Underground Car Guy

So I was talking to someone at church about seeing the Movie, Noah.  And I told them what I thought about it, and then they asked me, if I did not know anything about Noah, is it a good movie?  And this was not hard for me to answer, and I said Yes.  If you look at it as a Movie, it is a pretty good Action / Adventure Movie.  It had drama, conflict, and action, but we somewhat know how the movie ends. But before I went to see Noah, I wanted to brush up on Noah and went to the source, the Bible.  I heard some one say, how can you get a movie out of  few verses, but the story of Noah cover a lot more.  It story takes in Genesis Chapter 6 thru 10.   So I read the book before seeing the movie. And I think this is the problem that most Christians are having with the film.  It tries to follow the story, but how much literary licence are you going to get away with.  And that is the problem, they strayed to far from the original story. I ...

So here is the Tie of the Day!  I got this one when I was with elder Wilde in Don Loughaire, Ireland.  As I understand it, there are only three Elders that have this tie and I am one of them.  Did anyone get the theme of the month?

Clouds somewhere between Chicago and Baltimore.  On my flight on from the D.C. area, I was setting next to a young man who was some where between 11 to 13.  His mom and sister were sitting behind us and from time to time would place thing too him.  One of the items was a tablet.  I watched from time to time, he would play games on it.  I am talking about really good game, not watching a dot avoid other dots on the football game that I had when I was 14.  But also movies.  I could tell that he was, at his age, a well seasoned traveler. This brought back to my memory of all the times I have been traveling on an airplane.  I have been flying since I was 3 months old.  That was when my dad got out of the military, and we flew home, well Boise.  But we finally settled in Chattanooga.  With my mom's parents living across country this meant that I did a lot of flying at a really young age.  And the earliest I can remember is ...

So here is the tie of the day!  It is the Cork tie.  I got it when I served in Cork in 1989.  It the coat of arms of Cork.  Many of people coming to American, last place in Ireland was Cork.

So just about an hour after I got done with the first part of Missionary Companions, I got a personal message through Facebook, by a fellow IDM, who said they thought Elder Junior looked like Bruce Willis too!  I knew I was not crazy. In the 23 months of my mission I had 15 companions.  And I served in 11 different areas, and 6 different cities and 2 Countries.  Sounds like the total at the end of the Amazing Race.  But like the Amazing Race, it was and an Amazing Journey. The longest I served with someone was Elder Clarke in Limerick, 4 months.  The Shortest was Elder Silk, about 2 weeks.  I don't remember where everyone was from, but I do know that I did serve with guys from Arizona, California, Utah and Idaho.  Its funny, I was just remembered that my trainer, Durrant was from Idaho and Neal from Idaho.  I also served with a guy from Canada and Sweden. 8, well 9 if you count the MTC, of my companions I served with only for a month. ...

So this is the second part of  Missionary Companions 1988 to 1990 .  The first part took us from November 1988 to January 1990.  This picks up in January, and goes to the end of my mission in October 1990.  Again I am trying to find the good in all of my companions. Elder Butterfield, Rathmines: I was glad to have Elder Butterfield as a companion.  I had come out with him and roomed with him in the MTC.  But we are the total opposites.  I love eating beef and he was or still  is  vegetarian.  He was a spiritual giant and I wasn't.  But he was what I needed after the month I had had.  He was there when my Grandfather, who was not a member of the church, died.  His idea at the time of grieving was working, and at the time, I hated him for it.  But it was what I needed.  I guess you can say that he is the guy that got me back on the horse.  We got to baptize Anne Ralli, which was also a great experience, as...

So when I was visiting with Heidi, the missionaries came over to teach a lesson.  We sat there before the person was there and Heidi told them that we were in the same mission.  So we kind of forget that the Elders are there and we just start talking about the mission.  To the point that she makes the statement that I really did not have a lot of good companions.  So this made me think about what could I say about all of my companions?  Was there just one positive thing I could say or was it just all bad as Heidi said.  Now don't forget, she knew some of them, so it may be her opinion that is coming out in this opening statement. Elder Ford, MTC: OK I can say that it was neat that two Elders from the Phoenix area, being teamed up, and going to the same mission is kind of cool.  But I always thought that Butterfield and Ford should have been MTC companions.  They were closer in there friendship with each other.  I am not saying that Ford i...

