I just got back from a late night walk around the neighbourhood.  It’s all peace and quiet tonight (well, except for the house with all the crazy dogs.  That was momentarily worrisome.  Note to self…next time avoid the house where they seem to be breeding pitbulls…).  The peace and quiet is a nice respite from the craziness of the past couple of nights.  I think my neighbours must be in recovery mode.  Friday night was the night they hired the Mariachi band for their wedding/birthday/whatever the heck it was.  I’m not normally opposed to Mariachi music (come on…who doesn’t like a little toe-tappin’ Mariachi music)…but these guys went ’til 4 AM.  4 AM people!  And they’d tease me.  They’d stop just long enough that I’d think they were finished and I’d start to drop off to sleep, and then bang, away they’d go again with the trumpets blaring and the drums…drumming… 

So you can imagine my happiness when I laid down to go to sleep on Saturday night and the same people fired up their karioke machine.  And we all know karioke only gets better the drunker people get.  At around 2 AM I almost got up to go see what we were celebrating and join the party.  If you can’t beat ‘em…

But tonight the barrio is at rest and we only have to contend with barking dogs and buzzing insects…and the occasional taxi driver trying to keep himself awake (and everyone in a 300 ft radius) with his stereo.  Pretty much normal…

Actually…as I wrote that, a drunk lady down the street started banging on her gate trying to wake someone in the house to let her in.  Ah…irony…

I realize that I haven’t been here much lately.  I checked my blog stats to see if anyone was actually still coming to read, and I was surprised to see that lots of you are.  So then I felt guilty.  Then I felt even guiltier when I realized my last post was about not wanting to share my toilet paper.

You’re a good bunch of people!

Then thing is, I do actually have lots to write about.  Which is why I haven’t actually written anything.  It’s been a busy few weeks here.  So even though it’s a bit late right now, I figured I should at least acknowlege that I’m still here and promise to write something significant and profound in the next couple of days.  Well…I’ll promise to write something anyhow…     

Until then, I thought I’d just leave you with some random pictures from the past week.  Hope you enjoy them…and thanks for caring enough to keep coming back!

Some pictures…

So the other day (the day before the Christian School team left), I was in the shower
when I heard a pop, bang and a couple of other funny noises and then the power
went out to the second floor of the house (killing my hot water in the process, by the way). 

It turned out our electricity was trying to burn down the house.  It would have succeeded
if it wasn’t for the fact that we live in a cement box.  This is where the electricity
comes into the house (in my room).  Somehow the wires all melted together and more
or less exploded.  Well…maybe “exploded” is too strong of a word, but when you
have black soot marks on your wall, that’s never a good thing.  Fortunately I’m 
paying for classes for a future electrician and for once I got something back
(other than the joy of helping someone of coure…) and Jimmy was able to fix us
right up…at least until the propane tank decides to try and take us out… 

Andres airbanding…

Our new brick patio and BBQ pit in the back yard that the Saskatoon Christian School
built us.  We used it for the first time to entertain another S’toon group,
Fairmont Baptist.  They’re here for a couple of weeks working with one of our
interns who is from their church.

On a side, and sad, note…notice our mango tree is dying.  It was fine on Sunday and by
Wednesday the leaves were all drying out and falling off.  We’re not sure what happned…
(actually that’s not entirely true…we think Ronelo watering the tree with a five gallon
paint bucket without really washing the bucket out and thus poisoning the
tree is what happened…)

…but it’s sad…

We cooked some serious beef…

This is Ryan.  He’s staying with us for a few weeks.  He’s the cousin of one of my
friends back home, Jordan.  He’s traveling SA for a year.  I only include this picture
’cause it makes me laugh.  Sandro took it. 

Of course it might be funnier ’cause it’s 1:34 AM….

Cleaning up after the BBQ.  Andres’ hand on the back of my neck signifies that I’m
his “cachorro”…someone he rules over (it’s a street kid term for someone you
could take in a fight).  Sigh…he thinks he’s being funny…

Andres reaching to put his hand on my neck once again for the picture.
Sandro just jumped the gun with the camera…

Again with the “cachorro” thing…

Andres discovering who’s who’s “cachorro”…

The “I’m a good leader and don’t really beat up the kids in my house” picture…

Olya, our IT intern and my fellow Saskatoonian…the shaking of the fist is just a joke. 
Really.

Andres getting tired of Sandro taking random pictures of him…

Sandro being…Sandro.  I think he was overseeing us cleaning the kitchen…

Marcee sitting on top of all the foamies left over from the SCS team (as a side
note there’s a lot of them ’cause I got mixed up and bought double what we needed. 
Now I don’t know what to do with them). 

Why is Marcee doing this you ask?
Uh…yea…that’s a good question.  Write me and I’ll send you her e-mail address.
I’ve stopped asking those kinds of questions…

Anyhow, that was our week more or less.  At least the part we took pictures of.  Thanks again for praying for us!