D-Day minus 11

O.K., getting close to departure. Everyone asks me if I am nervous. Not really nervous. I would say I am now one or two quantum levels above nervous. What else would you call it if you woke up at 4:30 A.M. every day, and could not go back to sleep? What else would you call it if your mind was so preoccupied with the great adventure to come that you can think of nothing else? If you want no better proof of my state of mind (or perhaps, absence of such state of mind is more accurate), look no further than what I did this morning. I got dressed to go to work (my last weekend on call before the big trip), and put on my black shoes. I happened to glance down when I got to work, and noticed that I did indeed put on my black shoes: one from each pair of black shoes that I own. Hey, give me some credit: I got the color right.

So my newest morning routine is, after thirty or forty minutes of tossing and turning, I get up about 5 A.M., and exercise. Then I take the Bichon brothers for excessively long walks in the pre-dawn morning. (At least some secondary gain for the dogs: they'll be in the best shape of any two Bichons I know).

I am not so much nervous about what I face when I get to Burundi. That's because I don't have a clue what I do face. No, I'm more worried about the logistics of getting there: the acquiring of all the things I will need when I do get there; the packing; the trip itself; and all the myriad details that must be attended to before I leave (including various bills).

Speaking of acquiring all those things, today was the day when most of the remaining "acquiring" occurred. Today was what I call "The Trip to Target," or "Julie and her Dad do Target." Under the very strict direction of my daughter, Julie Rose Friedrich, (who matches me in her obsessive-compulsive tendencies), the two of us went through Target at warp speed. Who would have thought that two people could acquire so much stuff in such a short period of time? We were up and down those aisles like two finely tuned race cars. In less than thirty minutes, we were in and out of that store. Julie's very detailed list served as our guide, and what a guide it was. We literally filled a shopping cart with items anyone going to sub-Saharan Africa needs; items such as large bottles of insect repellent with 100% DEET (oh, yes, you want that DEET, for you really don't want to make friends with any of those female Anopheles mosquitos. For those who don't know, the female Anopheles is the carrier of malaria. Like many species I know, the male Anopheles is perfectly harmless); sunscreen; several bottles of hand sanitizer; toothpaste; toothbrushes; soap; soap-dishes; towels; power bars (again, something I never eat, but presumably will eat in Burundi); and who knows what else.

I feel that I am almost ready, but that feeling is presumably deceptive. It's like moving; whenever you feel like you're done packing, you unexpectedly come upon another bunch of stuff that you didn't think you had. However, the "Trip to Target" served its purpose; a necessary purpose at that.

Signing off for now. Peter