It burns!

1 hour writing, 3 hours reading/researching

Ooh, that's no fun. I spent a couple of hours this morning going through several hundred listings from the Library of Congress catalog, culling relevant sources about the municipal and departmental police in Colombia, and then emailed them to myself; but it turns out their email system erases any line with an accent in it. Which is like every line containing a title, when you're consulting Spanish-language sources. D'oh! At least I have the call numbers that I can use to reconstruct the listings, but still, it's a hassle. Good news is there's a LOT of stuff there, including a good bit at the state level. A trip to DC may be in order...

First, I need to go figure out what data I need, what's highest priority, and then figure out if LOC, NYPL, or Berkeley are my best bets. I'm considering a research trip to Colombia in September, but I want to get as much as I can stateside before committing to that. There's a surprising range of Spanish-language sources, and historical ones too, in the three libraries I'm consulting. Certainly makes life easier.

Continued writing the police chapter. A professor who's written on irregular armed forces, of whose work I think highly, has offered to take a look at it, so I'll be getting that to him next week in advance of the August 1 LASA deadline.

Thanks to Rafael Mazer for being a great, engaged monitor this week, in the midst of what I take to be his last week at Hispanics in Philanthropy. Muito obrigado, Rafa! Up next is Geordan Drummond, in Philadelphia. More on him - and on Williamstown and Restaurant Week - next Monday. Have a great weekend!