Elder Parker Thomas Alexander

Mexico, Torreon LDS Mission
June 30, 2010 - June 2012

parker.alexander@myldsmail.net
Elder Parker Thomas Alexander
Mission Mexico Torreon
Apartado Postal 792
Coahuila, 27000 Mexico

This blog is updated weekly by Parker's family.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Ingrown toenails aren't fun!



Hey guys!


Well, as you can tell from the subject, I found out first-hand this week that ingrown toenails are definitely not fun things to deal with..... Ouch! haha I sent a picture for you all too! It´s fun stuff! Luckily, the clinic I went to to have them cut it out is run by a member and she did it free! Yay! What happened was that it was hurting pretty bad Wednesday and Thursday and I decided to go on Thursday to get it looked at by this member and she saw it right away, and said it was infected so she had to operate. I was pretty scared. She then proceeded to take out an inch long needle to give me a shot to deaden everything. I can´t tell you the pain that was centered in my tender, infected, ingrown toe... Ouch. The best part was that she stopped and started in the middle of the shot a few times and that made it hurt even worse. After that, she took out her X-acto knife and started cutting the nail out. That part was actually cool because I felt absolutely nothing, but I could see the fact that she was cutting me. It was really strange. One thing lead to another and because of the pain I later felt, we went to the house and didn´t leave again all night. It was great fun. Also, there was another Elder with the same problem so Friday, I went with him to the Red Cross Hospital where they did the same thing to him, but worse because they just took out the entire nail. I watched. It was GROSS! haha We ended up staying in, talking and studying Friday too. It was cool. He´s a cool Elder from Salt Lake. It was a neat experience although I absolutely hated being cooped up all day. That was horrible! haha


Anyway, I gotta say the other two crazy things that happened yesterday.... First and foremost: It was actually worse than seeing the toenail get wrenched out. Yesterday morning on te way to church, we saw a guy get hit by a van while crossing the street. It was horrible. We heard screeching tires, a thud, and we looked over to see a guy flying in the air and landing on the street. The worst part was that the guy in the van just ran away. It was pretty bad though. We rushed over to see what we could do, but there were a ton of people doing the same. He looked pretty bad with a gash in his head and a compound fracture in his right leg. It was nasty stuff. After that experience, we headed to church where we had another crazy experience. We were welcoming everyone to church and this teenage kid asked me if I spoke english and if there was a drinking fountain. Come to find out that the kid goes to Ogden High! How nuts is that! His cousin´s in our ward and going on the mission next week so they´re visiting. It was nuts! What and incredibly small world, eh? Some kid from Ogden sees me and he lives on 31st street. Nuts, right? I thought it was cool. The bad news is.... There isn´t a drinking fountain in the building. LAME! haha Anyway, onto the spiritually cool experiences now, right? I had one of the coolest things happen to me that has ever happened in my life. It was awesome! Do you all remember Maria who got baptized in January with her grandkids? Well in these 3 months that we´ve been working with her and the kids, her husband has never wanted to come down out of his room to listen to us. He´s kind of a shy guy. Anyway, I went with another elder Tuesday to their house to visit them because all sorts of stuff´s been going on with one granddaughter running away and she´s been sick and all this stuff. Anyway, we were there and invited her husband to hear us again and he actually said yes! We started teaching all of them and it was going really well and then I asked him to be baptized. He said yes again! Then I asked him to be baptized on Easter and he said yes yet again! It was sooooooo cool! The family is going to start to receive even more blessings now! Maria said tat she´s been praying ton that her husband could get baptized and this Easter, it´s going to happen! I was so happy! He came to church with his family yesterday and we taught them again last night about how he felt and he said ¨If Iwouldn´t have liked it, I wouldn´t have stayed for three hours!¨ I thought it was pretty awesome. haha It´s also fun to see him interact with his grandson because he reminds me of a certain grandpa I know. haha It´s pretty cool. Well, all is well with me. The toe´s feeling better and I´m happy! I do have some bad news though. That CD of pictures you sent me got busted. I don´t know what happened, but when I took it out of my backpack to print the pictures off, it was busted right down the middle. I don´t know if it would be possible for you guys to send another my way. I would greatly appreciate it. I´m trying to fill a photo album with pictures of family and friends! haha Um.... I think that´s about it. This week, I´m going to be reading the talk by Juan A Uceda and the talk by Patrick Kearon. I´m reading two because they´re short! I hope that´s alright and I hope you are all doing great today! I´m pretty happy! Love you all! Elder Alexander