What We Did This Weekend: Running Out of Shoes Before Conference

The biggest portion of our weekend was spent watching and listening to the 179th General Conference of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There are four sessions, five if you count the priesthood session, two on Saturday and two more Sunday. Growing up, I went through three phases in how I approached conference.

1) Excited that there was no church on Sunday! More Sesame Street for me!

2) Dreading conference because my mom was going to make me listen to those boring old guys in the dark whose monotonicity put me in a deep, deep sleep twice a year on a Sunday afternoon.

3) Excited to hear the prophet and the other brethren and what they had to teach us.*

*So excited to hear it, in fact, that I fought with my brother once during conference because I wanted to watch in peace, but he wouldn't cooperate. And when I say fought, I don't really mean arguing. I mean WWF-MMA-throwing-people-across-the-room-and-oh-by-the-way-you-had-better-watch-out-or-you-might-have-your-ear-bitten-off-title-bout kind of fight, if you catch my drift. That was the session of conference the weekend before I left on my mission. Ah, the memories.

I've stayed in that third and final phase ever since I arrived there. It is really nice to be able to log in to lds.org and watch each session over the internet with Brookie. It makes for an extremely nice, spirit-filled weekend. But, my guess is that we'd better enjoy it while we can, because I can only assume that when we have children of our own, it may become more difficult to sit still for eight hours of conference addresses, as they will likely go through the same progression I did.

So General Conference, that's what we did Saturday and Sunday.

Friday night we went out with some friends of ours.* We met them at Waldo Pizza (any date-night that involves Waldo Pizza is successful in my book), and it was awesome, of course. I stopped to let Brookie out of the car at about 7:20pm, and she went inside to put our name on the waiting list while I looked for a parking spot. I finally found one at 7:35pm**, and she let me know that it was going to be about a 45 minute wait. But, like the sign says that sits near the front door, "It's Worth the Wait."

*Luckily they were some very patient, good-humored friends, since there was a little confusion about at which Waldo Pizza we were meeting that night.

**I must have just missed a dozen spots while I circled in the xB for 15 minutes. I would drive through the small lot and no one would be pulling out or even walking to their car. Then, on my next lap, I'd pass six or seven cars that had just parked and were getting out and going into the restaurant. Of course, Brookie watched the whole thing and had a good chuckle from the sidewalk by the front door.

After dinner the plan was bowling, but first, please indulge this digression:

Back in Provo, Brookie and I were out for a date, and we had a hankerin' for a nice, big, juicy hamburger. We decided on Fuddruckers (since we had a Fuddruckers gift card in-pocket). I guess I can't speak for Brookie, but I, at least, really wanted a Fuddruckers hamburger that night. We pulled into the parking lot and my mouth was already watering. I could already taste the beef, their freshly baked buns, and their equally fresh toppings. My hamburger-day-dream was dashed, however, when we sauntered up to the counter to order and the manager told us they were out of beef. Whaaaahhht? Out of beef? But you're a hamburger place; how can you be out of beef? Isn't that you're whole thing? Beef? Those are just some of the thoughts that went through my mind as we left and walked across the parking lot to a nearby Applebee's (keep in mind, this is before the invention of the Quesadilla Burger, so going from Fuddruckers to Applebee's – especially when we had a Fuddruckers gift card – was a let down). Needless to say, I did not ring the bell on my way out of Fuddruckers that night.

Now, back to Friday night: I was really excited for bowling. I'm no professional-wanna-be, but I enjoy bowling. And besides, we'd figured out in the car that by bowling for an hour, we'd burn about 230 calories, which amounts to another slice of pizza. As we walked into the bowling alley near the Ward Parkway Mall, there were some good signs, the best being the no smoking notice posted on the door.

Inside it was apparent that it was "Bring Your Weird College Friends in Costume" night. It was really busy, so I guess you could say the place was hoppin'. Apple juice seemed to be the drink of choice, as there were pitchers of it on every table, and plastic cups of the amber nectar in each hand. We made our way to the front desk to pay for some good old recreation, but the man working behind the counter didn't acknowledge us. It was obvious that we were neither in college nor in costume, so I guess he thought we were lost, and that we would soon figure that out and leave. We overheard him say something to one of the patrons also waiting at the desk (who definitely was college-age and might have been in costume too, though I can't be sure about that), but what he said was a little ridiculous, and caught me off guard:

"We're out of shoes."

Then he disappeared. He never spoke to us, just went away (maybe he was out of juice, and went to get some more). The four of us, now a little dazed, wondered how a bowling alley with at least six open lanes, could be out of shoes. The only thing more absurd would have been that they were out of bowling balls pins. So we went back out to the cars, tried to think of another bowling alley in the area (and one that would have enough shoes for all the bowlers), and ultimately called it a night.

And that's what we did this weekend.

Oh, and by the way, kudos to everyone that commented on my last post. It takes guts to fess up to being duped by an April fools gag (even if it was an awesome one). I know there were quite a few visitors who fell just as hard but were too embarrassed to let us know.