Krefeld and Munich, Germany

I left Düsseldorf at 9:40 to fly to Munich. The Lufthansa flight was full. I sat in a middle seat and had a good conversation with an engineer-salesman for a hydraulic press company. He lives in Krefeldt, also. He was on his way to Bulgaria and then Tel Aviv. Next week he flies to Akron, Ohio. I wish I was going with him.

We arrived in Munich on time. Gordon tried to rent a car from Hertz but they were all booked out. The same story at Avis. He finally got one from InterRent. We drove to the Regina Palast Hotel and checked in. It was a nice room with a balcony for 69 marks per day. We had lunch at a small restaurant by the plant and went to the office about 1 p.m.

Weibrich had a problem with the Dataform disk. Most of the forms worked, some did not, and gave the message “Bad Form” back. A casual inspection revealed no answers. I must read the documentation. I changed the Parts Master Maintenance for BLW. It took about 10 minutes. I found out that Hr. Busch has never programmed before and doesn’t know assembly for the Datapoint computers. I immediately started a “one-on-one” class. We got through the subtract operations before Gordon was ready to go home. That’s one problem when traveling with somone … his is finished about 5 pm. and I’m ready to just get started.

We went back to the hotel and then out to eat at a restaurant by the Opera House. We both had shrimp. They were very good, but not enough of them. I followed  that up with Peach Melba. Excellent. Back at the hotel we went down to the bar for a drink (Gordon had some wild “liqour” and I had a Coke). There was a big Carnival Party at the hotel. Some very interesting costumes or lack of costumes. I was in bed about 10:30 p.m.

Transcribed from my journal.

Krefeld, Germany

Up at 7:30 and into office about 9. Gordon was already there. We discussed BLW during the morning and got everything ready. I went to the bank and deposited a $300 check in the checking account.

We went to Hemesath for lunch and I had a chicken sandwich. It was quite good. Gordon bought a pair of scissors for his wife and I bought a new calculator. The price advertised was 65 marks, but I got it for 58.00 plus another 20 for a connection to the wall so I can use both battery and wall electricity.

I didn’t do much in the afternoon. I talked with Dick for a while. Gordon will follow up on getting Henry Heinrich into a management school. We’ll work towards getting Repa and BLW payroll on the Ehrenreich computer.

Gordon and I took the tram home and had dinner at the house. I played Reversi with Gordon and I won three times. He could be very good at this game. I must try it out on Bill Stevens … perhaps over lunch some day.

Trevor got sick going to bed. He coughed so hard he couldn’t keep his supper down. Nina was having the same problem at the same time. Quite a circus.

Transcribed from my journal.

Krefeld, Germany

Up shortly after 6 a.m. and at the church at 7:05 for Presidency meeting. We organized the Primary and Relief Society. We will release Sis. Mohr as a counselor and call Sister Belger. We will call Sis. Trautmann as a counselor in the Primary and Rebekka as a teacher. We need more active people!

Four missionaries, Br. Rudloff, Hoppe, and Trautmann at Priesthood Meeting. Gilbert came late. Thirty-six people at Sunday School. Sis. Dornbusch didn’t come, but Sister Mohr was there. I talked with Sister Mohr. She’ll be released as a Relief Society counselor and set apart as the Press Agent. We’ll have to get the ditto machine ordered.

We had the English Sunday School class. The lesson was about the beginning of Christ’s ministry. We’ll talk next week about the Sermon on the Mount.

I prepared a talk for Sacrament Meeting during the afternoon. Thirty-two people at Sacrament Meeting. Sister Clas was there, back from her trip to the States. She wants her money to be used to help all the poor people over there. She sure is a funny person. I talked about trials and tribulations, and why we have them. Sister Hansen talked about her escape as a young girl with her mother and sister from East Germany. Br. Ostler talked about our calling as missionaries. The missionaries sang a song for us. Very Good! We must organize more music in the Branch for Sacrament Meeting.

