Interesting morning of mission work today. We run three truck routes on church nights to pick up members from three different communities. However, on holidays like Christmas, New Years, and Easter the laws say that large trucks and passenger trucks can not be out on the roads; however, if you get permission from Civil Defense, then you can run the trucks. Well, our church services are on Friday nights, and this year Christmas Day and New Year's Day fall on Fridays, so in order to pick people up we need this special permission. So, with the help of one of our church leaders we called the head of Civil Defense yesterday, and he said that we could get special permission, we would just need to meet him this morning. So, we headed down to meet him this morning. I assumed we were going to the Civil Defense office, but found out that he was working out of his business today. A tire repair store just minutes from my house. It is actual a place I have used often, since it is so close to our home. It's surprising how many times here you can have trouble with tires, but you have to see the roads to understand. Right now for instance the city did some work with water lines or something and they have left gouges in the road that wreck havoc on tires. So when I mentioned tire repair store you may be thinking Firestone, Goodyear, Sears Automotive. It's not anything near that. I found it humorous that we are doing this official city government business in this little mechanic shop. Well, we get there and he says, "Sure, no problem, can I have the copies of the truck paperwork?" Well, sure, except I didn't bring copies, because this is the first anybody mentioned copies (I think to myself as I'm smiling politely). I ran to the office were I keep the copies of the paperwork, and headed back to his store. Somehow he had a computer hidden among the car and motorcycle parts in a back room, and he types up these nice forms that give us permission to run the trucks, and of course gives them an official stamp!
