Greg Begins the First Day of His Sixtieth Year!!

Well, this has been some kind of week on the back of non-stop meetings last weekend. On Tuesday we began our slate of monthly meetings. I woke up at 2:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning wondering when I would ever get back to my minutes (Decisionpoint), so I got up and worked until 6:00 a.m. and got caught up. Day two became a very long day!! I would have done them right after dinner on Tuesday, but the Shepards were hosting FHE for the senior couples. On Wednesday afternoon, a sister in our office approach Sister Shepard and said, "Elder Shepard doesn't look too good!" At the end of day two, I did get to the minutes right after dinner and finished by about 10:00 p.m. Day three was a lot easier, having had a full night's rest. When I got home at the end of day three, I was decided to complete the third and final round of minutes. But I couldn't quite get the energy. By 8:30 p.m. I was fast asleep. On Friday, we began putting together a Powerpoint presentation for the Area Presidency. We completed the rough draft, emailed it to SL, had a video conference to review it. President Pieper and I left the office at around 8:30 p.m. We have Monday and Tuesday to "polish" the presentation. Saturday morning I completed my minutes from Thursday. Next week, I will try and catch up on everything else!!

I got a call this morning, from our visa and travel manager, indicating that they had no translator for the Coordinating Council being conducted today in Moscow. This was really my first one (other than the special one we arranged last December), so I didn't know about the translator requirements. Apparently, it had been communicated on the bottom of a spreadsheet showing travel arrangements for all of the Mission Presidents and District Presidents that were attending. Unfortunately, I never saw it. But we get a chance to redeem ourselves next week, when the second round of Coordinating Councils begin. The good news is, that in most councils, there are people who speak enough English to translate for those who don't speak Russian. It's just an extra burden we would rather they didn't have to bear.

In the afternoon, we celebrated my birthday. We did see a little sun. We went to the store. Chris made some yummy meatloaf. We watched a movie/took a nap (man can we multi-task!). Chris gave me a hand-carved, hand-painted Russian box to keep my keys, wallet, etc. I get a little treasure and it keeps the apartment picked up!! We both win.

I have a lesson to ready for tomorrow. Chris is working on the final steps to organize the branch library. It's supposed to rain tomorrow.

I thought I would post a couple of pictures from the concert we attended a couple of nights ago.