"Sweet Home Alabama eh? Creative!"

Here is Bradley's letter from Monday, September 2nd. He is doing good. Thanks for all the support you give as family and friends. Hope you enjoy this week's letter!

"FAMILY!!! Don't fret, despite the late emailing today, it is a little tricky, because of labor day, so we are emailing in the Family History Center, and this place is like stuck in the 80s, I am emailing on a box computer, what is this? But man the time is flying out here, am I right!? Does it seem to be going fast for ya'll back home. Because I am starting my 4th week of second transfer that is so crazy. But alright lets get into it!

Monday - Oh boy, we were at the mercy of the Sister's all day.. We were out of miles, so we had to bum a ride off of them all day, so we waited for them at wal mart for like 30 minutes, I thought on a mission, I wouldn't have to worry about waiting on girls anymore.. Bleh! Any whom, so we did hit up some great thrift stores and other places as such, and I bought me another great Alabama shirt from CitiTrends. And then once P-Day was over we had dinner at Ci Ci's Pizza and then Brother Willie Parker invited us over to his house for some ice cream, so we talked to them for a little bit. Then we had to be home, so that the zone leaders could be at our home, so we did a trade off, I had Elder Call in Dothan, and Elder Stubbs went up to Ozark for the night and next day. Elder Call is a way cool dude, so I really enjoyed serving with him for a day.

Tuesday - So as I mentioned, I was with Elder Call for the day. So we went and saw Barbra Philips, which I can't hold it in any longer, SHE IS GETTING BAPTIZED. But that didn't happen this time, so we talked to her about the Plan of Salvation, pictures and everything. So we had her quit smoking, and we were going to ease into getting her off of coffee, but when we were there, she willingly gave us the coffee maker, all of her coffee stuff, and her coffee. And we just threw it all away in the dumpster, it was awesome!!!! Then we went and saw Paul Kennedy, and we talked to him about setting a date for him to get the Priesthood, and he doesn't want in.. he feels that he will never be worthy of it, nor does he want the responsibility, he just wants to be a "commoner." Which is so sad! So we are going to work with him! Then we saw some other which was short, saw a dude who had drew us a picture and told us his conversion story, but he wouldn't let us come visit him, then we got a ton of food given to us by a member, then we had dinner at the Davis's. And then we went and balled, only two marines showed up, didn't have all of them.

Wednesday - We went and did service in the morning for a member in her garden and it took a long time, and these things were gnarly tons of grass and covered in roots, so I am going to town, thinking I am being funny just ripping roots out like crazy, and then after a while I think to myself man Bradley your hands hurt and I look down at them and I have massive blisters on my thumbs and on my palms, so I got that going for me. Oh boy this heat down here will just about knock you over, I had belly sweat, who has that? This guy! So after that, we went and visited little old Lois Bynum and Phillip here 50 year old son who has cerebal palsy. Those visits are always awkward, but the son knows just about everything about sports. Then we had two dinners this evening, one at Brother Bains house, so we had meatball sandwiches, by the way I am eating tons of stuff down here that I normally wouldn't! So I take it easy there, and then we had dinner scheduled for a less active guy, who's wife isn't a member, so we were pumped about that, sadly they are moving in about a week, but he made us burgers and they took forever to cook, and no lie this thing was like 2 POUNDS. Not kidding, so much meat, and it was all raw. So I start eating this thing, and he kept telling us that there was some suprise, so I bite into it, and there is cheese in the middle, and it like starts pouring out all over me, and the guy no like throws his arms up in the air and yells, "Thats the JUICY LOUSIE burger!!" So ya I took that baby down, raw meat, and full of cheese. This dude loved, I should say loves his food.

Thursday - Zone Conference all day basically, so president was there and the AP's. So I loved it! It was all about finding through family history! So they are really going big with it, to be able to find people! At the FSU football games they are having a booth set up at the games, with a banner that says "Are you a Seminole?" And then they are going to have 10 missionaries with iPads in there gettting people set up on Family Search and getting referrals, are you getting chills just thinking about that? Cuz I sure did! And the APs are teaching legit college classes at FAMU in Tallahassee on Geneology, how cool is that!? I honestly can't wait until we get iPads so we can start doing a lot of this kind of stuff. Also have you heard about the Facebook thing with missionaries? It is sketchy to me.. Apparently most US missionaries are doing it and they are on FB for an hour a day and they can talk to anyone as long as it is Gospel related.. I don't know about that! Any whom so zone conference was awesome and I think that we are going to do a lot with it! After that we went and saw Barbra Phillips and we set her BAPTISMAL DATE! It is on for September 14th!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So that is really soon, we had it set for later, but we had to move it up, so two weeks away. She is so excited, like she is beyond ecstatic about being baptized!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am so happy about it. We also got a reply from Nathan Hanbury who is at marine bootcamp, and he said this place is so vile, and it is hard to keep the commandments, but his faith grows each day! He is in Alma 17! He brings friends to church! And he said, can't wait to come back and be baptized! Are you kidding me!? I hope with all my heart that I am here!. Then after all that we saw the Skippers, a member in the ward, and I just talked college football the whole time with him, I can't help it!

