I am a frustrated man. A frustrated, tired man.

Today was the first day of our Summer Institute of Theology at the seminary. I was kept busy, off and on, selling textbooks to the pastors who have come in for continuing education. At 4:30 I went home, leaving the operation in the hands of my assistant, with some qualms. He’s a seminarian from a third-world country, and he has never really mastered the cash register. But the last thing he told me was that he felt he was doing better now.

I drove home and fell into bed. No afternoon walk, no lawn mowing (which is needed). I had a bad case of insomnia last night (my own fault—I stayed up late and missed the brain wave curve), and I just wanted a nap. I’d been nodding off all afternoon, and I never nod off in daytime.

I wasn’t horizontal long before the phone rang. It was my assistant. He said he was having a problem with the cash register.

Then there was a noise on the line. My renter had picked up the phone (he always does this. I suspect he’s a little deaf. He seems to hear the phone ringing, but he never hears me talking on it). When he realized I was talking to someone, he hung up. At the same moment I lost the connection with my assistant.

I waited for him to call back. Nothing happened.

I don’t have the number for the phone at the front desk. It’s not a number I’ve ever needed. I tried my office phone, and even the business office downstairs. No luck.

Maybe my assistant thought I hung up on him, and is afraid to call back.

I should have dressed and driven back to work. But I’m honestly so tired I’m afraid to drive.

And now I can’t sleep.

Oh fudge.

Well, I could have worse problems. Like this lady, for instance.

Dale sent this link to a story about an appalling case of contemporary censorship in England.

Every year American librarians rend their garments and sit in ashes, scraping themselves with potsherds, because of all the horrible “censorship” they endure, when parents try to keep them from making porn available to their children.

I’ll just bet the English librarians don’t say a word about this genuine act of censorship.

(Note: Dale points out, correctly, that this isn’t technically censorship, because it’s not a government act. But in suppressing the publication and distribution of a book, a foreign government has managed to restrict the ongoing discussion of ideas in England. It’s much closer than anything the ALA bellyaches about annually.)