Welcome to Egypt

Bob's sisters, Carol and Lorrie (center, and center right) just got back from visiting their inlaws in Egypt.

There is so much I could say about this picture. For now I'll sum it up in three words: The Wisconsin Dells. Which is where we all spent the most memorable four days in the history of a seminary career. Forget the Red Sea; the Mediterranean Sea, no. We went to the water park capital of the world. Imagine a grocery store in rural Wisconsin. Imagine two Egyptian men (Magdi and Ragaey, far left and right) at the cash register with a cart full of food, voraciously arguing in Arabic. "I will pay for this!" "No, I insist on paying!" "No, I must pay for this." Needless to say, we ate good that week. (Aiman is taking the picture.)

Anyway, a few weeks ago the Speirs sisters et. al. were wandering around the new mall in Cairo and who did they bump into -- our dear friends from Seminary. It was an impromptu Dells reunion. Hi Magdi, Heba, Rafi, and Wasim, if you're out there! We love you. We miss you. As I said, there's so much more I could tell you about this picture.

More vacation pics. . .

What's not to love? Ragaey and Aiman in their usual serious selves. Great sailor hats! The subtle humor runs in the family as you'll see below. The funny thing is this, Ragaey and Aiman both come from the same small village in Egypt, but met each other in New York City. That's kind of what happened with me and my friend Martha A too. We first met in New York City, but actually grew up 6 miles apart in Rochester, Minnesota.

Laila and Olivia.

Walking a mile in Auntie Lorrie's shoes.

Well, what can I say? Bob and I often shake our heads in despair, because even at times when we are ready to ring each other's neck and trade our blessed union in for something else, we know we can't. We are stuck with each other because we both like our inlaws too much. Once we were in this marriage group thingie for a whole year; we were the failures of the group because we just didn't get it and mostly our interactions were pretty strained. We were sure that all the other couples were worried about us. Finally, one month the topic was "inlaws." Oh my goodness, we passed that session with flying colors! While all the other couples were telling painful tales of horror, Bob and I were just laughing and all animated with funny family foibles. By the end of the session all the other couples were trying to get us to just please shut up. I'll leave it at that.

Thanks for coming over to the liver blog, everyone. I really appreciate it. I hope you are all well.

With love, T