Making money overnight (sort of)

Although I avoid doing the conversion math to figure the price of gasoline ("petrol" for those British readers who need help in reading my English) in dollars per gallon, every so often curiosity gets the best of me. The last time I figured it out, I posted the results, which you can read about here.

At that time, the prices of the two grades of fuel were $6.80 and $7.48 a gallon. According to my calculations today, given the increase in the price of fuel and the continual drop in the dollar, those figures are now $7.29 and $8.09 a gallon. (Ahh...I forgot to check the exchange rates today. The dollar may have slipped a few more notches and increased the value of my last tank of gasoline.)

I bought the cheaper version of gasoline this week and paid the equivalent of $83.79 to fill up. Revelations like that are the reason I avoid doing the conversions.

Scenes of yesterweek

We got home Monday, and two days later Abbie got up and said, "I would like to be back in Lisbon." As nice as it was to be there, I couldn't imagine it having been that nice. But she had just looked out the window and seen the overcast skies, which are common here. Aha! She didn't miss Lisbon, after all. She missed the sun. Well, the weather was perfect both times we went. Ne'er a cloud in the sky. Note the picture of the Marquis do Pombal monument.





The Marquis was in charge of things when the big earthquake leveled Lisbon on Nov. 1, 1755. He supervised the rebuilding of the city, with its wide avenues and large traffic circles. He also expelled the Jesuits from Portugal, which I guess in today's terminology would make him "a mover and a shaker".





We were refreshed by the leadership conference, and over time we pray that we can transmit some of what we experienced to the leaders in the church here. We made several very interesting (and I believe, important) contacts during the week we were there. Some of the sights we saw:

In the "I-would-have-picked-another-name" category:

Eating out is always a big part of going to a strange place, and we passed by this place one day at lunch. Something about the name made it seem less than attractive as an eating establishment. As I said, we passed by it, and ate somewhere else close by.






Help wanted: Circus experience desirable
As this picture so graphically illustrates, in these days of high unemployment and economic crisis, if you have a job, you'd better hang on to it, especially if you're working on/from/off of an upper floor.

Shadows of Kings and Angels

The last time I wrote we were in Lisbon...and here we are again (not still). We were back home for about 10 days, and then had to come back to Lisbon again. I had meetings in the embassy yesterday, and next weekend we'll be participating in a leadership conference. The short time at home was so busy I didn't have time to post. I did get some photos put together in an album, and there you'll find some comments on what we saw and did a few weeks ago, between shadows of angels and kings (and of some who were neither).

In news about the work, Jackie and Jaime have now gone on to England for a couple of weeks before they head for Australia. The day before we returned to Madeira two weeks ago, Alves, a member of the church who lives on the neighboring island of Porto Santo, had a massive heart attack. The first indication was that he had only a 15% chance of survival. He has recovered enough to be released, but he still is not allowed to go back to Porto Santo. He and his wife, Lourdes, will be staying in our house this coming week while he recovers his strength. Some may remember that back in 1991, Lourdes was healed of a tumor that had grown into her spinal chord and left her unable to walk. She was given three months to live. Pray that this new affliction will be used by the Lord to strengthen this couple spiritually and that the seed of the Gospel will be sown on Porto Santo because of it.