from certain countries have to get out of line at the airport for additional screening.”

Background – one of the Dude’s fellow students is of Afghani descent. He and his family were subjected to additional airport scrutiny during recent travels. Obama’s pollsters should take notice. When the kids at Friends School start dissing the Prez, it could spell trouble.

Oh how I miss discussing the sexual innuendo in Bruce Springsteen lyrics.

Fast forward a few hours and things are looking up. I spent the noon-hour at Feed My Starving Children helping out the Dude’s class as they prepared meals for starving kids around the world.

[Preparing food at FMSC. Dude on right in brown sweatshirt.]

Other fun work-related note: Today, for the first time in 16 years with the company I was quadruple-booked for meetings. Yes, that’s four meetings at one time. If I was new to the company I would be working on a big, fat ulcer by now. As it is, it’s all I can do to keep from laughing.