Very productive Monday

It was a very nice day today, with one exception. We got a lot of things fixed or at least started in that direction. Elder Balzotti, whose job it is to deal with apartments and appliances, came over to look at our washing machine and the fridge in the back bedroom. The former didn't seem to be dispensing fabric softener -- the slot for that liquid never emptied and was always still wet after a load, so my wife had stopped using it. Turns out that it's different and rather clever: instead of opening up the compartment to empty the fabric softener, it just adds water to the compartment to raise the level to where it falls out of the little vertical tube. He took things apart and showed us how to clean various filters (which really needed it!), by doing most of it for us this time. Hopefully that will fix the issue.

The back fridge, which we use for overflow when buying food for the Institute, wasn't getting cold, though the freezer was working fine. Apparently (we hope) the vent from the freezer to the fan in the fridge compartment was blocked with ice, preventing cold air from moving up. So we emptied everything out and unplugged it to defrost the entire device, which should make everything work well if his theory is correct. Stay tuned, but we are excited to hope that stuff is fixed. 

I also tried my Andrew Federal chip-and-PIN card at the Conad market, which worked great. In the afternoon, I contacted them to start the process of getting a second set of cards (different number/account) so we can each have a separate chip-and-PIN card. It'll take a few weeks probably but will be nice. The issue is that, if one of our cards gets lost or stolen (not that pickpockets are a thing here! :-), we'd have to deactivate the whole account and neither of us could use that account for a while. In general, even though we both have cards for each account, we carry completely different cards, to avoid that kind of problem. So having a second set will be good.

My mission credit card also got activated, and I'll try it tomorrow for a tiny purchase to make sure. Wednesday we will go apply in person for our codice fiscale (tax ID). We will need both items to renew our ZTL (Limited Traffic Zone) pass, which allows us to drive downtown and expires soon.

At the Institute, I was able to figure out how to get the fancy OKI color laser printer to work in network mode. Before today it had been hooked up only via USB to the one desktop there, but now we can print to it over WiFi from our laptops! Very cool. Getting it to work was a multi-step puzzle, but it's great to have that option now. I documented all the network wiring / configuration and emailed copies to us and to Ugo so that somebody else can take over someday.

So, lots of good stuff. Unfortunately, my wife stubbed her toe (and possibly broke it) walking on the internal driveway at the Institute. She ended up falling on the ground and was very slow to get up. It's swollen and purple and painful -- wasn't fun to watch. She iced it and took ibuprofen all afternoon. Hopefully she can sleep tonight.

In the evening we had some visitors from Carlsbad:  Renee, Joe, Gemma (about age 2 and so cute!), and Sharon (Renees' mom, who served a mission in Italy). Renee is one of my former students in Seminary (and nursery, if you want to go way back); we've been friends with the family since 1990. They brought us stuff from home: cold meds, taco seasoning, and another Amazon Echo Dot for use at home. They stayed for home evening with the GANS, with my wife giving the lesson in Italian and me translating for our visitors.

Renee, Gemma (future sister missionary?), Joe

San Diegans: Whitings, our visitors, and Elder Waddell

My wife made some awesome goodies, which I forgot to take a picture of, and her lesson was short and sweet, with nice participation from the kids. Afterwards a large group of them played Cover My Assets -- there wasn't even room for us.

We have now been in Italy for a month, and time is flying. The Lord is really blessing us and we love being here.