Chapter 31: Sicka than most

Hello my faithful followers, I don't have much to write about this week. Due to a gnarly illness that took hold upon my feeble, mortal vessel, I spent many, many hours within the confines of our house, usually asleep upon a mediocre mattress. Occasionally we went to the office, where I slept on the bed we have in the infirmary while Elder Chinchilla did his office work. It was very fun. Eventually, they carted me off to the hospital to get some tests run to figure out what I had. It wasn't Dengue or Chikungunya like the medical assistant thought, but instead a gnarly intestinal infection. Sooooooo now I'm taking lots of medications and being very careful with what I eat.

To spice up this email, here's a few fun quotes from my sick days:

Elder Merrifield (my zone leader): Be careful with that stuff, Elder Jensen. Gatorade is a gateway drug, ya know

[in English]

Me: No, Elder, I'm not going to overdose on Acetaminophen

Elder Chinchilla: C'mon, trust me. I studied medicine three years

Me: Yea, you also studied English for five years, and look how far that got you

Elder Chinchilla (under his breath): freaking bully...

Elder Madsen (AP): Wow, you look bad

Me: I may look bad, but our weekly statistics look badder 

[In the hospital, right before they drew blood]

Nurse: Respire profundo

Me (distracted): Wha--AAHHHH

Later

Me: Y entonje, cuando iba a decirme que iba a apuñalarme?

[Also in the hospital, translated]

Me: I think this is the first time I've had an IV insterted...

Nurse: Don't worry, this is my first time, too

(she thought she was soooo funny)

[In the hospital, when the nurses came to cart my bed back to my hospital room after another doctor performed an ultrasound to look for signs of Dengue]

Me: Me dicen que son gemelos

In the end, Elder Flores (the mission medical assistant) said he was very grateful to be a spectator throughout my whole hospital experience, and told me he'd gladly come back to watch anytime.

But now I'm feeling much better and am ready to get back to work. I certainly have missed actually doing things. My companion lost his mind at about day 4 of being indoors.

Thanks for all the love, support and prayers!

Have a great week everyone!

Elder Jensen