Digging out.

It's been a while—I missed you! I just looked at the date on my last post and it was the day we started moving our office. That part went fine—the movers were super-efficient and professional—but the ensuing two weeks of nonstop hold music and frustrating, circular conversations with our phone and internet "provider" were about as unproductive as my year off from college in 1998. At least I didn't lose my driver's license for a month and my job at the grocery store forever like I did that year.

This creepy Monopoly Man is riding a narwahl. That's all I'm going to say about that.

Maybe moving to the next part of this post will help you get your mind off that infographic nightmare.




ISLAM
While it's pretty pathetic to say the least, I am proud to have finished memorizing Surat al-Fil with my Quran Buddy (QB). I now have three out of five done for my Ramadan goal—did I mention there are roughly 12 days until Ramadan???!! But guess what? I can do this with the help of Allah. 

Next up is Al-Quraysh, which is a companion surah to Al-Feel. I already have the first line and a half memorized because it's read all the time and very easy. The rest I have bits and pieces of just because I have never sat down to learn it front to back. All this is to say that it shouldn't be difficult because I'm so used to hearing it and it's short, like all of the surahs I'm learning for this goal. Baby steps, people!

For these surahs, I found it's easier to get a video from YouTube so you can see the Arabic and hear it at the same time, rather than me copying and pasting from Quran.com. Working smarter, not harder!

Here you go:

I missed Arabic class last week because I was visiting my parents (an Islamic virtue above almost all others in itself) and having a great time playing with 10 new puppies, frying fishes, chatting with my mom, and watching TV with my dad. A very refreshing weekend. 

I did go to the Midweek Halaqa but A) missed half of it and B) can't remember much from the other half right now so we'll just leave it at that. 

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EXERCISE
Yeah, no. It's not really happening. Here is a list of lame but not-so-terrible excuses as to why I haven't been putting in my 20 minutes of physical activity every day:

1. It's been over 100 degrees (or very close to it) for about a week and a half. Minnesota is that place that is totally mischaracterized by people who have never lived here year-round. Everyone is always like, "But it's so COLD there!" and I'm like, "Yeah, until it's a blast furnace when you open the door in July after sitting in the AC all day to survive while wearing any clothes at all." My air conditioner at home hasn't been able to keep up with the 90+ percent humidity and the ridiculous temps prompting everyone and their mother to take a picture of their car thermometer so inside exercise has even been daunting. 
2. I'm truly and utterly exhausted every day after work. It's not even physical exhaustion. I'm just tired from the strain of being weeks behind on my regular work while being forced to deal with the immediate messes of moving. I was in charge of pretty much the whole thing from scheduling the movers to buying the furniture to nearly carpet-bombing Comcast's headquarters and so forth.
3. I have the summer doldrums. This is when you can't peel yourself away from Netflix long enough to put down your dinner bowl of cereal and walk to the bathroom. Everyone gets it when it's punishingly hot outside and I am the first to admit that until the storms finally rolled through last night, I had it bad. 

At least I'm finally posting here after two weeks. I have hope that during Ramadan my posts will be inspired, jam-packed with beautiful content with my personal reflections, and regularly loaded onto the Internets. We'll see.