Taco Tuesday

The weather has been absolutely gorgeous here, by the way. The high is in the mid-70s, and the low is in the mid-50s. Today was our first day driving to and from the Institute ourselves. I gave up on trying the route used by the Thackers -- too many turns to keep in mind. We simply used Google Maps on my wife's phone, and it worked well enough. Much simpler in my estimation, but still Italian driving which will take some getting used to. I was a bit stressed, but my wife was wonderfully helpful as co-navigator. We laughed rather than get upset when things went wrong, which can be painful with our coughing and my sore chest.

In the morning, when we woke up, power seemed to be out in our apartment. I was heading down to the basement to try the master circuit breaker, when my wife by reflex turned on an overhead light switch, which worked. I was puzzled because I didn't know about any subpanel, but a call to Elder Thacker pointed us to it right by the front door. Flipping the breaker brought everything back on. Whew! We had to re-run part of the washer cycle which had been cut off, but otherwise no big problem. Before heading downtown, we did some quick grocery shopping not far from home, which was also our first time going that direction on our own. Only one wrong turn, and now I think I have that down. 

Today was our first Taco Tuesday lunch. The Thackers told us how it should go, and my wife makes great taco hamburger meat with onions. The kids each take a tortilla, get the meat (we have to portion it out or they'll take huge amounts), and then add their own selection of tomatoes, lettuce, cheese, chips, and beans. There were about half a dozen kids present, plus the young missionaries. My main contribution was doing the dishes afterwards. Here's a photo:

In the evening there were English classes for the public, taught by the young elders and sisters, a small choir class, and an Institute class taught by Ugo, with about a dozen kids in the room and maybe more than that online using Zoom. Because the place was well staffed, Ugo let us go a bit early tonight, which we really appreciated because we're still suffering from fatigue and sickness, but it is getting better slowly.

Tomorrow we get the day off, as the Spragues (another senior couple) will cover for us at the Institute. We plan to sleep without alarms and do some shopping to stock up a bit and get a few things to organize the apartment the way we'd like. There's also a bunch of paperwork we need to catch up on.

It was a good day. These kids are amazing. They love the Savior, and it's a joy to be with them and hear their stories.