I'll Never Think of Bingo the Same Way Again

A distress call was sent, co-patriots of fortune needed. The organizer, fearing the awkward social danger levels if the call were answered alone and feeling that a group of comrades would be better received, called upon his fellow co patriots to go cheer up one of their fallen comrades.
Two others were able to attend, free from other obligations they met in the early hours of the morning to visit the fallen.
The directions had been inquired of the day previous, but upon entering the edifice where the fallen comrade lay, the guardian of the records informed them that their comrade was held at the other side of the building and imparted the manner at how to arrive in the most timely fashion, while too imparting a warning that their comrade may lay unconscious due to strength of the medicines used to further help discern what malady afflicted their fellow comrade.
The three made their way to the wing to where she lay and inquired of another guardian to and keeper of records of their intent to visit their comrade. Fortunately permission was granted and they were led to where the brave comrade lay.

The comrade lay awake, though slightly weakened by the medicines still in her system. They talked, joked and comforted her. Many topics where discussed. Laughs exchanged and grandparents on the dating scene in reference to 'bingo'. 'Bingo' was the climax of awkward conversations.

And thus came time for the three to leave, to part ways from their comrade and bid her farewell, with the horrors of 'bingo' fresh on their minds, they all knew they would never think of Bingo the same way again.

Rescued

Floating on the driftwood
The ship still sailing away
No sign of turning around
The skies darken and hope fades

But unexpectedly a line is thrown
A three man fishing vessel saw his fall
And set out to rescue him
The sailor grabs hold feebly
And is pulled aboard
given food and bread. And hope.

So slowly the ship carries the sailor
Tending to his needs, his wounds
Until the ship be reached or a harbor found

All by some lone wandering shipping boat.

Flung Overboard

Flung overboard and left without notice.
Watched as the ship continued
Expected a line to be thrown
Giving meager shouts

Adrift on a piece of driftwood
Wondering when his absence will go noticed
Wondering if they will turn around
Wondering if he's just an extra on some captain's crew
And if anyone really cares

Nothing in sight.
Only the sea in all directions.
Not sure what he could do
Too shocked to paddle
To swim toward the ship
Just floating doing the doggie paddle.
Surviving

Flung overboard
and too shocked to act.
Traumatized, shocked, hopeless.
With the ship in distance.

Wondering if they would notice'
a simple overboard sailor.
And waiting.

Waiting.

Waiting.

Today Would Score a Three if it Dove into a Pool

Nothing much was done today, well nothing productive. I succumbed to my roommates and read the online Midnight Sun book thing that was put on the web because it was linked.

Definitely interesting, but I say Edward is still a creepy stalker. Sure his thoughts are revealed, but it merely proves him more guilty in the arena of stalking. He was humanized a bit by playing matchmaker at the end. Bella is still annoying. His perspective does nothing to redeem her.

I do have to say that Midnight Sun should have been first to be published. All Bella can do is stare and swoon at Edward and be obsessed about finding out he's a vampire. That's what the movie improved on, it wasn't from her point of view.

Midnight Sun is able to take the mysterious Edward Culling from the Twilight series, the creepy stalker with super-human abilities from being foreign and un-understandable to being Peter Parker basically, and we're able to relate to that more.

I actually like what Meyers did, or was in the process of doing, that we got to see a new side of Edward. From his point of view in M.S. he basically goes from an unknown to just a regular ordinary guy in high school. Not being able to read her thoughts, falling in love, trying to protect his and his family's secret basically makes him out to be a Peter Parker who is just an ordinary guy but with super powers.

I could go on, but I won't. Most likely I am shaming Bob for having acknowledged all that. I think Meyers started out wrong, that Bella should not have been the main character. She's just a nobody-sue who doesn't change at all personality wise. It is Edward who goes through the changes, who develops. It was just extremely hard to see because the books were written in silly Bella's perspective.

Do I think that the Twilight series is a great series? No, but it's ok. Midnight Sun surely makes it more interesting, or raises the level of it from it just being a bunch of Sues wondering around.

So Meyers, if you read this for some inexplicable reason, I say you should finish the book. It will certainly make the series a lot more interesting. I still say you should have the Cullins and the Voltari fight. Maybe through in Bigfoot and the Loch-ness monster?


Of course, reflecting on why I see Edward in a somewhat higher light, I guess I understand why so many girls like Bella, cause they can relate to her and her awkward mindset. I guess so many girls can relate to Bella due to insecurity and all that. I guess that means I am glad that I can't read minds, if there are similarities in mind sets. Of course if I suddenly gain super-abilities, I guess I wouldn't mind?

But yeah. That's what I have to say on the subject.

So, let the shame begin?

Super Apostacy Missionary Thursday

Well, here is what my brother had to say about the latest week. Also, anything repeated from Sister C is in no way endorsed as fact by this blog or by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day saints.

