Dear Famiree,
I guess it's about time I sent a letter home! Hang on, I have to go wash my fingers, they're sticky from chicken from our dinner appointment.... Sorry, I had to blow my nose too and ended up giving myself a bloody nose... surprise surprise.... Ok, I've got half an hour to write this. You all know how much I like writing letters, but President Griffin told us that we should be writing a "substantial letter" home each week and I ran out of time on P-day.
Anyways, here's a funny story. We had a multi-zone activity on P-day with ultimate frisbee, tennis, soccer, and the like. We got a call from our neighbor that lives above us asking if we had cooked anything that morning before we left. Of course we hadn't (the most cooking I've done is a Totino's pizza a few times a week :) ). Our neighbor said that they kept smelling smoke, but couldn't figure out where it was coming from. I just figured they left a pan on the stove or something and quickly forgot about it . Several hours later, when we finally got home from the activity, we opened our front door reeking electrical smoke smell and a nice foggy bluh in our whole apartment with an oddly hissing thermostat in the background. After a little exploring and investigating, I decided to check the electrical A/C unit thingy to see if anything was obviously wrong. Something was obviously wrong. One of the lines into the house was surrounded by an inch thick layer of frost. I promptly turned everything off and did a little more investigating. I think the thermostat malfunctioned, causing the air conditioner to not turn off when it hit the set temperature. The external unit froze solid, subsequently burning out the internal one which then thought that it would be fun to start spewing smoke through the vents rather than cool air. Now I'm sitting downstairs in a roasting apartment. :] I called the land-lord and he's sending a repair guy pretty soon. It's been a fun couple of days.
Oh! I salted a slug tonight! We didn't have any real salt, so I covered it with jalapeño salt. It didn't like that very much. :\ Okay...what else should I write about?...
Oh! Elder Dino's great! (that's what I named the screature thing) I've gotten several missionaries with him! I take them through the whole "He really likes it when you pet his back" and "He bites if you put your hand in front of him" and eventually get to "He loves it when you pet his nose." I always make sure he's pointed right at them when they pet his nose and they get soaked! It's rather funny....
Oh. I guess you probably want to hear about how it went with Elder Ballard, huh! It was really awesome! It was about a four hour bus trip each way. We left at 10:00 p.m. CST. I had a pretty cool experience before the meeting. As we walked into the building, Elder Ballard and a couple of his escorts walked down the hall right in front of us. I got to see him from about three feet away, which I thought was pretty cool. Then I had to go to the bathroom. It was one of those teeney little LDS chapel bathrooms tucked away in the corner with one urinal and one stall. Anyway, apparently Elder Ballard had to use the bathroom too.... I walked in and crammed into the little bathroom was Elder Ballard, Elder Snow (of the Presidency of the Seventy), Elder Duncan ( 1st quorum of the Seventy), President Griffin, and me! Needless to say, I was pretty much in priesthood la la land as I waited to use the urinal between Elder Ballard and Elder Snow ( Elder Snow had me cut in line in front of him). I peed in the same toilet as Elder Ballard. Haha... that's kind of gross I guess, but pretty cool! I was the only person in the bathroom who wasn't at least an area seventy. That was pretty humbling. Well, I'm out of time tonight. I'll finish writing about the meeting tomorrow morning. Good night! Spiel.
Alright, I'm back. The meeting was awesome! Elder Ballard brought a full squad of Seventies too. Elders Snow, Duncan, Cornish, and McSomething were also there. Their main focus was on how we should obtain a vision by the Spirit of how the work in our areas will be more successful as we follow Pres. Monson's Rescue Plan. In short, use members. They really pounded us hard and called us to repentance and told us we weren't baptizing enough ( which is true). Elder Ballard said that the key to being a successful missionary is to be a "very, very, very good teacher." He talked a lot about finding and teaching methods. I found A LOT of answers to questions I've been having lately. We've been working closely with the ward and the branch PEC to implement the Rescue Plan. Anyway, the meeting went really well. Afterwards we rode back home in the bus, finally got back about 11:30 and crashed. It was pretty intense.
I can't think of anything else to write. (My brain's not working yet). I love you all! Thanks for your letters and packages!
