Colleagues

You should not expect daily posts this week. And here's why. The General Counsel from the US, my direct supervisor, is in town for a couple of days this week so I went out to dinner with him and a couple of colleagues. We had to meet at 7:30pm for dinner because I wanted to come home to give Syd her dinner and put her to sleep first. She usually goes down around 7-ish. I had a babysitter come and stay with her while I was at dinner (and iron my clothes because the wrinkles aren't going to work themselves out. All the clothes that were shipped to me were, as expected, incredibly wringled. Yes, it did occur to me to do it myself but I don't want to). Anyway, it worked out great. So we had plans for dinner tonight again at 7:30pm for the same reasons. One of my colleagues, Effie, asked if we could eat earlier. I said that I couldn't because of the Sydney situation but if she didn't want to wait until 7:30 then I'll take a pass on dinner. And she said ok, we'll see you tomorrow. Now, I was sincere about bowing out of dinner to accommodate her, but the quickness and bluntness of her accepting my offer did startle me a bit. I mean, I have good table manners, I'm fun, I don't order off the menu and I don't need anyone to cut my food. Who wouldn't want to eat with me, right?? The person that is actually disappointed by this is the General Counsel. Effie speaks English well but she has a thick accent and you have to read her lips when she speaks or it is difficult to understand her. After a couple of hours of focusing so hard, I usually get a headache. So does the General Counsel. He's probably popping Advils right about now. I wasn't going to cancel the babysitter because I didn't have her number and to chase down my ayi to do it seemed like too much work. Plus the ironing needed to be done. But I wasn't going to waste a babysitter on watching CNN at home (don't get me started on the tv here). So I went out to dinner at a really good restaurant in the neighborhood, and then off to the grocery store. It has been a good night.