Day 59

I feel like kids these days go straight to violence

I mowed the lawns today, and in the process I discovered evidence of cows. When I told everyone Elizabeth said that this morning she saw like 6 cows just hanging out by the shop and so she scared them away. This gave me an idea. Depending on what time of cow this is I am going to try to ride one. I have a few different ideas on how I will go about doing this but one of them is that I will feed them everyday until they learn to trust me. Then one day I will just jump on one of they're backs and see how long I can hold on. Super. So there was a board meeting for the school in the chapel today so I was going to grill up some chicken for everyone for dinner. Well I didn't defrost it in time and it was still frozen by dinner time. So I guess I'm making that tomorrow. Instead I grilled some hot dogs that Leo had and made mac and cheese. Most everyone contributed other things too so it was a very good meal. Jen even brought Pepsi, I love Pepsi. Carlos, Yanina, and the girls are back for the week. So Betsy's class will full again. She took some great pictures today that I will post as soon as I get them.

Day 58

My Attacker 

So, on Saturday Betsy, Leo, Wilfredo, Sonia, and I went to a little island called Vieques. It was a short drive to the ferry and a 20min. ferry ride to the island. The ferry costs 2 dollars to get to the island, if your deaf its 1 dollar, whats that about. No es justo. Anyway we get there and catch a ride on a publico(taxi... ish) and Betsy asked the driver what the best beach on the island was, she said la playa rojo is the best but its kind of in the middle of nowhere. That sounded good to us so we went there. This was the most amazing thing I have ever seen. This beach was ten times better than any post card or desktop wallpaper, and I got to swim in it. Betsy and I basically snorkeled the entire cove. We even swam out to this little island, its not really and island; Maybe 30x10 feet, and it was made up of lime stone that had eroded away from the waves and all that was left were sharp rocks. Not very friendly. Either way I managed to time out my attempts with the waves and got onto the thing. All the crabs came over to my side of the island to see what was going on. The pointy lime stone was very difficult to walk on and it continued just beneath the water level so I was really worried about how I was going to get off of this ridiculous little crab infested island. I basically had Betsy find the deepest piece of water within 5 feet of the island then I waited for a wave to come and I dove into it trying to stay as close to the surface and as far away from the rocks as possible. Long story short I survived. I was later attacked by a basketball sized sea urchin. Leo was stabbing at it with a stick, I guess trying to kill it and when he got it out of its hiding place I caught it with my hands and it tried wiggling its way between my hands and got enough pressure between them to stab me in the finger. Not very nice, I was trying to help it. Despite the unnecessary violence both to and from the urchin it was a really cool break after a long week. Betsy sent me this link to a "focus on the family" thing and I listened to it and it explains very well a lot of problems that the deaf community face. If you can spare a half an hour to listen to this it is an extremely important message. Just follow the link above. So today I went to the Evangelical Church for the Deaf again but this time I brought Betsy so she got to reconnect with a lot of old friends so that was nice. Tonight I went to Spanish church and heard another good sermon. I love Sundays, and not just the dessert. I woke up to a ton of rain this morning! It was great, Betsy was up before everyone and of coarse playing in the rain. I know that rain causes flooding here and all sorts of problems but I can't help but love it. I grew up in Orange County California. It never rains there. I think the last time it rained I was 6. And I still have reason to believe that was just the neighbors sprinklers. Either way if your raised in a desert you learn to enjoy the rain. I don't know what Betsy's excuse is.

Day 56

Gaby, Myself, and Saul

I spent almost the entire school day today with the kids. I had a great time. I led chapel this morning and then a boys devotion after that. I eat breakfast then helped in Betsy's classroom until about 11 then I put together a video that Betsy will be showing to her church in October. After Lunch we practiced the bells with the older kids then we all went to badminton. It really seems like the kids are enjoying badminton more and more. It is quite a bit more relaxed now that we know that we won't be competing for a while. Betsy's church is having a prayer vigil tonight. They will all be up until 12 midnight praying together, I don't speak Spanish well enough to pull that off, and Leo is in a youth group bible study which I am to old for. So I am home alone. Tomorrow morning Betsy, Leo and I are taking a boat out to a very small island called Vieques. I don't really know what we will be doing there but I'm sure it will be fun. Betsy and Leo are pretty excited. I guess you'll find out in tomorrows post. Until then.

