In the Rough - The Blog of Joel McDonald Jr.

Greetings and welcome to my last mission update for the year 2005! As the mission is changing Preparation Day (i.e. e-mail day) to Mondays beginning the first of the year, my next update will come to you on January 2nd, 2006!Unfortunately, I don’t have a day-by-day accounting of the past week. Things are going well here in Dodge. We had a great Christmas.Elder Adams and I did some Carol Tracting one day. We had a pretty good time doing it. People were a little surprised to answer the door and find someone just wanting to sing them a Christmas Carol. We were also a little surprised at some of the negative reactions we received. For example, we had one nice lady answer the door and say, “Well, sure, I suppose you could sing to me…by the way, who are you affiliated with?” Me: “The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints” Her: “Oh…well…I really am busy right now and can’t listen to you.” We walked away a little confused, but not in the least surprised. Satan does work very hard…he magnifies his calling to a fault.It was great to call home on Christmas and talk with family. It’s interesting (and somewhat annoying) when other missionaries run around with arms flailing, trying to schedule their calls home (which sometimes requires a call home ::rolls eyes::). As for myself, I knew that if I called at a decent early hour Christmas morning, I would catch everyone with two phone calls (one to Florida, and one to Virginia). It worked, I’m happy. It was nice.Funny Story: We spent Christmas Day out at the Brinkerhoff’s in Montezuma. They have about 40 acres out there, some horses, and some goats. We were standing around watching and petting the horses, and the goats sounded hungry. So, I went into the feeding enclosure and grabbed a pitchfork and started shoveling food out to the edge for the goats to eat. Next thing I know, the three Elders I was with started singing “Old M’a'cDonald had a farm…” I have to admit, that for perhaps the first time, considering the situation, I actually found it funny.I hope everyone had a nice Christmas. Thank you very much for your thoughtful cards and packages. I hope everyone will look to the next year with expectations for improvement, and set goals to achieve that improvement. A resolution…truly…indeed.