After the meeting we set everyone apart. I went over to visit with Mervyn after supper. I don’t know why he didn’t come to church. We got the money squared away. He sure is a good man.

In bed about 10:30. Peter stayed over night.

Transcribed from my journal.

Krefeld, Germany

The alarm went off at 6:15 … out of bed at 6:25. Late getting out of the house. Picked Br. Trautmann up and got 15 minutes late to Presidency Meeting. Br. Rudloff was already there. Discussed re-organization of Primary and Relief Society organizations. Got the announcements straight. Br. Trautmann has the lead today. I get to sit back and take it all in.

Eleven brethren at Priesthood Mtg. 43 people at Sunday School. The English lesson was about the miracles of Jesus used to teach his apostles and disciples. We had Correlation Meeting right after Sunday School. All auxiliaries except Primary were represented. I talked to Sister Hohmann just prior to the meeting. She had to go to work and couldn’t stay for the meeting. She suggested Rebekka Hansen as a counselor and a teacher in Primary. (Sister Hohmann) has a problem getting Wednesday free. It’s normally her free day but if something happens, she has to work and can’t be to Primary.

Visiting Teaching districts were set up and will start in February The additional Relief Society on Sunday morning will also start in February. Sister Hansen has talked to Sister Trautmann about teaching a class and about being a counselor. I wish Sister Hansen wouldn’t do that.

We had Missionary Correlation Meeting at 3:00 p.m. Rachel Hansen and 4 missionaries were there. We talked about training Rachel and the missionaries made an appointment for Friday to take Rachel tracting and to give a discussion. The missionaries will make a chart to tell us what is happening with referrlas and contacts. We planned a Fireside for February 16th and will have the movie “Meet the Mormons”.

Thirty-six people at Sacrament Meeting. Br. Dietrich and his wife and a High Counselor were there. Sister Mohr didn’t show to give her talk.

Br. and Sis. Wright and Peter came over after Sacrament Meeting. I took everyone home about midnight and was in bed about 12:30 a.m.

Transcribed from my journal.

Krefeld, Germany

Up at 7:15 and got to the church house a little after 8 to work on the MIA Room. The Missionaries were there, but Br. Rudloff couldn’t make it. The missionaries wallpapered and I painted the door and doorway from the foyer into the MIA Room. The missionaries got one wall almost finished. The wallpaper sure looks good. Br. Miller painted one of the windows, but paint doesn’t go on the windows so well. We quit about noon.

I tried to call Gordon but no answer. The heat was off in the church and I couldn’t get it on. I called Br. Trautmann and he said he’d get it started when he came in to clean the building.

I went home and took a three-hour nap. I picked Rebekka up about 6 p.m. and we went to Düsseldorf to go to dinner with Gordon. We arrived at the Hilton to find a big Carnival Ball going on. I saw Frau Hoch, first time since she left Ehrenreich. We went to the Heinreich Heine Steuben for dinner by taxi. We all had steak. It cost 72 marks for all three of us. We walked around downtown on Schadow Strasse. Took Gordon back to the hotel about 10 p.m. and went home. Was in bed shortly before midnight.

Transcribed from my journal.

Krefeld, Germany

Up at 6:30. Nina drove me to the tram. In to Ehrenreich a little after 8. Wrote expense report for the Repa trip. Gordon came in a little after 9. We spent the morning talking about the Repa and BLW projects. Solved the problem with the Cost Center Summary Records for cost centers with overhead based on machine hours but still having direct labor content. We will write two summary records for these cost centers — one for the machine hours and one for the labor hours. This way Bill Stevens can break out both labor and overhead into the two factors: rate and usage variances.

We had lunch at Rheinaturn, roast beef sandwich and goulash soup, 24 marks for the entire bill.

