And What Will We Do in the Afternoon?

This is a punchline to an old East German joke. I don't remember how the joke goes, but I have a vague notion that it involved an impossibly long list of things to do that could not realistically happen all in one day, but the person on the receiving end of the list asks "And what will we do in the afternoon?"

For some reason I thought of that punchline this morning, and it has proven to be quite an appropriate theme for this day that was so oddly full. I mean, my days are normally pretty full but this one was such an eclectic mix of things, it was almost like being back in the parish. . .which I guess makes a little sense because I'm covering for someone right now. Anyway, the day looked a little something like this:

Wake up, get ready, eat breakfast, etc

Call Eileen, go over draft of letter to participants in the upcoming LPI consultation

Edit draft according to conversation (including looking up and adding participants' titles, positions, and institutions). Take care of other administrative tasks for LPI.

Depart to Grandma's

Each lunch with Grandma, then take her to a doctor appointment
(aside: I went into the test room with her today, and it was equal parts cool and weird to see this heart that has loved me so well for so long beating there right in front of me on the screen)

Bring Grandma home

Go to the church to check in with the secretary, fix the four mistakes I realized (last night) were still in the bulletin, check for messages and take care of other random administrative type stuff

Come home

Make dinner

Eat dinner while watching an episode of Hand Aufs Herz

Go to ISAIAH training for faith-based organizing

Get a call 2/3 of the way through training from a number I do not recognize. Realize it's probably a pastoral emergency and leave the room to deal with it. Find out a parishioner has died, I now have a funeral-planning meeting tomorrow and a funeral sometime early next week.

Rejoin the last part of the ISAIAH training

Come home, facebook the friend I'm supposed to meet for lunch tomorrow to warn we will probably have to reschedule

Write blog post on the oddly full day before emailing secretary so she can add prayers for the deceased's family to the bulletin before running it tomorrow morning

I will then finish the evening reading through more galley proofs of Chris' forthcoming book (hint: it's really really good), taking a final pass at editing and constructing Scripture and Topical indexes before it goes to print


. . .and then what will we do in the afternoon? :)