Trip to a Mall

There is one thing that I can do all by myself at work now.  It has to do with registering baptism. Besides other things, it involves getting faxed copies that need to be entered in the computer. The faxes are sometimes terrible to read, plus the handwriting is sometimes (most of the time) poor, and trying to decipher the Spanish names and places is super stressful.  But, I am getting better at it.  I am much faster at it than last week.   Our mission had 24 baptisms last week.

There are still many other things that I will do, but I can't report on them yet, because I can't get my brain wrapped around them.  Most things I have only done once with Elder Clegg, but to do them again and by myself . . . well. . . . it will be a while yet.   Rich is learning and doing well with the finances, but I'm glad I don't have that responsibility.  It sounds so complex and confusing. He is quite slow and cautious in entering things and balancing accounts etc, but he'll catch on to it.   We are both fearful that we will never be as fast and efficient as these young Elders who can flip through the screens.   They have such a command of the computer.   But what are they going to do . . . . fire us and send us home???

Sister Argyle is always looking out for us.  Last night she called to say she had been shopping at a place called the Nor Center.  It is a big shopping mall that has underground free parking. That's a plus, huh!  And she found a carpet store that was having a 50% off sale.   They had area rugs and carpets that would be the size we need for our apartment.  She thought we should check it out.  Trains do not go there, so we would need to take the office vehicle to get there. Being the brave souls that we are, we ventured out with GPS in hand to find this place.  And we were successful.  Could never have done it though, without the GPS.   How did we ever survive without them?  We found a rug that will do.  It isn't super large, but it breaks up the bare tile floor, and it's a start to making our living room area look more homey.  It cost a little under $100. 

Now we need a couch.  We may steal one from the Assistant's apartment.  They never use it and it is brown leather.  We are worried that it will be too big.  We can only accommodate a love seat size.  However, leather couches are not what we are used to in the US.  They are not big and billowy and soft.  They are firm, not too much padding, with pretty straight lines.  But that would do for us.  We just need something more than we have.

We wish we could convey through writing the magnitude of the cars and traffic here.  We think it is wild here in our area of San Fernando, a suberb type place.  But the freeway is a joke.  At one point, when we were on an overpass, we could look down upon three freeways practically side by side going off in different directions, and each one had 6 lanes across.  It was massive! 

It made Salt Lakes I-15 look like a country road.   Tomorrow will be the supreme test if we are going to master driving in this place.  We will have to leave really early for conference which starts here at 1:00 p.m.  We need to account for time getting lost, and taking wrong turns, or taking wrong exits.  Easy to do!!  

We are going to the President's house for breakfast in the morning at 8:00 a.m.  Around transfer time, they have the office staff over for breakfast.  Then we need to decide if we are going to take the train or drive the office car to the main center of Buenos Aires to watch conference at the  Area Offices with other senior couples.  They said they are planning on us and will have parking available if we drive a car.  They are serving slopping joes for lunch in between sessions tomorrow, and Hawaiian Haystacks on Sunday.  Sounds fun to us.  We are excited for tomorrow.   

The Area Office that is located here in Buenos Aires deals with Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay.   We aren't sure if any senior couples are coming from those other two countries, or any other part of Argentina, for that matter.  It might just be a gathering of those of us here in the three missions in Buenos Aires - - - the North (us), South, and West.  More about that next time!!