Discussed Centralized Data Center possibility and Henry Hansen in the afternoon, and got together with Dick. Teves is not a good possibility for getting together with Ehrenreich in a centralized EDP system. Helling at Teves wouldn’t buy the idea. He can’t even get his two plants running centralized let alone talk about centralizing all of Teves with Ehrenreich. We will investigate running the Repa and BLW payroll at Ehrenreich rather than at outside service bureaus. We will try to make a good EDP manager out of Henry. First send him to a management school and then come in and make a detailed study of the EDP organization here. Then develop reporting and control systems which will force him to use his people rather than doing it all himself.

Weather was rain in the morning to partly coudy in the afternoon.

Left work a little after 5 and took the tram home. We went to Mervyn and Lynn’s for the evening. Rebekka Hansen babysat for us. Got home about 1 a.m. and in bed about 1:30.

Transcribed from my journal.

Alfdorf and Krefeld, Germany

I got up about 10:30. I showered and packed the suitcase and checked out of the hotel. The cost was 138.00 marks — 120 for the room for 3 nights and 18.00 for telephone calls to Mervyn and the PostScheckAmt (post office bank). I was able to get breakfast. I went in to Repa just about noon. I made MOUT tape to take to BLW next week and asked Bill Stevens to get info and formulas to calcuate standard costs. I talked with Dr. Von der Lanken’s secretary and ordered the books for Pleuger, attn. Dr. Peeper. The word from Hannover is that the 2314 drive is there but thay haven’t been able to test it because they didn’t have a disk. They knew two months ago that it was coming. It is rather strange that they’ve not ordered one. This is a delay we don’t need.

The driver to the Stuttgart Airport was a half-hour late and traffic was worse than normal, but I made the airport in time. I sat next to a seathog on the way back to Düsseldorf on the airplane. He wanted all of his seat plus half of the ones on either side. Fortunately it’s only a 50 minute flight. The airplane was full. The weather in Alfdorf was mostly coudy with haze; Düsseldorf was overcast.

I did get the seat belt for Frau Schmetz. The price was still 88.80 marks. I had almost 30 kg of luggage, almost 10 kg over, but no questions asked.

Nina picked me up at the airport and I babysat while she went to Relief Society. I did the dishes and cleaned up downstairs. I called Gordon at the Hilton and finally reached him about 10 p.m. He’ll find his own way into Ehrenreich in the morning.

Eight sisters at Relief Society. I took Santa Clause off of the front room door and went to bed about 11:00 p.m.

Transcribed from my journal.

Alfdorf, Germany

I got up about 11:30, showered, and had “brunch” at the Haghof. I got into Repa about 1 p.m. I ordered seat belts for Frau Schmidt at Ehrenreich. I wrote the program to calculate the Branch Ordinance and Action Report statistics. I’ll run the program tonight and see what comes out. It’s a rather complicated program. I worked on the agenda for Branch Council on Sunday. I must send the post cards tomorrow to remind everyone that we’ll be having the meeting.

I put the post cards in the mail and sent Sister Lucyzk the list of the 12-18 year-old girls in the branch. I worked on the program and listings of Branch members. I found an error in the age calculation … after increasing the field size by 1 in the month it worked correctly. There wasn’t enough space in the field two characters wide to subtract 1 from 12 and have a minus sign. the Branch statistics calculated very nicely, with minor discrepancies to the one Br. Rudloff calculated by hand. I got out the birthday list — this coud be a home teaching tool. Br. Trautmann and I go visit the members just before their birthday, take a card, and give them birthday greetings. Fellowshiping possibilities here. The records show a lot of 25-30 year-olds still living with their parents … probably not so in all cases. We’ll need to track them down and see if we need to send off some membership records.

Gordon Plummer arrives in Düsseldorf today and will be here through Monday. We will fly Tuesday to Munich to be at BLW for the rest of the week to attend the EDP Steering Committee Meeting on Friday.

I went to back to the Hoghof hotel about 3 a.m. The weather was clear and beautiful.

Transcribed from my journal.