Week 7, 11-13-17

Hey guys!

It's been a really good week. It’s definitely getting colder here. The high this week was like 52º if I remember right. I am definitely going to have to pick up a hat and scarf today.

I promised you guys last week that I would talk about kittens this week. And one thing I've learned on my mission is the importance of keeping commitments.

Fluffy Kittens

You probably know that the cheetah is the fastest-running animal in the world. So as you might guess getting food is easy for them. The hard part is keeping it. The cheetah's body is made for powerful spurts of speed, but they run so fast that after they catch their prey they are completely exhausted and often need time to catch their breath. This gives scavengers like hyenas a perfect opportunity to steal lunch from a napping cheetah.

If you were to ask someone to tell a male from a female lion most people would look to see if they have a mane. Although this would work most of the time it would not work all of the time. Some male lions don't grow a mane and some females do. In places in Africa that have a lot of hunters the males are slowly evolving to not have a mane, and in places, without hunters, there are more females with manes because the males see it as a sign of strength and are more likely to breed with them.

Tigers may be the most terrifying animals on the planet. To my knowledge, they are the largest feline species in the world. They are also some of the only animals to actively hunt humans. There are approximately 88 documented tiger attacks per year. All of this being said there are still over 7,500,000,000 humans on the earth and tigers are going extinct because of hunting and loss of habitat from deforestation. So the moral of the story is if a tiger hasn't killed you, return the favor and don't kill them.

Normal stuff

The other day we had a mission conference. Every missionary serving in the DC south area was there including one – Sister Ricardson. (Rachel Richardson was one of my close friends in high school.) Hopefully we'll be able to see each other more before she goes home.

The main speaker at the conference was Elder Neil L. Anderson. (The LDS church is run by a prophet, like in the Bible and Book of Mormon. There are also two councilors who help the prophet and twelve apostles. Elder Anderson is one of the twelve.) We all took a giant group photo with him. He also shook everyone's hand as we walked into the conference. He talked about a lot of great stuff that will help Elder Neilson and me in our missionary work.

It was super open for a church meeting. He would ask questions and we would call out answers. If any of you remember this in two years you can ask me about the time I made one of the twelve laugh.

Stay safe and don't let hyenas steal your lunch.

From new Dread Pirate Roberts -Eli