Circunvalacion 1 - Week #15 (and winding down)

Howdy All!

I can once again officially say that I am near the end of my term here in the office of the great Chile Santiago North Mission. This coming week is the last week of the change and will definitely mean a change of scenery (at least from the office) for myself and Elder Young. I've got to admit that I'm pretty excited to be out working in proselyting full-time again, but there are going to be certain advantages of the office that I'm again going to miss. This time I'm completely confident that my replacement is in complete control and ready to go! Elder Skidmore has completely caught on in the 5 weeks that I've been "training" him, and now he is already flying solo! I'm so proud!!! *TEAR*

This week has been rather frustrating for me on the administrative end of the mission. Monday we had to send a missionary home early, he was going to be ending a week from this coming Monday, but for circumstances of the which I don't know the details, he wasn't able to finish his mission. Apart from that dim bit of news, we have been working on getting everything ready for the move... As I think I've mentioned before, everything in Chile is a major production! So in this week we've been trying to coordinate between our office, President May, the construction department who is overseeing the remodel of the new office, and O&M who will be turning it over to us, as far as how and when the move is going to happen. The turn over was supposed to have happened yesterday, and before that on the 15th, and before that on the Monday after Conference, and before that on April 1st, and now... we might receive the building on Thursday OR Friday!!! AHHHHHHH!!! Next weekend, my last weekend in the office, might be spent moving an entire office and 3 apartments... Oh what fun!!! Such is life...

Monday morning brings about a special time for all the missionaries, it is the last day of interviews with the mission president. We, the office, have interviews Monday morning so that ought to be something to look forward to. This will be my next to last interview with President May before he ends his mission and President Essig shows up. It will probably be a little odd going home only 2 months after the new mission president arrives and barely having an opportunity to get to know him. By the way, I don't know if you've seen it yet but the Church News article featuring President & Sister Essig came out recently. Here is the link if you haven't seen it yet, so that you can see who will be taking care of me when I'm most trunky... LOL
(http://www.ldschurchnews.com/articles/60634/New-mission-presidents.html)
There isn't a whole lot of excitement happening here in the North Mission right now. For some reason our normal work load in the office has decreased by alot and lots of times I find myself struggling to find things to do. (But don't tell President that...) LOL!

I'm happy to hear that Ryah went to Prom and had fun. Did she go with a date, or just with a group? And I still haven't gotten pictures... what's up with that?! I'll be impatiently waiting for those... *Tapping of the foot begins*. But how did she manage to stay out so late on a Saturday night? I'm almost positive she slept through church the next morning... LOL. Speaking of waiting impatiently... I'm still waiting for pictures of the house! *Foot tapping continues*. I keep hearing about all of these advances, but I'm not seeing the progress. Or would it be better to keep it a surprise until I get home and you're already living in it? And when is the projected move in date anyways? I'm genuinely hoping that it is before I get home because I've moved enough houses in the last 10 months to last me a lifetime (as a matter of fact I've moved 2 in the last 2 days).

Congratulations to Miss Ryah for "officially" being the Valedictorian of the Central High School Class of whatever this year is (2011?)... LOL! I better be receiving a video and a written copy of the second most famous valedictorian speech ever given in Central High School history. Of course, we already know who gave the first (but I'm humble)... LOL. Just a tip, get Weathers to take a look at it and proof it for you, that saved me a couple of errors! Oh, and when should I be expecting that the graduation announcement arrive?

Missionary work continues here on the southern half of the world. We as a mission are baptizing consistently, but a lot of the zones are suffering pretty hard right now, but the work goes on. We are kind of in limbo as to whether or not the office will be moving or not this next week, so everything in our sector is in utter chaos! This week will be spent on buckling down on the move and getting everything packed, luckily we still have a little bit of extra man power for now so that ought to make the work a little more bearable.

I love you all and miss you bunches! I'll be talkin' to ya in just over 3 weeks!!! Yay! Just a rumor that I've heard, I'll know more within the next couple of weeks, is that we'll be able to use Skype to communicate with you this time. Right before Christmas the General Offices of the Church in Salt Lake sent an e-mail notifying that is was allowed, and encouraged, to use Skype with video capability to speak with the family for Christmas, but the notice wasn't sent to the whole mission (only the office and a few of the chums of Elder Driscoll, who he thought ought to know). So now we are waiting on the go-ahead from President May, but you might prepare for that anyways.

Hope all is well at home and I'll be waiting for those pictures (patiently). *Tap, tap, tap...*

¡Todo mi amor y muchos abrazos!

-- Élder Todd