National convention

Rhonda and I just got back from national convention in Santiago.  We had our missionary fellowship meeting as well and we did enjoy getting together and seeing so many friends.
Weather was real good there and it was nice to get warm! Especially when we got back to the airport here and they told me it had gotten down to -14 there!

Heh heh heh

Went out to the shop this morning to check my trap line.
No mice (since SOMETHING) ate all the bait.
One mink.
Years ago I got a live trap at a garage sale and it's been sitting in a shed ever since.  I got it out, strung some of my secret, sure-fire, mouse bait (pepperoni) and set it real light.
Mink ain't too timid, he zeros in on my finger and would bite it off if he could. (He's looking at my finger in the photo)
No, I'm not going to release it.  Mink are not native to Chile and have reached official "plague" status.  They are doing all kinds of damage to the native wildlife.
Maybe I'll make Rhonda a real tiny mink coat.

War

I went out to the shop to check the mousetrap.  The mink had returned in the night and tore it up getting the fresh bait.  I hope he realizes that this means war.

Podcast

Pastor Gene Roncone called this morning and we taped a 20 minute poscast for them to put on their website.  I think it's pretty neat that we can do something like that even though we're separated by over 6000 miles!

http://www.aurorafirst.org/media_player.asp?messageID=61551

Now what

So, I was in the shop (where I have the repeating bucket mousetrap set up) and noticed the bait was missing.  I had set it up so mice couldn't get to the bait.

Out of the corner of my eye I spotted something moving.  Rather large.  My first thought was a rat, then I saw it had a furry tail.  I finally got a good look at it a moment later.  It was a mink.

Now I have to figure out how to trap a mink, in the shop...

Mouse trap

Well, it seems it happens every year. When the weather gets cold the mice move in. I keep rat poison set out and monitor it, when it starts to disappear I know they are back. Some disappeared a few days ago and I set more out. It went too so I set more out. After about 5 packets going away I set about 3 packets at a time out. They ate that as well. So I set about 5 packs out, that took them a few days but they ate that up. By now I was kinda ticked, I mean I spent probably $8 or $10 on poison and it looked like they just thought I was putting snacks out for them.
So I made a mouse trap. They do sell them here but they are expensive, made of all metal, and the bar has sharp teeth on it and it looks like it would literally cut a mouse in two. Yuk. So I made a trap that would tip the mouse into a 5 gal bucket and baited it with a piece of pepperoni. I’ve caught 3 so far.

Puerto Cisnes

We arrived after only 2 hours 40 minutes of driving.  We can’t believe how fast it is now.  After so many years of driving between 4 and 5 hours to get there now driving the 112 miles in a little over 2.5 hours is great.  Pavement really does help!  I think there is only 20 miles left unpaved on the trip.

Sunday I shared a message to a very full house!  There were 22 in attendance which is great for Puerto Cisnes! There were just no chairs left and one guy sat on the steps to upstairs and seemed to tape much of the service with a camcorder.  We had a good service and a number of people dedicated themselves more fully to the Lord.

Enové came by the house today while he was town and told me that the guy who taped the service broadcast the whole thing on the local TV channel.  I think it’s funny that they even have a TV channel and teased Enové that probably no one saw it anyway.  He said that actually many people watch it and someone contacted Enové’s wife (Ximena) after watching the sermon and she led them to the Lord and they plan on coming to church Sunday!  Someone else wants to get the tape to the island of Chiloe and show it there.

I guess it goes to show that we never know who will be touched by what we share!  Even long after we’ve shared it.

Moving cities

Just read that Chile has to re-do a bunch of it's maps.  Seems the city of Concepcion is moving.  They expect this year that it will have moved almost 40 feet west.