While the name “Preparation Day” is reasonably explanatory in the missionary sense, in light of the non-event of this past Monday it takes on a bit of new meaning.

For some reason, the lunar eclipse on Monday to some people was a harbinger for the end of the world. Someone had seen a vision, written a book, and a significant population of gullible Utahns bought into the end-of-the world thing and denuded store shelves of toilet paper and such. I guess if the world is ending, one can’t have enough toilet paper… The hype even got high enough that the Church issued a statement on the subject! Some folks just don’t understand the word “surely” as in “Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets (Amos 3:7)”. I wonder if they felt the least bit embarrassed on Tuesday?

Enough of that. Today was our Preparation Day. We didn’t have one (deliberately) last week as we worked an extra shift on our Preparation Day so that another senior couple could spend the day with visiting friends. They’ll return the favor  and we’ll do it again for others. The result was thirteen days in a row working at the Visitors’ Center. So, we took advantage of that today and stayed pretty close to home.

We cleaned the house, finished up the laundry (I’ve still got shirts to iron after our shift tomorrow morning), and did a little bit of shopping. Nina has been working with the sister missionaries to get enough of the right kitchen utensils and cleaning supplies into each apartment, so we delivered some of those along with a new bookcase to one of the apartments. We stopped at a local beach for a while, stood on the beach in the rain watching the waves crash to the shore, and took a few pictures. The weather has turned away from the hot, humid summer weather. The trade winds are back. The humidity is down. This is indeed a delightful little piece of paradise!

I managed to whack my new Apple Watch yesterday while taking down the flags. The crank whipped around, I lost my grip, and bingo! a cracked watch face. I have insurance, fortunately. The replacement watch is intended for delivery tomorrow … however Apple screwed up the replacement order! They mixed the billing address and the shipping address. So, FedEx is planning to deliver a watch to 1000 Yellowstone Ave, Laie, Hawaii — an address that doesn’t exist. Argh!! I had a nice chat with Stefanie at Apple Support who tried to change the shipping info, but the repair logistics center is closed until 2am Hawaii time tomorrow morning. She gave me the number to call and the needed information to give them. Since I seem to be getting up regularly during the night to visit the bathroom, I’ll take advantage of one of those visits to call. Maybe I’ll get a replacement watch tomorrow, maybe not!

Life is a bit suspenseful, it seems!