First email of the last year

I made a bomb new years video at midnight. I was asleep and then the concentration of fireworks started at midnight and woke me up. So I was like, "I'm not going to be able to sleep through this." So I got up, put on a shirt, and made a video. It was pretty good I think.
There were fireworks going off basically from Christmas Eve til Sunday afternoon, so that has been kinda bomb, kinda lame. Bomb when they are colored fireworks, lame when it is just a really loud bomb that flies in the air and irritates everyone in the neighborhood.
But New Years Eve was cool, we could see a lot of fireworks from our porch. I mustered up the courage to use some of those poppers you sent me and the air horn, my comp thought they were all cool.
We had a surprisingly successful week, the holiday basically took all people out of commission on Friday and Saturday, all drunk or sleeping. But one couple we are teaching, Rosangela and Adão, came to church and brought Adão's Alzheimer-inflicted mom. They liked it.
Also this recent convert who moved here from Belem came to church and brought her younger sister, Laynefer, who wants to be baptized. So that will be bomb. Another investigator we have is named Carla. She is pretty good, she wants to get baptized, but the overdose death of a close friend messed up Sunday so she couldn't go to church.
But she is pretty set for baptism on the 16th. With any luck, we will baptize Adão, Rosangela, Carla, and Laynefer on the 16th and break the Quebec curse (no baptisms since May) and get a barbecue from the first counselor in the stake presidency that lives in our ward.
Three baptisms in a month gets us that prize, it was like the first thing he told us when he picked us up to bring us to this area. The ward is coming along a lot, really getting behind us and offering basically whatever we ask. Except referrals haha.
It has been really hot here recently. I have been using a lot of sunscreen because I don't want cancer.
Today will be an interesting Pday. My visa expired about four months ago, so today I am going to renew it. Someone in São Paulo controls who renews the visa when, so I have been forced to be here illegally for the last few months. It has been interesting, now I know what it is like to be an illegal immigrant: completely normal, I still feel human and still have been treated with respect.
If only the states in America could treat their aliens the same. Was that law repealed yet?
ANYWAY things are good here with my comp. I tried to discuss the possible benefits of legalizing marijuana with him, but he got kinda upset and said he would tell President Tavares. I told him that was fine. What is the legal status of weed in the USA right about now? And is there still like a civil war because of drugs going on in Mexico?
Well, that's about all I have to say. I hope you all have a great week, sorry I don't have any photos this week
Love you,
Joseph

"One of them got out a revolver, and the man said, "Yes, this may scare people who believe in many gods and one world, because for them this would end everything. I am a person who believes in one god, but in many worlds. So you can't scare me with that."
-Matisyahu