I publicly prayed in church today and by accident called another man in the rooms wife beautiful

So my Fans... okay Alana, has spoken and she wants me to come back. So here I am.

I got an email from a friend of mine a few weeks ago. I have been trying to convince him to be a blogger, because he has the most interesting stories, and no one tells them better than he does! But he just won't do it, but he did give me permission to post one of his stories.

So since he is much more interesting to listen to than me...
I know it's long, but it is well worth the read. This is for real. This is what all of his stories are like.

I publicly prayed in church today and by accident called another man in the rooms wife beautiful

I should feel guilty because I skipped the first hour and a half of church today. When ever I drive to church I have a habit and I don't know, maybe I do it consciously or subconsciously, but I always drive by the house of Abigail, the girl I home teach. She lives there with several other single girls so when I go over there I never know what exciting things could happen. Once a month me and my brother-in-law go over to their house and share a scripture or something to Abigail and at the same time I try and teach the lesson to her I'm also hoping to talk to all of the girls in the house. I guess there is a natural pull towards that house. But today I was already a few minutes late to church and I saw one of the single girls walking home away from church so I pulled over and asked her if she needed a ride back to church and she said "actually i'm going hiking" and I was thinking to myself "self - i wish I was going hiking with girls today instead of going to church" She also told me my beard looked good and I should keep growing it out and that may have given me even more confidence and since we were in front of her house I said "maybe I'll come inside with you and wake up Abigail and bring her to church with me because I'm tired of sitting alone at church" I went inside with the girl who was skipping church to go hiking and who said my beard looked nice and she went down and woke up Abigail. Abigail came upstairs and said she wasn't coming to church with me but that she'd go next week with me. I found myself standing in the kitchen with her and two other girls and thinking to myself "self - I know I should be going to church but I'm standing in a kitchen with three girls and even though Abigail has a boyfriend and I'm her home teacher the fact that she has a boyfriend automatically makes her off limits and more attractive. Maybe I'll continue standing here and talk for a minute." That minute turned into about an hour and a half at the breakfast table where we were talking about how to tinder date properly and how a woman once accused one of the girls of having an affair with her husband. This accusation was clearly false because the girl telling us the story told us it was false. Unfortunately gossip stories are so fun to listen to and I tell myself I should enjoy listening to them but I secretly do.

I finally got to church and one of my best friends Rob from elementary school and his wife, of less than a year, were team teaching Sunday school. The room was pretty full and so I walked up to the front of the room and sat next to my best friends wife (so it was almost as if I was one of the team teachers and it seemed kind of like a confident cocky move to boldy walk to the front of the classroom and sit by the teachers but it was my best friend teaching and I didn't want to sit alone at the back of the room. After a few minutes my friends wife stood up and started teaching and my friend sat next to me and we whispered hello and disappointments about last nights football game. I noticed a feeling of slightly uncomfortableness come over me because I was sitting next to the teacher and facing the rest of the classroom and could feel the entire classrooms eyes occasionally wander at me almost asking "why are are you sitting up there with the teachers"

There is this young man in the class jon, who is about 25 and often blurts out inappropriate and also appropriate things when the teacher is talking. Once in elders quorum class he blurted out "it's hard being the bishop because he has to come to the building all the time every Thursday and stuff and talk to all the people about sex and stuff like that" and often when church is about to end and the lesson is going to long he will blurt out "What time is it? Class is over!" And we all start laughing because he is so honest and all of us feel the same way and want the lesson to be over so we can leave and go home.

I'm guessing Jon had an accident and had some type of brain damage because once he bore his testimony in the first hour of church and stood up in front of the entire congregation and said "10 years ago I was riding my bike and this fat lady was driving her car and she was so fat that she couldn't get out of her car and all of a sudden she hit me and I flew 30 feet in the air and landed on my head and woke up in hell" and then he sat down. It was was a obviously a sad story but a little humorous the way he told it - it was fresh and interesting and honest because most testimony meetings are boring and the same people stand up and say the same things every month but it was also quite sad and touching because it made me realize there was probably a time before his accident, a time before he had brain damage, when he was normal and wouldn't say such outrageous awesome funny things in church and obviously I wish he hadn't been in an accident but I also love him so much the way he is.

