10-12-09 "That Darn Cat!"

Greetings from Tomball! So far a great place to serve as a missionary. Tomball, or the Tomball ward boundary at least, is more like three towns attached to the same highway in one town. We have main downtown Tomball, where our apartment is located, Greater Tomball to the south closer to the Houston metropolis, and an area up north called Decker Prairie and/or Pinehurst. Sadly, from looking through old ward records, it appears that my German class acquaintance's family has actually moved out of the ward in the last year. Oh well. From church yesterday the ward is wonderful in any case.
Also from looking through the ward list, I have discovered that this ward is full of detectives. Two men work for the FBI (perhaps similar to a certain possibly secret operative in our home ward), someone works for border patrol, and there are one or two police officers. So although I am no longer working in the CSI ward, I am still among the compadres of the Hardy brothers. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Zeke Kelso of the movie "That Darn Cat" lived somewhere nearby, and I'll tell you why. Our apartment has a short-haired grey cat who constanly hangs around, looking for food and causing general mischief. I'm convinced it's D.C. from "That Darn Cat!" although I can't prove it and the cat has quite a different coloring. By general mischief, I mean it's always trying to get into our apartment. I will have to tell Sister Kemp to "shut the front door" unless we want to get ourselves involved in a little mystery. (Which maybe we do. Don't tempt me.) I can't decide whether to be the Hayley Mills character or her older sister in this little subplot. The sister seemed so much more graceful and mature, plus she got to date the detective in the end, but the Hayley Mills character was more fun and adventurous and had the quirky fun boyfriend with the weird name--Canoe, I believe. Of course, since it's all a fantasy, who's to say I can't be both? Plus, it's been rainy ever since I got down here, so I've had plenty of occasion to wear my rain jacket, which makes me look just like a detective. Too fabulous. I'll send a picture (and others) as soon as we take some. (By the way, some of your pictures aren't opening up. I don't know if its just the computers I'm using, but maybe send another round of actual copies sometime. No rush.)
Right now we are working with two main investigators. The first is Jennifer (although her real name is something else). She is from Vietnam, has an adorable little boy who's almost two named Ricky, and has been learning with missionaries for a while. She partially allows us to come over to teach her English--which should work out really well since Sister Kemp is an elementary education major from BYU-Idaho (any questions Cassidy, you can send them our way, as long as they're not too pressing) and I'm an English major. We also are teaching her about the Restoration of the gospel, but slowly because it takes a while with the language barrier. Her husband is Catholic, and she's concerned about having two religions in the home, but she loves reading from the Book of Mormon and is very accepting of the teachings we have for her.
We're also working with a man named Alex, whose life is a bit of a mystery. His family is from Venezuela, he's been in the navy (although for which country we're not exactly sure), he lived in Spain for five months, and now is looking for a home in Tomball because his kids live here with his ex-wife. He attended LDS services for years before he lived in Spain, but didn't realize that our church is all over the world, so he started going to the prettiest Catholic cathedral he could find over there, until he got back here and found the church again on his own. He's already set a date for baptism, and the ward members are doing a very good job of fellowshipping him.
Oh! And I got word this week, the very day after I arrived here, that Charles Marshall has also set a baptism date! November 1! Pray for him! I want to go and see him get baptized. Nothing would make me happier, although the happiness would be on par with knowing Eli will be baptized at the end of this month. Happy Birthday, Bubby! I love you, and I'm so glad you're excited about getting baptized.
Speaking of birthdays, I did get the shirts you picked out and they are WONDERFUL! Shut the front door! They could not be more perfect! And thank you for having so many people send me birthday cards. In addition to family, I have them from: Donna Griffiths, Aleisha, Miss Peg, The Dells, and Mallory Hart. So fun.
Thanks for the info about the shooting of the moon. Last week I had a less active member give me the whole schpiel about how the moon landing was all faked because he'd read up on it on the greatest and truest of all sources: the internet. That's also where he discovered the truth about 9/11 being an inside job. As if. It's good to know the space program continues despite their crazy naysayers who accuse thousands of people of being liars. Sadly, I also discovered this week that the Johnson Space Center in Houston could not be farther away from our mission, and is practically not in Houston at all. Oh well. And we may have seen as we were leaving our nursing home service that Obama apparently won the Nobel Peace Prize...? Why? Is the war over? I don't mean entirely to sound like a naysayer, but I am almost totally uninformed about current events. Surely one doesn't receive the NPP for giving a speach to elementary school students?!? Okay, that's about all for this week, except to say, I'm glad you enjoyed Rebecca even if you don't think you understood it all. Let's just say I thought it was ironic that I'd asked you to read it around the time my apartment burned down. Does that offer any insight? It's been awhile since I read it myself, so I can't give you any more clues than that.
Also, thanks for all the Lawrence references. The only one I thought of was Laurie Lawrence, but your list went above and beyond. Dad, thanks for the facts about Tomball and the magical birthday card. Cassidy, sorry you have a cold, but glad to know you're doing well at school. All the best to Mark from me. He'll love being on a mission. Grandmother and Grandpa, don't get to cold. Here its been colder--in the 60s. Try not to be too jealous, and I hope you stay feeling well. Get your will taken care of, too, I guess.
All the best and all my love,

Sister Whitney Sorensen

PS Eli, I'll send you a birthday card today, so look for it!