"When God was handing out mouths he gave me a big one."

Quote of the week explanation

This week we had exchanges with our district leader and company. I went into the other area with the District Leader, and at one point in the day we had an appointment with this guy named Larry. We went in expecting to have a nice, thirty minute conversation... And we ended up being there for two hours. Any effort that we spent trying to get Larry to stop talking was futile. After we had been there for an hour  and forty-five minutes, he apologetically said the quote above. But the whole time he was basically bashing us. He knew more about the bible than anyone I've ever met, and he was quoting random passages of the Old Testament in Hebrew to try and convince us that the Melchizedek Priesthood had not yet been restored. It was definitely an interesting experience.

Hello

In case you weren't aware, Monday has come again.

We had another week out here, and it we did some stuff in it just like we do every week.

We didn't have as many appointments with those we are teaching as we would've like, mainly because Joan is insanely busy and Iris was pretty busy for the first part of the week, and she is still being plagued by illness (she said she wasn't feeling 100% when we met with her last week, so that must just have escalated). And we also found out that the Chinese guy we're teaching, ZhiCong, is moving to San Fransisco today, so that was a little bit disappointing.

We did have a good visit with Joan on Monday, though. We talked with her mostly about the Book of Mormon and how it can answer our questions and concerns. She is still on date to be baptized, but we will probably have to push her date back a bit because we still have a lot to teach her, and sometimes it can be difficult to set up appointments because of her unpredictable schedule. Unfortunately, she was not able to make it to church yesterday, but we have another appointment tonight, so we'll see how it goes.

Like I mentioned earlier, Iris was sick this week. We did call her a few times, though, and she seemed like she was still doing well in terms of gospel learning. It's quite the privilege to get to work with people like that, I've found. We are looking forward to continuing to work with her in the future.

Also... Anthony. We met with him this week as well. We read the Book of Mormon with him. He is very willing to meet with us, but somewhat hesitant to come to church. We will be working to find someone good to be a fellowshipper for him to come to lessons and help him to overcome that concern.

Other than that, nothing too insane happened. On Friday we have an appointment with a Chinese potential, so we'll see how that goes.

Well, I suppose I will close off there. Don't want you to get insanely irate as you watch your entire Labor Day slip through your fingers as you read some dumb kid's email. So bye.

Benny

P.S. I am eating an orange roll right now.

P.P.S. I hear that Utah smacked BYU in the second half. Good job! It was kind of amusing Thursday evening, because my companion is plagued with the ailment that is all too prevalent among missionaries these days, namely that of being a BYU fan. When we got home on Thursday, we had gotten several updates from assorted family members about the goings on of the game. The moment we returned to our apartment, I changed into full Utah attire, and my companion into full BYU attire, and we sat breathlessly waiting for my phone to vibrate and give us a score update. It was about as close as you can get to actually watching the game as a missionary, I imagine.

P.P.P.S. "Be that word our sign in parting, bird or fiend! I shrieked, upstarting."