04/30/2008

Family & Friends,

Looks like I’m going to have to adopt the same strategy I did last time I wrote and just piece this letter together one paragraph at a time. I really should be studying but I have a meeting (more on this in the next paragraph) in about 20 minutes so I figured I’d write until then.
I guess the big news to report in my life is that about 2 weeks ago I got called as the elder’s quorum president in my ward. Yikes! Really, I’m very excited, I just hope I figure out what I’m doing sooner than later! We are having a mid-week presidency meeting (mentioned above) to continue working on home teaching. This meeting began Sunday afternoon, but after 4 hours we still have a lot of work to do, and we figured we’d better meet to get some more done. I already love the calling, but keenly feel the responsibility of it at the same time. It’s interesting to me that church callings have a way of juxtaposing those emotions. My love for the people out here is growing in ways I never knew it could, which is neat. I love how active service in the church provides opportunities to serve and grow in love for people.
A few days after I’d been issued the call but before the ward knew about it, I had a chance to spend an evening in the Chicago temple. Descriptions of the feelings, emotions and insight gained during such times never translates well into written word (at least not for me), but it was an evening I’m very grateful for, where I learned a lot and received a lot of insight, especially into the matter of who should be called as councilors. I felt I received as clear a direction in councilor selection as I have ever received about anything in my life and the few hours we spent together on Sunday only confirmed to me that the Lord really prepared these people for their callings. All I can say is I’m glad the Lord is in charge on this whole thing because I’d never be able to pull it off alone.

Next Day…

So, the weather in Milwaukee has been steadily improving over the last few weeks until it finally now resembles habitable! There were weeks this winter when I wondered how the first person ever saw Wisconsin and said to himself, “Self, I think I’ll build a house here on the frozen tundra amidst the drifts of snow that just buried my horse, and call this place home”. But, as always happens, the weather has improved to the point where I completely understand how a person could happily live their entire lives in this state! The snow-mountains have melted, things are green, and we get an occasional rain shower (which I love!) It really is beautiful out here.

Later in the day…

I’ve got a couple of funny stories I want to share. These strike me as funny. Hopefully a few others may see some humor in them.

First, “The Story of the Fulminate Kitchenware”
For breakfast the other morning I decided I wanted to get a batch of Pillsbury caramel stick rolls cooking in the oven. I turned the oven to the prescribed temperature (375 degrees), prepared the rolls in a small Pyrex dish, put them into the oven to cook and started doing some of my other pre-lecture morning routines.
Perhaps 3 or 4 minutes before the rolls were ready to be pulled out of the oven, I was mixing up some grape juice to supplement my morning fare and my roommate was sitting at the kitchen table contentedly reading the Ensign. In the midst of these peaceful endeavors, a somewhat startling sound emanated from the oven. It sounded a little like small arms fire followed by the disheartening sound of broken glass falling onto a hard surface. My roommate, who had been absorbed in his Ensign article, assumed I had tried to pull the pan from the oven, burned myself and dropped the Pyrex, casing it to shatter. In truth I was 10 feet from the oven, and to my advantage had not burned myself at all. My first thought was, “that can’t be what I think it is”…but sure enough it was! The Pyrex pan, of its own volition, had exploded! And I mean that in all seriousness – It exploded! This pan did not crack, or delicately split down the middle, it blew up into lots and lots of tiny little pieces, spilling caramel and glass shards onto the heating element of the oven. This of course resulted in a fumigation of our apartment with carbonized caramel smoke. As this occurred minutes before I had to rush off to lecture, I had no choice but to quickly scrape the glass shards out of the oven, and turn the oven to “self clean” before running over to the school.
Approximately 9 hours later I returned to our apartment for dinner. I had kind of forgotten the incident in the rush of daily activities and only remembered upon seeing the oven still set to “self clean”. Not knowing how these things work, I assumed the self clean cycle must be done by then turned it off, then turned the oven to 400 degrees in order to do a little cooking of my dinner. While the oven heated I called someone and we started talking. Just at that moment my roommate came home and upon entering the kitchen noted a faint aroma and a small whiff of smoke rising out of the oven. He opened to oven, determined to investigate the matter for himself. Once again, we fumigated the apartment as billows of choking smoke poured from the oven. Apparently the “self clean” cycle on our oven does not work and the heating element was still covered with caramel!
Lets just say I ended up eating out that night, and had to spend over an hour the next day cleaning the oven with oven cleaner and paper towels!