Dear family and friends,

Thursday was transfer day and I am staying with my companions. They spoke to President Roach and said that he likes me in trios. I think the Pres really likes Elder B. and he will be the new super missionary of the mission, though Elder B doesn't want to take that route. Thursday night we met Elder K's greenie; Elder P. He is the grandson of a cousin of the Elder Perry of the 12. He gets treated lots better then I did as a greenie. All he got was one harmless greenie prank and he took it very well. He'll be a cool guy once we loosen him up a bit. Thursday night we went back to the 'God's House of Prayer' church because one of our investigators invited us to teach the congregation. Unfortunately we didn't get to teach anything at all because the head pastor was there and he had a very large spirit of contention. Everything he said was wrong and we were not happy with him. If we tried to say something to him he would twist it in circles and spit out nothing but falseness and lies. We all wanted to just chew him out for being so dang stupid and contentious when we weren't trying to be. I was very angry and the spirit constrained me to remain silent. We got sick of hearing all the lies and bull he spit out, that we left long before the service was over. We went back to the hollowed ground of our own church and the moment we stepped inside the spirit and atmosphere completely changed and we started feeling better. We sang some hymns, bore testimony, and prayed. We came home feeling loads better then when we were at that church and we will not be going back to that church again.
Sunday at church Sister C. told me that I have a special mission that extends beyond my current one. That was very intimidating and I just hope I can live up to what is now expected of me. She has a special gift where she can read them and she knows them well. The district got into a discussion with her on spiritual gifts and we are still fired up about all the gift talk. I was told by her and members of my district what some of my gifts are that I didn't even know I had. When we were alone both my companions used their gifts to discern what my super gift is. I didn't say a word to them about it, but once they knew I confirmed it. They did what everyone else does when they know of my gift, they pumped me for info then they told me to explore it further, use it more, and gain a greater light and knowledge about it. I talked with Sister C. about this and she said that like I've figured parts of it out on my own, I must continue to explore it on my own. There are loads that I still need to explore with it, not as simple as I first thought.(Editor's Note: A big Huge No Comment Here.)
Monday was zone conference. We had a guest general authority speaker, Elder Newenschwander(sp?), but then later it didnt seem like he was realy talking to the missionaries at all and he lost most of our attention.
Today at Sister C's we discussed 1. When the earth split it didn't happen all at once, it happened over time and God used this to move people where he needed them to be. 2. The olive tree was the first tree to appear after the flood because it is symbolic of Christ. The leaf is a symbol of piece like Christ and you have to crush an olive get the juice, Christ was pressed and crushed by the sins of the world and bled because of it. 3. When you play cards make sure they aren't face cards because face cards are of the devil. All the different patterns and faces on the cards represent the secret combinations of Satan. So gambling with face cards is twice as bad because we know of what gambling itself can do but also because Satan endorses it with his codes. Tarot cards are also bad for the same reason. If you want your fortune read go to someone with the priesthood, it may be different but it will be done by a better power. Like always, other things were said and learned as well.
That's all I can think of for now. Our missionary work is doing well and we're keeping pace a little slower now and concentrating in our effort more. (Editor's Note: At least #2 is whole heartedly correct)


love Elder Fields.

Too Awesome For Words

You know, I ran across this today and thought it was worth sharing, just because it is hilarious. I think I want this coloring book, because it's filled with awesome.


And for further laughs, I direct you to this article here.

Now if only we in the LDS Church believed in that, that would be truly awesome.

Bin Laden Saves Me What Now?

Occasionally I take a gander at the spam I receive, usually to make sure nothing important is arriving there by mistake, but there was one piece of spam that drew my attention, to wonder how someone could be so stupid as to put "How Bin Laden Saved You Money, Sam".
Now this made me interested, interested enough to find out the insipid tale and see how Bin Laden could have possibly saved me money.

But then I clicked on the e-mail and was filled with disappointment. I was expecting a somewhat humorous story to try and get me to squander money and waste my time, but it was only a a business firearm thing to get me join some club. Apparently they started the free club because they outsourced a programming job to someone in the middle east who replaced all the links with links to Muslim extremist sites and it caused them to lose business. Not funny.

Come now spammers, if you want to be remotely interesting, you need some sort of funny story to go with that title. If you're going to say Bin Laden saved me money, you should have a funny story or offer to get me to give my credit card information for all his frozen assets that the FBI are now giving out to the populace, not some $10 gift card and entrance to a free club after spinning a sob story. (Which may be true? I didn't look at the e-mail too long to really care)

Come now spammers. You're dropping the ball. Really. Be more original. I still won't fall for your offers, but at least I'll be laughing at how you all offer me stuff you really won't give me. And it's the thought that counts right?

Awkwardness Squared

You know how you have days where you just feel awkward, that anything and everything you do is awkwardly intensified by all normal expectations? Well without giving any awkward details to really implicate myself or cause others to pity or fear me by the sheer amount of awkward that was exhibited (I'm pretty sure if awkward could be tapped into as a fuel source, there would be no energy problems for the next twenty years); I'll just say that last night was one of those nights.

