strange organization

I'm reorganizing my files, so I just went and grabbed a pile of old manila folders to reuse. The first one I picked up is labeled "Icelandic Short Stories."

Who on earth has a manila folder of Icelandic short stories?

Miscellaneous update

In Arabic class this week we learned the word insaan, which means "human being." In Arabic pretty much all words are derived from a root verb, and our teacher says that the root word for insaan is probably nisian, which means "to forget." Chuck was amused by this and said, "So the name for man is 'forgetfulness,'" which turns out to be a line from a poem. ("He is only called man (insaan) because of his forgetfulness (nasiyaan), and it is only called the heart (al-qalb) because it changes so rapidly (yataqallib)." (Quoted from here.)

I'm not sure if the etymology is really historically accurate, but the linking of the two concepts -- humanity and forgetfulness -- is definitely meaningful. In Islam the fundamental cause of sin is not disobedience, but rather forgetfulness of our true relationship to God.

Unrelatedly, jess_qatar and kgilmore and I went the Muslim Youth of Education City meeting after work today. They had a guest speaker, a Westerner who converted to Islam seven weeks ago. I'll write up my notes tomorrow, inshallah.

I am aware that my rate of posting has decreased significantly lately. What can I say: I actually have work to do at work these days, so I'm not sitting around pondering Livejournal entries all day. This is, in fact, a good thing.

Also, I am happy, happier than I've been in quite a while. This is likewise a good thing.