December 31, 2010 Friday
We went tracting this morning. There was a large gray cloud in the northeast. We began to hear some distant thunder and then a woman we talked to said her mom had called to tell her we were going to have a cyclone pass by. We decided to make a run to the store and gas station. When we reached the shopping center, the rain started to dump. It let up just as we needed to leave—we appreciated that. Then it rained hard most of the afternoon. The Great Western News at 5:30 said there was a tropical low that might turn into a cyclone running across the northwest of the state (that’s us). It is supposed to pass by Broome around 2:00 am. But there hasn’t been any heavy rain since then. Even with the air conditioning on, you can hear the rain pounding on our corrugated tin roof when it’s a heavy rain. We just watched the national news at (9:30). All it talked about was the tropical low across our area.
We’ve decided to let the thunder and lightning (if it comes) bring in the New Year. We’re old, so we can go to bed.
HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYONE!
It didn’t even come close—no rain last night.
Friday, December 31, 2010
HE’S READING :O)
December 30, 2010 Thursday
This morning we went back to see Dr. IK to get the blood test results. The cholesterol #’s are pretty good, but the best part was that he brought up the Book of Mormon. He had a few questions: The typical, “Are these the ancestors of the red Indians?” “Did they have the book of Isaiah?” and “I’m not quite sure if it’s the truth.” We explained about Moroni’s promise and that he needs to pray about it and answered his other questions. He’s going to keep reading and write down questions he has. The only problem is that I don’t have a return appointment. He did assure us that he has our phone number.
As I was paying, the cashier asked if I was American and then said, “So am I.” She’s from California, near Magic Mountain and has been here for 2 years. She came over with her boyfriend. She said she has a good friend who is going to BYU and then asked where our church is. We explained where we meet and what time, then invited her to church on Sunday.
This morning we went back to see Dr. IK to get the blood test results. The cholesterol #’s are pretty good, but the best part was that he brought up the Book of Mormon. He had a few questions: The typical, “Are these the ancestors of the red Indians?” “Did they have the book of Isaiah?” and “I’m not quite sure if it’s the truth.” We explained about Moroni’s promise and that he needs to pray about it and answered his other questions. He’s going to keep reading and write down questions he has. The only problem is that I don’t have a return appointment. He did assure us that he has our phone number.
As I was paying, the cashier asked if I was American and then said, “So am I.” She’s from California, near Magic Mountain and has been here for 2 years. She came over with her boyfriend. She said she has a good friend who is going to BYU and then asked where our church is. We explained where we meet and what time, then invited her to church on Sunday.
THE JOY OF SOCIALIZED MEDICINE
I mentioned 10 days ago or so that I might have a deep vein thrombosis. Here are the details just so you can oppose socialized medicine in the States.
December 17 Friday We took our P-day. We did the wash, went to the internet café to update the blog, checked the mail, and did the weekly shopping at Woolworth’s. After studying for a little while, I got up to get ready to go out. As I did so, I felt a terrible pain in my right calf. It felt as if it were tearing apart. I sat for a few minutes and the pain dissipated. It began to hurt whenever I put weight on it as I flexed my foot to take a step. Standing didn’t hurt it. We went out to dinner (our wedding anniversary). It was painful going up and down the steps at the restaurant as well as walking.
December 18 Saturday I called Sister Cahoon. She recommended I get it checked out as it might possibly be a DVT—deep vein thrombosis or blood clot. We went to the Emergency Department at the Broome Hospital. The nurse there explained that even if the doctor thought it might be a DVT, there was no one available to do a sonogram because it was a weekend. So I took it easy over the weekend, keeping it elevated except for the 2 hours at church. The pain began to disappear.
December 20 Monday We started to do our regular routine. By noon the pain was coming back so we went to the Broome Medical Clinic. I saw Dr. IK (eye-kay). He examined it and said that since it wasn’t swollen and there was no swelling in my ankle, he doubted it was a DVT but gave me an order for a sonogram anyway. He scheduled me to come back in 10 days. He also gave me an order for a fasting blood test to check my cholesterol levels. I went to the X-ray Department. They didn’t know how long to schedule the exam for so they took the order and said they would call me when they found out. The pain only was present when I would flex my foot with weight on it. There didn’t seem to be any place on my calf that was painful to the touch.
December 21 Tuesday I went to the BMC and they drew blood and said they would call me if there was anything serious. Otherwise I could call in on Thursday to find out the results. I called the X-ray department since I hadn’t heard from them. They couldn’t find the orders for my sonogram but scheduled me anyway for a scan on January 5.
December 22-26 The pain lessoned. Other than when I first stood up after sitting and in the morning, I paid almost no attention to it.
December 26 Sunday We took a short ride (30 minutes) and then walked around about 5-10 minutes. I put the ball of my foot on a half-buried brick and let my heel go to the ground. My calf felt like something huge popped in it. It was very painful and continued to hurt as I went back to the car. It continued to hurt and was painful when I flexed my foot even with no weight on it. There was also pain when I touched it.
December 27 Monday We took another ride. It took an hour to reach our destination. We got out and walked around a bit at our destination and then drove home. About dinner time, I noticed that my calf was swollen and my ankle was started to swell. We went to the Emergency Dept at the hospital. I was seen by Dr. JJ. He felt it was probably a DVT and started me on 120 mg of Clexane (enoxaparin sodium) in my stomach. I received some some Ted hose that come up to just below the knee to wear. He gave me orders for an Urgent sonogram and a d-dimer blood test that I was to have done on Tuesday. I’m to return in 24 hours for another shot of Clexane and repeat that until the results on the sonogram come back which takes 2 days because the scan has to be read in Perth.
December 28 Tuesday I called the X-ray Department; it wasn’t open because it’s a holiday. The lab said they weren’t doing anything either and that Dr JJ should have drawn the blood last night if it was an emergency. I called the Emergency Department. They said they would have the doctor there today look at my record to see if he thought it was an emergency. I went to the ED so they could draw my blood. The nurse then told me that I would not have a scan today because the X-ray tech on call doesn’t do sonograms. She said they would try get me in tomorrow, but that wasn’t a sure thing because the schedule might be full. We returned to the ED at 8 pm tonight for my second shot of Clexane.
29 December 2010 Wednesday This morning I called the X-ray department. I was told that there wouldn’t be a tech in until next week who does ultrasounds. I called and left that message on Sister Cahoon’s voice mail. She called back tonight and said that Dr. Burton felt that I wasn’t in any great danger because they had started me on the blood thinner. When we returned to the ED tonight for another shot, Kate, the nurse who’d drawn my blood yesterday commented that she didn’t know why they hadn’t just given me the medicine and let me do my own injections at home. I said I’d be willing to try, so we came home with enough to take me through until next Tuesday. She also commented that X-ray wouldn’t be open next Monday because it would be part of the New Year’s holiday. So much for an “urgent” scan!. Kate also checked the results of the D-dimer test. It was inconclusive
30 December 2010 Thursday This morning we went back to Dr IK to find out the results of the bloodwork he’d ordered. My cholesterol is good and 5 points lower than when I left home. Triglycerides have dropped 60 points to 165. HDL’s improved but LDL’s climbed. He encouraged me to cut out the sugars, pop, and get more exercise. Tonight I gave myself my first shot. It was easy—no problems.
December 17 Friday We took our P-day. We did the wash, went to the internet café to update the blog, checked the mail, and did the weekly shopping at Woolworth’s. After studying for a little while, I got up to get ready to go out. As I did so, I felt a terrible pain in my right calf. It felt as if it were tearing apart. I sat for a few minutes and the pain dissipated. It began to hurt whenever I put weight on it as I flexed my foot to take a step. Standing didn’t hurt it. We went out to dinner (our wedding anniversary). It was painful going up and down the steps at the restaurant as well as walking.
December 18 Saturday I called Sister Cahoon. She recommended I get it checked out as it might possibly be a DVT—deep vein thrombosis or blood clot. We went to the Emergency Department at the Broome Hospital. The nurse there explained that even if the doctor thought it might be a DVT, there was no one available to do a sonogram because it was a weekend. So I took it easy over the weekend, keeping it elevated except for the 2 hours at church. The pain began to disappear.
December 20 Monday We started to do our regular routine. By noon the pain was coming back so we went to the Broome Medical Clinic. I saw Dr. IK (eye-kay). He examined it and said that since it wasn’t swollen and there was no swelling in my ankle, he doubted it was a DVT but gave me an order for a sonogram anyway. He scheduled me to come back in 10 days. He also gave me an order for a fasting blood test to check my cholesterol levels. I went to the X-ray Department. They didn’t know how long to schedule the exam for so they took the order and said they would call me when they found out. The pain only was present when I would flex my foot with weight on it. There didn’t seem to be any place on my calf that was painful to the touch.
December 21 Tuesday I went to the BMC and they drew blood and said they would call me if there was anything serious. Otherwise I could call in on Thursday to find out the results. I called the X-ray department since I hadn’t heard from them. They couldn’t find the orders for my sonogram but scheduled me anyway for a scan on January 5.
December 22-26 The pain lessoned. Other than when I first stood up after sitting and in the morning, I paid almost no attention to it.
December 26 Sunday We took a short ride (30 minutes) and then walked around about 5-10 minutes. I put the ball of my foot on a half-buried brick and let my heel go to the ground. My calf felt like something huge popped in it. It was very painful and continued to hurt as I went back to the car. It continued to hurt and was painful when I flexed my foot even with no weight on it. There was also pain when I touched it.
December 27 Monday We took another ride. It took an hour to reach our destination. We got out and walked around a bit at our destination and then drove home. About dinner time, I noticed that my calf was swollen and my ankle was started to swell. We went to the Emergency Dept at the hospital. I was seen by Dr. JJ. He felt it was probably a DVT and started me on 120 mg of Clexane (enoxaparin sodium) in my stomach. I received some some Ted hose that come up to just below the knee to wear. He gave me orders for an Urgent sonogram and a d-dimer blood test that I was to have done on Tuesday. I’m to return in 24 hours for another shot of Clexane and repeat that until the results on the sonogram come back which takes 2 days because the scan has to be read in Perth.
December 28 Tuesday I called the X-ray Department; it wasn’t open because it’s a holiday. The lab said they weren’t doing anything either and that Dr JJ should have drawn the blood last night if it was an emergency. I called the Emergency Department. They said they would have the doctor there today look at my record to see if he thought it was an emergency. I went to the ED so they could draw my blood. The nurse then told me that I would not have a scan today because the X-ray tech on call doesn’t do sonograms. She said they would try get me in tomorrow, but that wasn’t a sure thing because the schedule might be full. We returned to the ED at 8 pm tonight for my second shot of Clexane.
29 December 2010 Wednesday This morning I called the X-ray department. I was told that there wouldn’t be a tech in until next week who does ultrasounds. I called and left that message on Sister Cahoon’s voice mail. She called back tonight and said that Dr. Burton felt that I wasn’t in any great danger because they had started me on the blood thinner. When we returned to the ED tonight for another shot, Kate, the nurse who’d drawn my blood yesterday commented that she didn’t know why they hadn’t just given me the medicine and let me do my own injections at home. I said I’d be willing to try, so we came home with enough to take me through until next Tuesday. She also commented that X-ray wouldn’t be open next Monday because it would be part of the New Year’s holiday. So much for an “urgent” scan!. Kate also checked the results of the D-dimer test. It was inconclusive
30 December 2010 Thursday This morning we went back to Dr IK to find out the results of the bloodwork he’d ordered. My cholesterol is good and 5 points lower than when I left home. Triglycerides have dropped 60 points to 165. HDL’s improved but LDL’s climbed. He encouraged me to cut out the sugars, pop, and get more exercise. Tonight I gave myself my first shot. It was easy—no problems.
HOLIDAYS, HOLIDAYS AND MORE HOLIDAYS!
These lizards are everywhere now that we aren't in the "cold" weather anymore.
December 29, 2010 Wednesday
It’s been a really slow week. Not only was Sunday Boxing Day, but Monday and Tuesday were both official holidays. The shops were open, but none of the government stuff. So today we went to the Post Office thinking we’d have some mail, but there was nothing. So either they didn’t start sorting the mail or it hadn’t been flown up from Perth. And next Monday is a holiday because of New Years.
This afternoon we went to the care center. We had a big bunch of folks there doing crosswords today. One lady, Diane, is Australian and looks like “nobody’s home” behind those eyes; but she comes up with so many answers, it’s just amazing. She can’t write, but she loves to come and help us get the answers.
Then we did the bread run. There wasn’t much excess bread today. We were done really quickly. We told the Young Women we saw today that we weren’t going to be doing Thursday night YW for a while because they weren’t coming to Sacrament Meeting anymore and that’s more important than YW. They’ve got the idea anymore that church is optional and they haven’t come for a really long time. Maybe this will get them back to church. I sure hope so.
