During the meeting, some workmen showed up to fix the broken HVAC wall unit at the back of the chapel. I left the meeting for a few minutes to talk with them because I know about the problem and wanted to help. The door to the electrical panel was locked, which none of us had seen before. I called the bishop, who explained where the key is found, so they got in finally. After a little while, they decided that the little motherboard in the unit was dead, so they will order a new one and return later to replace it.
I also spoke with Cristiano, the first counselor in the bishopric, about the Vodafone fiber internet that is supposedly coming. Their technicians have missed a couple of appointments when they were supposed to come install the equipment, which is very frustrating for those who took off work to wait for them at the chapel. I offered to help out next time if I could, as it will be a big boon for the ward to have good internet service finally.
After the meeting, we went to Lidl on the way into town, stocking up on some food for home, but more for upcoming meals at the Institute. When we pulled into our parking spot inside the courtyard at the Institute, Jenna was there with her parents. They were downtown doing some sightseeing and needed a bathroom, so they dropped by at a very opportune time, carrying a bunch of our bags upstairs. We visited with them a while before they headed out for lunch at Quel Che C'è, a fun little restaurant just down the street that Dee liked and recommended to them.
While we were unloading the car, another resident came up and confronted us about a couple of things. First, he doesn't like the little steel post that blocks our parking spot when we are not there, saying it is a hazard to people walking there at night. He demanded that we take it out. We told him that our landlord put it in, and that he should talk with the landlord. He said that I should do it, because I was the tall one (?). He also complained about people leaving trash outside the small trash bins. We almost never empty our own trash, letting our cleaning lady do that, so we just said that we aren't the problem. It was a strange encounter, but ended up ok. I later told our landlord about it,and he said that he would put some reflective tape on the post. There is still light in the courtyard whenever we leave a night, so the danger seems minimal, but maybe it turns off later in the night. In any case, there is nothing for us to do.
During the afternoon, while she was cooking carrot cake for the evening activity and chicken for a future dinner, Dee started feeling like she was coming down with a cold. She had a dentist appointment in the late afternoon, going there by taxi but returning by public transit, which took a long time and wore her out even more. She took a nap in the kitchen, which seemed to help some.
My back was hurting a little, though nowhere nearly as bad as last week. I messaged the chiropractor to try to set up an appointment earlier than my followup next Monday. Fortunately, she has something on Thursday morning.
I spent the afternoon working on my lessons for Friday, as well as writing up a draft of my report and suggestions on the mission cell phone bill. The bottom line is that, if we get just the senior missionaries off the gold-plated cell phone plan the church provides and have them just pay for their own personal plan, we can save almost half on our large cell phone bill (about 100 phones in total), even if the mission reimburses the seniors. The personal plans will be dramatically cheaper than the current one. The church plan has all kinds of bells and whistles that we neither need nor use, but it has very limited data, running up large bills in many cases. It will be interesting to see what happens. President Pickerd loves to save money, so hopefully he will be in favor.
For our Wednesday night activity, we did indexing. Only three kids came: Joyce, Dario, Grace. Ugo was also there, probably because carrot cake is his favorite (that was their wedding cake). The kids were surprisingly good at reading handwriting -- a rare talent for this generation -- but I was still able to help them out by reading a bunch of names that they struggled with. Italian cursive is difficult! They also got very good at using Google and the Italian white pages (paginebianche.it) to look up names to verify what they have transcribed. We played music from Casting Crowns in the background, including "The Voice of Truth", Grace's song. Grace was much happier than a couple of days ago, having heard from her stake president that her mission papers were almost all ready to submit after overcoming a few hurdles. The carrot cake was wonderful.
I stayed away to limit passing on my germs, and especially to not have them touch my contagious keyboard, but Ugo asked me to help him index. He had never used the newer web-based system. I was able to show him a few tricks for verifying names, like the Italian white pages that Doug mentioned, and also looking up the same unindexed records on familysearch, which is helpful for seeing more than the current batch.
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| L-R: Dario, Joyce, Grace |
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| Dee helping Ugo |
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| Carrot cake is the best! |
We got home and Dee soon collapsed into bed on the couch in the living room. She was concerned about coughing or sniffling and keeping me awake. It is nice to have another room with good sound isolation. Hopefully I will not get the same cold.
Here are my Tuesday notes, since I was too sick to write them at the time.
Sister Knies gave me a Bosch mixer, which originally belonged to Sister Thomas. The Thomases were here to work on the Temple landscaping. The mixer sells for €155 on Amazon, so it's pretty nice. Ugo was blown away. I can't wait to try it. But I knew there was no place to store it in the Institute kitchen. However, I started reorganizing Tuesday evening and carved out a spot. It's so surprising that with only one cupboard and one stack of drawers I can still accumulate clutter.
I made some coconut rice on Monday that I've been enjoying for lunch. I'm so glad Anziano Papritz told me about it. The smell of chicken cooking was very tantalizing on Monday, and I cooked more on Wednesday. I have already deboned the first batch, ready for Friday's enchiladas.
It's always nice to get a chance to walk around, and I really enjoyed it when I went to the new dentist, Dr. Fabiani, on Wednesday. On Tuesday, I got to walk around the open market. There's a Bangladeshi man who sells sterling silver jewelry at a very low price, so I got some earrings.
Dario's mother, who died a few months ago, would have turned 60 on Monday. After FHE, we learned he had posted it on Facebook and Instagram. He didn't want to be alone, and brought a couple of very nice friends to FHE for the first time. In fact, he had never come before.
When Taco Tuesday began, Doug had to take the family history computer down yet again, since the promised table has not appeared. This is a pain, especially with his current back issues.
The student council is getting excited about having a special Sunday activity where all will go to Church together, probably in Ladispoli, having a singles Sunday School class, along with regular participation in the other meetings, and then a lunch afterward. I suggested this several months ago, and it's great to see it blossom now that others are excited about it. Jack Pettit used to say you can do anything if you don't insist on taking credit for it, haha.
We still haven't see the Thackers, even though they're right next door. I'm sure they're slammed with the time change and settling in, and we'll see them soon.
On Tuesday, Fabrizio Romeo came to Taco Tuesday. He is a former GANS, now married with a little baby. I asked him about his family history since he was talking about going to the Temple. He has a couple of brick walls and I was able to show him that his town's records are available online, to his delight. Alexis Certa, the french man from the Swiss Temple, also emailed me. He hasn't found a connection between our lines, and I hope to look into it myself. It's been so busy that I don't get to my computer during the day. No down time is pretty common now.