13 February 2007 – Tuesday

I slept in a semi-sitting position in one to two hour segments throughout the night. It really was not bad as I would get up, numb my lips, coat them with medicine and then go right back to sleep. This morning they are much better – hopefully the next two days should see the redness disappear. My cold did not seem to bother me – when I would wake up, I would cough to clear my throat and that seemed to be that. I am sure that over the next couple of days my cold will get worse – at least that has been the pattern in the past – and then clear up. If this is the worse thing that I catch in Indonesia it will be a good 16 months.

I rather dragged through the morning in the apartment and I think it is going to be a long day. I really do not feel all that sick it is just everything takes too much energy. We had a good time reading from the Kitab Mormon – Mary knows most of the words but I am able to add some things from time to time. My reading out loud is improving but has a long way to go. What I am not doing is learning vocabulary each day…truly my greatest weakness – or at least when it come to language.

We went into the office and although no one came in for help we were able to do some work on other things. Mary got ready for her Thursday English class, I worked on reports and caught up with the church e-mail.

I had a nice talk with Elder Bennett – he and Sister Bennett are pretty much settled in. He was able to get his car quickly because of the things I had told him about the temporary license and insurance. I think I will write up a sheet for new senior couples telling them what to expect and how to get some of the things that we all need to do done with minimum fussing around.

Also while we were there the supplies for the kits that they are going to be making started showing. Truckloads of blankets, towel, and crackers came in – more items will be delivered through the day.

We left at 12:30 to go to the mission home and get our new car. While there Elder Subandriyo asked me to re-write my last article on the floods and that Deseret News would be doing a story on the floods. I will just add some statistics about the hours, how many LDS families were affected and such. I am also going to do a story on the kits and their distribution.

A funny thing happened while we were there. Elder Subandriyo showed us a letter from Elder Packer asking him if he could chose a second name – it seems that they are having problems with him just having one. Elder Packer said that if he could not come up with one, Elder Packer had some suggestions. Elder Subandriyo wrote back and asked if he took a second name did he need to get re-baptized. Mary asked him what his friends called him in school and he told us ‘Yoyo.’ I suggested that would be a great first name – or perhaps second name since when you only have one name who is to say it is which. It is not a family name – it is just what he was called by his parents.

Sam got the new car, the paperwork and transferred our stuff. At first he had a little trouble because he has been driving an automatic for a couple of weeks and it took him a while to get use to the stick shift. The new car is great – it is shorter and narrower than what we had before but it should get better milage and except when we need to carry 7 people it will be fine. The important thing it is ours for the rest of the mission and there will be no monthly payment.

By the time we got home I was very tired but service men started arriving to fix some of the problems and I doubt if I will get to nap until after they all leave. I read in today’s paper that those who took a 30 minute nap at least three times a week were 37% less likely to have a heart attack than those who did not. I wonder how those who take 2 hour naps every day can expect to gain? Anyway I plan to make sure I get my naps in …

It is like grand central station in here right now. One group is fixing the bathroom problems while another is cleaning the air-conditioners. It is the latter that are the noisiest but ever so often the plumbers manage to let us know they are working.

I open up AOL and found a lead story about a man killing people at Trolley Square. Immediately I wonder if Cindy or Bob’s family was there – or anyone else we might know. It was on Monday night – family night – when it would be full of families from the area having a night out together. There is little in the way of details about who was killed or wounded. Now all we can do is wait to hear from our family to make sure everyone is OK.

I try to nap but the cold will not let me sleep – I can not imagine what tonight will be like. I try to read some Indonesian but can not concentrate for more than a few minutes. I don’t want to watch TV all night so I must find something useful to do – maybe get Mary to read some more in Kitab Mormon.

Patience – I am really doing better here. Whenever I start to get worked up over something I remind myself that it is not worth getting upset about and back off. I am sure that I will do some backsliding along the way but hopefully I will be able to continue to work on this attribute.

Charity fits right in with Patience – by looking for the good and not what is wrong is not easy and I have a long ways to go here. But I think that is part of the reason the Lord sent me here – to see the positive instead of the negative in the people and ways of Indonesia.

We got good news – the apartment finally closed. That means we have money to pay off some loans and the last of our credit cards, Mike no longer has to worry about collecting rent there, and we will have more income.