Okay, so that wasn't her ward.

Those of you not religiously inclined, please feel free to skip over the next five paragraphs.

I called Grandma last night, and she said that Susanne actually goes to church in Spijkenisse, even though the Meetinghouse Locator at LDS.org says that she's assigned to the Rotterdam First Ward.  Whenever I search anything in Hellevoetsluis, it always comes up as Rotterdam First Ward--doesn't say a single thing about the Spijkenisse Ward, even though there is definitely a meetinghouse there, and it's about halfway between here and Hellevoetsluis.  Weird.

Yet, the people at the church today knew her name when I said it, so they've probably at least met her, which is even more puzzling.  Grandma thinks that the building I went to today is the Stake building, but it's so tiny, how could it be?  Sure, the Stake President was there today, but that could have just been because that ward was getting a whole new bishopric.

Oh, well.  At least I packed my Kindle (which I have copies of the scriptures and the hymns on)--not even my mini-quad and my mini hymnals would have fit in either bag I packed for this trip.

Anyway, I got up and got dressed, surprisingly, at 8 a.m.  One of the other people in my room snores, so I figured it would be easier just to get up, especially since I had a long walk ahead of me.

After breakfast, I headed out, and it was pouring down rain.  I had that umbrella I bought at Madurodam yesterday, but the wind blew so hard that the umbrella turned inside out, and half of the extender arms broke!  Both my jacket and the bottom half of my dress were soaking wet by the time I got there.  The rain stopped long enough for me to get back after church though.  Oddly enough, their meetings are in reverse order of the ones back home.  We had Relief Society first, then Sunday School, and then Sacrament Meeting.

So now I'm back, and I'm hoping to do some laundry later, because I didn't pack nearly as many t-shirts as I thought I had, and I've run out of clean, full-length pants.  In other words, all I'm left with are warm-weather clothes, and it's pretty chilly here right now.

Or maybe I'll try calling Susanne in a little while, and do laundry tomorrow.  Though that might not be a good idea, for the same reason I just said above.

I didn't take any pictures while I was either walking or at the church, since I was just trying to stay warm, and my camera was inside the jacket.  Opening the jacket to get the camera would have been dumb--not to mention, my hands were already pretty frozen as it was, carrying the umbrella and the Kindle.

That's about it for now.  Maybe I can get some more of my story typed up or something.

Harry Potter and Other Manias *SPOILERS*

The rest of last week went pretty boringly. I had Friday off, and went to the doctor's office for an in-grown toenail (ouch!). It wasn't too bad, so she just told me to soak it with Epsom Salts and let it grow to normal length. We both agreed that surgery would be a last resort.

I spent most of Friday and Saturday at Mom & Dad's house. Friday, I was planning on seeing Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with the rest of the family if Dad would take us, but Jason was still at Scout Camp and it wouldn't have been fair to him. So I just hung out and helped Anna with her homework for her computer and English classes.

Saturday morning, Mom called me around 10:15 out of a sound sleep (I'd stayed up until four that morning, reading--hey! It was a three-day weekend!), begging me to drive Jason home from the Stake Center. So, I did that, then went back home and slept until about 1:30.

A little while later, I went back to Mom & Dad's and waited for Dad to get home. It took until about 6:30 for them to decide that they weren't going to see the movie that day--they were going to see it on Monday instead. I couldn't see the movie on Monday, because I had an appointment at my allergist's office as well as my shots after work and I didn't know when that would be finished. So, I took Jason to the movie on Saturday.

The movie was okay, I guess. It's possible I was just too drained from waiting almost two extra days, plus having to do all that thinking to help Anna with her homework and such, but the movie left me more amused than awed. There were a few exciting scenes (the ministry battle was not one of them!), but overall, the movie kind of fell flat to me.

Not only did they shorten and convolute the ministry battle, but they also left out a great huge portion of Harry's end-of-year chat with Dumbledore. I was so looking forward to seeing Harry trash Dumbledore's office too! That, coupled with the fact that they left out a great many things in the battle (the brains, the time turners, etc.) which I would have left in for excitement's sake, made the ending kind of "ho-hum."

Ginny, as a character, was also jipped--again. Her only lines were "Reducto!" and "Expecto Patronum!"

Dumbledore's battle with Voldemort was kind of stupid as well. All they showed was lightning flashing between the two wands and connecting--no transfiguration of anything (although a few things did get shattered into dust shortly before Voldemort possessed Harry), no pieces of the fountain protecting Harry.

I'll have to see it again, just in case my energy levels at the time could have effected my enjoyment of the flick.

Sunday I went over for dinner, as usual.

Yesterday I had my appointment, and it was nearly 7:30 before I got home, so I stopped at Roy Roger's on the way and got a grilled chicken sandwich with a side salad and a vanilla shake--YUM!