Even later (I’m clearly taking too many study breaks)…

Second story: “The Story of the Rogue Elders Quorum President”
(Tell me if this doesn’t sound like just what you would expect to have happen the week you are sustained as elder’s quorum president…)
I don’t know how many of you have ever eaten at Noodles and Co. but if you haven’t, let me recommend that you do. In fact, don’t wait. Go right now. Drive to a neighboring state if you must…I love that place! They have a dish called Pesto Cavatappi that I would rank on the list of Ideals in Humanity somewhere between a cheap, inexhaustible, clean energy source and world peace.
Last week a friend and I (this friend shares my feelings about Pesto Cavatappi) decided we needed to try and duplicate this recipe. In fact, this friend is who I felt needed to be called as elder’s quorum 1st councilor. We were meeting to discuss elders quorum business and decided we wanted a meal to go along with our meeting. We did a google search and came up with a recipe that claims to be the same as what Noodles and Co. uses. This recipe, among other things, calls for the noodles to be pan fried in white wine (thus burning off the alcohol but leaving behind the taste). Anyway, it was my job to get the groceries necessary for this culinary endeavor.
I must have been the strangest customer the alcohol department at Pick n’ Save has ever seen. I was almost blushing from embarrassment at even being in the alcohol section, and I walked around reading labels just hoping to find a bottle labeled “white wine”, but apparently that is not French enough. Everything was labeled in mystic wine code (pinot noir, cabernet sauvignon, merlot, etc). Eventually I had to approach the lady behind the counter and have the following dialog:

Eric: “umm…I need help. See, I don’t drink but I need a bottle of white wine for a recipe I’m making”
Lady: “that is what all of our alcoholics say. What is it you need?”
Eric: “I just need the cheapest white wine you’ve got”
Lady: “sounds like you actually need a Sherry”
Eric: “No, I need a wine”
Lady: “A Sherry is a type of cooking wine”
Eric: “ohh…I guess I need that”

After proving that I’m a total alcohol moron (a title I’ll gladly claim) I approached the counter and asked about the procedure of buying the wine. I had it in my head that I would have to prove my age, status as an American citizen, and possibly have a criminal background check before the Sherry would be issued. In fact, the lady didn’t even ask for my driver’s license until I asked her directly if she needed to see it!
And for bonus laughs, wouldn’t you know that in the Pick n’ Save at the exact moment I was exiting the liquor section with my purchase I ran into a lady I recognize as a member of one of the married wards in the stake! I’m hoping she didn’t recognize me as a Mormon because I’m pretty sure she’d think I was AWOL in a word of wisdom sense!
By the way, the recipe turned out really quite good and if anyone is interested I’ll gladly send it along!

Okay, those are all my stories, and I’d better finish up here. The only other thing I want to leave with is an excerpt from Dave Berry that really rings true to me right now because I just bought my plane ticket home for the summer (ouch!). This excerpt is from a section titled “Answers to Common Air-Travel Questions”

Q: Airline fares are very confusing. How, exactly, does the airline determine the price of my ticket?
A: Many cost factors are involved in flying an airplane from point A to point B, including distance, passenger load, whether each pilot will get his own pilot hat or they’re going to share, and whether point B has a runway.
Q: So the airline uses these cost factors to calculate a rational price for my ticket?
A: No. That is determined by Rudy the Fare Chicken, who decides the price of each ticket individually by pecking on a computer keyboard sprinkled with corn. If an airline agent tells you that they’re having “computer problems” this means that Rudy is sick, and technicians are trying to activate the backup system, Conrad the Fare Hamster.

(I wonder if the price of medical school is determined in a similar manner???)

Love you all!
-Eric