We went out to watch the sunset tonight over by the port. The sky was beautiful all around us. The ocean had big breakers coming in. Last night we had a big thunder storm during the night. It reminded me of the storms in Indiana.
December 29, 2010 Wednesday
It’s been a really slow week. Not only was Sunday Boxing Day, but Monday and Tuesday were both official holidays. The shops were open, but none of the government stuff. So today we went to the Post Office thinking we’d have some mail, but there was nothing. So either they didn’t start sorting the mail or it hadn’t been flown up from Perth. And next Monday is a holiday because of New Years.
This afternoon we went to the care center. We had a big bunch of folks there doing crosswords today. One lady, Diane, is Australian and looks like “nobody’s home” behind those eyes; but she comes up with so many answers, it’s just amazing. She can’t write, but she loves to come and help us get the answers.
Then we did the bread run. There wasn’t much excess bread today. We were done really quickly. We told the Young Women we saw today that we weren’t going to be doing Thursday night YW for a while because they weren’t coming to Sacrament Meeting anymore and that’s more important than YW. They’ve got the idea anymore that church is optional and they haven’t come for a really long time. Maybe this will get them back to church. I sure hope so.
We went out to watch the sunset tonight over by the port. The sky was beautiful all around us. The ocean had big breakers coming in. Last night we had a big thunder storm during the night. It reminded me of the storms in Indiana.
HAPPY BOXING DAY!
December 26, 2010 Sunday
Australia has the day after Christmas as Boxing Day. We aren’t sure where the tradition came from but it is considered a holiday. It’s kind of like most of our holidays at home where the stores are open, but other businesses are closed. We had church but instructions from Perth were that we only do a hour meeting.
Christmas was good. We had some packages to open in the morning and did our traditional fruit salad breakfast with “crumpets” this year. They are sort of like English Muffins but not quite. In the afternoon Raphy and Samantha came over and played games with us. Then Samantha and I tried to make our Thai egg rolls. I hadn’t found the right wraps at the store so I bought some rice paper wraps. And the sausage here wasn’t the same as what we are used to. Anyway after we deep fried the egg rolls, the wraps went translucent and cracked open in places. They were sort of okay, but not like the ones I learned to make in Thailand. Samantha said she was willing to take some home, so they weren’t a total “bust.”
We were able to talk to most of our siblings and kids and that was fun. We did most of the calls at 2 am here when it’s super cheap to call. They seem to be doing okay for the most part. This morning we made a couple more phone calls before church and a couple after church.
We had 6 at church this week—a 50% increase over last week. The parents of one of our inactive members came. Their daughter-in-law had a baby on the 13th, so they are here helping. They usually host a big family Christmas in Perth, so Christmas yesterday with a small family of 4 was very different for them. They did enjoy our little church because they said, “It was big in spirit.” Nice of them to say that since I spoke about keeping the spirit of Christmas all year long through service to others. I even tied Joseph Smith’s birthday into it by quoting the song he requested be sung shortly before he died, “A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief.”
Australia has the day after Christmas as Boxing Day. We aren’t sure where the tradition came from but it is considered a holiday. It’s kind of like most of our holidays at home where the stores are open, but other businesses are closed. We had church but instructions from Perth were that we only do a hour meeting.
Christmas was good. We had some packages to open in the morning and did our traditional fruit salad breakfast with “crumpets” this year. They are sort of like English Muffins but not quite. In the afternoon Raphy and Samantha came over and played games with us. Then Samantha and I tried to make our Thai egg rolls. I hadn’t found the right wraps at the store so I bought some rice paper wraps. And the sausage here wasn’t the same as what we are used to. Anyway after we deep fried the egg rolls, the wraps went translucent and cracked open in places. They were sort of okay, but not like the ones I learned to make in Thailand. Samantha said she was willing to take some home, so they weren’t a total “bust.”
We were able to talk to most of our siblings and kids and that was fun. We did most of the calls at 2 am here when it’s super cheap to call. They seem to be doing okay for the most part. This morning we made a couple more phone calls before church and a couple after church.
We had 6 at church this week—a 50% increase over last week. The parents of one of our inactive members came. Their daughter-in-law had a baby on the 13th, so they are here helping. They usually host a big family Christmas in Perth, so Christmas yesterday with a small family of 4 was very different for them. They did enjoy our little church because they said, “It was big in spirit.” Nice of them to say that since I spoke about keeping the spirit of Christmas all year long through service to others. I even tied Joseph Smith’s birthday into it by quoting the song he requested be sung shortly before he died, “A Poor Wayfaring Man of Grief.”
CHRISTMAS EVE AND 100 DEGREES IN THE SHADE!
SANTA EVEN FISHES ON THE ROOF!
THIS ONE'S TAKEN FROM THE OTHER END.
HE LOVES TO FISH.
HARLEY SANTA
December 24, 2010 Friday
Yep, it was a hot one. And when I took Samantha home tonight at 8:30, it was still 90 degrees out there along with high humidity that we’ve had all day. Our poor little air conditioner here in the living/dining/kitchen area just couldn’t match it. It got up to 86 degrees here in the house with it running, so we turned on the AC in the three bedrooms and left the doors open. It finally got down to 80 in the house by about 6 pm.
But it’s been a great day. We delivered some more caramel corn we made early this morning. It was fun to see the surprise and pleasure on the faces of folks we visited. And little Siska Rollason yelled, “And we get to keep the red bowls too!” They were just simple plastic bowls, but she was excited about them. Matilda Shirley, last night, asked if they had to return the bowl. Kids are cute.
We hit the grocery store. It was amazing; a million people were there, but we only waited one or two minutes in line behind one other customer. They had all their checkout lanes open. We came home, made a vegetable dip, a cheese ball, a white-chocolate covered mixture of cereal, M&M’s, pretzels, and peanuts. For our “fancy” Christmas Eve dinner, we had bought a roasted chicken and some cole slaw. We ate chicken sandwiches with rolls from our bread run. The chicken was on special and it was cheaper to buy it cooked than buy a raw one and cook it myself.
Then we put out a bunch of candy, nuts, cookies, veges and dip, mince tartlets, etc. I picked up Samantha and we waited a while because Diane Morato said maybe they would come. They didn’t show up so we began to munch and watch The Testament. It’s such a good movie and portrays most of the life of Christ. It was perfect for Christmas Eve.
THIS ONE'S TAKEN FROM THE OTHER END.
HE LOVES TO FISH.
HARLEY SANTA
December 24, 2010 Friday
Yep, it was a hot one. And when I took Samantha home tonight at 8:30, it was still 90 degrees out there along with high humidity that we’ve had all day. Our poor little air conditioner here in the living/dining/kitchen area just couldn’t match it. It got up to 86 degrees here in the house with it running, so we turned on the AC in the three bedrooms and left the doors open. It finally got down to 80 in the house by about 6 pm.
But it’s been a great day. We delivered some more caramel corn we made early this morning. It was fun to see the surprise and pleasure on the faces of folks we visited. And little Siska Rollason yelled, “And we get to keep the red bowls too!” They were just simple plastic bowls, but she was excited about them. Matilda Shirley, last night, asked if they had to return the bowl. Kids are cute.
We hit the grocery store. It was amazing; a million people were there, but we only waited one or two minutes in line behind one other customer. They had all their checkout lanes open. We came home, made a vegetable dip, a cheese ball, a white-chocolate covered mixture of cereal, M&M’s, pretzels, and peanuts. For our “fancy” Christmas Eve dinner, we had bought a roasted chicken and some cole slaw. We ate chicken sandwiches with rolls from our bread run. The chicken was on special and it was cheaper to buy it cooked than buy a raw one and cook it myself.
Then we put out a bunch of candy, nuts, cookies, veges and dip, mince tartlets, etc. I picked up Samantha and we waited a while because Diane Morato said maybe they would come. They didn’t show up so we began to munch and watch The Testament. It’s such a good movie and portrays most of the life of Christ. It was perfect for Christmas Eve.
HAPPY JOSEPH SMITH’S BIRTHDAY!
December 23, 2010 Thursday
We decided a while back that we would take copies of the DVD, Joy to the World, around to people we have given lessons to in the past and maybe a few others. We started with the couple that runs Brumby’s, the bakery that gives us all the bread each Wednesday. Wayne wasn’t there, but Lori was and she was so surprised that we were thanking them for all that they have donated to us over the 6 months we have been here. We drove out to Tony’s, but it looked pretty deserted. Lots of people are heading somewhere else for Christmas. We stopped at Jhun’s. Only their boys were home. We left them a DVD and this month’s “The Friend.” (A little while ago we subscribed to The Friend and The New Era so we would have them to give out when we needed them. The first ones came yesterday. They really are great magazines.) Then we dropped another DVD at Jan Martin’s, the animal carer. She’d told us she’s “not a religious person,” but we decided she could use a Christmas DVD anyway.
We came home and made a batch of caramel corn to take around tonight to inactives. The ones we managed to catch at home were Karen Arkeveld. I felt bad for her—her family had had to put their dad into a care center yesterday because of his Alzheimers disease. Next we hit Alan, the “Jack Mormon” Kiwi. He’s planning on having a couple of other old guys over for Christmas lunch. We gave him a copy of The Testament. He has a good testimony even though he’s inactive. We also gave a copy of it to the Shirley family. They are the inactive folks who run Kimberly Optical. She’s been really friendly the last couple of times we’ve run into her.
There was an article in yesterday’s paper about the house that had won the Christmas Decorating Contest. It’s quite close to where we live. So we drove past and stopped to take pictures. The couple who does it were out in the driveway talking to folks who stopped. They started with one string of lights 15 years ago to please their daughter and it just kept growing. I asked if they bought all the stuff locally, because they had so much stuff that we haven’t seen anywhere in town. They said they get a lot off E-Bay and other internet sights. He pointed out a “fan” of lights that they ordered from the states. They’ve won for two years in a row now. It was really cute. On the roof was an animated light set with Santa fishing from a small boat. In the carport they’d set up a Christmas tree which had a training playing Christmas music running around it. There were several blow-up Santas and one blow-up kangaroo with a Santa hat on it and presents tucked in its pouch. They even had a table in the carport set up with a row of various animated animals that played music when you would squeeze a paw. At the front of it all was a lighted nativity set. They’d put the manger piece up on a bale of hay so it stood out more because it had seemed dwarfed by the shepherds and the camels of the wise men. Their son came out; they said he got to hand out candy canes when the kids from St. Katherine’s orphanage came around. (We didn’t know there was an orphanage in town.) A few minutes later, the local (old) double-decker bus that takes tourists around Broome came down the street and you could hear the kids before you ever saw them. It was so cute.
It’s interesting here. Most people do not decorate outside their houses for Christmas. Just driving around it’s evident that pretty much there’s just one house per street maybe that puts anything outside. Kind of sad. I love the lights at Christmas. They add so much to the fun.
The Big Picture
Santa's pulling the sleigh!
Our favorite!
Look, it has packages under it. We did add a gold bow to the top to look like a star, sort of.
We decided a while back that we would take copies of the DVD, Joy to the World, around to people we have given lessons to in the past and maybe a few others. We started with the couple that runs Brumby’s, the bakery that gives us all the bread each Wednesday. Wayne wasn’t there, but Lori was and she was so surprised that we were thanking them for all that they have donated to us over the 6 months we have been here. We drove out to Tony’s, but it looked pretty deserted. Lots of people are heading somewhere else for Christmas. We stopped at Jhun’s. Only their boys were home. We left them a DVD and this month’s “The Friend.” (A little while ago we subscribed to The Friend and The New Era so we would have them to give out when we needed them. The first ones came yesterday. They really are great magazines.) Then we dropped another DVD at Jan Martin’s, the animal carer. She’d told us she’s “not a religious person,” but we decided she could use a Christmas DVD anyway.
We came home and made a batch of caramel corn to take around tonight to inactives. The ones we managed to catch at home were Karen Arkeveld. I felt bad for her—her family had had to put their dad into a care center yesterday because of his Alzheimers disease. Next we hit Alan, the “Jack Mormon” Kiwi. He’s planning on having a couple of other old guys over for Christmas lunch. We gave him a copy of The Testament. He has a good testimony even though he’s inactive. We also gave a copy of it to the Shirley family. They are the inactive folks who run Kimberly Optical. She’s been really friendly the last couple of times we’ve run into her.
