Animal Encounter Week

Wow, I had so many crazy experiences with animal this week! They are all pretty funny!

We also got to see our main investigator family a ton this week! They haven’t come to church these past couple weeks but they are working through things plus the mom is super pregnant.

Tuesday: Pday then interviews with President Passey! It was super good to talk to President and we talked about leadership and how I am progressing as a missionary.

Wednesday: We had our district meeting then I was feeling sick so I took a nap during lunch. After the nap I woke up with a major headache. We went to a trailer park to find some less active members. As we drove up, a cute little puppy ran in front of the truck! I got out to keep it out of the way while Elder Tyler parked. The puppy was so cute and I let it lick my hands. Then we followed the dog to its house. It ran right up onto the steps and into its little crate. Next to the crate, and between the crate and the door, were 3 POOPY, SOILED, NASTY, EATEN BABY DIAPERS!!!! It was so nasty!!! I just looked at my hands and said, "He just licked baby poop onto my hands!" As we went to the car to use a whole bottle of hand-sanitizer, there was some dog poop on the ground. I was dodging the dog poop mines pretty well but then I stepped in gum!! So I thought that was it but no... Later that night, we went back to the same trailer park to talk to a less active, we got there early and went to knock on the door of a potential. As we got there the less active canceled so we just knocked the potential. They had this crazy little chihuahua on a chain that was going ballistic as we knocked on the door. From experience, when you get close to a barking dog, they usually walk away or they stop and sniff. So I decided to place my foot just within his range. He stopped for a second and backed up only to spring and bite my leg! A LITTLE CHIHUAHUA BIT MY LEG!!! He bit me through my pants and sock and he only like pricked my leg. It is mostly a bruise. I called Sister Passey and because he had tags, and since most dogs here have had their shots, and since it was minor, I am not rabid.

Thursday: Animal day 2: We went to visit a less active in Columbus. As we visited with them the husband was gone and so we couldn’t go in. We decided to go see their sheep. There was this big barrel about 2 feet from the fence. I lifted the lid and the scent hit them super-fast so a sheep immediately turned then sneezed on me! I WAS SNEEZED ON BY A SHEEP!!! So I used another bottle of hand-sanitizer. We later visited with our investigator family and shared a message with them where Christ says, "Lovest thou me? Feed my sheep." I tried to! I opened the food barrel then I was sneezed on!

Friday: Weekly planning all day until dinner... It was really intense...

Saturday: Exchange! Elder Tyler went with Elder Whittle and Elder Christensen came with me! We, as a district played tracting bingo and it was super fun! You just make a bingo card of common occurrences, like, "Sorry, I am Catholic." or "Sorry, no speak English." Later that evening we went to visit a less active young man. He is very cool and he came to church on Sunday! Anyway, we went to visit him but he wasn’t home. He has a very cute puppy that always lies on his back when you walk up so you can scratch his belly. He went to his back so I went to give him a scratch. As I gave him a belly rub, he started peeing like a squirt gun!! I WAS PEED ON BY A CHIHUAHUA WHILE GIVING HIM A BELLY RUB!!! This week was not my week for animals... Our investigator family had a baby shower and invited us over to eat. They have a horse but from my luck this week with animals, I decided to stay away.

Sunday: No animal encounters. No one showed up to the Columbus group :( Church was good! Later we had a great lesson with our investigator family! We had a great lesson about the Priesthood and were able to talk about how the Priesthood blessing everyone!

Pics will be sent next week!

Hope you had a good laugh this week, maybe a few tears at this email.

This week was really short since we emailed on Tuesday. Great week! We also met a couple families that want to learn more! It will be super awesome to see them progress and to see how the gospel and the Atonement work in their lives!

Love,

Elder Dallin Baker