So may things running through my head today – compounded by a work-related lack of sleep this week.

Of course, there’s the papal visit to New York City – which affects me not at all, really. But, as the most reasonable sounding Pope in the last couple of millennia, it is rather interesting to hear the varied opinions from my Catholic friends – and the huge amount of negativity coming from my politically conservative friends. I think he sounds refreshingly Christian. There are many things I don’t agree with him on, and many more issues with the Catholic Church, but I think he’s been a step in the right direction, at least.

Since the Pope spoke to Congress, Congress is on my mind and I’m reminded that John Boehner is apparently resigning his Congressional seat at the end of the October. Not a fan, but I do worry quite a bit about who will replace him – especially since Speaker of the House is a weighty, and quite powerful, role. But it’s hard to find anyone, on either side of the political spectrum, that wants him to stay. And it’s hard to imagine that the House of Representatives will be any less dysfunctional with him gone.

And then there’s Donald Trump’s latest feud with Fox News – it’s like “pot meet kettle’ but I’m unable to determine which is which. It would be funny, if Fox isn’t viewed, repeatedly, as the most trustworthy news source, somehow, and if Trump wasn’t still the front-runner in the GOP primary race. Instead, it’s a bit scary. Maybe more than bit.

But there’s a weekend rapidly approaching, a Garlic Festival to attend (my favorite of the many festivals held in these parts), a wedding anniversary early next week, and there’s always Sunday for reviewing the news. On that note, I leave you with the following thought to ponder from Martin Heidegger:

“What seems natural to us is probably just something familiar in a long tradition that has forgotten the unfamiliar source from which it arose. And yet this unfamiliar source once struck man as strange and caused him to think and to wonder.”

Enjoy the weekend!

Image of the sloop Clearwater on the Hudson River between the Walkway Over the Hudson and the Mid-Hudson Bridge, April 2015.