# Chateau de la Tobler

## Sunday, January 24, 2010

### This and That

So, today I talked to the bishop. I asked him if we could move the choir performance from the second Sunday to the third, since we don't have practice on Fast Sunday. That wasn't a problem. Then I told him that choir wasn't going to be able to perform at all unless we gt more people to come to practice. The last two weeks we have gotten a grand total of three people to a practice. The bishop frowned and said, "We've got to do better than that. I'll announce it again today." Then he totally spaced it and no announcement went out. Apparently, however, he did remember in time to give a big choir plug during priesthood. That was good. Today I had five men and three women show up for practice, twice as many as I've gotten since Christmas. We might be able to preform on schedule after all.
We are always early to church. This has not always been the case in our marriage. Jeff was raised to think that as long as you slid into the pew before the bishop actually started talking you were on time. I have often explained over the years that I just can't do that. We were late if we weren't there a half hour early. Eventually this translated into us being about fifteen minutes early. Mostly that was because when I was called as a Sunbeam teacher I insisted on being at least that early so I could get my classroom set up for class and it just stuck at that point. Once I was called to be the organist, I started to insist on the half hour model again. The one time I let him talk me into being 'late' the bishop came up and actually asked that I provide twenty minutes of prelude. Now that we are the first ward in the building at 8:00 am we have actually turned on the lights in the chapel when we arrived a few times. Today we got there and there were two people already in the chapel. I put up the numbers for the hymns and started playing the organ. After about ten minutes the bishop came in and sat down. He was joined by the high council member for our ward, but that's not terribly unusual. Then the Stake President came in and sat on the stand next to the bishop. This also didn't mean much to me as the Stake President's ward is also in our building and he's often around on Sunday. Then the rest of the Stake Presidency showed up and they all sat down on the speaker's side of the stand. Now I was paying attention. As we had had our Ward Conference two weeks ago this was unusual. I was expecting something to happen. I think any of us would be expecting something in this case. Then opening exercised started. The bishop released a few people, extend a few callings and turned the time over to our High Council member stood and informed us of the release of various stake callings including the entire Young Women's presidency, then we had the sacrament. After that Lillian and I went down to sit with everyone else and I asked Jeff, "What's going on?"
He shrugged and leaned over, "Maybe they are just fishing." His expression if they are just looking at the members and waiting for inspiration to strike about a particular calling.
The youth speaker finished speaking and the musical number performed. Then the bishop turned the time over to President Ray. He released our first and second councilors and called our old second councilor to first and a new second councilor was called.
Looking back I wasn't terribly surprised. While it doesn't necessarily mean being released, the first councilors wife has recently been diagnosed with Valley Fever which has a six to twelve month recovery time and two children under eight. He was needed at home.
After church I baked a cake and got ready for choir and then had choir. After everyone left, the little girls started to watch "Olivia" on NickJr. I was fussing in the kitchen finishing up a few things for dinner when Olivia said something. She said, "Little brothers should NEVER be taller than big sisters." While I understand the context of this line, it caused me to laugh a little hysterically. My own little brothers have been taller than me for close to twenty years! The bypassed me before they even hit puberty. Besides, doesn't Olivia know that little brothers almost always end up taller than big sisters? Not that that was the point, but I'm just saying.

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