There was an article in yesterday’s paper about the house that had won the Christmas Decorating Contest. It’s quite close to where we live. So we drove past and stopped to take pictures. The couple who does it were out in the driveway talking to folks who stopped. They started with one string of lights 15 years ago to please their daughter and it just kept growing. I asked if they bought all the stuff locally, because they had so much stuff that we haven’t seen anywhere in town. They said they get a lot off E-Bay and other internet sights. He pointed out a “fan” of lights that they ordered from the states. They’ve won for two years in a row now. It was really cute. On the roof was an animated light set with Santa fishing from a small boat. In the carport they’d set up a Christmas tree which had a training playing Christmas music running around it. There were several blow-up Santas and one blow-up kangaroo with a Santa hat on it and presents tucked in its pouch. They even had a table in the carport set up with a row of various animated animals that played music when you would squeeze a paw. At the front of it all was a lighted nativity set. They’d put the manger piece up on a bale of hay so it stood out more because it had seemed dwarfed by the shepherds and the camels of the wise men. Their son came out; they said he got to hand out candy canes when the kids from St. Katherine’s orphanage came around. (We didn’t know there was an orphanage in town.) A few minutes later, the local (old) double-decker bus that takes tourists around Broome came down the street and you could hear the kids before you ever saw them. It was so cute.
It’s interesting here. Most people do not decorate outside their houses for Christmas. Just driving around it’s evident that pretty much there’s just one house per street maybe that puts anything outside. Kind of sad. I love the lights at Christmas. They add so much to the fun.
The Big Picture
Santa's pulling the sleigh!
Our favorite!
Look, it has packages under it. We did add a gold bow to the top to look like a star, sort of.
ASHAMED OF ME?
December 22, 2010 Wednesday
ASHAMED OF ME?
Last night Samantha asked if we would take her to an appointment at 9:30 in the morning. It wasn’t a big deal, but Orson needed to take some time at the internet café to research some computer stuff. So I dropped him off there and picked up Samantha. When we got close to Centrelink, some kind of agency that helps Aborigines, she directed me to park in the shade of a tree. She then explained that she would walk through a nearby building and cross the street to a different building. It seemed strange that she didn’t have me park closer, but then I realized that she didn’t want to be seen being driven by a white woman. Made me laugh!
We had a great afternoon at the care center and then did the bread run. Jan Martin, the animal carer, said she has 11 wallabies on bottles and had to buy another crib in order to care for a new one that is injured and needs to be confined. She just amazes me. They don’t take vacations because she doesn’t know who would care for her “babies.” (What an understanding husband she has!) We also had a great visit with the Catholic missionary family. Her 9th baby is due in February. She’s the same age I was when I had Sam. I can’t wait to hold her tiny one!
ASHAMED OF ME?
Last night Samantha asked if we would take her to an appointment at 9:30 in the morning. It wasn’t a big deal, but Orson needed to take some time at the internet café to research some computer stuff. So I dropped him off there and picked up Samantha. When we got close to Centrelink, some kind of agency that helps Aborigines, she directed me to park in the shade of a tree. She then explained that she would walk through a nearby building and cross the street to a different building. It seemed strange that she didn’t have me park closer, but then I realized that she didn’t want to be seen being driven by a white woman. Made me laugh!
We had a great afternoon at the care center and then did the bread run. Jan Martin, the animal carer, said she has 11 wallabies on bottles and had to buy another crib in order to care for a new one that is injured and needs to be confined. She just amazes me. They don’t take vacations because she doesn’t know who would care for her “babies.” (What an understanding husband she has!) We also had a great visit with the Catholic missionary family. Her 9th baby is due in February. She’s the same age I was when I had Sam. I can’t wait to hold her tiny one!
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
ESTHER
December 21, 2010 Tuesday
There’s a woman on our branch list that we have never seen except for her picture in the paper when she helped officiate at the opening of something for the Aborigines. Anyway, we have tried and tried to visit her. Sometimes no one is there. Other times, a voice has called, “Who is it?” When we say who we are and that we want to visit Esther, the voice tells us she’s not home. Other times, her niece, young adult age, answers and tells us that Esther is teaching in Kunnunurra, a town 12 hours away from here by car. I even went visiting teach with another branch member and all the response we got was “the voice” telling us she wasn’t home. We suspected for a long time that “the voice” was Esther. So today we were tracting the housing complex where she lives and decided to try to see her. Her niece answered the door and greeted us. A voice called, “Who is it?” I guess the niece let her know it was us because that was the last we heard of the voice. Well, Orson was not to be ignored. He said, “Was that Esther?” No answer. He asked the niece if she always loses her voice when people come or just for us. Niece muttered a few things. Then he told her we just want to find out why she doesn’t want to talk to us. No answer. He asked if we had done something wrong. No answer. Finally he told the niece to wish Esther a “Merry Christmas.” We laughed a lot after we left the vicinity.
We went back to the clinic today and while we were waiting for my blood draw, Dr IK came out. I was able to give him the Book of Mormon. He smiled at both of us before calling his next patient. Then I called the hospital imaging department to see about getting my ultrasound done. They had lost the order for it that I’d left there yesterday. I was put on hold for a while and then the receptionist said she would just give me an appointment anyway. It’s for two weeks from now. Socialized medicine—gotta love it! Evidently what qualifies as an emergency in the US isn’t one in Australia. But my leg is feeling better tonight, so maybe I won’t need to have the scan after all.
There’s a woman on our branch list that we have never seen except for her picture in the paper when she helped officiate at the opening of something for the Aborigines. Anyway, we have tried and tried to visit her. Sometimes no one is there. Other times, a voice has called, “Who is it?” When we say who we are and that we want to visit Esther, the voice tells us she’s not home. Other times, her niece, young adult age, answers and tells us that Esther is teaching in Kunnunurra, a town 12 hours away from here by car. I even went visiting teach with another branch member and all the response we got was “the voice” telling us she wasn’t home. We suspected for a long time that “the voice” was Esther. So today we were tracting the housing complex where she lives and decided to try to see her. Her niece answered the door and greeted us. A voice called, “Who is it?” I guess the niece let her know it was us because that was the last we heard of the voice. Well, Orson was not to be ignored. He said, “Was that Esther?” No answer. He asked the niece if she always loses her voice when people come or just for us. Niece muttered a few things. Then he told her we just want to find out why she doesn’t want to talk to us. No answer. He asked if we had done something wrong. No answer. Finally he told the niece to wish Esther a “Merry Christmas.” We laughed a lot after we left the vicinity.
We went back to the clinic today and while we were waiting for my blood draw, Dr IK came out. I was able to give him the Book of Mormon. He smiled at both of us before calling his next patient. Then I called the hospital imaging department to see about getting my ultrasound done. They had lost the order for it that I’d left there yesterday. I was put on hold for a while and then the receptionist said she would just give me an appointment anyway. It’s for two weeks from now. Socialized medicine—gotta love it! Evidently what qualifies as an emergency in the US isn’t one in Australia. But my leg is feeling better tonight, so maybe I won’t need to have the scan after all.
DR IK or A GOOD PAIN?
December 20, 2010 Monday
Last Friday after just normal p-day activities, I stood up and experienced a terrible pain in the calf of my leg. I began limping and carried on with our regular activities. It didn’t hurt when I wasn’t putting weight on it. It only hurt when I flexed my foot with weight on it when I walked. So later that night I called my sister-in-law, Marjorie, an RN, and then my sister, Nancy, a sonographer. They both indicated that I should get it checked as it might be a deep vein thrombosis. So on Saturday we went to the ER. The clerk there said that even if I did need an ultrasound, it wouldn’t be done until next week because they only did emergencies on weekends. So we went back home and I stayed off of it as much as I could for the rest of the weekend. This morning it was still bothering me a little, so we went out to do a little missionary work. By noon, it was hurting a lot more, so we went to the clinic next to the hospital. (We had found out it would be $80 cheaper if a GP ordered the ultrasound than if we went to the ER for it.) As a walk-in, we got to take “pot-luck” on the doctor. The receptionist told me I would see Dr. IK (pronounced eye-kay). He turned out to be from Nigeria and has been in Broome only two months. He practiced in Botswana for 5 years before coming here. His real name is very long so he’d shortened it to IK. He was very sharp and as we talked it came up that we were here as missionaries for the church. He’d not heard of the church before and had been raised a Catholic but had switched over to being a Pentacostal. A bit later in the exam he asked me, “So what’s the difference between the Mormons and the other churches out there?” What a dream question that was! He received the short version of a 1st lesson which includes the Book of Mormon. He asked how long it is and then said, “I’d like to take a look at that book.” (Missionary swoons right here!) I told him I’d bring him one. He ordered an ultrasound (still waiting to hear back from the Imaging Department at the hospital as to when my appointment is) and told me to get a fasting blood test. So tomorrow we go back to the clinic to have that done and drop off a Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith pamphlet to the good doctor. I’m thinking it was worth a pain in the leg.
Later today we returned to Matt Wilson, a J-dub that Orson had found tracting. We explained we would like to talk to him about some things we’d learned about his church and its statements about Mormonism. He said he could give us 5 minutes. An hour and 20 minutes later, we left. He was very attentive and told us that he had left his church for a while and then come back to it and was comfortable there. But he was surprised to see all the falsehoods that had been printed in the Watch Tower about our church. We invited him to read the Book of Mormon but he didn’t take us up on that. We figure we’ve planted a lot of seeds for him to ponder. When we left, he said we could come back to talk anytime. We are planning to take him a copy of the Family Proclamation and the Living Christ in a couple of weeks.
Last Friday after just normal p-day activities, I stood up and experienced a terrible pain in the calf of my leg. I began limping and carried on with our regular activities. It didn’t hurt when I wasn’t putting weight on it. It only hurt when I flexed my foot with weight on it when I walked. So later that night I called my sister-in-law, Marjorie, an RN, and then my sister, Nancy, a sonographer. They both indicated that I should get it checked as it might be a deep vein thrombosis. So on Saturday we went to the ER. The clerk there said that even if I did need an ultrasound, it wouldn’t be done until next week because they only did emergencies on weekends. So we went back home and I stayed off of it as much as I could for the rest of the weekend. This morning it was still bothering me a little, so we went out to do a little missionary work. By noon, it was hurting a lot more, so we went to the clinic next to the hospital. (We had found out it would be $80 cheaper if a GP ordered the ultrasound than if we went to the ER for it.) As a walk-in, we got to take “pot-luck” on the doctor. The receptionist told me I would see Dr. IK (pronounced eye-kay). He turned out to be from Nigeria and has been in Broome only two months. He practiced in Botswana for 5 years before coming here. His real name is very long so he’d shortened it to IK. He was very sharp and as we talked it came up that we were here as missionaries for the church. He’d not heard of the church before and had been raised a Catholic but had switched over to being a Pentacostal. A bit later in the exam he asked me, “So what’s the difference between the Mormons and the other churches out there?” What a dream question that was! He received the short version of a 1st lesson which includes the Book of Mormon. He asked how long it is and then said, “I’d like to take a look at that book.” (Missionary swoons right here!) I told him I’d bring him one. He ordered an ultrasound (still waiting to hear back from the Imaging Department at the hospital as to when my appointment is) and told me to get a fasting blood test. So tomorrow we go back to the clinic to have that done and drop off a Book of Mormon and Joseph Smith pamphlet to the good doctor. I’m thinking it was worth a pain in the leg.
Later today we returned to Matt Wilson, a J-dub that Orson had found tracting. We explained we would like to talk to him about some things we’d learned about his church and its statements about Mormonism. He said he could give us 5 minutes. An hour and 20 minutes later, we left. He was very attentive and told us that he had left his church for a while and then come back to it and was comfortable there. But he was surprised to see all the falsehoods that had been printed in the Watch Tower about our church. We invited him to read the Book of Mormon but he didn’t take us up on that. We figure we’ve planted a lot of seeds for him to ponder. When we left, he said we could come back to talk anytime. We are planning to take him a copy of the Family Proclamation and the Living Christ in a couple of weeks.
“WHERE 2 OR 3 ARE GATHERED….”
December 19, 2010 Sunday
Well, actually we had four of us at church today. The Robinson family and the Davis family have gone to Perth for the holidays. Samantha didn’t answer her phone when we called to say we were coming by to pick her up for church, so it was us and Raphy and Simon at church. After the sacrament, we watched the first hour of the Saturday afternoon session of conference. During the RS/Priesthood time we talked about how those talks related to the true meaning of Christmas: Brother Hales had talked about agency. It occurred to me that Christ chose to do what he did in the pre-earth life. Mary chose to bear Him here. Joseph chose to marry here in spite of her pregnancy. And finally, once again, Jesus Christ chose to fulfill the atonement. Elder Cook spoke about light. Christ is the Light of the world. Elder Edgley spoke about faith and that’s where it all begins. We must choose to have faith in Jesus Christ and his gospel and then act accordingly and there we are once again back at agency. Kind of cool how those talks all dove-tailed together. We may have been small in number but that didn’t stop us from learning from being at church today.