Friday - We had lunch at the Bain's house.... the food there is delicious. So then we went to the Hospital, and it was awesome! We got to talk to a lot of people and we prayed with a ton of them, and talked to people who had Mormon co workers, so it was a real successful day! Then after that we went to CVS because Stubbs needed DayQuil, and then we start talking to the lady who works there and she is part of the Ozark Branch (which is in our stake) So we talk to her about her conversion, and then she asks have ya'll had dinner? And I perk up NO, even though we had, so she had us go buy ourselves Taco Bell hahaha, and then bring her back what she wanted, so we did, we went over there ate, and then we waiting for her food... and a worker at taco bell left the store, then came back in, and said to his manager he needed to talk to her, then she came back in and said "Have you paid for your food?" We had, then she said well someone is paying you back and she gave us 20 bucks! So we tried to find the guy, and we waved at him, and he shook his head no. Then he comes back in and I thank him, and Elder Stubbs goes and talks to him, and he says, "I'm on one path, and you are on another, I respect you guys a lot, keep it up." So we gave him our number, but man that was humbling .. I don't know I didn't feel worthy of everyone's hospitality. It was just really cool! Then we had correlation meeting to finish off the evening with Forest Bain. Oh also we heard a marching band and so we went over and checked out the high school football game, awesome! The two high schools in Dothan, are playing each other next week, and we're going to it!

Saturday - Service, service, service! We were in our service clothes until 6 pm this evening, in the morning we went over and helped Linda, and her neighbor Gloria with service, we emptied out Gloria's back shed, and organized it all, which took about forever. And you wouldn't believe some of the spiders and lizards and cockroaches down here, I was scared for my life as I entered their back shed. Then we biked all the way across town and helped Sister Newton plant all of her flower gardens, or put new dirt in them and mix them all up and what not. She is the family history coordinator, so she is going to teach us how to use it all this week! Then on the way home, there is this way sketchy thrift shop, like spray paint all over it, so we're like alright we gotta stop by. So we stop in and we are talking to the lady that owns it, and we tell here were missionaries and were looking for ties, because we're in service clothes. So she gives us 3 free ties each, and some free sunglasses, And we are talking to her before we leave, and she is asking us all kinds of questions. So we are like well we would love to come talk to you about it sometime, and she says well theres a chair right there and a chair right there, lets talk! So we taught here the whole first lesson in her thrift shop hahahaha! It was so awesome! It wasn't the best lesson, but she told us to comeback! And we have to bring here a big Book of Mormon so she can read it! But how awesome! I hope there is a future with her! Then we went and saw Barbra Phillips with Cameron, and we retaught her the first lesson, she really is so pumped to be baptized it's awesome!!

Sunday - We had Gloria and Barbra at church which is so fantastic! The other two Tiffany and Mitchell, were in Georgia, but Tony Hansen said that they want to meet with us, so hopefully we will get to teach them this week!! But Gloria and Barbra came to all 3 hours of church, which is great! During Gospel Principles, Barbra saw a picture in the book of a baptism.. and she said, pretty loud, "Oh boy do I have to go down into that water, I better get me some slacks!" *all in German accent* Then everybody kind of looks at her and she says, "I'm sorry, I'm fix'n to get baptized and it is all I am thinking about, I didn't sleep last night because I was thinking about it!" And then she just chuckled. It was so awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Then after church we had to do weekly planning, because we put it off for too long. Then we went to dinner with a family in 1st Ward that used to be in 2nd Ward. Then we saw the Hughey's and we had kind of given up on them, but the dad started talking to us about some debate between two religion guys that he watched, and he said, "I am just all about finding out what God is about, I call myself a Godchaser." So we talked to him forever about all kinds of stuff and we think that he is ready!! We were pumped about it. Then after that we went back and I helped Cameron log all of his stuff in the computer for his mission he leaves in two weeks..... :( I'm gonna miss that dude, he is so awesome!

Family great things are happening here in Dothan!! I feel like we are barely scratching the surface, but it is so exciting! I am loving it here, and the people are so awesome! I hope that all is well back home, I love and miss each and everyone of you so much!!!!! The Gospel is so true, and the Lord's hand really is present in our work here! LOVE YA'LL!!!!"

LOVE, ELDER HINTZE