Sup

Sorry I didn't get to email yesterday - the library was closed. But, I am here today so that's good. First off, Mason - sorry I didn't tell you last week, but your letter was very nice. I put it on my wall with all of the other ones you've sent me. So, I have got kindof a lot of stuff to talk about. I guess we'll strt with the Elders' Quorum golf tournament we had last week. About a month ago, one of the members found out that I golfed a lot before my mission, so he assumed I was really good. Turns out, he told just about everyone in the ward, so when it came time to go to the tourney, I had all kinds of people telling me they wanted to see me play. Even the Stake Pres. who I had never met before last week's ward conference, knew I golfed! So, we got to the course, and one of the members paid for us, which was cool. I had these super ghetto clubs that were pretty small for me. But, my first drive was straight down the fairway, so I felt pretty good about that. I think it's safe to say that I actually played one of the better games I've played before. It was fun. We were playing best ball, and my team used my ball about 90% of the time. haha. There were 5 teams of 4 that played, and mine won! oh yeah. We finished at +2 for 9 holes, beating out 3 other teams that got +3. It was pretty satisfying. And, I got closest to the pin on the contest hole, at 14' 10" (which I didn't think was that great, but, hey, I won) and I was in first for the longest drive until the last team came through and one of their guys beat me by like 5 yards. So, now I have a reputation in the ward for being good at golfing. I'm just glad I didn't screw up and have a really bad game. haha. So that's my cool golfing experience for the week. I think we are going again next Pday, but we'll have to wait and see if that really happens or not.

Alright funny story time. The other day, my comp and I were out contacting. We were walking down this street and there was this fat guy, not wearing a shirt, super sunbuned, with a shopping cart full of alcohol cans and bottles, sitting on a cement wall in front of a house. He waved to us, so we walked over to him. He says, "can you call an ambulance for me, my leg is broken." I looked at his feet, and they were both swollen up to very unusual proportions. It looked pretty disgusting. and they were purple-blueish, and bleeding in some sopts. We asked him what happened, and he said that he tripped whil walking down the street. I didn't believe him, because nothing else on his body was injured, and you usually don't break your ankles from tripping on the sidewalk. Anyhow, we went and asked someone else on the street if they could help us out. They let us use their phone (because my comp didn't want to use ours for some reason) and we called 911 and requested an ambulance. It got there a few minutes later, and they people got out, asked us what happened, we told them, and they started asking him a bunch of questions. Turns out, he has been given multiple rides in the ambulance and that the people that picked him up have seen him before, and that this dude had been in jail for a while. haha. They told us thanks for helping and that we could leave. So we did. It was pretty funny.

So we've been teaching this old lady named Donna for a while now, she has a date for the 13th. We taught her the stop smoking workshop on Satruday, and she was super excited to quit. The next day, she wasn't at church, so we were kindof worried. We talked to her friend that referred her to us and she told us that Donna wasnt' feeling well, and she couldn't make it to church today. Upon asking more questions, we found out that she just didn't want to come and her friend told us not to go over on sunday. so, we called her multiple times, but she never answered her phone. We kept trying and she kept not answering. So, yesterday we went to her house. She wasn't home, but her husband was and he told us that we "were pretty thick" when we taught the workshop. He said that he knew we weren't trying to be mean, and were just following the program, but she just couldn't handle it. So, we told him to have her call us when she got home. And she did, which was good. She told us that she just couldn't quit, but she wants to keep learning. So, we will most likely be postponing her date, which is LAME!! And as far as progressing investigators, that is it. But, we have been doing a lot of contacting on the streets and we have about 8 other people that we have appointments with this week, so we'll see how that turns out. I'm excited. OH! We met a cambodian lady on the street the other day! She was crazy. Literally. She was all cross-eyed and was pushing a shopping cart up this big hill, and didn't respond when we said hi in English, so we said hi in Cambodian. We gave her a passalong card and asked if she believes in Jesus. She didn't, and took the card, smiled and kept going. But, I talked to a cambodian person! haha. It was cool.

Last year, I don't know if other temples do this, but the Boston Temple was open on Memorial Day, and had a huge turnout, so they did it again this year, so Pres. Evans gave us all permission to go for Pday. We went to go to the 8 o'clock session, but there were tons of missionaries and a stake temple day as well, so we got postponed to the 9:10 session. they told us to go to the baptistry and help out and to come up around 9 to go to the session. We went and did some proxy confirmations, and at 8:50, we went back up to the session, but it had filled up already and the next one wasnt until 9:40 (they only have 2 endowment rooms), so we went back down to the Baptistry. some of the cambodian members from the other cambodian area were there to do baptisms and confirmations, and so were the other cambodian elders. So, when they were doing confirmations, we all took turns confirming them in Cambodian! It was awesome. I confirmed one lady for 10 people all in cambodian! it was so sweet. I loved it. Oh, and by the way, the Boston temple is awesome! It's way pretty, just like all of the other ones. they let us go sit in the Celestial room too, and that was very nice. I miss the temple. Now I have to wait 3 more months to go again.

Also, after we went to the temple, we went into downtown Boston and hung out for the rest of pday. We went to this all you can eat grill called Fire and Ice, that was delicious, and only 9 bucks! It was sweet. And, in the Boston Commons, they had 20,000 flags set up in honor of all the military personnel that had been killed that were from the Boston area. It was a pretty awesome sight. I'll eventually send home some pictures so you can see them. haha. And, as everyone and their dog has told me, it's Celtics-Lakers in the championship. Go Celtics!! There are posters and signs and people wearing jerseys EVERYWHERE out here. It's pretty cool.

And in closing, I would like to share a verse from the Book of Mormon with all of you who read these emails and don't send me letters. Alma 60:6 Think about that for a while, and then let me know how you feel when you write to me! haha. Alright. We gotta go teach some people now, so I'm out. Byebye. Love you all!!

Love,

Elder Hammer


P.S. I don't want to brag to Justin about his '09 Malibu, but I am driving (because my comp's license is expired s of today) a 2010 Toyota Corolla. haha. just thought I'd let you know. Peace!

P.S again. I just remembered school's out. How's that going? Please don't ruin my nintendo when you play it all day for the next 3 months. haha. Just kidding - I know mom wouldn't let you do that.