Well, actually we had four of us at church today. The Robinson family and the Davis family have gone to Perth for the holidays. Samantha didn’t answer her phone when we called to say we were coming by to pick her up for church, so it was us and Raphy and Simon at church. After the sacrament, we watched the first hour of the Saturday afternoon session of conference. During the RS/Priesthood time we talked about how those talks related to the true meaning of Christmas: Brother Hales had talked about agency. It occurred to me that Christ chose to do what he did in the pre-earth life. Mary chose to bear Him here. Joseph chose to marry here in spite of her pregnancy. And finally, once again, Jesus Christ chose to fulfill the atonement. Elder Cook spoke about light. Christ is the Light of the world. Elder Edgley spoke about faith and that’s where it all begins. We must choose to have faith in Jesus Christ and his gospel and then act accordingly and there we are once again back at agency. Kind of cool how those talks all dove-tailed together. We may have been small in number but that didn’t stop us from learning from being at church today.
Celebrations
December 18, 2010 Saturday
Yesterday was our 41st wedding anniversary. There’s a Thai restaurant in town that we have wanted to try since we got here but have saved it for a special occasion. So we went there. Our first clue was the Indian fellow who greeted us at the door and was our waiter. The 2nd clue was that we were the only patrons there at 5:30 on a Friday night. (It was always crowded during tourist season, but evidently the locals know that is isn’t the best Thai food in town.) We ordered Garlic Fish and Sweet and Sour Pork. We continued to be the only ones there. The food was beautifully presented, but it had none of the delicate Thai flavors that we love. And it had no “hot” in either dish! Orson asked for the Thai hot sauce and that helped. We asked the waiter why there wasn’t any heat in the food. He explained that it had been “Aussified.” Evidently the first owner was an Australian married to a Thai. What seemed strange is that one of our inactive members has a Thai family living with her and the husband cooks at that restaurant. They must make him follow the Aussie recipes. Oh well, we will continue to stay married even if the celebration wasn’t all that we had hoped.
Tonight “Woolworths Carol,” is on TV. It’s a Christmas spectacular filmed at a huge stadium in Sydney complete with a children’s choir, orchestra, popular recording artists, and “traditional Christmas fireworks.” Fireworks are a new addition to Christmas for us. The show is good; every other song is a traditional Christmas carol that everyone sings along to. Many audience members are holding special candle holders that they sway along to the music. They did that at the carol singing thing we went to last week too. (Woolworths is one of the 2 huge grocery chains here in Australia.) The Tap Dogs, a group from the US are performing now—looks like cloggers made it big. The Wiggles are coming up next. Good thing Melinda’s little boy, Ben, loved them so we know who they are! Oh dear, Jack Black is now singing a fractured version of the “The Little Drummer Boy.” The Wiggles are singing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” “Snow” is now falling on the stage because Santa has arrived. This is really fun. Most of the audience is made up of families, and lots of folks are dressed in red with little kids having cute Christmas face painting on. Santa hats and reindeer antlers are everywhere. The cameras show different folks dancing and enjoying the music. The cutest was the little two year old girl’s reaction when Santa came it. Well, now you know what a Christmas program on TV is like down here.
Yesterday was our 41st wedding anniversary. There’s a Thai restaurant in town that we have wanted to try since we got here but have saved it for a special occasion. So we went there. Our first clue was the Indian fellow who greeted us at the door and was our waiter. The 2nd clue was that we were the only patrons there at 5:30 on a Friday night. (It was always crowded during tourist season, but evidently the locals know that is isn’t the best Thai food in town.) We ordered Garlic Fish and Sweet and Sour Pork. We continued to be the only ones there. The food was beautifully presented, but it had none of the delicate Thai flavors that we love. And it had no “hot” in either dish! Orson asked for the Thai hot sauce and that helped. We asked the waiter why there wasn’t any heat in the food. He explained that it had been “Aussified.” Evidently the first owner was an Australian married to a Thai. What seemed strange is that one of our inactive members has a Thai family living with her and the husband cooks at that restaurant. They must make him follow the Aussie recipes. Oh well, we will continue to stay married even if the celebration wasn’t all that we had hoped.
Tonight “Woolworths Carol,” is on TV. It’s a Christmas spectacular filmed at a huge stadium in Sydney complete with a children’s choir, orchestra, popular recording artists, and “traditional Christmas fireworks.” Fireworks are a new addition to Christmas for us. The show is good; every other song is a traditional Christmas carol that everyone sings along to. Many audience members are holding special candle holders that they sway along to the music. They did that at the carol singing thing we went to last week too. (Woolworths is one of the 2 huge grocery chains here in Australia.) The Tap Dogs, a group from the US are performing now—looks like cloggers made it big. The Wiggles are coming up next. Good thing Melinda’s little boy, Ben, loved them so we know who they are! Oh dear, Jack Black is now singing a fractured version of the “The Little Drummer Boy.” The Wiggles are singing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.” “Snow” is now falling on the stage because Santa has arrived. This is really fun. Most of the audience is made up of families, and lots of folks are dressed in red with little kids having cute Christmas face painting on. Santa hats and reindeer antlers are everywhere. The cameras show different folks dancing and enjoying the music. The cutest was the little two year old girl’s reaction when Santa came it. Well, now you know what a Christmas program on TV is like down here.
Thursday, December 16, 2010
A 7TH DAY DAY
December 16, 2010 Thursday
Today was a tracting day. Just before we quit for lunch we were at a door when we heard a motor scooter coming out from the back yard. The fellow on it was in a pilot’s uniform for Golden Eagle Airlines. Chris Cavilla was very friendly. He said he was a 7th Day Adventist and had known the Brewsters, a senior missionary couple from about 3 years ago. They had attended a “Get Fit” workshop the Adventists had run. He said we could come back to talk to him.
This afternoon, we went back out tracting. The first house that we went to had a dog who just couldn’t wait for us to come through the gate so we could pet her. The fellow who answered the door invited us in for a chat. Turned out he was also 7th Day Adventist. We spent a long time just visiting about each other’s beliefs and the JW’s as he called them. He seemed to be aware of William Miller, an apostate Mormon, who had influenced the beginnings of both the JW’s and the Adventists. He didn’t seem to feel threatened by our proselyting. He expressed that we are all teaching the same Gospel. Obviously, he hasn’t read the garbage the J-dubs have put out about us. He invited us to drop by their church sometime and meet the pastor and caretakers. His name is Colin. It was a great visit.
Tonight we did YW, but only Carolyn and Kerryanne Shires came. They brought one of Carolyn’s many friends, a girl named Dareyn. She was cute but definitely not interested in our Personal Progress work on Divine Nature. We read a couple of stories about President Monson as a youth at Christmas from a new book we received, “Christmas with the Prophets.” I’m worried about the Rollason girls. They seem to be busy whenever church stuff is going on lately. I hope we aren’t losing them.
Today was a tracting day. Just before we quit for lunch we were at a door when we heard a motor scooter coming out from the back yard. The fellow on it was in a pilot’s uniform for Golden Eagle Airlines. Chris Cavilla was very friendly. He said he was a 7th Day Adventist and had known the Brewsters, a senior missionary couple from about 3 years ago. They had attended a “Get Fit” workshop the Adventists had run. He said we could come back to talk to him.
This afternoon, we went back out tracting. The first house that we went to had a dog who just couldn’t wait for us to come through the gate so we could pet her. The fellow who answered the door invited us in for a chat. Turned out he was also 7th Day Adventist. We spent a long time just visiting about each other’s beliefs and the JW’s as he called them. He seemed to be aware of William Miller, an apostate Mormon, who had influenced the beginnings of both the JW’s and the Adventists. He didn’t seem to feel threatened by our proselyting. He expressed that we are all teaching the same Gospel. Obviously, he hasn’t read the garbage the J-dubs have put out about us. He invited us to drop by their church sometime and meet the pastor and caretakers. His name is Colin. It was a great visit.
Tonight we did YW, but only Carolyn and Kerryanne Shires came. They brought one of Carolyn’s many friends, a girl named Dareyn. She was cute but definitely not interested in our Personal Progress work on Divine Nature. We read a couple of stories about President Monson as a youth at Christmas from a new book we received, “Christmas with the Prophets.” I’m worried about the Rollason girls. They seem to be busy whenever church stuff is going on lately. I hope we aren’t losing them.
ANOTHER CHRISTMAS PARTY
December 15, 2010 Wednesday
Yesterday morning we went to the care center to help out with the Christmas Party. When we got there, they were bringing as many patients as could get there to the big lounge in one of the wings. Two aboriginal fellows were singing and playing guitars. They were good; they must have been singing a lot of Australian folk songs because we sure weren’t familiar with any of them. The one exception was “Tiny Seashells.” Then they asked if we wanted to hear some Christmas songs. So they sang a song about the Beagle Bay Catholic/Aboriginal community north of here. In the middle of the song, they sang one verse of “Silent Night,” and then continued on with more unfamiliar stuff. And that was the end of the music. Then Santa came in with a big rolling cart full of presents. His costume was made out of a stretchy, thin, red material. You could see the pillow used to make his belly bigger. But at least it didn’t make him hotter than it already was outside. He had gifts for everyone and his elf “Bon Bon” handed them out. I think she was his granddaughter who came to help. His beard was real but not very white. Everyone got a new shirt and a bottle of lotion and some soap. Then we hurriedly moved everyone out of the big area and carried in pre-decorated tables. We then wheeled everyone back in so they could all have lunch together. We left at that point. But it was great to see all the effort put into making it special for those poor folks who live there.
Speaking of Christmas music—we miss it. You don’t hear it anywhere. Neither of the shopping centers are playing it. I ran all the way through the FM dial on the car radio tonight and didn’t happen on to even one Christmas song. Even the TV ads don’t have Christmas music in the background. They do celebrate Christmas here, but it certainly doesn’t have the atmosphere we have in the states.
Yesterday morning we went to the care center to help out with the Christmas Party. When we got there, they were bringing as many patients as could get there to the big lounge in one of the wings. Two aboriginal fellows were singing and playing guitars. They were good; they must have been singing a lot of Australian folk songs because we sure weren’t familiar with any of them. The one exception was “Tiny Seashells.” Then they asked if we wanted to hear some Christmas songs. So they sang a song about the Beagle Bay Catholic/Aboriginal community north of here. In the middle of the song, they sang one verse of “Silent Night,” and then continued on with more unfamiliar stuff. And that was the end of the music. Then Santa came in with a big rolling cart full of presents. His costume was made out of a stretchy, thin, red material. You could see the pillow used to make his belly bigger. But at least it didn’t make him hotter than it already was outside. He had gifts for everyone and his elf “Bon Bon” handed them out. I think she was his granddaughter who came to help. His beard was real but not very white. Everyone got a new shirt and a bottle of lotion and some soap. Then we hurriedly moved everyone out of the big area and carried in pre-decorated tables. We then wheeled everyone back in so they could all have lunch together. We left at that point. But it was great to see all the effort put into making it special for those poor folks who live there.
Speaking of Christmas music—we miss it. You don’t hear it anywhere. Neither of the shopping centers are playing it. I ran all the way through the FM dial on the car radio tonight and didn’t happen on to even one Christmas song. Even the TV ads don’t have Christmas music in the background. They do celebrate Christmas here, but it certainly doesn’t have the atmosphere we have in the states.
DAMON
December 14, 2010 Tuesday
We spent a couple of hours this morning with Damon, a Jehovah’s Witness. Orson had spent a ton of time preparing a presentation for them. We’d checked out a book from the library written by the JWs explaining their history, accomplishments, and doctrine. We also had a book by Milton S Backman that told the history of Mormonism and the development of new sects after the death of Joseph Smith. It was interesting to learn that Russell Taze, the founder, contacted members of an apostate Mormon group, the Millerites, when we was beginning his bible study group. The JWs are the only other sect we know of that believes that God and Jesus Christ are separate beings. They also have a group of 12 men that govern the Watch Tower and Bible Study Corporation. Coincidence?
