champagne tonight, and I mean the good shit

So the best news in the whole wide world is that Little Rock, Arkansas is out of Sudan. I know an enormous Sisyphean amount of work still exists to be done there, but give the girl a break. Who goes to Darfur voluntarily? Um, as far as I know? My friend, and George Clooney. (Unfortunately - for both of them, I think - not together.)

OK, there have been a few others besides those two. But Entertainment Tonight is not going to cover the year of her life that my friend put into heartbreaking, deeply exhausting and spirit-shattering work there, so I'll just write this bit about it here.

I am proud of her, and though I don't know them, I am proud of all the people still over there trying to push that boulder back up even though it was someone else's trickery that started it rolling. Even when nothing seems to be working terribly well, isn't it heartening and inspiring to know that someone out there is working steadily, even without much hope, against the madness?

We're not talking about it yet (and maybe never will, it's her call). I'm just pouring bourbon down her gullet and feeding her good food and tucking her into bed if she needs a nap and oh my god laughing at her jokes because can you believe it? After all that, and arriving in this town a shell of a woman, she is still one of the funniest cleverest kindest wackiest people I know.