Bruised Back And Wounded Pride :l

1- Relaxing P-Day

2- Slipping on some stairs -_-

3- Early service

4- ReStore

5- The drain got fixed! :D

6- Contacting galore! 

7- Dinner with the Hetchlers! :D

8- Weekly planning

9- Fall-through Friday -_-

10- Dinner with the Hampsons again! :D

11- Service on Saturday

12- Long drives and sketchy referral... XD

13- Suspicious drink :l

14- Dinner with the Hills

15- Ever felt like a third wing? *nervous laughter*

16- Frozen doorknob! :O

1- P-Day was pretty nice last week. We got all our laundry and cleaning done, then went shopping and did a few things at the church. We spent most of the afternoon making emails and talking to family. Since Camrose is far from other areas, we can't gather with the rest of the district for P-Day sports. I'll miss hanging out with other missionaries, but it also frees up more of the day to talk to family and stuff!

1- The only downside was that our bathtub/shower drain was clogged. :l  It was slow-draining for a few days before I got here, according to Sister Curry. It finally got blocked up on Saturday. We tried using a hair snake and a toilet plunger, but they weren't doing much. We tried to call maintenance, but... no response. So we told the Fitzners, the housing coordinators of the mission. They said they'd contact someone and that hopefully our drain would get fixed on Monday. Welp, it didn't... :l

2- Monday evening we went to visit Sister Isaacson. She was showing us some of her quilting stuff and I slipped on the stairs when we were going down. -_-  They were metal-edged, steep, and narrower than stairs I'm used to. I came down on my lower back and bruised it pretty bad. I also hit my shoulder. I tried to shrug it off (no pun intended, haha), but by the time we left, I was hobbling and I couldn't lift my right arm without wincing. The only thing hurting worse than my back and shoulder was my pride.

2- I had some pretty nasty bruises and I was so sore that even breathing deeply hurt. I spent most of the evening laying on a heat pad and waiting for painkillers to kick in. Sister Curry and I did some more contacts and other necessary stuff, then got ready for bed. I slept really poorly because the heatpad kept turning off and the pain medicine didn't last all night. :l

3- We'd set up a time to come back to Sister Isaacson's early Tuesday morning to help her out. She's moving, so we're helping her pack. I was very cautious on the stairs. Luckily, we didn't do any heavy lifting, and for the most part I was fine. Standing up and sitting down weren't too fun, and I was careful about how I used my right arm. We packed some dishes and things from her kitchen into boxes. Her friendly cat, Velvet, kept jumping in the boxes and trying to eat the tape. XD

4- Later on Tuesday, we went to a place called the ReStore. It's a second-hand store kind of like Deseret Industries. People can drop off donations. Mostly, us missionaries reshelve, clean, and help price things. There are some slightly dangerous aspects, like machinery and heavy-lifting, so I had to go through this whole safety orientation. I was fine with it; it was mostly just walking around and answering common-sense questions. As long as I didn't walk quickly, my back felt okay.

5- We had a couple of lessons after the ReStore, then decided to pick up some Drano from Walmart to see if we could fix the drain on our own. It had been clogged for roughly four days at that point. *nervous laughter* We got Drano, then as we were coming in the apartment, a maintenance guy told us he'd fixed the drain. He complimented us for getting out what hair we could with the hair snake. He said the apartment might smell a little like chemicals, but the drain was fixed.

5- When we went inside our room, Sister Curry started gagging and said it smelled like eggs. XD  I can't smell a lot of sulfuric scents too well. It didn't smell like eggs to me; it smelled like wet Marine socks from SeaQuest. Basically, they're cloth tubes that go over filtration pipes to collect all the sand, grit, and other stuff that slips through the filter. They smell like death. XD The smell went away after a few hours, though.

6- Wednesday was a day of contacting! We did so many calls, texts, and social media messages pretty much all day. XD  Not many people answered our calls. A couple of members did, and we had one referral get kind of snappy with us, but aside from that, not too much of interest. It was a bit draggy, but not entirely unproductive.