Anyway, we proceeded to show Damon how his church was merely formed by a man who claimed no inspiration. Doctrine has been changed at times (Damon explained that happens when the leaders learn something new). They anticipated that Christ would come again in 1914. When He didn’t, they claimed He had come spiritually, but not to everyone. Another JW had given us copies of 3 articles about Mormonism that had appeared in the Watch Tower over the years. We spent time showing Damon that the articles had gross errors in them concerning our doctrine. We told him our church publishes no derogatory literature about other churches as theirs does. He then wanted to discuss the fact that we were building up “man’s kingdom” when we support it by voting and also the fact that we go to war. We explained we “render unto Caesar…” but he said he did too by paying taxes, but these other issues were totally wrong to take part in. He couldn’t accept that we had more scriptures that God’s Bible that He had protected over all the time since Christ so we could have what it teaches today. He also complained that we hadn’t used God’s name, Jehovah, once during our entire presentation. We asked him why Jehovah isn’t mentioned at all in the New Testament. He explained that during the ancient period when governments ruled the church, they had taken His name out. We challenged him that then he was admitting that the Bible hadn’t come through unscathed. He replied that it had since been fixed (obviously in their translation.) We asked him about baptism for the dead and read I Cor 15:29. He read it out of their Bible; it gave the connotation of “Why should man be baptized if he’s just going to die.” (We aren’t sure of their teachings about baptism so we couldn’t continue with that. We then explained that we could discuss differences all day long, but that all we really wanted was for him to read and pray about the Book of Mormon. He said he was too busy with his study of the Bible. At that point, we asked if we could have a closing prayer. It’s interesting that with both Damon and Ally, another JW, neither of them would pray in front of us. They allowed us to pray, but they don’t seem to want us to hear them pray. We hope to be able to talk to more of these folks. They have a nice chapel just a block away from where we live that could easily be converted to a Mormon chapel if we could convert the whole group ;o)
We spent a couple of hours this morning with Damon, a Jehovah’s Witness. Orson had spent a ton of time preparing a presentation for them. We’d checked out a book from the library written by the JWs explaining their history, accomplishments, and doctrine. We also had a book by Milton S Backman that told the history of Mormonism and the development of new sects after the death of Joseph Smith. It was interesting to learn that Russell Taze, the founder, contacted members of an apostate Mormon group, the Millerites, when we was beginning his bible study group. The JWs are the only other sect we know of that believes that God and Jesus Christ are separate beings. They also have a group of 12 men that govern the Watch Tower and Bible Study Corporation. Coincidence?
Anyway, we proceeded to show Damon how his church was merely formed by a man who claimed no inspiration. Doctrine has been changed at times (Damon explained that happens when the leaders learn something new). They anticipated that Christ would come again in 1914. When He didn’t, they claimed He had come spiritually, but not to everyone. Another JW had given us copies of 3 articles about Mormonism that had appeared in the Watch Tower over the years. We spent time showing Damon that the articles had gross errors in them concerning our doctrine. We told him our church publishes no derogatory literature about other churches as theirs does. He then wanted to discuss the fact that we were building up “man’s kingdom” when we support it by voting and also the fact that we go to war. We explained we “render unto Caesar…” but he said he did too by paying taxes, but these other issues were totally wrong to take part in. He couldn’t accept that we had more scriptures that God’s Bible that He had protected over all the time since Christ so we could have what it teaches today. He also complained that we hadn’t used God’s name, Jehovah, once during our entire presentation. We asked him why Jehovah isn’t mentioned at all in the New Testament. He explained that during the ancient period when governments ruled the church, they had taken His name out. We challenged him that then he was admitting that the Bible hadn’t come through unscathed. He replied that it had since been fixed (obviously in their translation.) We asked him about baptism for the dead and read I Cor 15:29. He read it out of their Bible; it gave the connotation of “Why should man be baptized if he’s just going to die.” (We aren’t sure of their teachings about baptism so we couldn’t continue with that. We then explained that we could discuss differences all day long, but that all we really wanted was for him to read and pray about the Book of Mormon. He said he was too busy with his study of the Bible. At that point, we asked if we could have a closing prayer. It’s interesting that with both Damon and Ally, another JW, neither of them would pray in front of us. They allowed us to pray, but they don’t seem to want us to hear them pray. We hope to be able to talk to more of these folks. They have a nice chapel just a block away from where we live that could easily be converted to a Mormon chapel if we could convert the whole group ;o)
JAN MARTIN
Jan Martin, Wild Animal Carer
December 13, 2010 Monday
This morning we visited Jan Martin, the “Wild Life Carer.” Talk about interesting! She took us into the living/dining area where there was a crib with two what looked like the old diaper stackers we used to hang in our closets except that the opening had been sewed up to about the middle of the opening. Sticking out of opening of was the head of a baby wallaby about the size of a Dachshund’s head. These “pouches” were hanging on the inside of the crib. She grabbed a flannel “bag” and took the baby out of its crib pouch. She held the bag open and he wiggled right into it, happy to be in another pouch. There was a full grown wallaby visible on the patio out back. Against the wall was an incubator just like is used in the hospital with 3 flannel “pouches” in it. Jan took a baby wallaby out of one of those—it had no hair yet. Then we went outside to a pen alongside the house. There were more older ones out there, some in flannel pouches. All we saw coming out of one pouch were legs! She then took us to the other side of the house where a fence enclosure was. Hanging upside down in there were about 10-12 “flying foxes,” the largest specie of bat. She went in and got one. Its face really did look like a fox and even has the reddish color of a fox. These are her favorites. They love to be held and lick your fingers just like a dog will. They eat only fruit. She has names for all of them. She said she has even had a couple fly themselves back after being released when they have been sick again. We sat inside while she fed the wallabies from baby bottles. The nipples are really long. She was so interesting to listen to. She’s been doing this for 18 years and pays for all the expenses involved herself. Her husband works at the hospital. They have a 25 year old son living with them. He told us he feeds the bats and cleans their pen.
Tonight we went over to the Seashells resort where the Page family is staying for a BBQ. They invited the branch over for an FHE activity. It has rained nearly all day but cleared up about an hour before the dinner. We used the BBQ outside by the pool. The kids and dads all swam. It has a really nice pool. It was potluck and we ate well. I took chicken marinated in taco seasoning, a Jello fruit salad, and a cheese ball. Only part of the cheese ball came home. We don’t feel bad about that—we can always enjoy it. There was a beautiful sunset tonight but we weren’t able to get any pictures because of the party.
"PEEK"
In the playpen
If you don't have a dog, one of these will do ;o)
This little guy lives in the incubator you can see behind him and Jan--"Look, no hair!"
This guy loves attention.
Jan and one of her flying foxes
"In the bat cage"
December 13, 2010 Monday
This morning we visited Jan Martin, the “Wild Life Carer.” Talk about interesting! She took us into the living/dining area where there was a crib with two what looked like the old diaper stackers we used to hang in our closets except that the opening had been sewed up to about the middle of the opening. Sticking out of opening of was the head of a baby wallaby about the size of a Dachshund’s head. These “pouches” were hanging on the inside of the crib. She grabbed a flannel “bag” and took the baby out of its crib pouch. She held the bag open and he wiggled right into it, happy to be in another pouch. There was a full grown wallaby visible on the patio out back. Against the wall was an incubator just like is used in the hospital with 3 flannel “pouches” in it. Jan took a baby wallaby out of one of those—it had no hair yet. Then we went outside to a pen alongside the house. There were more older ones out there, some in flannel pouches. All we saw coming out of one pouch were legs! She then took us to the other side of the house where a fence enclosure was. Hanging upside down in there were about 10-12 “flying foxes,” the largest specie of bat. She went in and got one. Its face really did look like a fox and even has the reddish color of a fox. These are her favorites. They love to be held and lick your fingers just like a dog will. They eat only fruit. She has names for all of them. She said she has even had a couple fly themselves back after being released when they have been sick again. We sat inside while she fed the wallabies from baby bottles. The nipples are really long. She was so interesting to listen to. She’s been doing this for 18 years and pays for all the expenses involved herself. Her husband works at the hospital. They have a 25 year old son living with them. He told us he feeds the bats and cleans their pen.
Tonight we went over to the Seashells resort where the Page family is staying for a BBQ. They invited the branch over for an FHE activity. It has rained nearly all day but cleared up about an hour before the dinner. We used the BBQ outside by the pool. The kids and dads all swam. It has a really nice pool. It was potluck and we ate well. I took chicken marinated in taco seasoning, a Jello fruit salad, and a cheese ball. Only part of the cheese ball came home. We don’t feel bad about that—we can always enjoy it. There was a beautiful sunset tonight but we weren’t able to get any pictures because of the party.
"PEEK"
In the playpen
If you don't have a dog, one of these will do ;o)
This little guy lives in the incubator you can see behind him and Jan--"Look, no hair!"
This guy loves attention.
Jan and one of her flying foxes
"In the bat cage"
WE MUST BE OLD!
December 11, 2010 Saturday
Today we called Germany and wished Paul, our oldest, a happy 40th birthday. Wow! We never thought we’d have a kid THAT old. But he sounded good and happy so I guess he’s going to survive it.
While we were out tracting this morning, we found an American who retired from the AF after flying planes for 20 years. Somehow he ended up marrying a woman from Canberra. They moved up here and he flies people all over the northwest here. He mentioned he flies a lot of Catholics out to their missions they run in Aboriginal communities. He trained at Columbus AFB in Mississippi when Paul was stationed for a while. He thought Mississippi was a nice place to leave just like Paul and Diana did. He’s Baptist and happy where he is. We did leave him a “Seventeen Points of the True Church” so he could look up a few scriptures to see what Christ had in His church.
Tonight we had the Wyldes come over for dinner. They’ve been packing all day and we figured that Karen would be happy to not have to cook tonight. Their moving truck comes on Wednesday and they leave on Friday or Saturday. We had tacos—a food most people like. In fact, Karen can hardly wait to get back to Perth so they can go to a really good Mexican restaurant.
Today we called Germany and wished Paul, our oldest, a happy 40th birthday. Wow! We never thought we’d have a kid THAT old. But he sounded good and happy so I guess he’s going to survive it.
While we were out tracting this morning, we found an American who retired from the AF after flying planes for 20 years. Somehow he ended up marrying a woman from Canberra. They moved up here and he flies people all over the northwest here. He mentioned he flies a lot of Catholics out to their missions they run in Aboriginal communities. He trained at Columbus AFB in Mississippi when Paul was stationed for a while. He thought Mississippi was a nice place to leave just like Paul and Diana did. He’s Baptist and happy where he is. We did leave him a “Seventeen Points of the True Church” so he could look up a few scriptures to see what Christ had in His church.
Tonight we had the Wyldes come over for dinner. They’ve been packing all day and we figured that Karen would be happy to not have to cook tonight. Their moving truck comes on Wednesday and they leave on Friday or Saturday. We had tacos—a food most people like. In fact, Karen can hardly wait to get back to Perth so they can go to a really good Mexican restaurant.
LAST SUNDAY
December 12, 2010 Sunday
Today was the Wylde family’s last time for church in Broome. President Robinson asked them to talk and express what they had learned while in Broome. It was great—they’d had no advance warning and ended up taking the whole time. Kevin went first. He’s never been baptized although he’s been attending church off and on for 10-15 years to support Karen. He was raised with Salvation Army and Anglican teachings. He believes in Christ and God and prayer and said he’s working on believing the Book of Mormon is true. He’s enjoyed his associations with the church up here. Karen was more emotional. She explained she’d been totally inactive and didn’t even know the church was up here when she moved here. She saw the senior missionaries when she was a checker at the grocery store but it took her a while to decide to tell them that she was LDS. She finally did but told them she wasn’t ready to come back. It took a while but she finally started coming; she said she had learned so much. She was grateful for the opportunity she’d had to work in the RS and Primary. She thanked Samantha for letting her come visiting teaching. She’s also grown a lot being in a small community because she’d been able to volunteer and help out much more than she had in Perth. Jacob (10) said he was glad he’d lived in Broome and would miss the sunsets.
Our Priesthood/Relief Society meeting was great. The lesson was about the sacrament. President Robinson played part of a DVD by Truman G. Madsen explaining about the Last Supper when Christ introduced the sacrament. It was really good. We also watched his explanation of the atonement. Robinsons will be in Perth for a month, so we are borrowing the set of DVD’s to watch. The DVD’s are titled, “Truman G. Madsen in the Holy Land—The Eternal Christ.” We had ice cream Sunday and a member family, the Pages, from Port Hedland arrived just in time for that. They had hoped to be here for all of church, but their plans didn’t work out so they ended up leaving early this morning instead of yesterday.
Today was the Wylde family’s last time for church in Broome. President Robinson asked them to talk and express what they had learned while in Broome. It was great—they’d had no advance warning and ended up taking the whole time. Kevin went first. He’s never been baptized although he’s been attending church off and on for 10-15 years to support Karen. He was raised with Salvation Army and Anglican teachings. He believes in Christ and God and prayer and said he’s working on believing the Book of Mormon is true. He’s enjoyed his associations with the church up here. Karen was more emotional. She explained she’d been totally inactive and didn’t even know the church was up here when she moved here. She saw the senior missionaries when she was a checker at the grocery store but it took her a while to decide to tell them that she was LDS. She finally did but told them she wasn’t ready to come back. It took a while but she finally started coming; she said she had learned so much. She was grateful for the opportunity she’d had to work in the RS and Primary. She thanked Samantha for letting her come visiting teaching. She’s also grown a lot being in a small community because she’d been able to volunteer and help out much more than she had in Perth. Jacob (10) said he was glad he’d lived in Broome and would miss the sunsets.
