Nonetheless, I managed to carve out an hour or so tonight to call my friend Claudia, from Guatemala, who is now in San Francisco. We hadn't chatted since I was in Houston in March, so we had lots to catch up on, including my May visit to Guate and her case for asylum here in the US. And it was very nice to spend an hour speaking Spanish.
I have several friends who I can't keep up with via chat or email, and I should make more of an effort to find the time to catch up with them via phone on a regular basis of intervals less than 6-8 months. Of course, with all the travel this year it's been crazy, but that's a worthy goal for the summer.