With one transfer left in his mission...

Yes sir and howdy do, I've made it to Louisiana, the land of parishes instead of counties, corporations instead of towns, and drivers that don't make you test your brakes every three minutes.

Welsh is part of the Jennings Branch, and there are two sets of Elders in the Branch; one in Welsh, and the other in Jennings.

When the transfer instructions came out, I was pleased to see that I was assigned as the driver for each of the three legs of travel between Spring and Welsh; being the driver, I wasn't crammed with people's luggage on my lap and around my feet.

His new companion is from a ranch near Burley,ID and was in the MTC with him -- same dorm building but not the same district.

(he knew of the incident where the big Samoan Elder hurled a toilet plunger at the door of my room and shattered the plunger handle)

He got dehydrated over transfers, suffering dizziness his 1st morning in the area while he fought to rehydrate. He quickly discovered the easygoing, friendly relationships w/ nonmembers in LA:

Some of the nonmembers here have the most casual relationship with missionaries that I've ever seen. There is someone here (nonmember) that all the missionaries call "Mama", who loves the missionaries in Welsh and Jennings. We've gone over to her house every day this transfer so far, eaten there multiple times, and taken a Sunday afternoon nap on her couch. Their son. . .works at a pharmacy in Jennings. Whenever we stopped by that pharmacy on my first day here to meet [him] and the rest of the staff there, we were hanging out with him and the rest of the staff behind two counters. . .Elder Christensen also was using one of the computers there. . .

On the church side of things:

Sunday, there were 28-29 people in Sacrament meeting (depends on who you ask), but apparently that number is quite a bit lower than normal, because there are a lot of people out of town during the Summer (big suprise!). There are several families (a lot of the leadership) who actually live in the Lake Charles ward, but are called over to help support the branch.

And, the obligatory weather report:

We have now officially gotten to that time of year when only warm water comes out of the cold side of the tap.

BTW, the town of Iowa is pronounced "AYE-oh-weigh"

See where his new area is on his mission map.