Day 55

Larry

So there are two little girls dorming at the school, and their parents as I mentioned yesterday. Well their dad is a champ. He has been here all of 4 days and he is close to being finished ripping all the vines down off the fence that surrounds the school, and he cut the grass in the field were the trees are. This is absolutely impossible to do with a lawn mower because the holes are deeper than the mud and have been filled with water for a week. Seriously you can be walking out there and the next thing you know the better half of your right leg is underwater. Well anyway he went back there with a edger, trimmer, weed whacker or whatever people call them where you happen to be from, and just went at the grass with it. It looks amazing down there. You can almost see the holes when you fall into them. Betsy said that one time they had someone come with a dump truck and they filled all the holes with gravel and dirt and it only lasted three years. How does gravel just disappear? The answer is simple, a tribe of little people who dig holes! Hole people! So anyway this guy has shown me how this school is supposed to look so all I need to do now is maintain. It'll be a full time job, but someone's gotta do it. So the picture is of one of six lizards that were just hanging out on me in the field today. It was crazy, I cut down this tree and after we cleaned it all up there were like eight lizards on the stump catching bugs. I wanted to catch one so I went for one of the bigger ones and it just jumped off the stump and onto my arm. I continued to do this until I had almost all of them on me. I don't know maybe lizards just like me. They seemed pretty content to just stay on my and it the little bugs that were flying around. I eventually had to shew them off of me and the biggest one bit my finger. Why is it that I can catch all the snake food in Puerto Rico but I can't catch a snake? It would be so well fed, really if the snakes were smart they would find me. Sounds like a pretty nice life really. Bumper sticker: JESUS SAVES, he passes to Noah, who shoots and SCORES!! Be alert, the world needs more lerts.

Day 54

54 days on this patch of sand in the middle of the ocean, that's a year and 13 days in dog years. I put the chainsaw to work again today. I went down to the lower field and cut down a tree that was leaning over the grass and blocking the lawn mower. I was so covered in mud! I wish I had a picture. Just before I had a heat stroke Betsy talked me into procrastinating and cleaning up the rest of the tree tomorrow. I've always been into surviving so I gave in. We took the girls that are staying at the school and their parents, also staying with us, to the beach. Betsy, Leo and I went snorkeling. We saw the biggest crab I have ever seen. This thing was hug. I tried to catch it but it got all upset, crabs can be a little edgy, and he jumped off the coral and sank to the bottom. I'm so mad I didn't just grab him when I had the chance. I could have had fresh crab for dinner tonight. I will always remember this as the day I almost caught captain jack crab. I expected better from me. We will meet again captain crab. After the beach I swallowed my regrets and went to church with Betsy and Elizabeth. Wednesday night church we are learning about revelations, and if you think that book is confusing in your first language it gets exponentially worse in your second and third. I understood the message for the most part so that's what counts. So I mentioned that Leo and I had a bet about quitting caffeine. Well I originally thought that I was quitting caffeine and he was quitting soda, but it turns out all I have to quit is Monsters. He says that I can have all the caffeine I want because that wasn't the challenge. Whatever sounds good to me. I don't have a monster(its an energy drink) addiction I have a caffeine addiction. So that should be easy enough. I don't like bumper stickers but if you must get one at least make it a good one, here are some ideas.
"Consciousness: That annoying time between naps"
"Lottery: A tax on people who are bad at math"
"I love animals, they taste great"
"Make it idiot proof and someone will make a better idiot"
"Eschew obfuscation"
"Meat is murder... tasty tasty murder"

Day 53

School was very close to being cancelled this morning because of the rain but it stopped before to long and everyone came to school. The green van that I was driving before that overheated and died and was going to need a new engine is fixed! And at a price much lower than we could have expected, awesome. I had pizza for dinner. I have always loved pizza. I'm going to the deaf church again on Sunday, I'm excited. Maybe I can get other people to go with. Today I punished Saul and he didn't freak out! I'm so proud of him. Lets pray he continues down the road of progression.  I'm getting better at Othello and strangely enough I enjoy it more now that I usually win. So in fact I don't hate games, I just hate losing. Easy enough problem to fix, just don't lose. "Failures are expected by losers, ignored by winners"-Joe Gibbs
I won a game of Othello today that ended 54 to 5. That makes sense to 2 of you. I'm sure you both feel special. Betsy's mom Ruth sent me some quotes that I like, here are a few. I don't know who came up with them.
"God doesn't call the qualified, he qualifies the called."
"Some minds are like concrete, thoroughly mixed up and permanently set."
"The good Lord didn't create anything without a purpose, but mosquitoes come close."

Day 52

It has been raining on and off all day so I couldn't mow. At about 6pm the rain picked up and it has been coming down hard ever since then. Kioney, Saul and Gaby didn't come to school today because there grandmother's car broke down, so Jen will be picking them up in the morning tomorrow. Day 1 of no caffeine, I was so tired this morning that I took a nap like an hour after I woke up, pathetic. I so excited for tomorrow, I get to withdrawal off caffeine. Anyway if it rains like this all night we wont have school. I forgot to put the aquarium out until the almost 7pm and I'm sure we got an inch of rain in the hour before alone. The lightning has been great, we had thunder today that was hurting my ears, very cool. I will post the rainfall tomorrow along with the updates on my uphill battle against caffeine, that is unless I get my own HBO special by then, "Chris Tingley, overcoming addiction". Ok I know its just caffeine and I may seem a little over dramatic but when you drink the stuff everyday your body gets used to having it. I'm so glad there weren't any energy drinks at the store today, Leo had plans to buy my favorite one and put it in the fridge to try to get me to break and drink it. Something interesting; Caffeine is found in varying quantities in the seeds, leaves, and fruit of some plants where it acts as a natural pesticide that paralyzes and kills certain insects feeding on the plant.