First, we return to last week’s wonderful experiences in the Preston England Temple. What Sister Blickenstaff failed to report was our only frustrating experience of the entire trip. When we were finished in the temple, we boarded our minibus and returned to the airport in Manchester. Upon arrival, we all went through security with a couple of hours remaining before our flight was called. We were all quite hungry, at least four hours having passed without a full-course meal and all we had to eat on the minibus was what the Blickenstaffs refer to as “band food.” (Band food was what we ate at San Juan High School when we travelled by bus to an activity at some major metropolis like Green River, Utah or Shiprock, New Mexico, and consists of high nutrition health food, such as chips, chocolate, cookies, soft drinks, candy and the occasional bag of homemade venison jerky.)
Sister Blick decided that we needed to eat at Burger King. Now we have not purchased food at a Burger King since about 1979 (two years before the oldest of our YSA were born) so I was not able to comprehend why it was critical to do so now. Here we are, in jolly old England, determining that our best food option is a traditional British institution like Burger King.
Nonetheless, having been taught by my friend, Captain Gary Peterson, that I only need to know two words to have a happy marriage (“Yes, dear”) I enthusiastically followed my senior companion into the BK. She sat down to claim a table whilst I stood up in a queue (queues are special lines in the UK where one stands in a line, waiting for something, anything, to happen).
Fortunately, due to my terrifying fear of being alone in a queue, I had company. There were 15 people in front of me. I looked at my watch and seeing that we still had two hours, decided that I could make it through what I estimated to be a 25-minute wait. Forty-five minutes later, I had moved up the queue to where I was the actual, literal, next person in line. By now, I had enough observation time to see that “Having it your way” was causing a major slowdown, so I made an on-the-spot decision to order it their way.
Rather than ordering what we wanted, I ordered what they were cranking out the quickest. The manager, who actually took my order personally, very helpfully explained that there were many people in line, so things were moving very slowly. “Oh!” I exclaimed. Armed with this startlingly revelatory information, I was now prepared to understand what was taking so long. I tried to think, but nothing happened (apologies to the Three Stooges).
Two members of the stake presidency, a high councillor and a bishop were in line behind me. As I finally walked over to where our wives were seated, being the first husband to return , my triumphant victory march was met with the wild ringing of applause from the wives. It was brilliant.
Another high councillor, who had the good sense to go into a British establishment to order food had already eaten and dropped by our group to visit. He said to me, “Well, they don’t call it fast food for nothing.”
To which I replied, “Well, apparently at Burger King, they do, in fact, call it fast food, for nothing.”
Now, I will change the topic completely and tell you about the baptism we attended on Tuesday. As we walked in, we shook hands with a man sitting in the back. He clasped my hand and would not let go. He moved his head closer to my name tag and stared at it for fifteen seconds, then he sat back and smiled and me. Then he leaned forward and stared at my name tag again and leaned back. This happened four or five times, all whilst firmly grasping my hand. I wasn’t quite sure what to say, and not wanting to interrupt what could have been an epiphany in progress, I stood there smiling at him. I eventually said, “Hello, my name is Elder Blickenstaff.”
He silently continued his inspection of my name tag for another thirty seconds, leaned back, peered up at me and broke into a huge grin. Then he said something totally unintelligible that I could not understand, but which allowed me to discover that he was four sheets to the wind. Upon this observation, I noticed that he had an earring in one ear and that he looked a wee bit like a pirate. After about four minutes he let go of my hand, for which I thanked him and moved along.
I asked the missionaries (pronounced mission-reeze – rhymes with breeze, please, tease, sneeze and freeze) who he was and it turns out he is one of their investigators (not the one being baptised that night). He really enjoyed himself. He chatted away to one of the elders during the hymns and had a few laughs at times when nothing particularly humorous was occurring. When we went into the other room to witness the baptism, he had to go outside for a smoke. One of the elders went with him (not to smoke, just for company – we missionaries do not smoke in this mission), which turned out to prevent both of them from actually seeing the baptism performed. So you might say that poor Elder James went out for a smoke and missed his first baptism. (Elder James did not think this was funny, but he is from Lindon.)
At the conclusion of the service, we were all invited into the cultural hall, where the ward members served a lovely dinner. They had rice, chili, curry (Sister Blickenstaff told me it was not curry; it was tikka tikka, to which I cleverly replied, “Teeka Shmeeka.” Later I learned that if you Google™ tikka, you discover it is a “curry dish of roasted chicken” so you can call me tikka or you can call me curry but don’t call me wrong or before 10:00 in the morning), baked beans, garlic bread and donuts. It was all quite good. I went back for seconds.
