50 degrees and overcast. scattered showers

so, more on my adventures in AK. actually, all of my posts this summer will be about that, so i might as well stop using that phrase.

the drive up was long as all get out. we hit snow really hard in montana, where apparently they got a 14" storm total for that one. pretty crazy. we stopped once, a little south of edmonton, and then pretty much drove straight through for the next two days. it was a nice, pretty drive once we got into the yukon territory. the alaska highway got uber bumpy for the last 200 or so miles before the border, but once we hit the border, the it was smooth sailing. or driving.

some cool churchy experiences since i've been up here:

1. we were being trained on a one of our tours and some other people from a different part of the company were being trained on the same tour at the same time. i saw a girl and instantaneously, i just knew she was LDS. she didn't say anything or interact with anyone; i just knew she was a member because of the light she radiated. i think i had just gotten so used to seeing everyone back at byu with that light, so it was completely commonplace for me to be around people like that.

i got to thinking about how people can always just spot LDS people by their....whateverness and of course wondered if people ever saw that in me--if i was one of those who you could just pick out of the crowd as being LDS.

then the other day on another training trip with some other drivers, i was talking to one of the drivers about things to do in Fbx and i mentioned the bar scene wasn't really my scene. to that she replied, "well, sorry if i'm being presumptuous, but there are PLENTY of mormons around fbx." of course, i said "how'd you know i was mormon?" to which she replied "oh, everything about just screams "mormon." i asked her what specifically about me "screamed 'mormon,'" but she couldn't pinpoint it.

i was really happy about that conversation; it was really quite reassuring and comforting to have that confirmation. it's just been so long since i've been in a non-predominantly-lds environment that i don't know what it's like to be a minoroity anymore.

anyway, that led into the third cool experience:

i've been praying for opportunities to share the gospel a lot, now that i'm not in the bubble, so of course after my previously-explained conversation they started asking greg (my roommate, who is a really cool, mellow, funny guy) and me a bunch of questions about how the Church was connected to the world of Christianity. i decided the best way to explain it would be to explain the restoration to them, which i did, basically teaching them a mini first. it's been a LONG time since i've sat down and really taught someone about the gospel, so it was really a thrilling experience for me. i felt the Spirit really strongly as i did so, especially when i taught about the First Vision. it was a real testimony to me of the restoration. it really pounded into my head that the restoration is our main message to the world, besides of course that Jesus is the Christ.

I was really grateful Heavenly Father answered my prayer about that and that i could teach a little about the gospel. i don't think the two girls we were talking to felt the Spirit as much as i did (or maybe they just didn't recognize it), but it was a great experience for me nonetheless. i know this whole thing just sounds trivial, but it actually meant a lot to me.

i shaved my beard. it was itchy.

BEARDED



GOATEED
















SICK.















STALKER-STACHE















BACK TO NORMAL!

oh, so i don't necessarily plan on using my blog as a lot of people use theirs: sometimes it will be to update people; other times to simply braindump (hence the url); other times it will be kind of as a journal. i'm sure i'll find more uses for it besides those. sorry if i'm not as traditional as you might want me to be.