I don’t see these very often, but every once in a while someone shows up at the Visitors’ Center driving a true beach buggy. They are indeed available to rent. I’ve heard they’re a bit pricey, aren’t very comfortable, get lousy gas mileage, and are a boatload of fun.
I received a message from a cousin about an upcoming event. Just to show how nerdy we tend to be on my side of the family, she used an excellent description of the typical “Mormon Standard Time”. In this case the deadline was specifically set to “accommodate those running on a standard LDS deviation from the space-time continuum.” That’s just plain delicious writing!
The planned picture for today didn’t pan out. Just as I was going to take it, the skies opened up and a ten-minute deluge ensued. This is the last week of the current “transfer” in the mission. Next week on Wednesday many of the missionaries will change companions, move to new locations, and take on new assignments. New sister missionaries will be arriving from the Mission Training Center in Provo, Utah. A few sisters will be coming back to the Center after serving their three-month assignment as full-time proselytizing missionaries and a few sisters will begin their three-month assignment. On Saturday evening after the Center closes at 8 pm all of the missionaries at the Center will gather in the large auditorium for the much-anticipated “Transfer News” video. That short (five minutes or so) video will outline the changes. The Coordinating Sisters (the two sister missionaries who are assigned to be the lead missionaries at the Center) spend much of the day on Saturday putting the video together. All of the sister missionaries whoop and holler, cheer and groan, and generally applaud the new assignments.
Every other transfer on the Monday and Tuesday of the week ahead of the transfer we hold a missionary “give ‘n take”. The sister missionaries bring over to our garage all the stuff from their apartment they don’t want or won’t be needing. That includes clothes they can’t wear any more (too big or too small), food items they won’t be using, and other stuff. We put it all on display on tables and ladders in the garage and the missionaries take from there anything they might use. I was planning to take a picture of the garage, but the rain caused us to have to close the door and it was too dark when the rain moved out. So, I’ll grab the picture tomorrow and it’ll be on a future blog entry.
BYU-Hawaii runs a large “Give ‘n Take” operation over by the student housing. Students and the community drop off stuff they don’t need or want and the students can “shop” for items they need. Periodically the staff culls through the stuff and disposes of things that no one will ever want. So, that’s where our missionary “give ‘n take” stuff goes tomorrow afternoon. Right now there’s quite a pile of stuff in the garage. Perhaps there’s a good home for it somewhere else. That’d be nice!
Yesterday (Monday) was one of the slowest mornings we’ve had since we arrived. By 2:30 pm we’d only had 50 guests and forty of those had come in after 1pm. Mondays are, as a rule, the slowest day of the week. Tuesday are usually fairly slow in the morning as well. Today was the blow-out exception. We were busy with fifteen to twenty visitors constantly at the Center the entire morning. Some were local. We had a number of visitors from the mainland, including Utah, Arizona, Illinois, Virginia, and California. We had people from New Zealand and England. Since the sister missionaries have their preparation day on either Monday or Tuesday (half on Monday, half on Tuesday), we only have one set of sister missionaries working with us at the Center on Monday and Tuesday morning. We were all very busy and before we knew it, the shift was over…. Except for the mouse. The sister missionaries have a room in the Center (called the Guide Room) where they have little cubby holes for their things, where they can change into our out of the muumuus they wear while on shift, and where they eat their lunch or dinner. Just as the shift was ending a number of missionaries were in the Guide Room getting ready for the afternoon shift when a mouse came out of a cupboard and dropped into the sink, then scampered away. I’m sure you can imagine the screams and commotion! Traps and bait have supposedly been put in place this afternoon.
Today was loud….