The hymnal I'd ordered from DeseretBook over the weekend arrived last night as well, but it was late before I was finished beta-reading a Lois & Clark fanfic for a friend. So, I went to Wal-Mart to get a headphone adapter jack so that I could still practice on the keyboard without waking up the girls.

I practiced until 10:45, then took a shower and went to sleep.

A Great Weekend

Yesterday started out pretty slow, but it got better.

I woke up around 10:10, took a shower, then watched Avatar: The Last Airbender (2 episodes every Saturday morning on Nickelodeon from 11 am-12 noon!). About 10 minutes before the second episode was over, Jason (my brother) called to see if I would be willing to take him to the library. I said sure, I'd be there after the show was over.

We went to the library, and Jason couldn't find the book he was really looking for, but he checked out a different book instead. We tried to get him a new library card (he keeps losing his), but they require either a school ID or a report card to show that he is who he says he is. And Jason's also lost his school ID. He used my library card to check out the book.

After that, Jason and I went to McDonald's for lunch. He still had a gift card from Christmas, so he treated me to lunch yesterday, and considering he's not yet 12, that was pretty cool.

Jason finally got to see my new place yesterday. We ate our lunches here in the kitchen, then I gave him the full tour of the place. He thought it was pretty neat.

A little while later, Anna and I went over to Patrick J.'s house to meet everybody (Kayla, Jason O., Devon, Kendra, Patrick J., & Cassie) to go hang out. Cassie took a wrong turn when she was trying to get to Patrick's house, so we just met her and Kayla in the church parking lot.

We went to the good theater to see Wild Hogs. It was HILARIOUS.

After that, we decided to go to Jason's house, where he'd order pizza--Anna was hungry.

When we got there (Anna, Cassie, Kayla and I all got there before Jason and the others), Brother and Sister O. were watching Monster-in-Law with another lady, so we all decided to watch it with them. That was an awesome movie.

Then we all talked for a while while we decided what to watch next. Finally, we decided on The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which was actually the first one anyone suggested. It was okay--not good enough to be one of my favorites, but not bad either.

After League, we all decided to go home. There was a pretty thick fog, so Anna drove slowly until we got back to Liberty Rd. She finally dropped me off around 1 am-ish.

After that, I got ready for bed and went to sleep--I didn't even do any reading or turn the TV on sleep like I usually do. I was exhausted.

This morning, Sister G. called me at 7:45 (half an hour before I had to get up!!!) to ask me to let Jen C. know about something that she was doing this morning. I knocked on Jen's door, but it sounded like she was in the shower, so I slipped a note under her bedroom door and then went back to sleep until 8:15 when I had to get up and get ready for church.

My left knee had been bugging me off and on yesterday, so I put on my knee brace this morning too. It started to feel better somewhere between Relief Society and choir practice, but I'm not sure exactly where. Just a few minutes ago, I took the brace off because it was starting to chafe, but then I had to answer the door and go up and down the stairs to see if one of the Jens were here, 'cause that's who the person at the door was asking for.

Yes, I actually went to choir practice today. My allergies and throat were actually cooperating today, so I figured I'd better take the opportunity to do some singing. We practiced "All Glory, Laud and Honor" for the Easter sacrament meeting coming up, and then we started on another hymn--I can't remember the name of it, but it's fun because there are a lot of eighth note-double sixteenth note combinations, so it kind of sounds like mini trills.

Dad was at my ward this morning, and he asked after the third hour if I wanted a ride to his house, but I told him I was staying for choir and I had stuff to do at home (like get lunch) first. He added that if I drove myself, I wouldn't have to get someone there to drive me back home afterward, and I said that yeah, that's probably a good thing too. According to Dad (and he would know, since he's the main cook of the family) we're having lasagna. YUM!

Scriptures/quotes from this week:

3 Nephi - The Savior's visit to the Nephites
Moroni 10
1 Nephi 19:9

In Sunday School, we went over the last half of the Sermon on the Mount, and we found things in Matthew chapters 6 & 7 that true disciples should and shouldn't do.

The Relief Society lesson today was about Elder Bednar's talk from the October 2006 General Conference called "And Nothing Shall Offend Them." Here are some good paraphrases from the lesson:

To be offended is a choice we make. It is not something afflicted on us by others. We can't blame the other person just because we took offense to something they did or said.

Try not only to not be offended, but also try to be careful not to offend others.

If a snake bites you, you have two choices:

1. You can curse the snake, yell at it, abuse it, or any amount of other things done or said in anger at the snake's action.
2. You can go immediately to get help to get the poisonous venom out of you before it kills you.

So it is with being offended. You can choose either to be angry and take offense to something someone says or does to you, or you can take a moment to think on the situation and do your best to get the poisonous feeling of anger out of you as soon as possible.

One of the sisters said that she tries to see the other person the way the savior sees him or her. Often, the other person doesn't realize that what they've said could be taken as offensive, so looking at it from the other person's point of view may help to keep you from taking offense as well.

And now, for my favorite quote of the day:

And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?
~ Alma 5:26