Our Priesthood/Relief Society meeting was great. The lesson was about the sacrament. President Robinson played part of a DVD by Truman G. Madsen explaining about the Last Supper when Christ introduced the sacrament. It was really good. We also watched his explanation of the atonement. Robinsons will be in Perth for a month, so we are borrowing the set of DVD’s to watch. The DVD’s are titled, “Truman G. Madsen in the Holy Land—The Eternal Christ.” We had ice cream Sunday and a member family, the Pages, from Port Hedland arrived just in time for that. They had hoped to be here for all of church, but their plans didn’t work out so they ended up leaving early this morning instead of yesterday.
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Smart Dog
We went to the Post Office the other day. This dog below was lying in front of the door in the right spot to keep the door open. He was thoroughly enjoying the air conditioning and the great thing is that the employees didn't seem to mind!
THE TREE’S UP!
And the pop-up tree.
Cute YW
December 9, 2010 Thursday
Last night after the bread run, we picked up Marcella as soon as she returned from work. She ate dinner with us, hamburger soup and sausage rolls. Then we spent a couple of hours with her talking about The Choice and how we choose our reactions to situations. It took her a long time to see that her constant worrying about what people were saying about her was very self-focused. We drew her a chart showing that and then another one showing how she could become others-focused. She didn’t show the intense anger toward people that she did on Sunday. She’s been studying the material we had gone over in an effort to understand it better. She flies out on Saturday at 5:00 pm but is coming over earlier in the day to talk some more.
While we were tracting, we came to a house that had a sign that said, “Wild Animal Carer.” (A “carer” is someone who takes care of somebody or something. Lots of carers work at the nursing home.) The lady who answered the door said she couldn’t talk right then because she was trying to set the broken foot of a wallaby someone had dropped off. She has 12 wallabies that she’s taking care of. She said she’d been friends with some of the elders who’ve served here and that we can come back and visit.
Tonight was YW. Carolyn and Jessi came. The older girls are in Perth visiting some universities. Jessi is now living with her aunt who didn’t have a problem with her coming over. (She said her father had taken away the set of scriptures we’d given her—darn it!) We made popcorn balls and decorated our Christmas tree. The girls hung stuff in front of the windows too. We have a bunch of extra lights that they wanted to hang outside. But it was dark and we have no idea whether there’s even an outlet on the outside. The tree was in the storage room outside by the washer. It’s not much to look at, but at least it’s a tree. We also have a “pop-up tree” that’s green with purple stars on it. Now all we need to do is put away all the boxes the stuff was in.
WE NEED MORE TECHNOLOGY!
December 7, 2010 Tuesday
Tonight Samantha and her son, Bowe, came over for scripture study. We talked initially about the need for religion in our lives and then started reading 3 Nephi 11. Bowe (11 years old) was bored. He asked for a map that was on the coffee table to look at even thought I’d given him a Book of Mormon to use. About 7:45, President Robinson came in to do some branch paperwork. He sat down, pulled out his phone and started reading scriptures with us from his phone. Pretty soon Bowe was reading with us from the phone and Pres. Robinson was reading from a book. Bowe didn’t want to leave later because he was playing a game on the phone. We are definitely “behind the 8 ball” when it comes to having the stuff that kids like to work with.
Tonight Samantha and her son, Bowe, came over for scripture study. We talked initially about the need for religion in our lives and then started reading 3 Nephi 11. Bowe (11 years old) was bored. He asked for a map that was on the coffee table to look at even thought I’d given him a Book of Mormon to use. About 7:45, President Robinson came in to do some branch paperwork. He sat down, pulled out his phone and started reading scriptures with us from his phone. Pretty soon Bowe was reading with us from the phone and Pres. Robinson was reading from a book. Bowe didn’t want to leave later because he was playing a game on the phone. We are definitely “behind the 8 ball” when it comes to having the stuff that kids like to work with.
A GREAT DAY
December 5, 2010 Sunday
After the party last night, Marcella told us she would like to come to church today. So we picked up Carolyn Shires, Samantha and her son, Beau, and dropped them at church then picked up Marcella. On the way there she told us that she’d attended church with her friend in Ireland and even gone to her house to listen to General Conference once. She described the men who spoke and the big organ and everything. It was testimony meeting today, and on the way to church we explained it to her. Part way through the meeting, she leaned over and said, “I want to get up, but what if I don’t do it right?” I assured her it would be just fine. She went to the front and said how when she first came to Australia she was all about material things, but while she’s been here she’d come to realize that it’s family that’s most important( in her darling Irish accent). And then she sat down. I gave her a Kleenex. It was so great.
After church we brought her over to our place because she had indicated that she was having some relationship problems in her life and Orson has a presentation called “The Choice” which helps people sort out some of those things. We had lunch and while we were waiting for another branch member who has some issues at home, we showed her “The Restoration” DVD and explained the Book of Mormon. She promised to read and pray about it.
When we started into The Choice, it quickly became apparent that she has been hurt badly by someone outside her family talking badly about her family. You’ve heard of the Irish temper? We saw evidence of it today. She was so full of anger at this person that it was tearing her apart. Aaron, the other member who was here, helped explain some of the damage that anger can do to a person (he’s an MD). After he left, we talked to her for a bit about forgiveness and how she needed to forgive the person because he was literally consuming her life. She finally could see that was important. We took her home and both felt like we truly had been able to help one of God’s choice daughters today. She’s coming back on Wednesday night for more. Bad news? She’s leaving Broome on Saturday to continue her travels. But she has promised to stay in touch and was happy when we told her we would make sure other missionaries pick up where we leave off. I mentioned something about living the commandments and she asked what they were. I told her the 10 Commandments, chastity, alcohol and tobacco and she finished with “tea and coffee.” So she’s not walking into this blind. She said she wasn’t really ready when her friend presented stuff about the church but she is now. She’s 26. How we wish she were staying here longer!
Tonight we went to the Broome Churches’ Christmas Caroling. It seemed so weird to take some camp chairs and sit in a park and sing Christmas carols with no coats on! Christmas caroling always means freezing to death back home. The sun went down, we saw bats fly overhead, and then the program began. A small choir sang, words were projected on a screen so we could sing with them. They were selling glow sticks and candles so folks could wave them in time to the music. A choir of kids for St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School did a re-enactment of the Nativity. (They explained first that Gabriel would be a girl since none of the boys wanted to be an angel.) We laughed because the boys in our church all know about the angel Moroni and he’s a man! A few of the words in a few of the carols were different but it felt good to be singing the carols with a large crowd. There were a couple of “up beat” songs we figured the Motab wouldn’t touch, especially when the last verse of one of them was done in rap. They passed a couple of collection baskets near the end. All in all, it was a good way to finish a great day.
After the party last night, Marcella told us she would like to come to church today. So we picked up Carolyn Shires, Samantha and her son, Beau, and dropped them at church then picked up Marcella. On the way there she told us that she’d attended church with her friend in Ireland and even gone to her house to listen to General Conference once. She described the men who spoke and the big organ and everything. It was testimony meeting today, and on the way to church we explained it to her. Part way through the meeting, she leaned over and said, “I want to get up, but what if I don’t do it right?” I assured her it would be just fine. She went to the front and said how when she first came to Australia she was all about material things, but while she’s been here she’d come to realize that it’s family that’s most important( in her darling Irish accent). And then she sat down. I gave her a Kleenex. It was so great.
After church we brought her over to our place because she had indicated that she was having some relationship problems in her life and Orson has a presentation called “The Choice” which helps people sort out some of those things. We had lunch and while we were waiting for another branch member who has some issues at home, we showed her “The Restoration” DVD and explained the Book of Mormon. She promised to read and pray about it.
When we started into The Choice, it quickly became apparent that she has been hurt badly by someone outside her family talking badly about her family. You’ve heard of the Irish temper? We saw evidence of it today. She was so full of anger at this person that it was tearing her apart. Aaron, the other member who was here, helped explain some of the damage that anger can do to a person (he’s an MD). After he left, we talked to her for a bit about forgiveness and how she needed to forgive the person because he was literally consuming her life. She finally could see that was important. We took her home and both felt like we truly had been able to help one of God’s choice daughters today. She’s coming back on Wednesday night for more. Bad news? She’s leaving Broome on Saturday to continue her travels. But she has promised to stay in touch and was happy when we told her we would make sure other missionaries pick up where we leave off. I mentioned something about living the commandments and she asked what they were. I told her the 10 Commandments, chastity, alcohol and tobacco and she finished with “tea and coffee.” So she’s not walking into this blind. She said she wasn’t really ready when her friend presented stuff about the church but she is now. She’s 26. How we wish she were staying here longer!
Tonight we went to the Broome Churches’ Christmas Caroling. It seemed so weird to take some camp chairs and sit in a park and sing Christmas carols with no coats on! Christmas caroling always means freezing to death back home. The sun went down, we saw bats fly overhead, and then the program began. A small choir sang, words were projected on a screen so we could sing with them. They were selling glow sticks and candles so folks could wave them in time to the music. A choir of kids for St. Mary’s Catholic Primary School did a re-enactment of the Nativity. (They explained first that Gabriel would be a girl since none of the boys wanted to be an angel.) We laughed because the boys in our church all know about the angel Moroni and he’s a man! A few of the words in a few of the carols were different but it felt good to be singing the carols with a large crowd. There were a couple of “up beat” songs we figured the Motab wouldn’t touch, especially when the last verse of one of them was done in rap. They passed a couple of collection baskets near the end. All in all, it was a good way to finish a great day.
BRANCH CHRISTMAS PARTY
December 4, 2010 Saturday
The branch president and his family are headed to New Zealand for Christmas and the Wylde family is moving back to Perth the same day, so we had the branch Christmas party and farewell for Wyldes today. We made up some flyers on Thursday and took them around to everyone. When we went to Justin’s apartment, we found out that Orson and President Robinson had been going to the wrong unit all this time! No wonder no one ever answered the door to those two. I made Reecy Pieces, a pasta salad, and some teriyaki chicken to take. There was tons of food. Karen Wylde brought a bunch of Christmas candy, crackers, individual mince pies, etc., and set them out along with the cheese and crackers the Robinsons had set out. All the kids immediately dived into the goodies and then didn’t eat much for dinner and no one seemed to mind. We picked up Raphy and Carolyn and Michael Shires and dropped them off. Then we went back and picked up Samantha, her son Beau, her daughter and her baby about the age of our grandson, Alex. Then we went over and picked up Marcella, an Irish girl who works at the internet café who had Mormon friends in Ireland. She has been very friendly to us ever since we started going there. We invited her and she came! Altogether there were 4 Wyldes, 4 Robinsons, 3 Davis, 4 Reynolds, 2 Shires, 1 Raphy, 1 Marcella, 1 Justin and us: twenty two altogether—that’s better than any Sacrament Meeting attendance we’ve had.
It was a lot of fun. The kids all played in the swimming pool and the adults had a great time visiting, telling stories and laughing. Samantha’s grandson, Zenai, is so cute. I got to hold him for a long time and he cuddled right in—it felt so good! President Robinson cooked all the meat on the BBQ, and we spent the entire time outside—that’s a far cry from Christmas parties back in Utah! Most of us had brought $5.00 gifts to exchange. That turned out to be fun; the most popular gifts were a couple of small Nerf guns. All the guys took turns trying to hit the two geckos that were on the ceiling of the deck. Just 22 days ‘til Christmas and the big party is over. We figure we’ll have a party closer to Christmas for those who don’t leave town.
The Chef--President Robinson
Justin and Kevin Wylde
Karen Wylde and Renee Robinson
Raphy, Marilyn, and Zenai
Samantha, Savannah, Karen
The branch president and his family are headed to New Zealand for Christmas and the Wylde family is moving back to Perth the same day, so we had the branch Christmas party and farewell for Wyldes today. We made up some flyers on Thursday and took them around to everyone. When we went to Justin’s apartment, we found out that Orson and President Robinson had been going to the wrong unit all this time! No wonder no one ever answered the door to those two. I made Reecy Pieces, a pasta salad, and some teriyaki chicken to take. There was tons of food. Karen Wylde brought a bunch of Christmas candy, crackers, individual mince pies, etc., and set them out along with the cheese and crackers the Robinsons had set out. All the kids immediately dived into the goodies and then didn’t eat much for dinner and no one seemed to mind. We picked up Raphy and Carolyn and Michael Shires and dropped them off. Then we went back and picked up Samantha, her son Beau, her daughter and her baby about the age of our grandson, Alex. Then we went over and picked up Marcella, an Irish girl who works at the internet café who had Mormon friends in Ireland. She has been very friendly to us ever since we started going there. We invited her and she came! Altogether there were 4 Wyldes, 4 Robinsons, 3 Davis, 4 Reynolds, 2 Shires, 1 Raphy, 1 Marcella, 1 Justin and us: twenty two altogether—that’s better than any Sacrament Meeting attendance we’ve had.
