Blatherations

Well, it’s almost 10pm and I am finally “officially off work.” You know that feeling at the end of the day when it hurts to think?

• I decided today I really like the days I split between Heritage and State. Here’s some reasons why: I don’t have to be anywhere ‘til 9 am so I get to sleep ‘til 7am. I’m always the first one there and the other girl who is second is a friendly girl who must have been homeschooled (I’ll have to remember to ask…I have it so settled in my mind that she was that I forget she never told me that…) and she and I usually talk a couple minutes before the grouches come in and scowl at us to communicate they are doing VERY IMPORTANT INTERN WORK. Can you tell I’m skeptical? Anyways… I also like the fact I usually get a free lunch since Heritage hosts so many events and lunches everyday and has leftovers they offer staff and interns. And I like that I actually get to go outside in the early afternoon on my walk from Heritage to the Metro and Metro to State…and feel the sun which is something I don’t get to do all the other days when I work from before sunup to after sundown. I also like that I get to walk through Union Station’s Main Hall on the way to the metro…and that is one of the most gorgeous building in D.C. and I don’t ever want to take for granted that I get to see that…
• That’s the end of my list of likes cause my main dislike is the overload of work which led to me leaving work at 8pm and not actually finishing work until 10pm. I have now committed myself to a nightly Latin American news summary for my Supervisor at Heritage so I had to do that as well as some research for State that I couldn’t do there since I can’t access the databases from there… firewall.
• At State I’ve mainly been working on Saudi Arabia that past couple days. We’re gathering research and hoping for a binding agreement for them to persecute those who propagate radical Islam(as in, believe the Koran and therefore want to kill people) or they’ll get sanctioned. This is major progress because they are an “ally” against terror so we didn’t think we’d get to do anything at all… Btw, that’s not even allowed to spread within State and is limited to our office so don’t go blabbing to your many State Dept contacts =) It’s not classified because it’s not even allowed to be written down yet. The reason being, there are many people in the State Dept who don’t care about religious freedom and resent those working toward it so we have to get this done and get Sec. Rice to make a decision on it before any dissenters find out and try to cancel it. Make sense? *sigh… bureaucracy….
• Speaking of progress, have you seen these stories? It’s been all over the news about the Vietnamese prisoners being released (over 8,000 total) and we are very excited! Not sure how it got to the Press since it was classified info we got straight from the embassy last week but there’s always leaks I guess… This one talks about our ongoing effort (btw, I didn’t know this until I started at State….but all these comments that figureheads make…they don’t make those up. Someone else writes every word they ever say and then 200 people sign off that it is ok to say before it is said. I’ll never read “State Dept Boucher said…” the same way again!)… I personally drafted many of those words…as well as composing the list of prisoners to be released…
• While I’m talking about the cool stuff I’ve gotten to do… the Ambassador told me a couple days ago that the briefing materials I gathered on the new Ukranian President’s wife (long story, she was a former State employee and somehow I ended up being the one doing research on her)… Collin Powell read personally, commented on, and used during his trip to Ukraine last week. Cool, no?
• And in all my important activites…I’ve also added a few not so important ones to the list. Tonight’s new one: Fashion Advisor to the Ambassador. Will that look good on my intern log for Regent? Seriously though, I had a hard time not laughing at him when he came out with 4 pairs of glasses to try on for me so I could give an opinion on which to wear while he spoke to the International Bible Study tonight… Oc, lest I feel too relegated to fashion activities, he also gave me 1 hr notice to work on drafting his speech and briefing him on the IBS….It was a major problem he couldn’t change the size of the font in a word document either…. He makes Bart look like a techie! Talk about a rush though! I think I was much more stressed than he though since I had scheduled/confirmed the times with the IBS and he was speaking at 7 and didn’t leave the office ‘til 6:55pm. I assume he made it though…
• Well, it’s warming up during the daytime this week. I ice-skated to work and back though…since it was frozen over… I narrowly avoided breaking my back. Oh the joys of winter…
• Stephen Johnson (LA analyst and my heritage supervisor) lent me “Underdevelopment is a State of Mind” so I’m going to read it finally which I’ve been meaning to do all year….
• There was a special on Fox at 7 about Venezuela, did anyone see it? Mr. Johnson asked me to watch it but I couldn’t since I wasn’t home from work yet. I also couldn’t see PBS Bio on Castro last night which was very promoted … Lisa doesn’t have PBS on digital cable…go figure… I heard it was relatively balanced, any dissenting opinions?
• Another A+ on my International Politics assignment. I guess I adequately expressed my horror over the ridiculous ideology in this week’s documents –No, I don’t think we should get completely disarm every nation in the world and create a World Police armed with water pistols… =) The effect of Dr. Rice’s comment about being nice to interns since she was one has been aggravated by her explaining how she got introduced to the political world and switched from a Piano major: a class in International Politics. Since my coworkers know that’s what I’m taking now I’m getting teased even MORE that I might be SOS some day… I laugh it off and all the while feel slightly guilty for know that what they consider “the ultimate” would be a compromise to me since I know that’s not my calling… Anyways…

Well, the pain of thinking is outweighing any other thoughts about the day. Email me please!

Martha/#2/me/marc/marco

E-Mail at: abbasdancer@yahoo.com