I tried to go for thirds, but just as I reached the table to snag one last piece of garlic bread (there were three pieces just laying there on a tray, seeming to say, “Please, Elder Blickenstaff, eat me”) a woman moved past me, gobbled up piece number one, gobbled up piece number two, placed piece number three in her handbag and walked away before I could say, “Bob’s your uncle.” It was brilliant!
Meanwhile, the pirate seemed to be sincerely enjoying himself as he ate everything that was placed before him. He also demonstrated his desire to give something back by taking out his harmonica and serenading us during dinner. He could play any combination of random notes that happened to come out as he was moving the instrument around.
All things considered, it was a lovely service.
The problem was that once we arrived, did our wee business and were about to embark upon the return leg, one of us suggested that we continue to walk in the general outbound direction. The specific suggestion was to walk to the Centre for Young Adults. When the other one gently remonstrated, the party of the first part asked, “Don’t you want to be able to say that we walked from our flat to the Centre?”
Well, all idiomites know the idiom, “You can’t fight city hall,” so the party of the second part reluctantly acquiesced (see Captain Peterson quoted above for the exact response).
We pressed on into the gale. When we arrived at the Centre, one of us thought the other one was going to suggest, “Why don’t we keep walking in to the Belfast City Centre?” or “Why don’t we walk out to the west coast of Ireland” or “Why don’t we walk across the Irish Sea to Wales?” However, none of these fears actually materialised. We just did our wee business and then started back on the return leg.
As all good things come to an end, we now faced the problem that the return trek was all uphill. Nevertheless, we pressed on with high hopes of somehow getting home. For some reason that will not be understood in this lifetime, we mutually determined to take the proverbial “shortcut.” As everyone knows, a shortcut in unfamiliar territory is a bad idea. This is particularly true in Europe, where the concept of a block is unknown in the various cities and towns.
Mysteriously, inevitably and indubitably, said shortcut turned out to be the long cut. It appeared to wind around down through the Republic of Ireland, out to the Isle of Man, over to Liverpool, past Rivendell and the Last Homely Home before we eventually came within sight of our flat.
Enigmatically, as we walked along, the burden of the One Ring became increasingly heavier. One of us pressed on as happy as if that person had good sense. The other one murmured and complained right the way through. Tragically, as we trudged within a few hundred feet of our threshold, one of us collapsed. The other one had to drag the collapsee along by the legs, causing the odd bruise on the collapsee’s backside.
Now I am too polite to mention the whining, reluctant, exhausted collapsed person by name. Suffice it to say that one of us was strong and cheerful whilst the other one was wimpy, cantankerous and consumed in pain and agony.
My backside still hurts. Next time, when my companion says, “Let’s walk,” I’m taking the train.
Next, I turn to the beautiful North Antrim Coast, the most scenic landscape we have visited in Northern Ireland. We have been up there twice on previous occasions. (It would be very difficult to be there twice on future occasions, unless one had use of the Tardis.) This time we took our wonderful sister missionaries with us. These are two twenty-something young ladies that have taken eighteen months out of their lives, interrupted their college education, left their families and come here at their own expense to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. They are assigned to the Belfast YSA Centre and we have come to admire and appreciate them.
We invited them to come up the coast with us, where we visited one of the island's primary tourist sites. It is called Carrick-A-Rede, which is Scottish Gaelic for “rock in the road.” It is a rope bridge connecting the main island with a small island called Carrick Island. Fishermen have maintained a bridge here for 350 years to check fishing nets and launch their boats. The bridge is about 100 feet above the ocean. The wind was screaming and it was quite an experience, especially for me. I have acrophobia and had a terrifyingly delightful time trying to look brave in front of all the women. Fortunately, we were the only four visitors there during this visit and after 20 minutes of acting courageous, Bob’s your uncle.
Finally, I have run out of things to write. With the exception of telling you that I learned a new phrase – Bob’s your uncle.
One of our YSA taught me this fantastic aphorism. According to the fountain of all truth (excluding the scriptures), Wikipedia, Bob's your uncle is an expression commonly used in Britain and Commonwealth nations. Typically, someone says it to conclude a set of simple instructions to mean, "And there you have it", or "You're all set". For example, "To make a ham sandwich, just put a piece of ham between two slices of buttered bread, and Bob's your uncle."
This is my favourite new phrase and I am using it every chance I get.
We love you all, and don’t forget, Robert is your father’s brother.
Elder Blickenstaff
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