¡Hola familia!

How the time does fly. Ok not really. This week was a little slow because Elder Lopez was sick with some sort of stomach bug and we spent two days in the house. I would also like to announce that the rainy season has officially begun here in Ecuador. It has been raining off and on the last couple of weeks but now it’s raining most days. That also means that once again the mosaic plagues are in town. Crickets and frogs for everyone! I cultivated a pretty healthy dislike for crickets while living in Ecuador that’s for sure. The darn things are always getting in the house and then they die in some odd corner and make the entire house stink of rotten cricket. We kill a good amount of crickets on a daily basis. One night I got feed up with all the crickets so I tied strings to several of the recently dispatched buggers and hung them on a cable outside our window in a vain attempt to ward off any cricket foolish enough to think of entering. It didn’t work but it does look pretty funny.

The rain also drove a couple of other interesting guests into the house the other day. A while ago I was making breakfast when I noticed something dart across the small space we call the kitchen. I was pretty sure it was a mouse but it was early and I’m still not a morning person so I wasn’t sure. My companion thought I was full of it when I wasn’t able to locate the mouse or any evidence that he existed, but I had faith. I knew the mouse was real. A couple of days later I caught another glimpse of the rodent and tried to pursue, but once again I couldn’t figure out where he ran away to. At this point my companion thought I was losing my mind because he still had not noticed anything. Then the next day he was moving his suit cases around trying to get at a cricket he wanted to kill when he yelled, “¡ah un ratón!” for those of you who don’t speak Spanish that means “ah a mouse!”. And I said, “¡yo le dije que no estoy loco!” or in other words, “I told you I wasn’t crazy!” We then commenced a drawn out battle as we struggled to capture the devil. As it turns out my companion is afraid of mice, which would have been funnier if I didn’t need help. To make a long story short, after much chasing and moving beds, furniture, and every other object in the house that was big enough to hide behind, I finally got the thing trapped in a bucket. Did you know mice are excellent jumpers? I had no idea. This one was an expert in his field because he somehow managed to clear the bucket and escape a few minutes later. Thus began “epic mouse hunt part 2″ which turned out to be even more drawn out than part 1. He really didn’t want to get back into that bucket and had gotten better at avoiding my tricks. Finally he ran to the kitchen and I lost him for a couple of minutes. I soon discovered evidences of a mouse home under the sink and as I lifted a small carton I noticed a pair of eyes looking at me. Unfortunately I didn’t have a fast enough reaction time and the mouse jumped out before I could toss the box into the bucket. But luckily we caught him pretty quickly after that. As we were sitting there contemplating our victory, I couldn’t help but notice that our mouse seemed to have grown since the last time I caught him. I looked in the carton where I had found the current detainee hiding and sure enough, I found another mouse. This time I was a little faster on my feet and tossed the mouse into the bucket before he could make a break for freedom. So now they are sitting in the house in a bucket and we are still trying to figure out what to do with them. Actually now there is only one mouse because the big one killed the little one for some reason. She must have been mad that the little guy led us back to home base. My companion wants to drown the remaining mouse but that’s not really my style. I wanted to make a short movie starring the mouse but I don’t have time for such antics. I think we may just end up letting it go into the wild or something (far from the house of course).

In other news, our shower finally got fixed this week. I know I told my family this on the phone at Christmas time but our shower broke on December 24th for some reason and since then we have been bathing out of plastic bins. The plumber came over several times trying to fix it but he never did figure out what was wrong. Then on his fourth visit the shower just sort of started working. We don’t know why. I try not to question such things and just count my blessings. Well I’m out of time but before I go I just want to mention that I tried cow tongue the other day, and it was good. I didn’t expect it to be, but it was. I have clearly been here too long.

Te quiero,
Elder Walke