Quite a few people out of town on our fourth Sunday. Anna and Orlando traveled to Alamos for their first wedding anniversary. Sergio Hernandez is in Tucson for a beer festival, and Heidi and the boys are spending the summer in Wisconsin.
I preached on Philippians 1, verses 2 through 11.
Yrem is missing from the photo, but with him we were at 10.
We drove up to Tucson today to partake in a most glorious tradition I was taking potatoes with Matt and Dana.
I received a gift for my birthday from them that was something I have wanted for a very long time.
I had records in my childhood. There’s something about them that enriches the experience of listening to music.
I’m rather excited to do some shopping tomorrow for my record collection.
Third Sunday. We had 12 people because six of them are currently traveling from Hermosillo to Wisconsin. Orlando preached on Acts chapter 1.
Started a new class on the history of the Reformation from WTS by Carl Trueman. There are 33 classes in total, Each of which is about an hour long. Sergio H. is joining me and honors our study by smoking with me. My Partagas was spectacular.
Yesterday we went to see a nutritionist that Yun has been using for a month or so. She weighed us and measured our body fat and then puts together a meal plan for 2 weeks. Yesterday’s breakfast was the start to my meal plan. So far I hate it.
My weight was 88.5 kilos (195lbs) and 28% body fat, nearly all of which is in my gut.
I need to incorporate some form of daily exercise as well. The problem of course is that I hate exercise. When I was in Guadalajara last month I was walking 7+ kilometers every day. But here, it is too hot for that. Even so, I need to find something.
Here we are 13 years later. 15 years later all together. We’ve had some exciting adventures over the course of those years. Tonight we celebrated our anniversary at Gold, the restaurant at Westward Look Resort. We have celebrated more than half of our anniversaries at this restaurant, beginning with our first in 2006.
On Sunday we had a chance to visit Midtown Presbyterian Church here in Tucson for the first time. This is a new PCA church plant here in town. We really value their liturgy and hope to one day be able to replicate something like this im Hermosillo.
On Friday I return from Guadalajara to Hermosillo after a month of intensive Spanish studies. I was so very excited to be back. I had missed the comforts of home.
On Sunday morning we departed Hermosillo to head to Tucson. And as has been a long tradition, we partook of some spectacular Sonoran steaks, twice-baked potatoes, and some colorful organic carrots. Dana’s bread accompanied. This was by far the best meal I have had in over a month.
Yesterday signified the completion of my first two weeks here in Guadalajara attending language school at the University of Guadalajara. It’s been rough. Five hours of classes each day and about the same in independent study gets old. The round trip to walk to classes each day is over 7km (about 4.5 miles). I’m not exactly used to much exercise, so it’s been a bit of challenge. I often arrive to school drenched in sweat.
Added to the above challenges is my living arrangements. I rented a small room in an apartment shared by two guys. It’s rough. My roommates are not clean and to make matters worse, they have a puppy and a demon cat. The puppy is cute, but pees and poops in the living room, so the smell is toxic. The cat hates me even though I’ve done nothing to it (yet). A few days ago it scratched my leg with its razor sharp claws, probably just to demonstrate to me that it is demonic.
Sadly, I rented this place for a month, so I’m only half way through my stay. I look for new places nearly daily. I found some great alternatives last night which I may possibly relocate to this weekend. Even though the rent was absurd by Mexican standards for my current place, I don’t think I want to continue here.
My esposa is currently in the sky on her way here from Hermosillo. She arrives in about 30 minutes and then departs Monday morning. Not a very long trip, but given the endless employee situations back home, she will return quickly to deal with a new employee that begins Monday evening. Hopefully that will work out so when she returns she can spend more time here with me.
Last Tuesday my roomies invited me to go to a Lucha Libre match, which apparently is a regular thing on Sundays and Tuesdays. I was a little reticent to join them because I don’t really know them and fake Mexican wrestling sounded a little lame. But on the contrary, it was really enjoyable. We paid $230 pesos for fairly decent seats, though it’s a pretty small arena, so there’s not a lot of variation.
The fakeness level of the matches varied between the experience of the wrestlers. It started out pretty ridiculous, but that only added to the hilarity of it all. I was laughing and shouting the whole way through. I can’t quite recall the last event I attended that created that level of enthusiasm for me. The crowd was pretty intense with their chanting, screaming, and flailing of arms. It was awesome.