7- We got to have dinner with the amazing Hetchler family on Wednesday! Brother Hetchler had to work, so it was just Sister Hetchler and her darling kiddos! They had two girls and four little boys. The oldest girl was eight and the youngest boy was just under a year. They're super sweet and really smart! We did the 'Jump for Jesus' lesson with them because they were very energetic too. At the end, we knelt for a prayer and the kids were surprisingly reverent. I could definitely feel the spirit. :)  Then, they gave us hugs before we left. It totally made my night!

8- We had a pretty good planning session on Thursday. We set some goals for the friends we're teaching and came up with new finding goals. Also, some personal goals that I'm slightly apprehensive but also a tad excited about. :)  I've been having a bit of a hard time finding the motivation to do Facebook work, so one of my goals is to make a daily Facebook story. I took some time Thursday evening to write myself up a sort of 'posting schedule' to help out. Schedules, lists, charts, and other things like that ensure that I get things done!

9- Friday was full of contacts because so many lessons fell through... We texted and cold-called for several hours and pretty much no one answered. One guy texted us and said he was Satan and that he'd eaten the person we were trying to reach. XD  That gave us a bit of a laugh, but it was still kind of discouraging to get very little answers from people. The members that we were able to call were busy more often than not. But that's the way missionary work goes sometimes. High tide and low tide. (:

10- The highlight of Friday was dinner with the Hampsons! Our friend that we've been teaching wasn't able to come, but we still had a great time. We almost got lost on the way, and the snow was super deep on the Hampson's driveway, but we made it okay. Sister Hampson had made spicy goulash because Brother Hampson likes food with a bite to it. XD  I cautiously waited for Sister Curry to take a bite. She told me it wasn't spicy, so I dug in.

10- I'm sure the goulash was delicious, but all my taste buds could register was fire. I was dying! My nose was streaming, my face was red, and my eyes started watering. I tried not to gulp my water or let the pain register on my face. It was maybe a 7-7.5 on my personal spice scale! Barely better than that breakfast wrap I got from Tim Horton's a while ago that was dripping with fire-sauce. 

10- Brother Hampson told us cool stories of when he was a missionary in England. He said everyone had nicknames, and his was Happy. One of his best friends was named Martin, but everyone called him 'Mank'. He also knew another guy named Mac because his initials were M-A-C. 

10- We had tasty lime jello for dessert. It helped to soothe the burn a little bit. XD The jello was stuck in the tray, so Brother Hampson tried to loosen the jello with hot water. The water was a bit too hot and liquified half the jello. XD  It was still good though, and we shared a good message while we sipped the jello.

10- A final thing that fell through that night was a visit with the Hills. They had invited us over after our dinner with the Hampsons, so we drove as soon as we finished the jello. We got to the Hills' house and were greeted by their big, shaggy dog. His name was Viking. He looked like a stout husky with the thickest fur ever! I swear, his fur had to be at least four inches long. He kept leaning against me and making this intimidating, crooning growl. I assume it was a happy sound, because he didn't eat me like I thought he would. XD  Sometimes big dogs just make me a bit nervous. But anyway, we knocked on the Hills' door and waited for a while, but no one answered. We got cold, so we waited in the car. After half an hour, we decided to drive back to the apartment for the evening. Sister Hills called us later to apologize and said she'd been visiting family for the day and lost track of time. She invited us over for dinner on Saturday to make up for it, though! XD

11- After we finished studies, we had an awesome Book of Mormon read with one of our friends we're teaching and Sister Lyon. We read some of the war chapters in Alma, Alma 43-44, if I remember correctly. We discussed how the Lamanites fought for dominion, power, and land while the Nephites fought to defend their families, their religion, and their rights. The Nephites, as the scriptures say, were 'inspired by a better cause', and so God was on their side and was able to help them. We talked a bit about Captain Moroni and how awesome he was, then Sister Curry and I headed off to a service. :)

11- Service at Sister Isaacson's again! This time we were helping to clean up some stuff because most of the packing was done. We wiped down counters, cabinets, and the fridge. I ended up cleaning out the oven. It was an ordeal! XD  I had to stop Sister Isaacson's cat, Velvet, from hopping inside the open oven at least four times. XD  Sister Curry and a helpful lady named Sister Dylke worked on the fridge. They pulled it out, cleaned beneath and behind it, then put it back. We had some fun chatting while we cleaned.

