amazon, finals and california

so, i had finals the other week. I was so glad to get that done when I did. i did really well on all of my finals except my linear algebra final. grah! i was doing so well in the class up to that point. and then, i guess i choked on the final. i did the worst on that final than i ever have done on any final in any class like ever. maybe my one test in 8th grade about hte constitution was worse. but, this one was WAY bad. i got like a 55 or a 60 percent. it brought me from A/A- to B+. GRAH! Well, in other news, I did really well on all of my other finals.

We went to California last week as well. We stayed the first night with a family that Mark knew. Me, Ryan Johnson and Mark Whitmer all went down together. I went over to Mark's house first and we waited for his landlord to get there so that he could move out. That seemed like it took FOREVER! Then we went and picked up Johnson from his house in Orem. We stopped at my house first to eat something real quick and orient ourselves on how we were going to get to California nad then we were off! We talked about the mission for awhile. We finally got to Mark's family at like 8 or 9 o clock california time. that was a fun visit. the hermana and the hermano were both really sweet and nice.

let's see if i can remember everything about the next day. i remember that we stayed with family in whitier at night time. i remember that we went around and visited a lot of people in anaheim. I saw the hermano espinosa in his work that day. he took us out for some sushi. i didn't really know what to think about it at the time. :) there was some green stuff on the plate, and i didn't know what it was. Mark ended up trying it. and MAN! he almost died. Later on in the day, we all went swimming in the Espinosa's pool. Johnson would throw in some coins and try to make us retrieve them at the bottom of the pool. That was way fun. We found out later that they had a hot tub and we tried that. At the end of the night, we watched Hitch. That was a fun movie. It was basically about how this one guy consults other guys on how they can get the girls they want.

On Friday, we all went to the beach. That was a fun trip. First, we all went to Long Beach and found Ada Garcia. She is actually rather attractive (At least, I thought so). So, she came with us to the beach and we had fun there. Hno. West lent us some surf boards that we could try out. That was pretty fun to use those surf boards and try to see if we could go surfing. :) I would just go out, wait for a wave to come in, and see if i could get it to catch me. I never really could get the wave to catch me. It was a way fun experience though. Ada, Mark, Johnson and I, we all played frisbee. Except, the problem was that it was really really windy and we couldn't throw it very straight. So, it made for a good game of keep-away because we couldn't catch the frisbee very well and it was easy for the person in the middle to get out. That night, we stayed at the Santiago Family's house. They have sadly gone inactive in this time. They were very hospitable toward all of us. It was nice to converse with them and see how they were doing. The thing with the Santiago family is that they have decided that they want to aspire to the honors of men instead of the honors of God. They try to get their kids to do well in school adn teaching them about the importance of doing well in our every day life instead of thriving and doing well in the eyes of God.

The next morning, we all woke up VERY early at four in the morning and went off to the temple. We made it just in time for the 5:30 session. We were all dead tired for that session. Woof! We went so early because we knew some members that were going to go with us to the temple. None of them ended up showing up. When we got back to the Santiago house, all that we thought we wanted to do was sleep. We all took a nap for a couple of hours until we all felt a bit more rested. that nap was the best idea of the entire day. After the nap, we all ate breakfast with the Santiago family. It's kind of sad that such a nice family has gone inactive. We all talked to them about faith and how they can exercise their faith. Johnson went to the 16th ward where they go to this Sunday and he said that they didn't show up.

Well, after the Santiago family, we all went out. I visited Irving and Ivett. They were good to see. Ivett says that she's closer to getting baptized (she always has said that she was going to get baptized. She never has).

Just a side rant, we took my car down to California. I ma a bit miffed right now that they kind of left me to do the repairs to my car and to fix my car myself instead of them at least helping the least bit in that. It's kind of annoying that they don't want to help me with this. Maybe if I go down again, I'll put the caviot in that if we take my car, i don't pay for gas. I'll pay for car repair expenses, but not gas. But, I'm a bit miffed that they tore up my car (lost a 14 dollar gas cap, lost my 20-25 dollar keys, plus normal wear and tear and oil change). I'm a bit miffed about the entire thing. I bet that my expenses due to the car are a couple hundred dollars. it's annoying that they don't want to help out with these expenses and want to just put them on me.