It was a lot of fun. The kids all played in the swimming pool and the adults had a great time visiting, telling stories and laughing. Samantha’s grandson, Zenai, is so cute. I got to hold him for a long time and he cuddled right in—it felt so good! President Robinson cooked all the meat on the BBQ, and we spent the entire time outside—that’s a far cry from Christmas parties back in Utah! Most of us had brought $5.00 gifts to exchange. That turned out to be fun; the most popular gifts were a couple of small Nerf guns. All the guys took turns trying to hit the two geckos that were on the ceiling of the deck. Just 22 days ‘til Christmas and the big party is over. We figure we’ll have a party closer to Christmas for those who don’t leave town.
The Chef--President Robinson
Justin and Kevin Wylde
Karen Wylde and Renee Robinson
Raphy, Marilyn, and Zenai
Samantha, Savannah, Karen
JUSTIN
Marcella and Justin
December 1, 2010
There’s a divorced fellow in our branch (inactive) who had a lump on his leg back in July. He finally went to the doctor. They removed it here in Broome and sure enough it was cancer. There was another tumor they didn’t dare mess with so he went to Perth for that surgery. He ended up staying quite a while because they had to do skin grafts. Anyway, he returned phone calls while he was down there but has gone back to his old ways since returning home. So we dropped by the computer repair shop where he works the other day to see if he was back to work. Hurray, he was there! His lower leg is wrapped with a dressing and he’s walking on a cane. As we visited, he asked if we wanted to see pictures. Orson turned down the opportunity but I was fascinated. He’d taken progress pictures on his phone from the day after surgery until now. It was amazing what they’ve done with him. I guess not too many people want to see his photos, so he was pleased that I did. He’s had a PET scan to ensure that it hadn’t spread, but he goes to Perth over Christmas for radiation treatments to get “all the little buggers” (as he put it). He’s a sharp guy. We think he’s become addicted to computer games and that’s why he’s inactive now. So sad, computers are great, but they also have caused a lot of problems.
December 1, 2010
There’s a divorced fellow in our branch (inactive) who had a lump on his leg back in July. He finally went to the doctor. They removed it here in Broome and sure enough it was cancer. There was another tumor they didn’t dare mess with so he went to Perth for that surgery. He ended up staying quite a while because they had to do skin grafts. Anyway, he returned phone calls while he was down there but has gone back to his old ways since returning home. So we dropped by the computer repair shop where he works the other day to see if he was back to work. Hurray, he was there! His lower leg is wrapped with a dressing and he’s walking on a cane. As we visited, he asked if we wanted to see pictures. Orson turned down the opportunity but I was fascinated. He’d taken progress pictures on his phone from the day after surgery until now. It was amazing what they’ve done with him. I guess not too many people want to see his photos, so he was pleased that I did. He’s had a PET scan to ensure that it hadn’t spread, but he goes to Perth over Christmas for radiation treatments to get “all the little buggers” (as he put it). He’s a sharp guy. We think he’s become addicted to computer games and that’s why he’s inactive now. So sad, computers are great, but they also have caused a lot of problems.
Thursday, December 2, 2010
JUSTIN
December 1, 2010
JUSTINThere’s a divorced fellow in our branch (inactive) who had a lump on his leg back in July. He finally went to the doctor. They removed it here in Broome and sure enough it was cancer. There was another tumor they didn’t dare mess with so he went to Perth for that surgery. He ended up staying quite a while because they had to do skin grafts. Anyway, he returned phone calls while he was down there but has gone back to his old ways since returning home. So we dropped by the computer repair shop where he works the other day to see if he was back to work. Hurray, he was there! His lower leg is wrapped with a dressing and he’s walking on a cane. As we visited, he asked if we wanted to see pictures. Orson turned down the opportunity but I was fascinated. He’d taken progress pictures on his phone from the day after surgery until now. It was amazing what they’ve done with him. I guess not too many people want to see his photos, so he was pleased that I did. He’s had a PET scan to ensure that it hadn’t spread, but he goes to Perth over Christmas for radiation treatments to get “all the little buggers” (as he put it). He’s a sharp guy. We think he’s become addicted to computer games and that’s why he’s inactive now. So sad, computers are great, but they also have caused a lot of problems.
JUSTINThere’s a divorced fellow in our branch (inactive) who had a lump on his leg back in July. He finally went to the doctor. They removed it here in Broome and sure enough it was cancer. There was another tumor they didn’t dare mess with so he went to Perth for that surgery. He ended up staying quite a while because they had to do skin grafts. Anyway, he returned phone calls while he was down there but has gone back to his old ways since returning home. So we dropped by the computer repair shop where he works the other day to see if he was back to work. Hurray, he was there! His lower leg is wrapped with a dressing and he’s walking on a cane. As we visited, he asked if we wanted to see pictures. Orson turned down the opportunity but I was fascinated. He’d taken progress pictures on his phone from the day after surgery until now. It was amazing what they’ve done with him. I guess not too many people want to see his photos, so he was pleased that I did. He’s had a PET scan to ensure that it hadn’t spread, but he goes to Perth over Christmas for radiation treatments to get “all the little buggers” (as he put it). He’s a sharp guy. We think he’s become addicted to computer games and that’s why he’s inactive now. So sad, computers are great, but they also have caused a lot of problems.
GRATEFUL FOR OUR MISSION CALL!
November 29, 2010 TUESDAY
The Cahoons went to New Zealand for a Mission Presidents’ Training Seminar a couple of weeks ago. Sister Cahoon talked about meeting the Samoan couple that is serving in Papua-New Guinea: They live in a gated compound which has razor wire all around the top of the fence. The missionaries also live inside the compound. She hardly ever goes out; when her husband goes somewhere he is accompanied by 4 armed guards. Only non-Caucasians are called to serve there.
The Cahoons went to New Zealand for a Mission Presidents’ Training Seminar a couple of weeks ago. Sister Cahoon talked about meeting the Samoan couple that is serving in Papua-New Guinea: They live in a gated compound which has razor wire all around the top of the fence. The missionaries also live inside the compound. She hardly ever goes out; when her husband goes somewhere he is accompanied by 4 armed guards. Only non-Caucasians are called to serve there.
BACK TO BROOME
November 28, 2010
Sunday, we went to church with the Nielsen’s in the Doubleview Ward. From one side you can see the city of Perth and on the other side you look down to the ocean. It was amazing to be among so many Mormons! Their ward has quite a few American families in it. The bishop is American as is the RS president and one of her counselors. As we were singing the closing song in RS, I noticed how strange it seemed to be singing with just a bunch of women. It’s been 6 months since I’d done that. After church, they had “Soup Sunday.” It was pretty much a pot luck lunch. We took all the leftover pickles and olives from our Thanksgiving dinner. It was good to be able to visit with some of the folks.
Nielsen’s drove us around their area a little bit; they have some beautiful beaches and parks there. It’s a little better economic area than where we were in Jandakot. We went home and were all going to nap, but we got talking and then exchanging computer files (recipes, etc.). At 4:30, Orson and I went to the Mission Office to listen in on the Auxiliary Training given to the branch leadership. Seemed kind of funny to hear the Robinsons on the other end of the teleconference.
After dinner, we visited some more, played a hand of Michigan Rummy and then went to bed. This morning we headed to the airport. When we checked in, the computer told us there would be a 45 minute delay. We were supposed to leave at 9:45. They kept announcing 15 minute delays. At 11:00, they gave us vouchers so we could get something to eat and we finally left at 12:40—just a few minutes before we should have landed in Broome if all had gone smoothly. It was 102 degrees when we got home and 92 in the house. We turned on the AC, unpacked, ate, washed the underwear and ended a great time away from here. But it feels good to be back.
Sunday, we went to church with the Nielsen’s in the Doubleview Ward. From one side you can see the city of Perth and on the other side you look down to the ocean. It was amazing to be among so many Mormons! Their ward has quite a few American families in it. The bishop is American as is the RS president and one of her counselors. As we were singing the closing song in RS, I noticed how strange it seemed to be singing with just a bunch of women. It’s been 6 months since I’d done that. After church, they had “Soup Sunday.” It was pretty much a pot luck lunch. We took all the leftover pickles and olives from our Thanksgiving dinner. It was good to be able to visit with some of the folks.
Nielsen’s drove us around their area a little bit; they have some beautiful beaches and parks there. It’s a little better economic area than where we were in Jandakot. We went home and were all going to nap, but we got talking and then exchanging computer files (recipes, etc.). At 4:30, Orson and I went to the Mission Office to listen in on the Auxiliary Training given to the branch leadership. Seemed kind of funny to hear the Robinsons on the other end of the teleconference.
After dinner, we visited some more, played a hand of Michigan Rummy and then went to bed. This morning we headed to the airport. When we checked in, the computer told us there would be a 45 minute delay. We were supposed to leave at 9:45. They kept announcing 15 minute delays. At 11:00, they gave us vouchers so we could get something to eat and we finally left at 12:40—just a few minutes before we should have landed in Broome if all had gone smoothly. It was 102 degrees when we got home and 92 in the house. We turned on the AC, unpacked, ate, washed the underwear and ended a great time away from here. But it feels good to be back.
Photos from Seniors Conference
Devon and Judi Nielsen--we stayed with them in Perth. They live in Layton so we had to travel to Australia to become friends ;o)
A herd of Toyotas at the stop in a beautiful forest on the way to Augusta.
Treehuggers--President and Sister Cahoon
A herd of Toyotas at the stop in a beautiful forest on the way to Augusta.
Treehuggers--President and Sister Cahoon
JUST LIKE YW CAMP!
Submarine that Orson toured in Freemantle
Part of the submarine tour.
Leaving Perth
"Last chance to eat"
Statue in Freemantle "Businessman takes briefcase on snorkling holiday"
HUGE cargo ship at Freemantle Port. Our little tour boat seemed very insignificant.
November 26, 2010 Thursday
It’s over and we don’t want it to be. We have just had an incredible experience because we’ve been able to share two wonderful days with twelve wonderful people. The senior missionaries serving here with us are such good people. We love them. We spent Friday and today seeing some of the beauties of nature in and around the southwestern part of West Australia and talking, and talking, and talking about the gospel and the work here and laughing a lot as we’ve shared experiences, frustrations, and fun.
Thursday we met and drove 3 cars (the AP’s minivan and two cars) 2 ½ hours south to Ngirgli Cave. It was beautiful and huge. At the bottom of the cave (which some of us didn’t attempt to see because of the long climb back out) was a ranger who explained some of the geology, biology, and history. Sister Kruger asked him if doing his job ever made him wonder about the creator of it all. An hour and a half later, he, President Cahoon and Orson finally came out at the end of his shift after a lot of testifying on the part of our two missionaries. Sadly, he wouldn’t give his name and address. From there we drove to Augusta (which we had visited in 2005 with Sam when we picked him up) to see the lighthouse there and the meeting of the Pacific and South Oceans. We also experienced incredible winds, but, as the native Australians pointed out, at least the flies didn’t bother us there. We had fish and chips there and then drove home in different cars so we could get better acquainted with some of the others.
Today we took a boat ride down the Swan River here in Perth to the port town of Freemantle. We visited the Maritime Museum, some took a tour of a submarine, ate, and shopped. We returned to the Mission Home for dinner and a testimony meeting where some very tender feelings were expressed and we learned more about one another. What a privilege it’s been to be here!
Part of the submarine tour.
Leaving Perth
"Last chance to eat"
Statue in Freemantle "Businessman takes briefcase on snorkling holiday"
HUGE cargo ship at Freemantle Port. Our little tour boat seemed very insignificant.
November 26, 2010 Thursday
It’s over and we don’t want it to be. We have just had an incredible experience because we’ve been able to share two wonderful days with twelve wonderful people. The senior missionaries serving here with us are such good people. We love them. We spent Friday and today seeing some of the beauties of nature in and around the southwestern part of West Australia and talking, and talking, and talking about the gospel and the work here and laughing a lot as we’ve shared experiences, frustrations, and fun.
