Dust in the wind

My still-sore shins and knees weren't the only thing still remaining from Friday night's relay. This morning at church, I found out that the keyboard I was supposed to use was the same one that had been used for the band's performance all night during the event. It was coated in dust. If you've ever tried to play a piano covered in dust, you'll realize how my fingers felt this morning. I really could have used a can of compressed air. My prediction of the absence of a new newspaper today was accurate, and I had a celebratory bowl of Baskin Robbins rainbow sherbet after dinner tonight. Since I saved the Thursday paper just for this event, I did have something to read, in particular the fact that astronomers are redefining what they call a planet, and our solar system may soon consist of up to 53 planets. So much for my very enthusiastic mother just serving us nine pizzas. I also continued browsing news about the war here. I remember the big discussion on network news back on June 8, when Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, was killed in an airstrike. Many of the talking heads were saying how one person isn't an entire organization. But if you followed the news in the days after, you saw numerous raids conducted off intelligence found from Zarqawi's safe house, and a ripple effect as many more terrorists were apprehended or eliminated. The same thing continues in many different ways, with terrorist captures leading to huge cache sites and cache sites leading to shwacking terrorists trying to emplant an IED. There are many of these small victories going on every day. One of this week's big successes was the completion of the Baghdad Fire Department, including esablishment of a 911-like system. The Iraqi Civil Defense organization is gaining the trust and confidence of the citizens, just one more small step in establishing a respected and capable government.