While I was working on a blog about my missionary companions, when I realize that I also made friends with other missionaries that were there.  There is a bond there that I was not able to form with some companion, and I feel like it would be sorry that you did not know about this people as well. Randall McClellan When I arrived in Ireland, it was Christmas time.  So we had a missionary conference.  Randall was like the first person to come up to me and say, cool you are from Arizona.  So we would pass each other through out the mission, never serving in the same zones.  But when we did have mission wide stuff we would get together.  Sometimes this was just passing in train stations.  There was a few time he would borrow some money here and there, I never kept a total, so I could never tell you how much it was.  I was always helping out a friend in need. When I got home he found me.  And for a few months we hung out until I got married...

The Tie of the Day is another one that I bought on our trip to Ireland, back in 2000.     

All of my life I have had a love of history.  Boy was I surprised that with my Political Science degree that I minored in Religion.  They just did not have the classes I wanted to take in history at Arizona State.  But when I was 25, I started to read some personal histories of family members that crossed the country in the great Mormon migration to the west in the 1840's to the 1880's.  Some would be called by Brigham Young to missions in England, then come home and moved there family where ever the church needed them.  Finally settling in Arizona.  This is the rich part of history of my mom's family. My dad's family is a little different.  They are from the south.  And have been there for over 300 years.  His family mostly settling in Tennessee, but moving up through Georgia from North Carolina.  Family rumors are abound about our ancestry.  And at times it is hard to hash out what the truth really is.  So my dad's si...

This was the tie that I wore to my interview.  I call it one of my safe ties.  It really is not going to offend anyone.  Plus it is flowers and it says springtime!    

Since the beginning of the year I have been reading The Book of Mormon. Some mornings it is just reading.  Sometime I come across things that make me ask question, nothing really faith challenging, but question.  If I say Dragons some will understand.  And then there are the ones that will stay with you and mean something to you forever.  This happened to me this morning while reading Alma 7 verse 23. This is Alma the Younger's mission as High Priest, to the City of Gideon.  He is preaching to the people about the coming of Christ. Alma 7:23 23  And now I would that ye should be a humble , and be b submissive and gentle; easy to be entreated; full of patience and long-suffering; being temperate in all things; being diligent in keeping the commandments of God at all times; asking for whatsoever things ye stand in need, both spiritual and temporal; always returning thanks unto God for whatsoever things ye do receive. This really hit me hard abo...

 When on my mission I had to wear a tie everyday for two years.  You kind of look for something different than stripes and or solid colors.  I did find a few Paisley ties that were cool.  And being in Ireland, most cities and towns had there own coat of arms, which they put on ties.  So this starting me on my tie collection.  I have so ties that I do not wear them more than once a year. So I will start giving a tie of the day or the week or when ever I have to wear a tie.  And tomorrow will be one of those days.  I have a job interview tomorrow and was told not to wear anything with characters or have words on it, from my girlfriend!  So here are the last three ties I wore.      A tie I wore back in February. Two of the ties that I bought in Dublin in 2000.  The one on the right is of Celtic writing.  I bought that one at the Book of Kells.  does anyone know the theme?...

So I have a laptop and internet serves!  I can blog again.

So here we are 11 months into blogging and it has been and interesting journey. I have posted just over100 blogs with 5800 people view them. In just 4 days you guys have viewed Anonymous Internet Post 116 times.  The second most viewed of all my blogs. So where do I go from here?  I don't know?  I was working on this vacation series, but this brought up a lot of memories that I shared now with my ex-wife, and did not think I need to go there.  But I will blog about future vacations.  But if you like the vacation series let me know and maybe start it up again. I have one more racing blog left to finish one of these days.  It is the last of the racing years and has to deal with me racing the Porsche 944.  So lets see what happens by the time I hit the one year mark on April 6.