Storytime

This week, I would like to begin with something that happened to me while knocking doors. I wrote it in my journal so I'll just copy what I wrote:

"We had a very interesting run in with some dogs. We were about to knock on a house but a dog was lying in front of the door. As we got closer it jumped up and started barking - causing two or three more dogs (one very angry, mean one in particular) to come running around the corner. The mean one was jet black and going to kill us. Elder Stanley went into Chuuk mode and took off his backpack to use as a weapon. We kept pretending to pick up rocks to scare them off, but its only temporary, and usually makes them angrier - which it did. At one point, Elder Stanley turned to leave, and quickly. Of course, this caused the black dog to start chasing him, but I was between them. I reached down to "pick up" another "rock", which scared it long enough for me to notice two gargantuan beasts, which looked enough like dogs for me to call them that, trotting casually up to where we were. These two dogs, for lack of a better word, then took their place between us and the pack of dogs, which consisted of about 5 or 6 dogs at this point. This was one of the coolest things I have seen in a long time. The pack of dogs were all barking, growling and showing their teeth, but the big ones just stood there facing them and didn't make a sound - somehow keeping them at bay."

It was almost as if the two were telling the others to calm down and back off, and the others were trying to convince them to let them eat us.

At this point, we realized it was time for us to go, so we did. I tried to go back yesterday and get a picture with these dogs so you could see how huge they are - but they weren't so nice this time. Maybe I'll try again another time.

If Luke ever wants to come to the Micronesian Islands, Continental is the only airline that flies between the islands. Pretty good vacation spot if he's looking for one.

The outdoor Shakespeare festival in Tuacahn sounds a lot like an outdoor Shakespeare festival that we have been to not too long ago. Sounds like a tradition in the making. If you were waiting for my RSVP, sorry, but I won't be able to make it to the reunion or Mom's birthday bash this year. Maybe next year - I'll let you know.

Did you tell Forrest that Japan is only a stone's throw from Palau? By stone I mean guided missile, and by throw I mean launch, but you get the idea.

Similar to Matt, we got a foot and a half of snow in the last couple of days and are expecting more soon. By snow I mean rain actually.

We set our baptismal goals for this year at 20. We're making a poster that has 20 squares with a black silhouette in each. Each time we have a baptism, we're going to take a picture and place them on the poster. We're trying to find a way to help later missionaries own the goal that we set. We thought this was a good idea.

My time is up, so this will have to be a short one this week. We had a good holiday season and surprisingly successful. We have a few baptisms scheduled this month, and hopefully they work out.

I love you all, keep praying for me, and I'll keep praying for you.

Love,

Elder Barlow