Aug 21, 2011

Sounds like you guys are still having some awesome
adventures this summer. All this talk of the great outdoors makes me jealous.
Although we did take a trip to Lands End today which was really cool. We went
with the Elders from the Red Ruth district. Elder Evans serves there and he was
one of my good friends from the MTC so it was nice to spend time with him. Ive
attached some photos which you should enjoy. And lizard point is in my mission
but we havent gone there yet.

I can't believe you rode 65 km on a tandem bike. That
honestly does not sound enjoyable in any way to me. I actually started driving
yesterday. It is really hard to stay in the middle of the lane on the wrong
side of the road. And the roads here are super skinny. Now that im driving, my
companion is the one who has to back the car up. The next part of this story is
quite embareassing. I guess in the first week when I would always go
upstairs and go sleep until like 1015 while he did accounting on the phone
downstairs, he called the zone leaders and the other district leaders and made
up the story of how the guy got backed up into by his companion and that we now
had to wear safety vests while backing up the car. So the next time i talked to
the zone leaders they told me that story and how we had to go get safety vests.
I thought it was strange but just went along with it. At district meeting and
stuff I would be backing up the car in the vest and all the other
Elders just said they hadn't been able to find a vest anywhere because they
weren't usings vests to back their cars up. And they all would take pictures of
me while i was backing up the car which I thought was odd but didn't look into
it too much. Eventually when this wasn't funny anymore the zone leaders called
me and told me that a new rule had been implemented. Everyone now needed to
wear a safety vest and also to hold either flashlights of ping-pong paddles in
their hands to make sure they are always visible. Looking back I have no
idea why i went along with this, but I grabbed the two flashlights we had in
the flat and later that day we were backing up in a parking lot and I had the
safety vests and were directing the car with the flashlights much like people
do at the airport. Elder Simmons took a video of this on his camera, and was
just dying laughing. At this point I realized that something wasn't right. He
admitted it had all just been a big prank. I was not impressed. There is talk
of putting some of the pictures taken into the weekly missionary newsletter
under the safety segment.

Anyways, I made a list this week of all the things that I
wanted to tell you about so I wouldn't forget anything. I actually had possibly
my first 'Allison moment'. I am not positive that this story is missionary
appropriate but you did ask for funny stories of me and my compainon and I
just have to tell you it. We had a dinner appointment at a members house. He
lives in Penzance and is kind of an old pirate. A little bit crazy. So we ate
dinner and were just talking in his living room. me and him were talking about
gardening, and he was talking about his tomato plants he was growing. He said
how expensive the seeds were; they cost like 2 pounds for 5 seeds. So I guess
he harvests the seeds of the tomatos he grows and uses those so that he doesn't
have to go buy them. He said he had a bunch extra, and he stores them in some
dry soil. So without really thinking, i blurted out 'oh, well have you ever
thought about selling your own seed?' Elder Simmons on the couch beside me
erupted into hysterical laughter which he tried to cover up by coughing. I
actually was laughing also to the point of tears and yet the member had no idea
what was going on, he was just staring at us. i guess he didn't really catch
the connotations of what I had just said. it was so funny.

Actually I have a couple other funny stories. One morning me
and Elder simmons were fighting in our flat. I guess it was more friendly
wrestling. Anyways he is way bigger than me, and at one point he picked me up
and threw me into my bed. The impact shattered a piece of the the wood 1x6
frame and the bed just collapsed. We have yet to tell the landlord, but we did
go to a hardward store and buy some wood glue and a clamp, so we repaired it
somewhat. Right now we have about 12 book or mormons stacked underneath the
break to support my weight as I sleep. I had to sleep on the floor the first
night.

Another time we were driving to an investigators house and
were messing around in the car. Elder Simmons stole my badge and started
wearing it so I took his and put it on. We totally forgot about it, and got to
the investigators house. We had met the investigator knocking the week before,
and only spoken to her for about 5 minutes so she didn't really know our names.
However she invited us back to share a message, and so we got there and the
investigator, Dellah, had a daughter we had never met before named Daisy who
agreed to sit in on the lesson. As we went to introduce ourselves, Elder
Simmons realized our badges were messed up so he introduced himself as Elder
Steed and I introduced myself as Elder Simmons. We had a great lesson, but I
guess midway through the lesson, Elder Simmons said 'What do you think about
that Elder Steed?' while looking at me. The investigator was like 'why are you
talking about yourself like that?' and we had to sheepishly explain what had
happened. However the lesson still went really well and we are going back to
teach them on Tuesday night.

Actually this week I am going on 2 different exchanges to
the other areas of my district. It should be alright.

I also taught the gospel principles class in church on
sunday. It was a little scary but went quite well.

I can't believe you are going to missionary mom luncheons.
That seems so weird to me. There have actually been seperate occasions this
week when I had a memory flash back to me about you and dad, and I've really
been realizing how amazing of parents you guys are. I am really sorry when I
was ever rude or took what you were doing for granted or even just didn't spend
as much time as I wish I would have around both of you. I have really realized
how much I love both of you and have really started to miss you guys.

Sorry I didn't have as many spiritual experiences this week.
I wanted to keep this weeks email a little lighter. We had 5 investigators
commited to coming to church on sunday and only one came. And he was the 10
year investiagator. So we were both pretty bummed out yesterday. Elder Simmons
is always really stressed. He is an amazing missionary but way to hard on
himself. I am trying my best to keep us happy and having fun but sometimes when
he gets really down it gets contagious. Im just glad I had some of these
fun/funny experiences this week.

I think im giving up a little bit of my old self each day,
its slow progress but I think eventually I will lose myself in the work.
Hopefully I never get to the point where emails are no longer something I look
forward to every week.