Breaking mission rules

It was fast Sunday, and I really hadn't had much to eat on Saturday except an apple for lunch and a sandwich at the train station for dinner. Surprisingly for me, I felt pretty good, though by the end of church I was feeling weak. It was good to get home and have something to eat, but I wasn't completely wiped out as often happens to me. Ugo's parents, Raffa and Alberto, came to church after having spent the week here tending their five grandchildren, plus two other grandkids from their children up north. One of the grandsons, Ivan, has bright red hair, like his grandpa Alberto. Others are blond, and several have dark hair and complexion. There is some interesting DNA going on in that family! It was great to see them, and I probably broke mission rules by giving Raffa a big hug. After knowing them over 40 years, I think that was fine. I gave them both a big hug, too. 😉😀

On the way to church, we got a call from Anziano Jensen. We offered to pick them up at the subway stop and drive them the final mile or so to church, which they were happy to do. Parked there waiting for them, we laughed at the arrows painted on the street at the entrance to the parking lot: both sides had arrows coming in, but no arrow going out. Actually there was a very faint one, but for a minute it appeared to be a dead-end parking lot!

Dee and I each taught a Sunday School class. Hers was on the son of Solomon and leadership. It was okay, but I should have planned better questions. The fun part was teaching them tricks for remembering which Article of Faith is which. They loved it. We sat in a semicircle, which was new to them. We had a fun visiting couple who participated a lot, too. It was wonderful what she did for me, and she really enjoyed preparing the lesson. Mine was on practical preparation for your first trip to the temple, and I got a lot of good comments and thoughts. I shared the story of 1977, when I took a young couple from my branch, the Giustos, to the Swiss temple at the end of my mission to be sealed. I was their branch president in Pavia, and it took some doing to get them there, because they didn't have a lot of funds. Anyway, it was a wonderful experience which helped them launch a lifetime of service in the church and some wonderful children. It was also one of the highlights of my mission. Angela actually gave me a kiss in the sealing room of the temple as I was leaving for the airport. As you can tell, sometimes the letter of the law takes a back seat to the spirit of the law!

The GANS who was supposed to bring a used replacement phone for Chris couldn't make it to church. I will try to arrange a time this week to get the phone from him and give it to Chris. I also spoke with Bishop Magnanti about the upcoming temple bus trip. Having never done this before, there are a lot of logistical questions, some of which we got answered. For example, the patron housing at the temple provides bedding but not towels. So we will be taking big suitcases, not our carry-ons.

On our way home from church, we gave Sorelle Nelson and Harmon a ride home, giving them their new Ikea ironing board cover as well. After getting home and eating, I spent the afternoon working on a CAD drawing (using Visio) of the layout of the new potential Institute apartment. It was sorta to scale, and hopefully good enough. I sent it off to the S&I planning folks in Utah, along with a link to the video I took of the walk through. Dee made a peach dessert for our evening get together at the Balzottis with the Knieses. When she turned on the oven, we had to turn off the AC for a while, which got rather uncomfortable, but a fan helped. It was only off for 15 minutes!

At 7pm, we walked over to the Balzottis for a couple of hours of visiting and dessert. A nice article on them recently appeared in the church news; you can read it here. It was a lot of fun to visit with them and the Knieses, as always. They filled us in on some of the things we would be doing this week while helping out in the mission office. We got home by 9pm, which is early for us. It was a nice day, and we are looking forward to a different kind of week.

Our ward is very international. For example, in Relief Society this week, there were16 women--and only one was Italian. There were women from Central and South America, Africa, the Philippines and the USA.

The Canfields, serving with LDS Charities, have started to attend our ward. Sister Canfield doesn't ask for translation. The two of them are doing amazing things for and with the refugees.

We said goodbye to our district leader, Anziano Jensen. He has done a great job with the training part of our district meetings. He's a very interesting guy who knows how to use a sword and rode a unicycle at home, too.

I experimented with my regular shoes and no compression hose for the hours of Church. By the time I got home, my foot was a little swollen, so I put the hose on, but it wasn't too bad. Progress!

 I had a nice talk with Wendy. She is finishing another double-load semester! Last week, she taught me about Illustrator with Teamviewer. She's so good with the graphics programs! The funny thing is that Teamviewer is starting to warn me, thinking I'm a business user.