wintry in wisconsin

Another day spent with Mom at her facility. I showed my Turkey photos to a small group, none of whom fell asleep.

Wind chill expected to get down to about zero tonight. It's definitely a change from a month ago, when we were cruising along the Mediterranean coast.

Just finished reading an absorbing book about a remarkable woman of whom I'd heard various references over the years, but really knew nothing about. The book filled in many gaps in my understanding of how the modern nations of Iraq and Saudi Arabia came about, not to mention correcting a few misconceptions that I had, from my many viewings of 'Lawrence of Arabia' (Gertrude Bell was a colleague of T.E. Lawrence, and his exploits are intimately connected with her work).

In the end, it becomes clear that the American experience in Iraq is eerily similar to the catastrophe of British involvement in the same region, in the 1920's. We never learn.