Florida Driving Rule #1 – Never drive through Miami during rush hour!  Florida Driving Rule #2 – If you must drive through Miami during rush hour at least set your map to the correct location!  Florida Driving Rule #3 – See Rule #1

In the morning we  thought we were going to a District Meeting but when we got there it turned out to be the Fort Lauderdale Zone Meeting! So we had a chance to spend a couple of hours with 22 great above average missionaries and share their reports, training and testimonies. It have us a chance to get to know some of the missionaries we have not served with closely. It was a spiritual experience to hear them discuss how they were going to reach their goals by working both harder and smarter.

Part of the problem with traffic is that there is a huge expansion program on the 595 freeway. It was going on before we got here and will probably continue for well after we have left. Unfortunately it is a freeway that we use often. At Zone Meeting elder Hall was asked to lead the music – he does not know how to lead but bravely got up and gave it a try. Elders Rondo, Patino, and Maki as well as sisters Escorbores  and Tuai join in singing.

One part of Zone Meeting is that the companionships give an accounting for the month. Elders Brown and Marcusen, Sisters Stegelmeier and Dye – sister Dye will shoot me when she sees this picture – Elders Wood and Shaffer all give their reports.

Elders Castillo and Maki, Sisters Escorbores and Tuai give their report. We have so many missionaries coming in that we had to move another bookcase in to hold all their New Missionary Binders. Hopefully someday there will be enough coming that both will be filled.

During the afternoon we got texts from Jim – who was in Miami for a business meeting – telling us when and where we could get together for a couple of hours. It turned out that we left our apartment just after 5:00 for what should have been a 40-45 minute drive to his hotel. Everything seemed to be going well until we got off the freeway and we found ourselves in terrible traffic that seemed to stop every block for a light. Then we could not follow the Goggle Map because they do not seem to mark cross streets very well in Miami. Of course it did not help that somehow the map Mary was trying to follow was to the wrong location. By hooking up the GPS and calling Jim we finally got to his hotel only about 40 minutes later than we should have.

   

All of the driving frustration was worth it as we were able to give him some big hugs, eat a nice dinner at a nearby set of shops, and catch up on lots of things for a couple of hours. While we were dropping him off at his hotel his boss was just getting out of a cab so we got to meet him. He is also a member of the Church and a convert so we had a lot in common.

We found out while talking that it seems that Jim’s family may be coming down in February to go to Disney World! If so we will ask president Anderson if it is OK if we take a couple of days off to go up to Orlando and be with them. That way we would get to see Colin and the girls!