To those who may have seen my awkward fumbling; I apologize. There was no good reason for it.

And in other news, I don't like Dell at the moment. Not at all.

My sister is currently attending Snow college and got a lot of grants and school loans, insomuch that she (through our Father) bought a Dell laptop. Now about two or three weeks ago it started intermittently giving the blue screen of death and shutting down. Well the first logical thing to do was to scan for viruses and do a system rollback. After that happened, it still occurred, always randomly, and it hasn't stayed on the screen long enough to really see what it says.
Anywhat, after that we tried re-imaging the laptop back to factory conditions, thinking that would work. It didn't. As it didn't seem to be the operating system, and inexplicably lacking the operating system cd, we connected with Dell online. The online tech looked at some files, some debugger files and concluded that we should re-image the laptop. Again.
So we do it, and the problem happens again. This time we call, through a series of calls and annoying procedures just to get to an agent, to see what else they would recommend and to get them to send us the Operating System CD; which after tremendous hassle they did.

So with the Operating System CD that we got last Tuesday we tried reformatting the hard drive (well, there were two partitions, one for the OS and one for everything else), doing this over the phone with my sister. That didn't work, she still got the blue screen errors. Not to mention problems my sister had with installing the drivers, but that isn't exactly Dell's fault...

Now my family drove down to Ephraim, picking me up along the way to celebrate my sister's birthday (she's now 19. *Sigh* They grow up so quickly) and so while down there I reformatted the hard drive, deleted the small partition so everything is together (and hoping that doesn't invalidate her warranty) reinstalled windows and ran 'chkdsk /r' to check to see if the hard drive is the problem. Nothing popped up. So I installed the drivers. And it gave me the error again.

So now I am downloading some debugger utility to see what the dump file says and if nothing else, calling Dell and doing some major complaining.

So yeah, I am not pleased with Dell. Not pleased at all.

Missionary Wednesday

Here is the next update in Elders Fields' adventure as a missionary.

Dear family and Friends
This week was loaded down with activity just like last week. Last week in an email Elder B. told the Mission President that if he kept our companionship the same, and let him stay one more transfer with Elder H.; that in that time he could get him 10 baptisms. The Pres immediately replied that his request was granted and all I can say is we had better work very hard so Elder B. can deliver on that promise.
Last week I also did something that missionaries in this mission sometimes do that I have never done before. Wednesday and Thursday night we attended non-LDS church services. Wednesday we went to the Pentecostal church; a church that I had never even heard of before until I came out here. They are very big in the Chicago area but I don’t know about everywhere else. This church was all black; we were the only white people there. It was also very loud with random shouts of joy during the pastors’ sermon. The people there were very friendly but even so, I don’t think I will be going back. I caught a small portion of his speech where he admitted that he didn’t have the power or authority of Christ but he quickly covered that by saying you didn’t need it as long as you followed Christ and did his will.
Thursday night we attended another church, ‘God’s House of Prayer’. This was a small hole-in-the-wall church that looked run down and had very few people there. I don’t think this one extends beyond the local area. These people were also very nice to us and even let us say a few words. In both of these churches I thought it would be easier to pick out the bits of truth among all the falsehoods, but it was actually the other way around. They were both very convincing and now I see how people can be so confused. Another thing about these churches is that just like how some of the doctrines are confused and twisted it’s the same way with the spirit. Our spirit does not reside there but they do have a twisted form of the spirit that to the untrained mind and heart could appear to be the real thing. But the feeling I got there was that it was way wrong even though they were trying to be on the right path. The second congregation was very small but they invited us back and we plan on teaching them all about the restoration. It should be fun to see how that goes.
Sunday we actually got an investigator to church! She liked it and is currently working on quitting smoking. Once she does that a baptism won’t be far behind. After church we went to the south-side Irish St. Patrick’s day parade. This holiday is very big out here, almost like Christmas. Never before have I ever been surrounded be so much degradation, drunkards and filth. The parade wasn’t even that good. We had planned on maybe teaching a lesson or two in the crowd but nobody was sensible or sober enough to really listen and pay attention. Instead we just handed out a few hundred pass along cards and taught mini-lessons about what was on the cards. We figure once the people sober up a bit, the calls will come in and we can teach the elect who would be willing to change their ways. The parade wasn’t that bad actually and the pass-along card thing made it worth going to. Sunday night we checked out our numbers for the district and discovered that we all did flat out amazing. Unfortunately these last two weeks of absolute hard work took a toll and we had a slow start on Monday. Once we got out we started feeling better.
Tuesday night we had a district activity because transfers are coming and we needed a reward for all our hard work. The transfer call came and our trio is staying the same, just as President R. promised. The zone leaders are staying; Elder T. form another area has completed his mission and is going home. Elder K. will be training and new missionary! That’s awesome, this means that I’m not the greenie anymore in the zone and now it’s my turn to have some fun. Hopefully the new greenie will be cool and not a hassle. Sister B is staying and Sister P is leaving, she will be missed, but her replacement, Sister Cl is another sister missionary I flew in with, so she’s cool.
Today we went to Sister C’s again. We talked about how during the time of Christ people only lived for 22-28 years(Editors Note: With some help from Yellow M&M, we found out that the mortality rate is a little skewed due to infants dying young, and that Josephus documented that many lived to their forties and some to the age of 100), so their old and ancient men, and priests, were actually very young by our standards. The second thing was that in the law of polygamy, when it’s allowed, a man can’t just divorce a wife, he has to get permission from all the other wives and they all must dismiss her from the household. Luckily we don’t have to worry about this anymore. 3. When they built the tower of Babble, the Lord wasn’t upset and destroyed the tower just because of that. He was mad because it was actually a form of the temple and they were trying to establish a false priesthood, that’s why he destroyed it.
I am staying in Beverly for at least 6 more weeks with a cool district. I look forward to this next transfer; I will hopefully get some baptisms here soon.

