Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Some Crazy People out there!

7-29-13

Well, here are the answers to your questions-I have heard from some friends and it's always good to hear from them and see how they're doing-I love it!  Yes, I got the package from the mission office that she dropped off-Thank You!!!!!  Next transfers are Tuesday, August 6th, so if I move to a new area or get called to train, they will call Thursday night and I would have to go to a meeting on Friday-so that's coming up.  We'll see what happens.  That's good that you got that cleaning job and are getting the yard done.  Some things I really miss.....swimming, atv, country music, country dancing, hanging out with friends and family, doing things by myself, girls, boating, lots of STUFF!  We have an hour to email each week.  So here's my story for this week:

So, we contacted this guy who is homeless, is 21, and has every Word of Wisdom issue possible.  We have been talking with him and trying to help him cut back.  He called us up on Tuesday and we met with him at Applebee's with his friend and talked with him there.  Then, we left Applebee's and walked with him down to the mall, which was about a 2 mile walk.  We were walking with him and trying to help him out, then he went inside Kc on the way there to use the bathroom and came out with a joint, a homemade cigarette with weed in it, and starts smoking it and he got really high and somehow had a tablet (like an Ipad?) in his backpack and started listening to rap music and dancing and singing to it in his own little world.  It was pretty funny, actually.  Then, as we were walking to the mall with this guy who was high out of his mind, this lady on a pink cruzer  bike pulls up next to us and starts yelling at us about womens' rights and how her half brothers are trying to kill her and a bunch of other crazy stuff.  She was CRAZY-like a stereotypical crazy lady.  While we were listening to her about her whatever she was talking about, we look over and this guy, stoned out of his mind, is just rapping and dancing away in his own little world.  It was the most interesting thing-but super funny!  Then, she takes off on her bike and rides up a little ways and my companion and I just look at each other like, "What just happened?  or  Did that just happen?"  It was crazy funny!  So, we continue to walk with this guy to meet his daughter and girlfriend and that crazy lady waited for us and started going off again about who knows what and this guy is just telling her to shut up and cussing at her.  She just ignored him because she could tell he was on something, but she just kept going on and on about some interesting stuff.  It was pretty funny, then she finally took off again and we walked to the mall and met his girlfriend and daughter and talked to them and then went to our next appointment.  The End-haha.  Other than that, this week was pretty good.  We did a lot of service-laid some cement (that was pretty fun) and helped some people move.  We also went to a Polynesian FHE that was fun.  We played basketball with the kids and had a bbq-it was Super good!  Hopefully, all is going well for you all.  Love ya!

Elder Whaley

Friday, July 26, 2013

Bike problems!

7-22-13

Haha-that would have been priceless to see you working with the pigs.  I wish I could've seen that.  (I told him about an adventure I had with my neighbor and I trying to take care of her kids' fair pigs in the dark).  I think I'm ready to move on, even though I like this ward.  I think I'm ready to move onto the next chapter.  I like a lot of stuff about my mission-the crazy experiences, the people, the food (of course), and just being a missionary.  My least favorite part of my mission is bike problems, stupid people, or when people just don't get things or don't understand what you're telling them-it's just frustrating sometimes.  To help me with different areas of the gospel, I just study on the areas I want to learn about or ask my companion.  When things get hard, I just get over it, move on, find ways to improve, and just plow through it.  This last week was kinda stressful because we had quite a few bike problems.  I had to buy a new rim which cost $60, which stunk.  We spent quite a bit of time fixing bikes, but we did do a lot of service, which was fun.  We had about 14 hours of service!  I haven't gotten the package you sent with Sr. Tingey's sister yet, but I will on Tuesday I think.  The mission office called and said they had it.  Nothing too exciting happened this week, but it went alright.  I hope all is going well for ya back home and goes well this week, also.  Dad-that is a very cool experience in the temple and yes, I definitely believe there are certain people in our lives who make a big impact when others can't.  I'm thankful for the wonderful leaders I had and the life lessons I have learned from you and mom, even though I wasn't always receptive to some of them-haha.  Thank you for sharing that and I will try to remember back to those times.   Thank you for all you do for us!  Love ya!

