Conference

I love General Conference weekend! October Conference was especially meaningful to me as I was taking the Teachings of the Living Prophets class at BYU. I had just learned so much about each of the men we heard from, which I think really helped as I listened to the talks. It also helped that I knew I was being quizzed on Conference two days later. Brother Newell told us in class that we would likely remember that conference for a long time, and a lot better than we remember most of the conferences.

This conference, when Elder Neil L. Andersen was called to fill the vacancy in the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, my roommates had no clue who he was. Without thinking, I said that he was the one that last conference spoke and said "you don't know it everything, but you know enough". I was pretty proud of my memory. Brother Newell was right, I do remember October conference VERY well now.

I loved Elder Hales' talk from Saturday morning. One of the things I want to point out that few readers of my blog probably know is that on March 1, 2009 he gave a very similar talk to the Young Single Adults of the church at the CES Fireside. I think Provident Living must be big (not that I'm surprised during these economic times) if he told the YSAs and then the whole church the same general message within a month of each other.

I also LOVED Elder Scott's talk about temples on Saturday Afternoon. Having just gone to the Draper Temple Open House and participating in the Draper Temple Dedication this semester, it was really neat to hear all of the talks/thoughts on temples this conference. Now I really want to read President Packer's book The Holy Temple. Add that to my long list.

Conference at college is much different than conference at home. At home (the home I know and remember... aka the old house in Redmond) we couldn't get Dish because of the trees, so we would go to the Stake Center to watch conference. Here the BYU channel is one of the few channels we do get (go figure, I go to BYU) so we have the option of watching it from the comfort of my own kitchen/living area. On Saturday some of my apartment opted to go to Roommate #1's parents house which is 35 minutes away. I kind of regret that option. She has a little sister that couldn't sit through conference but who wouldn't leave the room or be relatively quiet. Perhaps this is why I liked last conference so much? Today Roommate #1 went back up to her house, but both of us who went up yesterday stayed home. It was nice to watch it from home, but our TV is super small and the quality of the channel wasn't so good. I need to watch the second half of the Sunday Afternoon session again too... I definitely missed everything after the congregational hymn halfway through.

I also didn't get to enjoy the food that the Springgay's always take to Conference. They move into the building for the weekend, and the food in their special room helps prove it. Today during conference I ate stale tortilla chips, made koolaid in a big tupperware bowl, and between sessions I made some Hamburger Helper. Not quite the Peanut M&Ms, granola bars, fruit leather, pepperoni sticks, Papa Murphy's pizza, etc that I'm used to during conference.

My goal for next conference is to not sleep through the last hour of the last session. This has always been a problem of mine (except for October conference when my grade depended on me watching conference) and it's about time to overcome it. Also, I think I want to go home next conference. I might actually buy my first plane ticket and plan a trip all on my own. A trip that involves spending 10-12 hours at the church! And, I think that with the financial aid I should be receiving next year and the jobs I've been looking at for next year, this is actually a quite realistic goal! HOORAY!