Thursday we met and drove 3 cars (the AP’s minivan and two cars) 2 ½ hours south to Ngirgli Cave. It was beautiful and huge. At the bottom of the cave (which some of us didn’t attempt to see because of the long climb back out) was a ranger who explained some of the geology, biology, and history. Sister Kruger asked him if doing his job ever made him wonder about the creator of it all. An hour and a half later, he, President Cahoon and Orson finally came out at the end of his shift after a lot of testifying on the part of our two missionaries. Sadly, he wouldn’t give his name and address. From there we drove to Augusta (which we had visited in 2005 with Sam when we picked him up) to see the lighthouse there and the meeting of the Pacific and South Oceans. We also experienced incredible winds, but, as the native Australians pointed out, at least the flies didn’t bother us there. We had fish and chips there and then drove home in different cars so we could get better acquainted with some of the others.
Today we took a boat ride down the Swan River here in Perth to the port town of Freemantle. We visited the Maritime Museum, some took a tour of a submarine, ate, and shopped. We returned to the Mission Home for dinner and a testimony meeting where some very tender feelings were expressed and we learned more about one another. What a privilege it’s been to be here!
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
Orson and Elder and Sister Walker. They are in Geraldton (the easternmost branch in the mission. This is their 3rd mission.
Sister Matuauto, from SLC but grew up in Samoa. She worked in the missionary department for 22 years. She said everything there is confidential, but she bore a powerful testimony that this work is truly guided by the Lord.
Sister Kruger (from England), the office secretary. Elder and Sister Crawford, they are in charge of flats, cars, and phones. They served in Broome a year ago.
President Cahoon and Elder and Sister Orth (from Brisbane. They are working in Albany, the southernmost branch in the mission.
November 24, 2010 Tuesday
We flew down to Perth yesterday landing at 12:50 pm and made it to the 2:00 pm temple session. It was so nice: we stepped off the plane, the air was warm and DRY not humid. There was a nice breeze blowing. Brother Crawford picked us up, drove us straight to the mission office where the suitcase we’d left here in Perth with our temple clothes was and walked across the parking lot to the temple. We also did the 4 pm session. Nielsens (from Layton) had stayed late because an audit was being conducted. So they finished when we did and they took us to their flat where we are staying. He is the financial secretary for the mission and she handles all the referrals and a few other things. We had cold pork sandwiches for dinner and then talked until 11:30! It was so fun to talk to another senior couple.
Today I had a doctor appointment to renew some prescriptions and then we went to the 12:15 temple session. It was fun because we ran into two people from the Jandakot Ward where we worked the first month of our mission. It’s been so nice to be in the temple again. Our Seniors’ Conference starts tonight with a Thanksgiving Dinner at the mission home. Everybody is bringing something. We were assigned roll and pickles since we were coming from the farthest and were flying in. So we had some spare time this afternoon. We called Sister Cahoon and told her we were coming over to help her. She sounded really tired and agreed immediately. We were able to do some chopping and cutting. We also collated the booklets for our conference and wrapped a few presents. Then we ran back to the mission office to pick up the Nielsens.
Dinner was great: Turkey, sausage dressing, gravy, salad, potatoes, carrots, pickles, olives (unpitted), rolls, broccoli, peas, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, jello salad with pineapple and shredded apple in it, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, banana cream pie, apple pie, mince tartlets, and homemade coconut ice cream! Sister Cahoon made a presentation of “We Need Ewe” based on an old talk about sheep, shepherds and the Good Shepherd. Plans were announced for tomorrow. We cleaned up (she has an automatic dishwasher) and came back to Nielsen’s. Long, wonderful day :o) Senior missionaries are Elder & Sister Orth from Brisbane, Elder and Sister Crawford from Kanab, Elder and Sister Walker from Highland, Elder and Sister Nielsen from Layton, Sister Kruger from England, Sister Matuauto originally from Samoa but now from SLC, us, and of course, President and Sister Cahoon from Edmunton. Good, fun people.
Sister Matuauto, from SLC but grew up in Samoa. She worked in the missionary department for 22 years. She said everything there is confidential, but she bore a powerful testimony that this work is truly guided by the Lord.
Sister Kruger (from England), the office secretary. Elder and Sister Crawford, they are in charge of flats, cars, and phones. They served in Broome a year ago.
President Cahoon and Elder and Sister Orth (from Brisbane. They are working in Albany, the southernmost branch in the mission.
November 24, 2010 Tuesday
We flew down to Perth yesterday landing at 12:50 pm and made it to the 2:00 pm temple session. It was so nice: we stepped off the plane, the air was warm and DRY not humid. There was a nice breeze blowing. Brother Crawford picked us up, drove us straight to the mission office where the suitcase we’d left here in Perth with our temple clothes was and walked across the parking lot to the temple. We also did the 4 pm session. Nielsens (from Layton) had stayed late because an audit was being conducted. So they finished when we did and they took us to their flat where we are staying. He is the financial secretary for the mission and she handles all the referrals and a few other things. We had cold pork sandwiches for dinner and then talked until 11:30! It was so fun to talk to another senior couple.
Today I had a doctor appointment to renew some prescriptions and then we went to the 12:15 temple session. It was fun because we ran into two people from the Jandakot Ward where we worked the first month of our mission. It’s been so nice to be in the temple again. Our Seniors’ Conference starts tonight with a Thanksgiving Dinner at the mission home. Everybody is bringing something. We were assigned roll and pickles since we were coming from the farthest and were flying in. So we had some spare time this afternoon. We called Sister Cahoon and told her we were coming over to help her. She sounded really tired and agreed immediately. We were able to do some chopping and cutting. We also collated the booklets for our conference and wrapped a few presents. Then we ran back to the mission office to pick up the Nielsens.
Dinner was great: Turkey, sausage dressing, gravy, salad, potatoes, carrots, pickles, olives (unpitted), rolls, broccoli, peas, cauliflower, sweet potatoes, jello salad with pineapple and shredded apple in it, pumpkin pie, pecan pie, banana cream pie, apple pie, mince tartlets, and homemade coconut ice cream! Sister Cahoon made a presentation of “We Need Ewe” based on an old talk about sheep, shepherds and the Good Shepherd. Plans were announced for tomorrow. We cleaned up (she has an automatic dishwasher) and came back to Nielsen’s. Long, wonderful day :o) Senior missionaries are Elder & Sister Orth from Brisbane, Elder and Sister Crawford from Kanab, Elder and Sister Walker from Highland, Elder and Sister Nielsen from Layton, Sister Kruger from England, Sister Matuauto originally from Samoa but now from SLC, us, and of course, President and Sister Cahoon from Edmunton. Good, fun people.
KATE
November 21, 2010 Monday
Yesterday, Sunday, instead of our regular meetings, we watched the Saturday morning session of General Conference. I’d read most of those talks twice already, but it was sooooo good to see and hear the brethren present them. I hadn’t realized the impact that has on a person. It was great.
We hadn’t heard from Samantha all weekend and were worried she was turning away again, but she called Sunday afternoon to explain she’d been really involved with her best friend’s wedding (hmmm, sounds like a great title for a movie ;o) Anyway, she said we could visit her today.
Today, 2 appointments we had in the morning fall through so we ended up tracting. We found an American woman, Kate, who invited us in for a drink of cold water. Her house smelled like she’d just baked chocolate chip cookies, but she didn’t offer us any :o( She had grown up on a farm in Iowa in a large Catholic family. She had decided to become a lay missionary and worked here in Australia, Ethiopia, Israel, a couple of other countries, and then returned to Australia to work in Aboriginal communities. She met a dedicated Australian Catholic and married him. Apparently they don’t have any kids. She works part-time in the Notre Dame library. She was so friendly and great to talk to. She invited us back to visit any time and also to visit the library where they have some really cool paintings. It was fun to get to know her.
We dropped by Samantha’s and gave her the video “Finding Faith in Christ.” She’d been reading the Ensigns and had read an article about food storage. She commented how much that would have helped her if she’d had it over this last little while. We talked to her about the blessings of going to church and gave her a copy of the “Gospel Principles” manual. We invited her to FHE tonight and she came! We still have hope for her. She’s a really smart lady.
At FHE tonight we taught about the scriptures. We played a matching game about scripture stories and then talks about what the scriptures do for us. We gave everyone a reading chart for the next two weeks starting in Chapter 9 in 3 Nephi. They only have to read 5 verses a day. I hope they come through with it. There were 11 of us here tonight—all of them needed rides to come. It took 25 minutes to pick them all up and then again to take them all home!
Yesterday, Sunday, instead of our regular meetings, we watched the Saturday morning session of General Conference. I’d read most of those talks twice already, but it was sooooo good to see and hear the brethren present them. I hadn’t realized the impact that has on a person. It was great.
We hadn’t heard from Samantha all weekend and were worried she was turning away again, but she called Sunday afternoon to explain she’d been really involved with her best friend’s wedding (hmmm, sounds like a great title for a movie ;o) Anyway, she said we could visit her today.
Today, 2 appointments we had in the morning fall through so we ended up tracting. We found an American woman, Kate, who invited us in for a drink of cold water. Her house smelled like she’d just baked chocolate chip cookies, but she didn’t offer us any :o( She had grown up on a farm in Iowa in a large Catholic family. She had decided to become a lay missionary and worked here in Australia, Ethiopia, Israel, a couple of other countries, and then returned to Australia to work in Aboriginal communities. She met a dedicated Australian Catholic and married him. Apparently they don’t have any kids. She works part-time in the Notre Dame library. She was so friendly and great to talk to. She invited us back to visit any time and also to visit the library where they have some really cool paintings. It was fun to get to know her.
We dropped by Samantha’s and gave her the video “Finding Faith in Christ.” She’d been reading the Ensigns and had read an article about food storage. She commented how much that would have helped her if she’d had it over this last little while. We talked to her about the blessings of going to church and gave her a copy of the “Gospel Principles” manual. We invited her to FHE tonight and she came! We still have hope for her. She’s a really smart lady.
At FHE tonight we taught about the scriptures. We played a matching game about scripture stories and then talks about what the scriptures do for us. We gave everyone a reading chart for the next two weeks starting in Chapter 9 in 3 Nephi. They only have to read 5 verses a day. I hope they come through with it. There were 11 of us here tonight—all of them needed rides to come. It took 25 minutes to pick them all up and then again to take them all home!
GECKO ATTACK
November 19, 2010 Friday
Last night as I was leaving the house to pick up the YW, I turned to slide the door shut and a gecko jumped from the top of the door frame onto my head! I tried to brush him off and he jumped back up onto the door. I slid the door shut, and he jumped onto my head again. This time I succeeded in knocking him onto the driveway. Ooh, not my favorite experience, but I’m just grateful it wasn’t a snake or a big spider. We have seen a couple of 12-18 inch lizards in the yard, but hopefully they’ll never jump on my head.
This afternoon a big bank of dark clouds closed in on Broome. While we were shopping, loud lightning cracks and thunder could be heard outside. Lightning must have hit something in the roof of the shopping center because as we were leaving, a loud alarm began going off. We hurriedly put the groceries into the car and headed home. A few raindrops hit the windshield but it stopped before we got to the house. The thunder and lightning kept going when all of a sudden it was like a firehouse had been turned on the house. It dumped rain for about an hour or more. It was amazing. When it started, I thought it was hail because it was so loud. It was our first taste of “Broome rain” that the people talk about. It’s still cloudy tonight, but at least it’s not raining. Dec 3--we just read in the paper that the storm set a new record for a November rainstorm. Hope we don't set any cyclone records this year!
Last night as I was leaving the house to pick up the YW, I turned to slide the door shut and a gecko jumped from the top of the door frame onto my head! I tried to brush him off and he jumped back up onto the door. I slid the door shut, and he jumped onto my head again. This time I succeeded in knocking him onto the driveway. Ooh, not my favorite experience, but I’m just grateful it wasn’t a snake or a big spider. We have seen a couple of 12-18 inch lizards in the yard, but hopefully they’ll never jump on my head.
This afternoon a big bank of dark clouds closed in on Broome. While we were shopping, loud lightning cracks and thunder could be heard outside. Lightning must have hit something in the roof of the shopping center because as we were leaving, a loud alarm began going off. We hurriedly put the groceries into the car and headed home. A few raindrops hit the windshield but it stopped before we got to the house. The thunder and lightning kept going when all of a sudden it was like a firehouse had been turned on the house. It dumped rain for about an hour or more. It was amazing. When it started, I thought it was hail because it was so loud. It was our first taste of “Broome rain” that the people talk about. It’s still cloudy tonight, but at least it’s not raining. Dec 3--we just read in the paper that the storm set a new record for a November rainstorm. Hope we don't set any cyclone records this year!
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