Love Elder Fields.

Figs and Anti-Matter

You know, not many times does the Westboro Baptist Church get something right, but sometimes they do succeed in being ironically funny. As captured at Box Turtle Bulletin it appears that those over in Westboro got something ironically funny, because the only thing Jesus cursed was the barren fig tree. Sure that was symbolic for hypocrites, but it still fits. And thus their poster is funny.

I think I will join the figs in dooming the world. I hear it may be quite fun.

Urgent Announcement!

To any holders of Divine Comedy Tickets to the shows this weekend, I will pay $7.00 for any ticket that you may have available. Please.

Thank you, that is all.

Dear Anonymous E-mailer,

Dear Anonymous E-mailer,

I received your message, or rather your proposition. Seeing as you used some totally bogus e-mail address to write to me, you leave me no other choice but to respond here. Maybe the only clue from the e-mail as to who you are is that you have a Verizon Wireless Blackberry (It appears to be from an automatic signature, but may not necessarily be so) but that doesn't matter, nor do I have any desire to start polling people to find out who has a blackberry with Verizon. It just won't do any good.

Now I can understand where you're coming from, I'm on the market, I'm available, so why not start dating the person you suggested? But that of course is only implied in what you said, your real argument is in the one and only sentence in the e-mail, that says: "She's totally got the hots for you." Yeah, I get what you're saying, there's a cute girl who I get along with alright, we're pretty good friends, and she has the hots for me apparently, so why shouldn't I go out with her?

I mean, it seems a valid enough reason to go out with a girl right? I mean, what rational guy wouldn't go for something like that? (For the record, I am anything but rational) But, no offense to the girl with whom you wish me to date, I digress and admit that most likely such a thing will not occur.

Now you, and probably the girl in question are most likely wondering why, why I won't go out with her. Well, I'll answer you in this!:

Nanti's Guide As to Why You, or Anyone Else, Should Not Date Him

1. Think of the Children. I'm not really responsible to take care of them, in fact they'd probably grow up to be punk anarchists bent on bringing civilization to it's knee's, regardless of how good their mother is. And with the girl in question, well the odds are highly likely that we'd raise our kids to be ruthless dictators bent on conquering the world.


2. I'm Crazy. No, really. Ask anyone. I am totally bonkers. That may be one reason why the girl in question has the supposed 'hots' for me, that she's attracted to strange creepers, such as I, but that's not really healthy for any kind of relationship really.


3. My Asthma. Yes I do have asthma. Heavy laughter actually triggers it. I'm likely to die in my early thirties because of asphyxiation due to a collapsed lung while laughing, and with the young lady in question, I'd probably die before I hit 27. And no one needs the grief of indirectly killing me. Unless of course you are after my vast fortune, which coincidentally doesn't exist. I guess I could be down with that.


4. On a somewhat logical note, I am taking independent study courses, and behind in the schedule I have set for myself. I don't really have to time to really dedicate to any type of relationship.


5. I have no job at the moment. This doesn't bode well for any relationship. So I have no shiny monies to which pamper the girl in question. Or even take her out. I guess she could pay, but she undoubtedly has plans for all that well-gotten gain. Who am I to let her spend it on me?


6. Summer plans. The girl in question has summer plans of one sort or another, so even a Mormon summer fling would be out. (Not that I would have one anyway.) I will still have my independent study courses and hopefully a job, so I'll be busy.


7. Monastic Vows. Due to recent events, I've decided to find a monastery that will permit me to go out on dates with the female variety, but not steadily date them. So once that order of monks is found, any relationship will surely interfere with my monastic duties.


