It was wonderful to talk to you all yesterday. I enjoyed getting to talk to everyone. I got to answer some good questions and got to ask some good questions (even though some of you were a tad hard to understand =] ). I'm glad that Mom had a good mother's day and all went well. I did enjoy the wonderful card and I enjoyed the funny little duck on it. I'm excited to get mail again this week! =)
This week has been an interesting one. I found out I was leaving Mobile, packed up, said goodbye (see the first picture), and headed off to Pensacola on Wednesday. The rest of the week was mainly just getting familiar with the area and doing work. The hardest part was adjusting to everything. It's all unfamiliar and I don't have a routine or anything so it's kinda hard. I'm working up a routine and figuring things out, so that's good.
Pensacola is a dense place. It's the second largest place in the mission (the first is Mobile). Before President Jensen sent me to Alma he asked if I liked small towns, I said not particularly but I'll go wherever I'm sent. So maybe I'm being sent to all the big cities. There are several wards here and I'm serving in the Pensacola Ward. It's a nice ward and there are many ward members who are happy to help us in whatever way we need. They don't always feed us (I've only had one dinner appointment so far and Elder G said they get about 1 or 2 a week) but they're willing to help us, which I prefer. The ward council is great and the bishop here is a nice guy. The ward has an excellent mission plan that is measurable and I think it will really help. I think that good things are going to happen in the Pensacola area, slowly, but surely. Elder G my companion (see the second picture), is a really nice guy. He has a strong testimony and is doing things for the right reason. We get along quite well.
We had the chance this week to go to the old folk's home and help them out. I always thought bingo was just a joke in the movies and the older people in rest homes didn't actually play bingo as they had much better things to do like watch TV, go for a walk, enjoy the clouds, that sort of thing. It turns out they do actually play bingo. I don't mean they just play, they play. There was an atmosphere of intense competition. The announcer lady was shouting at the top of her lungs and when she wasn't talking it was silent in the room expect for the clatter of markers and the steady beam of monitors. Most ladies had two or even three bingo sheets to maximize their chances. My job was help them put the markers on the right numbers. Some ladies were very hard of hearing and would shout "What did she say? 29?" The lady I was helping had only a little trouble. She would sometimes put it on the wrong square or have trouble finding the right square. It took forever but soon enough we finished bingo.
Pictures! I have a wonderful picture of my district. We had done a serious pictures before so we decided to shake things up a bit. As you can see, (see the third picture) we shook things up quite a bit. It was lots of fun. I miss those guys a lot. From me (top right) clockwise is Me, Elder H, O, L, N, and W. I also have a picture of one of the members in Mobile. His name is A and he's awesome (see the fourth picture). He's preparing to go on his mission and we taught many of his friends with him. His cat Champagne, is the silliest cat I've ever seen.
That's all I have time for this week, but I love and miss you all!
-Elder Matthew Carlson
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| Saying Goodbye |
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| Elder G |
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| The District |
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| A and Champagne |
