Is it Just Me?

Is it just me or does anybody else have a hard time remembering the last pan of cookies when you are baking a batch? This picture doesn't really show it too well, but my last batch, the ones on the right, are definitely good for dunking only. They are crisp, dry, sad cookies. I must have adult A.D.D. or something, because I can't tell you how many times I have done this. I've done worse, much worse, but I really needed these last cookies today to make just the right amount for a Zone Conference. UGGHHH! So do I make a whole new batch or just make the assistants have the "well done" cookies? I have enough to give them two actually, but I'm not sure if two borderline burned cookies are better than no cookie at all.

Okay, okay, I'll post something

I've been shamed into posting something on my blog. Becca gave me the "It's high time you posted something" lecture in an email today, so here is this gorgeous picture of me sporting my brand new "MOO-MOO" as Alan calls it. I'm holding a bottle of A & W, two packages of Girl Scout Cookies and a fly swatter that I look like I just got hid in the head with. All these things and a lot more were in the last shipment of goods we received just last week. It was great! (A shout out to Lucy Dahl for the use of her old burgundy suitcases she was going to take to DI. They have been to Brazil twice, loaded full of great stuff, since she gave them to the cause.)

I think the moo-moo is great even though Alan pretty much hates it. I know it is not the most stylish or flattering, but it is cool and that is what counts. Becca picked it up at Wal-Mart for me in case anyone is wondering where you can get one. She said they have plenty left.

We used one bottle of root beer for our FHE treat this week and made delicious root beer floats. We're saving this one for later. You have to ration these things, you know.

Russell sent us enough Girl Scout cookies that we have even shared a few. I don't know how many cases he bought this year, but we were glad he did his part to support the Girl Scouts of America again and share with us.

The fly swatter is great too. I've used it every day since we got it and many flies have rubbed their legs together for the last time. They probably have fly swatters here, but I had looked in 4 or 5 stores and couldn't find one so I just put it on "the list."

So thanks for the stuff. We're pretty well stocked again except for peanut butter M & M's. I had requested the Easter egg shaped ones because I swear, they are better than the normal ones. They were everything I remembered them to be. I was rationing them to myself, 1/4 cup a day. That was the serving size listed on the package. (I thought it was a little measly, but since I was rationing, decided to go with it.) There should have been 7 servings, but I don't know if the information was wrong, or if I got a package that was shorted, or if they meant there would be seven 1/4 cup servings if you didn't sneak in the package and eat a couple extra 2 or 3 times a day. All I know is they are gone.

Is There a Nurse in the House?

One of my main jobs here is that of being the mission "nurse." So far I've dealt with quite a wide range of problems...sprains, headaches, flu, kidney stones, ear aches, head lice, appendicitis, cuts, acne, live bugs in feet and dead bugs in ears, not to mention heinous rashes and some of the more unmentionalble things that come up in a foreign country. Now that I think about it, a lot of medical problems are slightly unmentionable. It has surprised me that I have actually been able to talk with missionaries about some of these things and still have them look me in the eye the next time I saw them. (I, also, try to maintain eye contact.)

At first I felt totally lost when the missionaries would call. I really didn't know much about health and medicine to begin with and I really didn't know the Portuguese names for such things. But then the first mission secretary put together a sweet little binder for me with answers to common problems that he got from the web md website. He thought he was so funny when he titled it, "How to Save a Missionary's Life." A few weeks later I got a really good information packet from the Church doctors in Sao Paulo that had even more info and the names of things in Portuguese. I use it all the time.

Now we have two doctors, instead of just one, that work out of Sao Paulo and help with health problems in all the missions in Brazil. One of them even speaks Portuguese and will call the Brazilian elders if I need him too. They are great. Their reports back to me even supply us with quite a bit of confusion and a little humor.

We have received quite a few reports addressed to our mission, but about missionaries that are serving in some other mission. Or we get reports with one of our missionary's names on it with a diagnosis for a problem he doesn't have. Last week I had to call one of our missionaries to see if he really had cut his finger and had stitches and needed pain medication. I hadn't heard a word about it before the email report came and I figured it was for an elder in another mission with the same last name. But the fact that the elder's first, middle, and last name were exactly the same as our elder's, I decided I'd better check. Our elder was fine. He hadn't been cut, or had stitches or need pain medication and didn't have a clue how his name got mixed up in it. I don't know what happened either. I didn't want to call the doctor and embarrass him.

We got one today that was ours though. All the information on it was even right. It was the "doctor talk" that made us laugh. Poor Elder X.....He has a small bean shaped lesion on the upper portion of his leg near the buttock...... We must be easily entertained or just a little sick, but the word buttock, gets us everytime.