Elder Whaley

P.S.  I forgive you for selling Penny (our Boxer) -I'm not sure if he really does or if he's trying to put a guilt trip on me.  :)

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Samurai Shad

7-15-13

I got the package from Sr. Powell.  It was great!  I haven't had stamps, but I got some today, so I will send her something.  Everything is good.  We just had interviews with president and he said I will probably be transferred this next transfer and possibly be training.  He says a lot of stuff to people sometimes, so we'll actually see what happens this next transfer.  I'm sorry, I'm just not a very talkative, detailed person.  Haha.  (I keep telling him to give more details in his letters-we'll keep working on that!)  Landon (his friend) needs to put his mission papers in or he will have a harder time as time goes by.  Time has gone by pretty fast.  It's crazy that I've been out for almost 6 months-1/4 of my mission.  I love my mission and the people here are great!  Living with other elders is sometimes fun, except one of them is getting on everyone's nerves.  He is from Pennsylvania, so we'll see what happens to him in the apartment-hehe.  (Whatever that means)  That would be great if Josh got that little motor bike going.  Something interesting that happened this last week was that my companion has some Samurai swords and one of the other elders got it and was messing around with it and was swinging it around and sliced my thumb!  So, I just got some super glue and glued it back together and that was on Saturday night.  We just had dinner last night with the Bergh family and they have 4 girls and 1 boy.  They were everywhere bouncing off of us and the walls.  It was definitely not a boring dinner-haha.  They were so funny.  Hope all is going well at home.  Love Ya!

Love,
Elder Whaley

Shad's missionary tag and the bike plate we sent him!

The super-glued cut from the Samurai accident!

Elder Whaley happily biking along!

At the Apple headquarters (He loves Apple computers-
probably because of his Uncle Craig!)

Thursday, July 11, 2013

5 Months Out!

Dear Family,                                                                            7-10-13

Wow!  It sounds like you have had a good week that's crazy.  My week has been interesting.  The reason I'm late emailing is because on Monday we went to Santa Cruz and went to the beach.  It was really nice and fun, but there was a lot of people there-it was crazy!  While in Santa Cruz, as we were walking back to the bus, we saw a guy get stabbed- it was crazy!  For the 4th of July, we did service for a member of the ward moving dirt and went around visiting people.  They don't have fireworks here or parades or rodeos, so it was a weird 4th of July.  It sounds like you guys had fun on the 4th.  I got the 4th of July package you sent.  Thank you!  It's like a parade in a box-haha.  I was happy to get it because I wan't even expecting it.  I sent home a book today since I can't read it on my mission, but the guy that wrote it is in our ward, so he gave it to us.  Well, I'm glad that Corbin finally got his eagle-that's great.  That's crazy that McKinley and Brent are already baptized now.  Transfers are every 6 weeks, so I have been in this area for 4 transfers now.  The next transfer will be the 2nd week of August, so we'll see what happens.  Next time someone eggs the house or you hear them, just come out with the shot gun-that will fix the problem-haha!  It was probably one of Vanessa's boyfriends-haha.  I wrote Austin an email for his first day and he just barely wrote me back.  Thanks for sending those pictures of everything.  It was good to see them.  Everything is going good here.  We're having some good success with less actives coming back to church, but we need to find some investigators.  Well, hopefully all is well back at home.

Love Ya!
Elder Whaley

Sunday, July 7, 2013

Hot California!

7-1-13

It has been really hot here.  It got to 104 degrees on Saturday and we were doing service outside.  I don't think I've sweated that much before in my life-it was crazy hot.  That's so crazy that Austin is already in the MTC.  Hopefully, he will be able to adjust to the heat in Florida where it's pretty humid.  The Scout Encampment sounds like it was fun.  I wish I could go, but oh well.  We have set up a couple of appointments with that couple who said they wanted to be baptized, but they didn't show up to any of them and didn't come to church and now we can't get ahold of them.  :/  We're going to keep trying, though!  We don't have any investigators right now.  We just got some Sister missionaries covering our ward with us, so we had to give them half of our teaching pool which stinks, but will hopefully pick the work up.  Our bishop gave them one of the ladies that I have been working with since I got here and she is really progressing and starting to return to activity.  We're trying to get her to the temple, but our bishop gave her to the sisters which really stinks!  Anyways, other than that it's going pretty good.  My companion crashed on his bike, it was kind of funny, but also looked bad from behind, but he just got a few scratches.  I hope all is going well back home.  Love ya!

Elder Whaley