8. Personal Issues. Things such as procrastinating, low self esteem and other such things make for a boring guy. I'd hate to bore anyone by being a stick in the mud


9. Destiny. I've checked, the stars are against any such union, with anyone. It is written in the stars for me to be a single bachelor for the foreseeable future. Going against the stars will surely bring about Ragnarok, the Apocalypse and every other end-of-the-world prediction; all working in union and harmony for maximum destruction. It would make most people unhappy if such were to occur.


10. Cause a little birdie told me not to. How much more of a reason do I need?


11. My alternate personality likes raw fish, is an introvert and likes jewelry, specifically gold rings forged in volcanoes. It wouldn't work, trust me.


12. I am a soulless abomination. Ok, maybe I'm not an abomination, yet. But I am soulless. It was placed in a flask and whisked away by a small four year old girl, who has taken it who knows where. This will surely create conflicts in the years to come.


13. Zombies. I'm not sure why zombies don't want me to date anyone, but they don't. It's best to not ask questions

So there you have it, at least twelve reasons why you shouldn't date me. If you need more, ask Chilly. She can probably think of a lot more reasons as to why not go out with me, so if you don't trust my word, I call her as a witness to my madness if needs be.
So in short, don't do it. You'll be a lot more happy and healthier without going out with me, and that's a fact. Even the surgeon general recommends avoiding such things with me, and would you want to go against the suggestions of a such a highly regarded health professional? I thought not.

The Real Reason, I Confess

So maybe my post a couple of days confused you all, maybe you all think I am crazy, that there has to be a somewhat logical explanation for it all, right? Well my roommate Cheese Kurdles has the answer.

Tonight, while making some of the most delicious snicker doodle cookies, asked me how my lady friend, Katydid was doing. I replied in a sort of way that implied that I sorta knew, and that she was doing well, with a followup that we were no longer dating, but were just friends.

Cheese Kurdles then asked by whose decision that was, and I replied that it was kind of both of ours. Then without missing a beat, he looked at me and said "It was all that Hankey-Pankey, wasn't it?"

I confess that I couldn't answer his question immediately, or for the ensuing minutes. I couldn't answer, not because there was indeed hankey-pankey (which there wasn't), but because I was too busy laughing and trying not to fall on the floor.

So there you have it. Or not. Actually I'm not sure if there is actually anything to really understand. Oh wells.

W00T!

I got my federal tax return, the sun is shining, it's nearly the weekend; so things are good.

that's all I wish to say.

Meme Thievery

I am taking this meme from Yellow M&M, so here goes:

1. Who was your FIRST prom date?
I only went once to prom, her name is "April".

2. Do you still talk to your FIRST love?
Nope.

3. What was your FIRST alcoholic drink?
This answer is null.

4. What was your FIRST job?
I worked at a place called the Magic Wok off 5400 S and Bangerter Highway in Kearns/Taylorsville.

5. What was your FIRST car?
A white Geo Metro.

6. Who was the FIRST person to text you today?
Twitter, or my sister.

7. Who is the FIRST person you thought of this morning?
A certain female with an insect like psuedonym...

8. Who was your FIRST grade teacher?
Mrs. Earl?

9. Where did you go on your FIRST ride on an airplane?
Dinneyland!

10. Who was your FIRST best friend & do you still talk?
The Giant and Wally the Third were some of my first best friends. We still talk. Others, not so much.

11. Where was your FIRST sleepover?
Probably some friends house.

12. Who was the FIRST person you talked to today?
A roommate, telling him the time cause he fell asleep on the couch.

13. Whose wedding were you in the FIRST time?
I haven't been anything but and attendee at a wedding, but the first wedding I ever attended was my aunt's I think.

14. What was the FRIST thing you did this morning?
Went to change the oil in TC Jr. (My car)

15. What was the FIRST concert you ever went to?
Jon Schmidt in Kingsbury Hall a few years back.

16. FIRST tattoo?
It's invisible, but under the light of the full moon, when there are no stars in the sky, it often shows up...

17. FIRST piercing?
Umm, nothing has been pierced, and it's staying that way.

18. FIRST foreign country you visited?
Mexico!

19. FIRST movie you remember seeing?
Ay Caray, who knows.

20. When was your FIRST detention?
1st grade maybe?

21. What was the FIRST state you lived in?
Utah.

22. Who was your FIRST roommate?
Jon, Chaz, Aaron and David.

23. If you had one wish, what would it be?
To rollback the clocks, time travel.

24. What is something you would learn if you had the chance?
Everything.

25. Who do you think will be the next person to post this?
Chilly

Now to try and be productive today.

The River

The clouds were gray with no hint of dissipating, the air was cold, supernaturally cold, that it pierced to the bone. All around lay a desolate wasteland, nothing growing, no sign of life. Just empty.
The only movement apart from the shifting clouds was the river, barely flowing as if it had not the energy, but at other spots the ebb and flow changed so suddenly, and without warning, that the whole river churned and became more unstable than the most wild of rapids, before calming into the apathetic flow minutes later.

