TRAINING TIME

Monday is our regular P-day, but since the LA-FHL was closed for carpet cleaning that day all the senior missionaries decided to have an all-day activity. We drove in two vans to Long Beach harbor for a 45 minute harbor cruise, a visit to the Aquarium of the Pacific, and lunch at Bubba Gumps. The visitor's center was also closed so their missionaries had the same idea, but they chose the three-hour whale watching cruise. We had a good day. Not much to see in the harbor except the Queen Mary, the second largest shipping docks in the country, and some man-made islands for oil wells. All pretty industrial. But the day was nice, as it is every day, and we got a nice view of the the Long Beach skyline. The Aquarium was very well done. We had been to the Scripps aquarium in June and this one compares favorably. The food and the service at Bubba Gumps was very good. It was a good time to get better acquainted with the other missionaries.

Our group on the harbor cruise

With the Queen Mary in the background

Near the aquarium

We had what our library director calls intensive training for three days, from 8:00 to 5:00, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. These classes are for library staff and for anyone else who wants to sign up. We had two classes each morning and two each afternoon, taught by our director and a couple of part-time missionaries. It was very good, but a bit much to absorb in three days. However, we will get the beginners' training later and then will repeat the intensive in a few months. One of the classes was repeated on Saturday and Mary took it. We are learning a lot and enjoying it.

Friday and Saturday were spent working in the library. In the slow times (Friday) we can work on our own research, practicing what we learned in the training. But when it is busy (Saturday) we help the patrons. Max spent a couple of hours with one man in the morning and then just before lunch started another couple on searching FamilySearch and Ancestry, and came back with more help after a quick lunch. He found it very stimulating and a lot of fun. One researcher wanted to find more about Jewish emigrants from pre-war Austria and about his Norwegian ancestors. The couple wanted to trace their ancestors back to the antebellum slave plantations in Louisiana and Tennessee, and to post Civil War Texas. Max helped them find and use the US census slave schedules.

Max has been able to get up early and walk around the neighborhood for two or three miles each morning this week. Mary and one of the single senior sisters have started doing Tai Chi together. We went to the temple on Wednesday.  It is beautiful, even majestic.  We went to a farmers' market in Westwood Thursday evening and found a lot of nice, fresh produce. We walked back to Westwood, about a mile away, on Friday evening to visit the public library branch, but found it closed.

We did our laundry Saturday after our shift so we can be unencumbered tomorrow, our P-day. We attended church this morning. Great speakers and lessons. And we went to a "Why I believe ..." fireside at the visitors' center this evening. The sister missionaries sang and played hymns, and we heard from a professor from Pepperdine University who is a convert to the church about his conversion and mission and how he came to have his testimony.

We are both well and having a good time.

Love from

Elder and Sister Evans