12/31/2018 The Bus Pass

There is no better way to spend Christmas eve evening than going way out of your area and having to catch buses to get back.

To make a long story short, we were originally going to go caroling with the zone in Lakeland, but our plans were dashed when we found out the car in the area we were in had only half the miles we would've needed to get there and back.

So we just gave up and trekked to the bus stop to catch buses back, but it ended up being a very interesting time. If we missed any bus, we would be stranded until the next day, so we booked it to the stops to not miss them. And we got close to missing the first one. On top of that, Elder Jolie didn't realize he had forgot his bus pass at the apartment of the Elders we were originally going to borrow the car from until we were already on the bus. And we didn't quite have enough quarters on hand to cover the trip, so we were trying to figure out what to do while the bus was moving. All the while a young man was begging us for money so he could go to some basketball camp. We got to the stop we needed to, got berated to by the bus driver for not having enough money, ran to the Walgreens, got some more quarters, booked it to the next stop, and made it. We met some interesting people along the way though, one man giving us probably a bit too much information on his personal life, right in front of one of his daughters. So yeah, about 2 hours of bus catching and interesting conversations was my Christmas Eve.

But yeah the bus is fun. But sadly the same bus pass Elder Jolie left at the apartment, a couple days after he got it back, he lost it for good. RIP bus pass. 

Anyways, buses aside, we knocked a lot of doors this week. I met my first Hebrew Israelite as well. That was a pretty interesting experience. The man's wife also facebook lived it. So if it got saved somewhere, maybe it'll go viral and you'll see us just getting roasted by this guy. We really don't want to argue with people, and so we mostly just let him go over his spiel. Look them up if you want to know more about them. Just goes to show that you can construe the Bible to say whatever you want it to say. 

We also got another person to church on Sunday. It's another great story. The lady told us later that she had been praying that morning for a good church to go to, and she liked sacrament meeting, which we had two great talks (one of them Elder Jolie gave) for. We have a teaching appointment with her on Tuesday. 

Christmas was pretty uneventful beyond calling home. We tried to deliver some brownies to people, but we didn't really do any proselyting. How was all your Christmases? 

Pics

1) this tower intrigues and infuriates me. It's definitely not a tree, but those branches look so real. Also, why did they even do this, regardless of whether it's a real tree or not? I am confusion

2) for the past couple weeks we have had a friend come in some nights and snack on our food. We have to put bread in the freezer or else. We have been trying to catch him, but nothing has proved fruitful. We've tried dowsing bread in bleach, making a trap with a pot and lid, and now this. The bucket has water in it for the fellow to drown in once the napkin gives under the weight of the thief. Sadly there seems to be no attempt made so far to get the brownie

3) our zone leaders.