Wednesday, March 30 – In a post-3/11 world, friends are family.

At some point, you have to draw the line on waiting in line. Luckily, you don’t have to wait in line for friends.

I decided to join a line of cars waiting to get gas. After going only about 30 yards in 30 minutes, I gave up. Good thing too as I heard later that they ran out of tickets so I wouldn’t have been able to buy gas anyway.

I did get some good news today. The Stars and Stripes editorial team will arrive again on Friday and will stay with me. I can’t wait to see Elena again! I am tired of having meals by myself.

I continued to get caught up on the laundry and aired out the futons that Elena and the reporters will use. I talked to mom several times but did not visit her today.

A neighbor came by to see how I am doing. He works for a small, family-owned company that we hired to look after our house after dad passed away last year. These repairmen will fix anything and everything that can go wrong in a house – the roof, lights, leaky pipes, appliances, etc. He is so nice and has been a huge help to us. He even taught my mom how to send and receive email!

He called me several times after 3/11 but this was the first time he was able to catch me at home. He asked if I needed any water, food or supplies. I told him that I have everything I need. He and his family are visiting their customers and delivering rice, water, portable gas grills and more all for free! This goes above and beyond just great customer service – they are treating customers like family.

I told him that he must be very busy fixing people’s houses from quake damage. Surprisingly, he said no because they cannot get the materials they need to perform the repairs. Instead, they are keeping busy buying food and water and delivering them to their customers for free. Many small businesses are suffering from the quake because they lack customers, supplies, power, fuel or heat. Fortunately, they do not lack human kindness.