Valentine’s Day was a little different this year as the embassy welcomed visitors from Washington on Monday. The crisis in Ukraine changed the names of the people who came to get briefings from embassy staff and to attend an event sponsored by the government of Liberia. Liberia has planned a lot of celebrations based on the 200th anniversary of the return of freed slaves from American to this land that would be eventually become the country of Liberia. The government keeps referring to it as their “bicentennial” but it’s not the bicentennial of the country – but no one seems to want to parse that difference. My favorite visitor in the three-person delegation was the Secretary of the Smithsonian, Lonnie Bunche. I had a few minutes to chat with his about the ”Sidedoor” Smithsonian podcast (we share a favorite episode about Apollo 13).
Now that COVID rates are going down a bit, I ventured back to the salon this week, treating myself to leaving the office early (!) one afternoon. Last night, we were invited to a small dinner party (!!) at a co-worker’s home. She is Moroccan and made my favorite lemon-olive-chicken dish. It was fun to socialize with the couple and another guest; they also have two cute kids who enjoyed a couple of magic tricks from John. The smaller girl helped John with a magic trick several months ago when we had a talent show. When her mom told her that John was coming to dinner, and that John is mom’s boss, the little girl was amazed that her mother was so lucky to have a magician for a boss (!!!) – she’s quite adorable.
We’ve been watching the wonderful Julia Garner in “Inventing Anna” on Netflix this week – I’m totally hooked on it. I finished reading “Atonement” — so good — and just started a book of essays by A.S. Byatt (not as fun a read for me).
We also wished Pete a happy 86th birthday this week!