Elder Raymond
I guess it's about time I sent a letter home! Hang on, I have to go wash my fingers, they're sticky from chicken from our dinner appointment.... Sorry, I had to blow my nose too and ended up giving myself a bloody nose... surprise surprise.... Ok, I've got half an hour to write this. You all know how much I like writing letters, but President Griffin told us that we should be writing a "substantial letter" home each week and I ran out of time on P-day.
Anyways, here's a funny story. We had a multi-zone activity on P-day with ultimate frisbee, tennis, soccer, and the like. We got a call from our neighbor that lives above us asking if we had cooked anything that morning before we left. Of course we hadn't (the most cooking I've done is a Totino's pizza a few times a week :) ). Our neighbor said that they kept smelling smoke, but couldn't figure out where it was coming from. I just figured they left a pan on the stove or something and quickly forgot about it . Several hours later, when we finally got home from the activity, we opened our front door reeking electrical smoke smell and a nice foggy bluh in our whole apartment with an oddly hissing thermostat in the background. After a little exploring and investigating, I decided to check the electrical A/C unit thingy to see if anything was obviously wrong. Something was obviously wrong. One of the lines into the house was surrounded by an inch thick layer of frost. I promptly turned everything off and did a little more investigating. I think the thermostat malfunctioned, causing the air conditioner to not turn off when it hit the set temperature. The external unit froze solid, subsequently burning out the internal one which then thought that it would be fun to start spewing smoke through the vents rather than cool air. Now I'm sitting downstairs in a roasting apartment. :] I called the land-lord and he's sending a repair guy pretty soon. It's been a fun couple of days.
Oh! I salted a slug tonight! We didn't have any real salt, so I covered it with jalapeño salt. It didn't like that very much. :\ Okay...what else should I write about?...
Oh! Elder Dino's great! (that's what I named the screature thing) I've gotten several missionaries with him! I take them through the whole "He really likes it when you pet his back" and "He bites if you put your hand in front of him" and eventually get to "He loves it when you pet his nose." I always make sure he's pointed right at them when they pet his nose and they get soaked! It's rather funny....
Oh. I guess you probably want to hear about how it went with Elder Ballard, huh! It was really awesome! It was about a four hour bus trip each way. We left at 10:00 p.m. CST. I had a pretty cool experience before the meeting. As we walked into the building, Elder Ballard and a couple of his escorts walked down the hall right in front of us. I got to see him from about three feet away, which I thought was pretty cool. Then I had to go to the bathroom. It was one of those teeney little LDS chapel bathrooms tucked away in the corner with one urinal and one stall. Anyway, apparently Elder Ballard had to use the bathroom too.... I walked in and crammed into the little bathroom was Elder Ballard, Elder Snow (of the Presidency of the Seventy), Elder Duncan ( 1st quorum of the Seventy), President Griffin, and me! Needless to say, I was pretty much in priesthood la la land as I waited to use the urinal between Elder Ballard and Elder Snow ( Elder Snow had me cut in line in front of him). I peed in the same toilet as Elder Ballard. Haha... that's kind of gross I guess, but pretty cool! I was the only person in the bathroom who wasn't at least an area seventy. That was pretty humbling. Well, I'm out of time tonight. I'll finish writing about the meeting tomorrow morning. Good night! Spiel.
Alright, I'm back. The meeting was awesome! Elder Ballard brought a full squad of Seventies too. Elders Snow, Duncan, Cornish, and McSomething were also there. Their main focus was on how we should obtain a vision by the Spirit of how the work in our areas will be more successful as we follow Pres. Monson's Rescue Plan. In short, use members. They really pounded us hard and called us to repentance and told us we weren't baptizing enough ( which is true). Elder Ballard said that the key to being a successful missionary is to be a "very, very, very good teacher." He talked a lot about finding and teaching methods. I found A LOT of answers to questions I've been having lately. We've been working closely with the ward and the branch PEC to implement the Rescue Plan. Anyway, the meeting went really well. Afterwards we rode back home in the bus, finally got back about 11:30 and crashed. It was pretty intense.
I can't think of anything else to write. (My brain's not working yet). I love you all! Thanks for your letters and packages!
Elder Raymond
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