The Special Treatment

Today Salt + Light had a very special visitor. Monsignor Luca Lorusso is the Counselor of the Apostolic Nuncio in Canada. For those of you who don't know, an Apostolic Nuncio is a country's representative to the Pope. I have been told that Monsignor Lorusso, though not currently a nuncio, is going to be named an Apostolic Nuncio very soon - although I'm not sure to which country.

Because Father Rosica couldn't be in the office this morning, the Monsignor was being shown around by one of my Italian-speaking coworkers. I only met Monsignor Lorusso for a brief moment, but I thought he seemed very kind.

The office was slow today while everyone anticipated the live event of the Episcopal Ordination. After working more on the interview transcriptions and tax receipts, I felt myself dazing out. It's hard to stay focused at a 9-5 job. Back at school, you have an hour and 15 minutes when you need to focus on the task at hand - class. But after that, you may have a break where you can go home and nap or get some lunch. I never truly realized what a luxury the college schedule is. I find myself getting up and walking around to just wake myself up sometimes. I'm prepared to do anything in order to keep myself alert and working.

My afternoon took a bit of a turn for the worst when it was discovered that there was a problem with the tax receipts I had been filing. Because some of the checks I was filing came in during the 2009 year, they had to be filled for that year in order for the donor to receive tax credit for 2009. But the 2009 checks I had been filing were be processed for 2010, which couldn't happen. So basically this meant I had to redo work I had already done. Those things happen though, so I was just happy it was a mistake that could be fixed. I didn't get in trouble, especially since the person who assigned me the work didn't know about the rule, so I was thankful for that at least. Armed with a hot cup of tea, which I now like to drink with milk in it (go figure), I spent the rest of the afternoon reworking the receipts.

Sometime during my work, everyone began announcing around the office to switch to the website and start viewing the ordination. I thought the whole ceremony was beautiful and that the crew we had out on site did a great job. It's funny to see the people you work with day to day on camera, but I guess that's the reality of this business.

After work, I was invited to go to dinner with Father Rosica, Monsignor Lorusso, and some of my coworkers. We went to this really modern restaurant called Nota Bene. It was absolutely delicious. Father Rosica was very generous to everyone - we were able to each order an appetizer or salad, an entree, and a desert. And in addition to that, he ordered a few sides for everyone to share with our entree. The food was definitely the best I had in the city, and I'm assuming that restaurant is one of the highest rated ones in Toronto. As Ben and me like to say, I left the dinner "fat happy".

It's been a long day and I'm pretty groggy from such a full stomach. I'm thinking sleep is inevitable at any moment.

Sweet dreams world,

Michelle