Dear Dad, the only one who doesn't ignore me.

Dearest DAD and Everyone! 

Thanks so much for taking time from your watching the cats sleep, watching the cement dry, watching the weather reports, watching webcams of Utah and Alaska, and watching the bike tire fill up. You truly have a full life ;) but you took time out of it for ME!!! AND MOM DIDN'T!!! 

That turncoat trunky Terina-lady mother of mine, too busy playing with cousins and aunties and gramies and Utah houses and tent trailers and GF goodies and who knows what else to email her little snookums in HK. I'm not even gonna talk to her for the first 2 minutes I get home :) Seriously, for two WHOLE minutes. 

Our new mission president was asked, "What do you like to do when you're free?" and he replied, in SPITTING IMAGE OF MY DAD, "Work." (He's an "engi-nerd" according to his wife, and the director of technology at BYU according to his resume). "I like yard work, housework, fixing things... when we have a holiday at my house and all the other kids in the neighborhood are going off to play at the lake or something, I would tell my kids, KIDS, we're painting the deck today! Labor day is the day we celebrate WORK! And Memorial Day? RESHINGLING! The day we celebrate the hard work of our ancestors! And Christmas? chopping wood! LABOR is what got Jesus into the world!" BWHAHAHA. So ... sounds just like my family. I love it. 

Feed The Missionaries!!

I don't need money (NOW...), but I would love you to wait until the last week of the month to invite the missionaries over for dinner. When I go back to the states and get into a ward, I will always invite the missionaries for food on the 30th. It's the "starving week" ... No worries here, I can start playing the "I'm leaving soon" card so members will chang me out (chang means "invite" or "please" in Chinese, but it's used universally in missionary chinglish to mean buy someone food) and then I can gain back the 20 pounds I've lost the last 6 months [running every morning and only eating ONE (or two...) dessert(s) a day]. I'm back down to normal, and I'm worried I'll disappoint everyone who was all excited to see fat Sister D ;)

I have lots of pictures but no USB plug in at this computer ;P so they'll have to wait. They include such thrillers as, 

"Sister Darcey uses hair braiding to win the hearts and referrals of previously clique-y young women,"
 "trying to celebrate the Fourth of July in China at English class" and
 "various exciting and mysterious escapades on the way to hong kong history museum which the man on the phone tried to convince me to take a TAXI to instead of walking."
I think it's because he's a wuss.
"The photos include but are not limited to Australians celebrating Dragon Boat Festival WAY late, Jackie Chan's handprints and Jet Li's challenge to a duel". 

And our most GORGEOUS Salmon lunches (Sister C was a bus driver in Alaska last summer so she feels very strongly about eating Salmon. Which is fine with me!)

In that same (last night's) English class, I got stuck with the rowdy bunch of 15 year old boys who were LITERALLY punching each other so loudly they couldn't hear the lesson. I pulled them off the other group of "advanced" English learners so they, at least, could learn the awesome ancestor/culture/countries/family history lesson we'd prepped for English class and then I COMMANDED their attention by 

a) being female, blond and blue eyed AND able to speak chinese and 
b)by teaching them the difference between punch, hit, slap and kick in English. 

It was HILARIOUS--they went from [un] im-managable (is that a word?) to totally interested in 2 minutes--even raising their hands ("Baahk Ji Muih, would THIS** be considered a hit or a slap?") Everyone ended up bruised but happy, and they even let me teach about family trees after that. One even asked for a good night kiss at the end of the lesson (groan.......). 

Hilarious incident in Thailand relayed to us via Sister Cook's "friend" who's there on his mission: He just met a golden elderly couple who met the missionaries years ago and liked the church so much they named their two boys "Mor" and "Mon" (Mormon). However, they wouldn't commit to baptism because they got hung up on tithing. After hearing the story Sister Cook read, it only took a couple seconds for me to think of the pun it was begging for...

 "So... did they have a third kid named, 'Ee'? As in "Mor + Mon+ Ey?" 
bwahahaaAHAHAHAHAAA.

This week an investigator--bless her soul--invited us to her home to sit down with us. Very seriously, very carefully, she told us she had something she wanted to ask us. I was on pins and needles waiting for either her total dismissal or acceptance of the church and the gospel... but then she asked us if we wanted to MOVE IN WITH HER. NOT KIDDING. 

Oh... I just don't have enough time or words to express the sanctity of the moment... Oh, man. Dear little soul. She's in her fifties, totally alone and SO LONELY. Poor little thing. But.. at the same time... later it was RIDICULOUS.

We're going to dissect a pig heart next week to get a less-active and a recent-convert to bond with us. I'm so psyched I can hardly stand it. 

TIme's gone! I love you! AND I LOVE OUR NEW MISSION PRESIDENT! In my interview he said three things: "Well done" "thank you--I can see you've given up a lot, and given your heart to God" and "Lucky is the man who marries you. If I still had a son..." 

I love this! And I love you! Be happy! And if you miss Mom and Aidan so much... go to church and hang with those people? ;) Too much time in just the company of our cats can do some strange things to people...