t-minus one month

 
My flight takes off on January 8th.  This means that I have 10 more days at Yale, 18 more days at home, and approximately 140 days to spend in Sénégal before I return at the end of May.  These are useless numbers, though; counting the days doesn't actually tell me anything about the future, except that it's both short and long, soon and far away.

As I think about the 8-hour flight that awaits me, it's reassuring to note that South African Airways is one of the safest and most reputable of Africa's airlines, so my plane probably won't go tumbling into the Atlantic.  Whew.