But unbeknown to the casual viewer, beneath the the apathetic and at times violent surface, was a constant flow beneath; an underwater current untouched by the surface, flowing gently, peacefully, clear as clear can be be, but hidden and obscured by the surface.

Maybe in the future they will merge to be a gentle rolling stream, or maybe not. For that outcome lies beyond the horizon, where none have yet to venture.

But... the forecast for beyond the horizon calls for mostly clear skies intermingled with some gray clouds.

Missionary Wednesday Part 2

It seems he accidentally sent the first part of his e-mail off by mistake. Here is the second bit:

Sorry, the first part of the message just sent itself, now to continue.
I had hopes of being a reaper of souls but it certainly looks like I might just be a planter of seeds. This depressed me, I would so much more rather see the fruits of my labor but after talking to my companions about that, I am just a bit more Ok with just planting and not as depressed as that as before.
Daylight savings time didn't exactly help much either, that may have been a reason some did not show up. Benjamin Franklin was a great man who did great things but daylight savings time isn't one of them. That man's worth is just demoted in my eyes, they should put him on the $75 and give someone else the hundred dollar bill, either that or just get rid of daylight savings all together.

Monday at district meeting we inspired the rest of the district with last weeks amazing numbers and lit a fire under them; our district is going to try for a second week of amazing numbers. With the numbers we have now, our district is leading the zone and even inspiring them to do better. Later on Monday we got 5 more investigators and 4 more baptism dates, an impressive feat for just one day.

Tuesday made it official, I have officially been out for six months. As is the tradition in this mission, I burned a tie to commemorate the occasion. Elder V. gave me one of his ties before he went home and gave me permission to burn it when I reached my mark. I followed his request and did just that. It felt good.
Today we went to Sister C's again and learned much from her. Today's learning's include: 1. The Native Americans tell the same stories among themselves that we find in the book of Mormon. The only difference is that the good guys and bad guys are switched around, obviously twisted because of Laman and Lemuel.(Editors Note: I am going to check that out for myself) That is just another witness that the Book of Mormon is true. 2: The ordinance of brushing the dust off your feet. It's powerful and a real priesthood ordinance that when done right will in fact bring a curse upon the person or place it is done to. Things like fire or tornado will only effect that one place or person and no others around them.(Editors Note: If Chicago burns to the ground, we know who got trigger happy and who to blame)
3. We on earth are like the Nephites who had the truth from the beginning; we are slower to become more wicked and righteous, but when that happens we take it to the extreme. That intelligent life beyond earth is like the Lamanites; they will receive the truth or have it and when they get it, or have it, they will repent and become better faster, or the reverse will be true for their apostasy but they wont be nearly as good or bad as we are. My personal favorite part of this last one is that Sister C. agrees with me that not all the intelligent life beyond Earth is human; some is otherwise. Everyone else I know believes the opposite, and its good to have someone on my side. I have a theory about this but I don't think I will include it in this email.
Sam, in response to your e-mail, you may be right about the rules thing. We've seen that in the last few weeks, the rest of us were having fun and the sister missionaries weren't, they were working so hard but there numbers were dropping, we did the same but had fun and our numbers increased. They are understanding it a little now, personally I don't think the hanging out was the problem, it was the fact that we were doing it so much that was the bad thing. Like now it's P-day and were having a district activity, I prefer this to what President had in mind, because working too hard without a break isn't healthy.
That's it for this week. Hopefully you got the first part that sent itself. I look forward to hearing from everyone soon.

Love Elder Fields.

Missionary Wednesday

The next chapter in the adventures of Elder Fields:

Dear family and friends,

We worked it super hard this week. We set a goal for 20 new investigators and 15 lessons taught and we did it. We were worried on Thursday and friday when we weren't quite there, but we prayed hard and we found a super large family and taught them on Saturday. This was God's help in accomplishing that goal. We were super pumped up on Saturday night and feeling good, we had gathered so many new investigators and progressing investigators that we knew for sure that at least a small portion of them would come to church.

Unfortunately Sunday met us with great disappointment and none of our investigators actually showed up yet again!! I was so exited from the previous week but after church I was horribly depressed. My companions managed to chear me up a bit but for the rest of the day I was out of it. I had hopes of being a reaper of souls but it certainly now looks like I was meant to be a planter.

Love,
Elder Fields

At least he's not the grim reaper...

They Sang as They Walked

Twas a relatively warm winter, almost spring, afternoon when the Modern Pioneer go out of his old metal wagon and began a small trek to look for a new home come April. He had no other choice but to look, because he and his fellow dwellers were being kicked out their place of residence, being persecuted; not because of race or creed, but because of a temporary status, one that that they all shared in common: Unmarried. For their current habitation has decided to favor those couples of the married variety, and thus all those lacking such a blessing are forced now to look elsewhere for places to inhabit.