12- On Saturday, we had some long drives planned. We were going to visit Sister Varty, who lives about half an hour away from Camrose, and the Hills, who are also outside of Camrose but in the opposite direction from Sister Varty. On the way to Sister Varty's, we decided to stop by a referral that we haven't been able to contact by phone, text, or Facebook.

12- We were driving on long, dirt roads through marshy fields, cow pastures, and occasional copses of trees. We listened to some amusing--and uplifting--talks by Hank Smith. He's one of my favorite motivational speakers. :)  As we drove further from the city, I started to get a bit uneasy. I thought I was carsick, so I gazed out the window. The knots in my stomach got tighter as we closed in on our destination: the supposed address of our referral. It had been a good ten minutes since we'd seen a car, and the only buildings for miles were silos and rare barns. I kind of like being out in the open, so I didn't know why I felt so off inside.

12- Finally, we reached what Google Maps said would be our last turn. We went down another dirt road and saw a run-down house and a ramshackle barn ahead of us. There were dozens of rusty cars and old tractors. In the distance were mounds of broken farm equipment and vehicles. Sister Curry said she didn't feel too good about it, and I agreed. She turned around and we started to drive away. 

12- I don't know exactly why both of us got a bad feeling, but I do know that we weren't supposed to be there. That middle-of-nowhere dump was the boondocks version of a sketchy downtown Edmonton referral. My stomach felt better with every mile we put between ourselves and that place. The Spirit was trying to warn me, and I'm glad Sister Curry spoke up, or I might have continued to try to dismiss my feelings.

13- We eventually got to Sister Varty's a bit late. We knocked for a while, and just like at the Hills', we got cold, so we hopped back in the car. We tried calling her, then went to her other door. When we knocked, her dog barked, then she answered. Poor lady had fallen asleep waiting for us! She let us in, then got us a drink and some cake.

13- When I saw the drink, alarm bells started ringing in my head. I've never had iced tea, but I couldn't think what else this could be. It was the color of root beer with chunks of slushy ice floating in it. She poured us glasses and called it juice. I asked her what was in it and she said, "Oh, a bit of everything."  :l

13- Honestly, I didn't want to drink it. I was getting to the point where I was considering faking an allergy to get her to tell us what exactly 'a bit of everything' was. I asked if it was homemade root beer, and she told me it was juice. I took a tentative sip, then asked again what it contained. Finally, she told us it was a mix of oranges, blueberries, and some tropical fruits. It definitely tasted fruity, but also not as sweet as juice I'm used to. I felt bad for being so suspicious, but I guess I was still a little high-strung from that old farm-equipment dump in the middle of nowhere.

13- We drank the juice and ate the cake she gave us. The cake was pretty tasty! We also shared a scripture with her and talked for a bit. Then, we had to head out so we'd be able to get to the Hills in time for dinner.

14- We were a bit late to the Hills, and their dog greeted us again. Sister Curry and I were nervous because the cake and juice had filled us up... Luckily, they had salad. It was a light dinner, so we were able to eat an acceptable amount without exploding our stomachs. XD  We shared a message, then Brother Hills let us look at a neat art book full of bird drawings, paintings, and carvings. I had so much fun looking at it!

15- Sunday morning, we went to church early for Branch Council. I really felt like a third wing... We just sat there for most of the meeting, not knowing what we had to offer. The leadership of the Branch was just talking about a ton of things that went way over my head, and I didn't know if I was allowed to comment or add my opinion. :l

16- After church, we had to borrow some keys from President Hetchler to check supplies in the church building. It was so cold... about -20 Celcius. We pulled up to the Hetchlers' house and knocked on the door. President Hetchler tried to open the door, but the door had frozen shut! He was yanking on the knob and turning it, but the outer knob didn't turn at all. He ran to get something, and all his kids were looking out the window at us. One of the little boys tried to open the door. XD  President Hetchler came back after a minute and used some gloves to get a stronger grip on the knob. Finally, he was able to open the door. We heard ice cracking as he did so! 

Well, that's pretty much it! I'm glad it's P-Day again! :)  Hope everyone is doing well.

Here's a couple pictures! 

Snowflakes in Sister Curry's coat ruff, us in the snow, a random toilet also in the snow, some mule deer, and a new spider drawing I'm working on! >:D