The Bees Knees

Here is the final installment from my mission in Portland. What a great  place. I miss it and loved every minute there. The people, the work, even the annoying rain. Loved it all. Now I promised a second part to Spencer, here it is. Anytime you would go knock on his door he would yell, "Are there any bees?" Once you said no he would open the door, just barely enough to squeeze by, and then shut it quickly and ask, "Do you see any bees in here?" If you couldn't guess he had a bee allergy. We finally got him to come to church with us, and I figured it would be interesting. We had never seen him go outside, so I was curious to see how he dealt with the bees. We get there and he didn't ask about any bees, he opens the door, and walks out wearing his homemade bee suit. He had on boots with socks tucked into them, sweats, because church can be casual, a giant winter coat (it was still summer time), gloves, and the best part was a bee keepers veil. I've never been so jealous of an outfit in my life! The only downside was when he went to the bathroom and made me hold his veil. I wasn't going to just hold it, I had to try it on. I did and started walking around making the sound he did, "eh eh eh." I laughed at myself, and then saw out of the corner of my eye two people. Turns out the bishop and relief society president were watching me the whole time. I just took it off and said, "I've never held a bee veil before." They looked at me weird and kept walking by. Worth it!

Shut your mouth!

You may have noticed that from an earlier blog that I do not enjoy modern day hippies. One day in Oregon I met a man who really did not enjoy hippies. A group of us missionaries were at the library emailing our families. It was a lovely rainy day in Oregon. A few of us had finished and were sitting there waiting for the rest of the group. There is a guy, by himself, reading at a table. Out of nowhere he yells, "Stop starring at me!" and then goes back to reading. I thought maybe he was on his phone or something. Then he yells, "Hey! Quit starring at me punk!"It took everything I had to not bust out in laughter. My good friend Craig was there and it was his first few hours in the area. He had no idea what was going on either. The man then slams his book down and says, "Stop starring at me or I will spit in your face, hippie!" and mumbles how mad he is. I look over and there is only a book case in front of him. No one on the other side. This guy really hates book cases that remind him of hippies.

Made sense to me

One day I got stuck with this missionary who thought he was the best thing ever. He had to go on a split with me for a few hours. We we went on knocked on some doors. This one lady answers and says she isn't interested. I said, "well hold on, what's with all these tubes in your apartment?" She starts to tell us all about her hamsters. It was the craziest setup I have ever seen. Hamsters just hanging out in tubed that spread throughout her whole apartment. you could just see them in different areas. She asked me if I wanted one. I declined. She asked me if I was allergic, I told her I did not know. She said the only way to find out is to rub one on your face. I chuckled and she said,"I have one right here", and then pulled one out of her sweater pocket. the other missionary looked at me like don't do it man, this is weird. And I just said, "rub it on me!" The good news is I found out I'm not allergic to hamsters. We left shortly after, our walk was pretty quiet. I finally said, "good thing I'm not allergic to hamsters." He just glared at me, and I told him he wasn't very fun. I'm sure he got over it.
There were no hamsters harmed in this story.

Spencer; the Myth, the Legend.

I was in a small farming town called Cornelius. Not a whole lot happened there. The people were awesome, and the town had fantastic tacos. One day we went to teach a guy named Spencer. Turns out he was "blind". I use quotes not to be insensitive, but you'll understand later. After  a few visits with him we realized that he only really wanted us to come do service. Not a bad thing, but we really wanted to teach him. My companion and I made a plan to teach him or nothing. We got there and he asked to do service. I agreed even though I didn't want to. we went into the back room of his trailer and he asked us to move the hospital bed to the side of the room where his massage table was, and switch them. I was super confused why he had a massage table, but whatever. That was not the weirdest thing about him. As we are moving the be I realized that the bed was on wheels. I moved the massage table into the hallway, but it got stuck. So I began to lift it up, and it was not making a sound, when Spencer shouts out, "Hey! Don't lift that up! I mean if you are don't." It got super awkward after that. Man was I mad. Turns out he wasn't that blind. I wish I could have told him off, but I was just so confused/upset by my previous decision to dance a jig in front of him while he was talking. I guess he saw that as well.