And so the Modern Pioneer found himself south of the perilous hill of doom, where a pond of ducks lulls most passerby into a false sense of security. And though the Modern Pioneer knew he would dread the climb in the days to come to hallowed halls of learning, he knew that this was the spot where most housing was the least expensive. And so he began his search, entering with permission into the domain of others, comparing and contrasting the dwellings he visited, he passed through such residences such as the places called Miller, Continental, Academy Arms, Old Academy, Sumerhays (The Modern Pioneer had to carefully trek across the wagon's road, to which a signal was given that indicated the safety of the way.), Park Place, Monticello, Elms, Bay Terrace and Alpine. To his chagrin, a few places of habitation, like Elm, Monticello and Belmont had no room for a weary traveler, and had to continue his search for a place a residence.

The Modern Pioneer continued his trek, walking and walking and until a little over 2 hours after he began his trek, he found a place that was satisfactory to his liking. He looked it over and decided upon it, but due to the semi-lateness of the hour, he was unable to get a hold of the mayor of the small community to get a land contract, which would have to be obtained today to be official.

The weary traveler then returned to his metal covered wagon and returned to his place of residence, collapsing on the furniture with the thought that more physical activity, A.K.A exercise, was needed as his legs were tremendously sore.

To Buy or Not to Buy...

You know, I watch CNN from time to time, and am always amused at how they seem to place the DOW as the sole indicator of how the economy is doing (I think it is more of a public perception of how the economy is doing) and who seems to be slipping.

Now it has come to my attention that Citibank shares are now going for about a dollar a piece. Sure it's down low, but I've been thinking of buying about $10 worth of shares in them with this reasoning; if they go under, I only lose $10, but if they start gaining some ground again in the next couple of year, well it may pay off.

Sure it sounds dumb and may be a risky investment, but the government now owns 40% of the Citibank stock, and I doubt if it will fail anytime soon. (And if it does, then we as the tax payer lose more)

So yeah, I will probably buy some stock in them. Let me all know what you think.

Missionary Thursday

This week we join our hero after a not so vitalizing trip to zone conference, where he is subjected to what the President demands and what reality actually allows. And some good old fashioned apostasy too. Yee haw.

Dear fam. and friends,

Last Thursday was Zone Conference and according to Elder B. it was just one big waste of time. The theme for this zone conference was how to become baptizing missionaries, but really all President R. did the entire time was rebuke us for breaking the rules. According to Elder B. our zone's motto is Work hard, Play hard'. Elder G. said it was to do everything you can to avoid tracting, but that's another story. According to Elder B., a baptizing missionary is a happy one and you can't be happy if you're working too hard, you've got to take some time to chill. According to President R., what we've been doing is not allowed. President R. wants to see our numbers go up and gave us permission to do whatever is necessary to do that, but what he doesn't realize is that all of the legendary missionaries who got a load of baptisms are also the ones who broke most of the small rules and had the most fun. He doesn't realize that he is contradicting himself on that point. We are all tired of the show we have to put on and I'm glad other people besides me feel frustrated about that. Personally the rebuking, for me, was water on a duck's back but everyone else took it harder. The elders got over it faster but the sisters still aren't over it. My personal policy is that i obey the rules to the best that I can but if my companions want to do some stupid activity that will ultimately not effect anyone in the long run, wont get them sent home or damage the reputation of mission work or the church; then I wont stop them. I will get on them however if it starts looking like that though.

President R. chewed the whole zone out on lots of stuff, but our district actually only had any problems with two things: 1. Hanging out with the sister missionaries. They get the shaft of mission work. They cant really talk to anyone at all unless its related to mission work, they cant do anything else much either. The only regular contact or socializing with other missionaries that they get is a phone call to the district leaders to let them know their safe for the night. Elders don't have it as hard because they can at least talk to each other. The socializing rule is hard for everyone but hardest for them. Needless to say we haven't been doing a very good job of observing that rule. 2. P-day: apparently we can't have much fun on P-day either. We must do things like laundry, shopping and cleaning house. The only fun thing we can do is occasionally in the city zone go down town to some recreational place. but officially P-day is only 7 hours long, not even the equivalent of a whole work day. If we do all that work we wouldn't have time to go downtown and have fun. We would be too exhausted and would dread the next day. Don't get me wrong, I get why these and other rules are there, without the little rules to keep us at least somewhat on track there is no way we could obey the bigger rules. So that was zone conference; one big rebuking from President R.

Sunday unfortunately again we did not have any investigators at church. I haven't had a single investigator at church at all. Our investigators are primed and ready for baptism, but the only problem is that they are not coming to church. Everyone else in the district gets theirs to church but ours will not come, and this burned me up even more than the rebuking did. Also Sunday we finally got back to Sister C.'s, shes been avoiding(Editors note: I am unsure of what word Elder Fields was trying to use) us for her new boyfriend for the last month and decided to forfeit the blessings that come from feeding the missionaries. She was there this weekend and informed us of the sad news that they broke up. Everyone thinks shes better off without him and now she can resume the joy that comes from feeding us.(I hope he's being sarcastic there) Also Dad, when I was there I asked her about if we might be related and she said that her husbands surname was C. and he had family all over the southern states, so yes, I think we might actually be related to her, at the very least through marriage.