So, then we drove around Anaheim for what seemed way to long to me. we spent like an hour and a half just driving around anaheim. in between the driving, we went to the swap meet down there for like two minutes and then to this one vietnamese restaraunt later on.

one of the only good things about saturday was that we ended up being able to drop me off in hb for the night. i went to hna. celia gonzalez's house first. i saw that miguel was kind of sick when i first got there. I ran up to Warner to see if there was a pharmacy there. but, there wasn't. so, i ran down to slater to see if there was one down there. luckily for me, i found one. phew! i ran up and bought the kids tylonol and ran back to celia's house. i gave her the tylonol, but i couldnt' stay much longer with the people there. I went down to Erasto's house to see if he was there. But, he wasn't. I told the people that I might be coming by the next day at like 9:00 in the morning. Afterwards, I went by to see if Luis and Elvis were there at their house. I was sad to see that they had taken off for the night somewhere else. After that, I went by to see if the Carreto family had already arrived. But, alas. They weren't there. So, i walked up to the sosa family and spent some time with them for awhile. that was rather fun to joke around with hermano sosa. when i was on my mission, we did a change that i would root for the chivas if he would root for the jets. he forgot that he was rooting for the jets by the time i got there. i kind of got onto him for that. he brought up the texas flds sect and asked if that was the same thing as us. i had to tell him no. :)

afterwards, we went to the menendez's house and spent the night there. she was very amable and gave us some ice cream and some good water. :)

the next morning, Mark wanted to be at his chapel by 9:00. Johnson was saying that he didn't think that he could make it back *cough* excuse *cough*. so, i had to take mark. After that, I ate breakfast and went to church with hermano menendez. we stopped by celia first in the morning and gave miguel a blessing. i sure hope that celia gets active again.

i really enjoyed spending sunday at huntington beach. i was happy to see a lot of the same people that i served my mission with. however, it was kind of sad because i didn't really see that many people attend the branch. i was used to a while lot more people when i was a missionary there and a lot of those people weren't there when i attended with them that sunday.

after church, i went to the espinosa's house and chilled with them. i called up hermana lagunas. she was at first reluctant to invite me over because she wasn't ready for me i guess. but, then when i told her that i wouldn't be able to come again, she told me that it was alright that i came at that time. I decided to check to see if I could do something. I wanted to see if i could get some ncmo out of karina. :) so, i was being rather friendly with karina, putting my arm around her and everything. when i was about to leave, i asked her if she wanted to go for a walk somewhere. she said yes. so, i came back like an hour later and we went for a walk in this one park in huntington beach. karina was kind of onto me when i was in the mission and i thought that she kind of liked me back in the day. so, i was taking her for a walk. i think taht i might have been a bit too forward with her. i was holding her hand and putting my arm around her and everythign. i think that was a bit too forward because it seemed like she didn't really want to do anything. she said at the end that she wanted to just be friends. so, i'm not going to really pursue that anymore.

about that time, i got a call from hermana menendez reminding me that i had forgotten about my appointment with hermana rollins. bryce moulton and i both know hermana rollins. she moved from his mission to my mission. so, i told hermana rollins that iw ould be at her house at like 6 o clock. i sadly forgot (all of this time that i was talking with hermana menendez, i was driving. BAD IDEA! don't drive while talking on the cell phone!) So, i went back to the espinosa's house at that point and talked with them for the rest of the night. i really enjoy their company and being able to talk with them. :) we stayed that night with the reyes family. i baptized hermana reyes with elder johnson when we were both in norwalk.

the next day was monday. we went to the beach again. (OH SO MUCH FUN!) We went with this one girl that Johnson knows named Heather. Heather seemed kind of cool. It was fun to hang out with her.

The next day, we drove back. I kind of feel like th erest of the people kind of jipped me because i had to repair my car. i pay for that from my own pocket. it's annoying that they don't really help at all with that. but, i already talked about this a bit. so, i wont' bore anyone reading this with anymore.

taht's how i've been! so long! i start amazon this upcoming week and i drive down tomorrow!