The One Where I get Kidnapped in Memphis & Overdose on Chicken

​(I'm tempted to leave my weekly as just this sentence and the subject line, just to mess with y'all.)


It's been an AWESOME week in the Arkansas Little Rock Mission. I won't leave ya hanging. In fact, this is a really long email. Sorry. But I used my novelist skillz in this one so I hope you enjoy.

Thursday is my 3 month mark! (Whaaa?!?!?)

Last Monday was the best P Day ever. We got kidnapped.*
Allow me to explain.
*More accurately, Brother Boggs took our Zone Leaders, (Elders Jennings and Breen) Elder Henderson, and I to do a puzzle escape room. In this particular escape room, (w/ a 33% pass rate) we started off blindfolded and handcuffed to a cot in a dark room, with 1 hour to escape. After solving a bunch of puzzles, riddles, codes, passwords, etc, we escaped the room with like 3 minutes to spare. It was super fun. Then we went to Gus's Chicken again. Gr9 as always. (Better than gr8.)

- E C L I P S E -    time!

We went to the Pink Palace museum in downtown Memphis, got our swaggy
- E C L I P S E - glasses.
Sat down on the lawn to wait for the - E C L I P S E -. We actually saw Caroline and her mom walking around there, too! It was a hopping place. Tons of people in their swaggy - E C L I P S E - glasses waiting for the 94% coverage "event of a lifetime." There were tv stations, school groups, the whole shebang.

We got to the point where we could see about 2/3 of the sun covered, and then the WHOLE sun got covered!!! And the moon too!!! Cause it was cloudy!!! And then it rained.

- E C L I P S E -

That was still fun, though. The rain went away after the - E C L I P S E - was over and we still had a few hours before we had to drive back to Collierville so we decided to check out the Lorraine Motel, the motel where Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated. The inside is now a museum (which we didn't check out) but the outside, including 2 gorgeous old cars, looks exactly like it did, with a wreath over the spot where MLK was shot. Pretty amazing piece of history. It made it feel close and real and extra sad to be there. People are crazy and dumb and stupid. And the whole racial divide thing isn't close to over yet, I keep hearing snippets of the news today. Crazy stuff going on.

We went back to Collierville and spent most of the rest of the day playing Settlers of Zarahemla. (Settlers of Catan, Book of Mormon-themed.) I lost. I won the next round though, by a lot. And then I lost twice again. I think I hate that game.

So yeah Monday was just the best! And then Tuesday came along, which was probably the worst day of my mission so far. (And honestly if this is the worst day, I'm still doing pretty good.)

We had district meeting in the morning. Then the aforementioned zone leaders thought up this great idea. A food challenge. At Buffalo Wild Wings. 200 boneless wings. 8 people. (Do the math.) We thought this would be a fun idea. I wasn't opposed to it at the time, but had I known what horrors lay in store, I'd have sooner eaten my tie.

So we went. A large box of boneless wings is $18.99. But wait, there's more! It's Tuesday and so it's buy one get one free. Bam. 2 larges for each companionship. 48 wings total/2 people. We started w three orders of 2 larges. (Spoiler alert: We didn't get to ordering the final pair of larges.)

4 wings go by: Eh these aren't too bad. They're not great. I like Gus's more.
8 wings go by: Hmm they have some interesting flavors at least
12 wings go by: Hot diggity dog I am full on wings
16 wings go by: I don't think I can take another bite. Their flavors are becoming one - the flavor of pain. Heat and garlic and synthetic lemon rub are merging into lava acid chicken all over my mouth.
20 wings go by: just kidding I think I had to stop at 19.

Reinforcements came, and finished off the remaining 20 or so wings. It had just been the 6 of us before they came. They are full enough when they're done, and we are too wrecked to even think of eating 1 more - let alone 48 more - wings, so we call it a day at like 144 wings between 8 people. I think at my 19 wings, I actually came in last place for "most wings consumed." 

We drive back to Collierville and I'm just stuffed. I hurt, and I can feel the chickens kicking my stomach lining out. I justify a 25 minute nap to myself before we go out to work. My alarm doesn't go off. (Or maybe I was in a coma state through it?) 1 hour later, I awake.

I feel forty pounds heavier, I'm sweating, dizzy, and worst of all - everything is chicken. Air is chicken. Nose is chicken. All is chicken. Every breath I take feels like the act of consuming Buffalo Wild Wings Boneless Wings. This must be what a hangover feels like. I wake up Elder Henderson and we shakily make our way to the car to try contacting some people. I feel like throwing up for about an hour. Nobody answers the door, thank goodness. But I survive, slowly feeling better after walking around in the sun and having a full plate of Mexican food for dinner. (Idk either, only that it felt like burying the chicken massacre in my stomach so it helped).

We make it through missionary correlation meeting and I go straight to bed when we get back to the apartment. I learned the next morning that I slept through Elder Henderson throwing up for at least an hour in his bathroom. The next morning I feel better, but too full for breakfast.

All in all: 0.3/10 experience, would not recommend or repeat

The rest of the week went better! 

We had a lesson with Caroline in which she readily accepted the Law of Tithing. She is seriously the coolest. Still on track to be baptized Sept. 9th!

We met with our other long term investigator, Anette, who we've been teaching since before I got here, even. She has had a hard time reading and remembering what we have taught, and coming to our church because she already likes hers. She has grown so much! She has a solid testimony of the Book of Mormon, and her reading and comprehension skills have improved so so much. We met with her again on Saturday and asked what she thought the Holy Ghost was trying to tell her as she read the Book of Mormon. After some silence, she said she wanted to be baptized. So she is back on date for Oct. 14th! She also came to church yesterday, yay! (The first time we've had an investigator come to church that we can sit with, anyway, since Caroline has been going to the YSA ward. So yay!)

One of the ward members told me that my book "Lies" is gonna be their book club pick in October! Ahhh I'm so excited about that hahaha.

On Friday we went ham knocking doors and trying to find new people to teach. Not a ton of big dramatic successes, but some cards given here, an email received there, and a house tour received!

(Yup, a house tour.) We complimented this lady's house and she just kinda out of the blue asked if we wanted a tour! We were like "uhh... sure!" It was beautiful. Apparently it had burned down a while ago, and they were in the middle of rebuilding. They had an awesome picture of Venice over the mantle, and we talked about how cool that place is for a little while. We didn't end up sharing much of the gospel, but she was so so nice, and we will definitely be back. 

We helped move furniture Sister Gaar bought from the previous owners house to her truck. We complimented her piano in her home and she invited us to come back to play it some time! Baby steps. :)

It really is the little things every day that make them feel good. When we work hard, regardless of the outcome, it feels good. That's a life lesson right there. I hate being unproductive and not using time wisely.

I could probably bore you with more stories not quite as exciting as getting kidnapped or helping people prepare for baptism and eternal salvation, but I think this email has gone on long enough. Until next week!

With love!
Elder Dahl

oliver.dahl@myldsmail.net

866 Shilling Rd. Apt. 103
Collierville, TN 38017