Tuesday night we we talked to the catholic mother of a media referral. She said that she doesn't do or accept anything without praying about it first. When she said this, the spirit strongly prompted me to teach the last principle of lesson one, pray to know the truth. I am glad I listened to that prompting because the rest of the lesson was scattered with no central point. My companions both said I was very bold in doing that. I love the feeling you get when you follow the spirit.
Wednesday we went back to Sister C.'s for more doctrinal discussions. Here are some of the things we talked about: 1. I always wondered why Satan told Cain to make an offering to God, now I know it was a weak attempt to cover the fact that he had sinned and was planing to sin again, now Cain is Satan's adviser. 2: When Israel went up the mountain with Moses and got scared to go all the way up, they said he should go alone and they would listen to what HE had to say, not God. That was there first wrong move. During the time of Christ they were still listening to Moses and still not listening to God. When they crucified Christ, they didn't just reject him then, they had been ironically rejecting him since the time of Moses. 3: Did you ever notice in the restoration movie when the twig snaps as Joseph is about to pray? That was the trees acting for God to warn Joseph of the immediate danger of Satan's approach.(Editors Note: WTFreak?) I always wondered about that part of the movie. there was lots of other stuff, but again pray about it before deciding if it's truth.
After Sister C.'s we went to a zone activity. We started with winter football at the Point, went to the high park building for lunch, played doge ball, basketball and just hung out. It was fun, but nothing like this will ever top the first Zone activity with the sword fight. I spent some time with other people in the zone I didn't know as well and got to know them better. I never knew just how fun hanging out could be. I also talked to our sisters, they have been more distant than necessary since zone conference and I think it's just sad that they have decided to cut themselves off from us completely. The rebuking from President R. scared them really bad,. even though it wasn't directed only at us. Sadly they couldn't be talked out of seclusion. None of the other sisters in the zone seemed to have this problem. They all seemed very happy, but the sister's in our district didn't. Even with that, the zone activity was still fun.

Anyway, my area has really been picking up and baptisms are around the corner if we could just get them to come to church.
That's it this week.

Salutations to all,
Elder Fields.

Editors Note: Great snapping twigs of 1820, I need to talk to this boy. Advice, anyone, to tell him Sister C. may be a bit loco, and to ask for references to what is said?

We're Not That Lame

I read a news blog that links to various pages about all sorts of things. One of the items was to this page about Mormon pick up lines.

I mean, I liked the Lehi's dream line is kind of funny("You remind me of the fruit in Lehi's dream; the most precious above all.") but most are lame. I guess it's good to show that we Mormon dudes are just as comfortable talking with girls as the rest of the nation, and are equally lame (Except for the last dude on the video) but c'mon really?

Anywhat, I just thought I'd share that. Also, I am amazed about the discussions that go on in Youtube comments, or rather in the case of this video, all the ranting and bashing on there, that there is lamer than any pick up line. And pathetic.

Anywhat, I'll end my rant. Have a good day all.

One of the To Sure Things

So, today I got my taxes finished. Now, I wasn't expecting much this year, but that was based on the small amount I got last year. Except... last year's taxes, 2007, was based off a half a year of work (Getting home from s mission in the end of June tends to do that) and being a dependent, so that would explain it.

And this year, what with being independent and working for the full year, I basically get almost everything I paid in taxes last year.

So, yeah, I'm happy. I think some part of Obama's college credit plan thing figured into it, I'm not sure. But either way, I'm happy.

Now to find an apartment.

The Calm Before the Storm

A feeling, unexpected it was. It came all of a sudden to induce wonder. Wonder turned to ponder and as the inquirer who felt the feeling wish it were not so. Easier it would to ignore the feeling, but knew that it were not possible to do so. The inquirer looked around and knew not what to expect, what would come of this. Surely some things would change, but would it be like the exploding of a volcano, would he have to hide his face, or would it pass relatively calmly? He knew not what to think, nor exactly what to do. The feeling came a little stronger, and his mind played at it and wouldn't let it go. He wondered if he should act and when he should act. He only felt what he needed to do, what had to be done. He know not why or when, only that he had to obey.
As he examined the thought, other thoughts came too, as if to help the first thought, to gang up on to, to help convey the message to make it easier, for the feeling suggested a hard thing to be done.

Though he had hope that good would come, he knew not how the immediate reaction would be, how him acting upon this feeling would affect the circle of beloved acquaintances. He only knew that he must act.

So slowly and surely he thought of how to act, not knowing why. Only knowing that it was the feeling and the confirmation thereof that prompted and guided him to act.

So slowly and surely he walked as if to the hangman's noose, anticipating the pain and agony that would follow. Be walk he must.

But walk he must.