Steady rain all day yesterday and last night It's still raining. This is apparently the edge of Hurricane Ida. I love the sound of rain while I am snug in my bed or sitting by the fire. The clock was blinking this morning, so I wasn't sure of the time. The power must have gone off briefly, but not long enough for my computer to shut down. It did make it uncomfortable driving and especially going from car to work, work to car, car to restaurant and bank...My parents found it unpleasant to be home all day, although Vanessa did go to yoga this morning. She also baked cookies, which warmed up the house and smelled great. I worked on my Arabic homework while I ate lunch by myself at the National: pumpkin soup and chicken salad. It was yummy but crowded and noisy. I was very close to a table of loud women talking about shallow things, which was mildly annoying.

One of the places the Board insisted on advertising the executive director job is Opportunity Knocks and we had 17 applicants respond there. In order to send them the questions, I have to log on to the site, click on each name, click on their email link, type in the name of the organization, type in a subject, paste the questions, and click send. 17 times. I am not sure how I can get the resumes from the site to send to the board members. Perhaps if they email me the answers to the questions, I can ask them to send their resume again, directly to me. I suppose the idea is to make it hard for them to contact me directly, which I applaud, but in this case it is adding tremendously to my work. Of course, I have many other resumes from other places we advertised.

One of our interns, Amanda, is excellent and seems to be very competent. One of our interns, Taylor, is really nice, but can't seem to focus very well and needs a lot more direction. I keep asking people to do things and they don't get done. I need to keep track of who I asked to do what and follow up. Kerri is off today and tomorrow, working on her comps, so it is up to me and the interns to take care of things. This is complicated by the fact that I keep moving from my office to the Executive Director's office and back. So I try to do the Assistant duties in the morning and switch to Director in the afternoon, but if an email comes in for me on the other computer after noon, I won't see it until this morning. Hopefully, if it's urgent, they'll call.

The President of the Board committed to speaking to a group last night, but she had a stomach bug. I am not sure if she expected me to let them know she wasn't coming and I didn't resolve that yesterday. I sure hope she contacted them.

Anyway, I picked up Ray at 3:40 and we came on home. We ate chicken pot pie from the freezer (one of the things I cooked with Janna). Vanessa made the crust and put it in the oven, so I had an hour or so free. I started working on an insulated shade for their room, but it has been a while and my brain was apparently rusty. I had cut two pieces of lining which had to be sewn together to be big enough for the two windows. I sewed them together, but on the wrong edges. Then I ripped out the stitches and sewed it the right way. In the process, the thread broke repeatedly. I was able to rethread the needle once, but then it broke again. I just can't see well enough to thread the needle. Ray was able to do it for me and eventually I finished my seam. Now I have a piece that is bigger than I need, so I have to cut it. It might have made more sense to cut it before I sewed it!

After our early supper, I headed off to Arabic class, a little late in the dark and rain. There was an accident at Whitehead Road. Cars were backed up. There were flashing lights and people with flashlights showing us how to get past. There was an ambulance and someone on a stretcher being loaded in. So I was really late to Arabic class. I am starting to be able to recognize about half the letters, and some of the sounds they make, but new things are being introduced. Some more marks that go above or below the words to tell us how to pronounce them, mostly what the vowels would sound like. So you get bnt, with marks, that is pronounced benet. Remember it is right to left. Anyway, it seems crazy hard to me, but there is a young woman who is way ahead of me. I will say she took the class before and she is very motivated, but she only comes about half the time (girl scouts, choir...). The most interesting thing to me is the teacher, who seems very stern and unhappy with our progress. Except then he smiles or even giggles about something. I think I will try to make him giggle...

I bought some baklava, but my parents were in their room with the door shut when I got home. I ate a piece, the rest will keep. Ray is trying not to eat dessert and to lose weight in other ways. He walked from my office in the rain yesterday morning.