Elder Henry H. Thompson: More Fires... Pray for California

Hey friends and family!

This was a refreshing week, despite the thick smoke. Some of our lessons didn't happen again but hey, it's all good. We found new people to teach and people were surprisingly nicer to us this week! What a feat!

The "Camp Fire" is sending all of the smoke and ash over here so that's been fun. Everybody is wearing masks and ask us why we are outside when we knock on their door. It made the sun almost as red as it was when I was in India! At first, we just saw a thick cloud of smoke coming in from Santa Rosa and we were like, "uh oh, here we go again...." because we didn't know how far away the fires really were. They are probably about 120 miles from me but the smoke was still crazy! Hopefully everything is okay up there. (sadly, the Camp Fire is now California's deadliest fire on record)

First up on the list of experiences was one where I used my stubbornness to my advantage when a man tried to kick us out of a smaller apartment complex, I told him that we wouldn't leave and kept going. The 2nd door that we knocked on, we met Michael. He has had some really spiritual experiences lately and we sat down with him and talked for like 30 minutes. It was great! I'm not going to let crabby people get in the way of other peoples' salvation! Good times.

We called our friend Barbara on Saturday and she answered the phone, "hey kiddos!" She is a sweet woman, about to turn 80 and has been Catholic all of her life. But she is happy to get more information about Jesus Christ through the Book of Mormon! She has been reading and telling us all about how she is marking it up! As we checked in on Barbara on Saturday, she told us about how a man from her church owns Mountain Mike's Pizza which is a good pizza place near our apartment. She said that we could go in and ask for the "Catholic discount" if we want cheaper pizza but only if we, "want to go, you know where...." haha it was hilarious. I don't think we will be using the Catholic discount anytime soon though. Maybe when I come back to visit and I'm not in missionary clothes... we'll take Barbara with us!

We also had Zone Conference this Friday and it was a long one but a good one. We talked all about finding and family history in finding. The leaders got to take an hour and teach our individual zones about finding and how to increase our faith in finding. We made a great video of past missionaries from this mission talking about how they developed the faith to find people to teach. Everyone loved it!

Sunday we had an awesome lesson with Ethan, a college student that we met on Wednesday. He had already read the Restoration pamphlet and also the beginning parts of the Book of Mormon before we got there! We had a very spiritual lesson and he enjoyed learning more! Then he wanted to show us his snakes and his hamster so we checked those out too. I know Kathleen, Kate, and Lindsay would have loved the snakes!

Happy Veteran's Day to all of those who have fought to keep this great country free and make it possible for me to proclaim my testimony publicly, especially the Veterans in my life: Grandpa Mick, Great Grandpa Spry, Great Grandpa Stew, Rob Anderson, mom's Uncle Bill and cousin Bill, Nini's uncle Bill... that's lots of Bills... and more I'm sure.

Also, Happy Birthday to Grandpa Roger this week! I hope you get to drive fast and eat lots of chocolate! Love you grandpa!

The Song of the Week is "Five O'Clock Somewhere" by Alan Jackson and Jimmy Buffett. Dad and I always loved singing "it's 5 o'clock somewhere!"

I continue to love my scripture study and learning more about the gospel of Jesus Christ. I got to listen to my trainer give his departing testimony as he goes home this transfer. He trained me, then I was a Zone Leader with him, now he's finishing up in our zone! It's good to be around him. I was definitely blessed with one of the best trainers to whom I give a lot of credit for the success of my mission so far. I'm waking up everyday and loving the message that I share with everyone. Not everyone accepts it, that is to be expected. But as Joseph Smith said, if we do our duty it will be as well with us as if everyone accepted the gospel!

Much love!

Elder Thompson