Thomas News

Well, trying to write to you today with my bad hand. By "bad" I think I'm over-emphasising the problem. It's actually been healing really well and in a couple of weeks should be as good as new.

Of course, I've had every missionary and his companion take the micky out of me. Some of the ever-so-heartfelt comments have been "Hi cripple". When I first broke my fist, I actually didn't feel too much. A little pain, but hey, I just punched a solid concrete wall. I look down to see how my hand is going, and it's pretty misshaped. Two broken bones are poking up against the skin and my pinky had sunk lower than normally possible. I show it to the other missionaries and it is decided that it will need an X-ray.

Problem is, very few hospitals on my side of Riga do x-rays as it turns out. We spend about 4 1/2 hours looking for a hospital during which I was able to laugh most of the way through (so much for my low pain threshold- squeezing pimples is still far worse and that day proved it). So it all turned out okay.

Hospital was a spirit killer. The movies that one guy was watching there involved a lot of swearing and some of them had a horror theme. It was hard to really get refocussed. Back on track now, glad to say.

One of our investigators, sadly has taken a turn for the worse. His name is Stefan, I might have told you about him. He has a large alcohol and smoking problem and is not married to the less-active woman with whom he has had a child (who is just as sweet as can be). Well, last week we come by and he is well and truly plastered. On top of that the whole place smells of smoke. He hadn't been smoking or drinking for two weeks.

We ran into a nice family yesterday night while tracting, who were just amazingly nice. Ruslon and Ielina. They are both Hari Krishna, a common religious group in Europe. I think I saw them in Prauge, even. They were the ones with the drums and were singing everywhere. Their religion agreed with a lot of what we said, which is sometimes even worse than when they don't, doesn't give a whole lot of reasons for conversion.

Thanks for your letter, Max, I really liked it. You seem to be doing a good job of ironing your shirt, keep it up, buddy. Peet playing the tuba? I find that hard to fathom in Peet. Oh well, I guess it's just something I'll have to see to beleive.

You'll be interested to know that Pres. Watterson was also in property devealopment before he was called. Apparently land councils were the devil- sounds like the project your working on right now.

We have a somewhat new missionary with us- Elder Prat. He's currently serving in the Rustov, Russia mission and is here for Visa work. He's a good kid, but they seem to do things pretty differently there. I had to call him on the beanie he was wearing- looked like a hoodlum. I hope you all are well, there is no need to worry about me, I am healing well, and in the service of the Lord, that is the least one can expect.