Last week in church my friend Rob and his wife were also teaching and the lesson was about Babylon and in the middle of the lesson Jon stood up interrupting my friend who was teaching and started singing out loud the hymn "oh Babylon oh Babylon we bid the farewell" and he sang the entire song and then sat down. It was actually really cute but I still couldn't help myself from bursting out laughing although I wasn't laughing at him I was just so happy that he was making church so not boring.

So back to today - I was sitting in my friends lesson still feeling awkward for coming late to class and going to the front and sitting next to the teachers but soon I was enjoying the lesson because Jon was interrupting constantly saying "who is Jeremiah and why are you holding that big metal stick" and my friend said this is a metal rod I'm holding to represent how unchanging and righteous Jeremiah was" and Jon blurted out "Oh Jeremiah is righteous because he was a prophet" and my friend said "yes" but before Rob could say anything else Jon said "so Jeremiah is strong like that stick because he was a prophet" and my friend could see Jon might continue being a little obsessive with this metal rod idea and keep shouting out things so he tried to incorporate Jon in the lesson and said "Come up here Jon you understand so well and should be a teacher with me and Jon straightened his crooked glasses and stood up and looked at the people in the room and then looked at the teacher and with a gleeful look walked up to the front of the room saying "Yes I'll help teach" and my friend told him to hold the metal rod and and that he would represent the Prophet Jeremiah and Jon grabbed the metal rod and lifted it a few feet above the ground and smashed it to the ground and it made and incredibly loud pounding sound and shouted out "I'm Jeremiah" (the rod was actually about 40 pounds and 6 feet long and used as a metal bolder mover that would seriously do some damage if Jon let it slip out of his hands and hit someone. The rod was wobbling in his hands and I was seriously nervous he was going to lose grip and it was going to fall and smash one of the old ladies on the front row. My friend was improvising and said "Jon you are Jeremiah and I want you to read this scripture" and Jon started reading the scripture but actually shouting the scripture out almost singing it out and shouting it with glee as if he had been given power to call us all to repentance and in the other hand he was swaying back and forth with the 40 pound metal rod and soon he was letting go of the rod and then catching it before it fell to show off that he had control  but if he missed grabbing - it was likely going to hit someone in the front row. My friend grabbed the rod and leaned it against the wall and politely thanked Jon for his help and kind of nudged him to his seat.  The lesson was so unpredictable and exciting with Jon that I was totally enjoying myself and lost in thought when my friend realized class was over and had to end class in a hurry and he needed to call on someone to pray. There is something about public praying that gives me extreme anxiety. I hide it well but it totally freaks me out. I'd rather give a talk at the pulpit in front of a huge audience then say a public prayer.

My friend didn't really ask if I could pray instead he told me to pray, although he said "Andrew can you pray" he was really saying "Andrew pray now and hurry up class is supposed to be over" I was immediately feeling super anxiety and everyone in the room was bowing their head and closing their eyes so this performance anxiety came over me like the time in 1995 when I got my only start in sophomore basketball and I was so nervous I air-balled a lay up and never started again. I bowed my head and remembered 16 years earlier when I used to pray at lunch on my mission and thank the family for the dinner and I would often forget the families name so I would figure out a way to thank them in the prayer without saying their name, something like this "Heavenly Father we thank you for this families kindness in giving us food" and in that way I would avoid having to say the families name since I had forgotten in and today in the split second I began praying I was feeling extreme anxiety knowing everyone was listening to me and it entered my mind "what is Rob's wife's name" and panick started to hit but I had to keep and say something so I said "Heavenly Father we thank you for this lesson that Rob and" and all of a sudden in a split second I new I wasn't sure of the name of my best friends wife and I was thinking light speed to myself "self - Its not your fault Rob met his wife and  married her two months later - I mean how was I supposed to remember her name that fast?" and In this split second I knew I had to think of a replacement for my friends wife's name something that would  and at least mention and reference her since I had already said my best friend Rob's name out-loud and I couldn't just ignore her even if I didn't call her by name and all this was going through my brain in this split second and I said the first thing that came to my mind "heavenly father we thank you for this lesson that Rob and his beautiful wife" and right at that split second I was thinking to myself "what the hell did I just say in front of this entire class - did I just say HIS BEAUTIFUL WIFE" and in that split second after saying beautiful wife I remembered her name and I so in all those split seconds I said "heavenly father we thank you for this lesson that Rob and his beautiful wife Becky have prepared" and I know I'm not supposed to take the lords name in vain but I was thinking in the next split second "Oh my God! I just said that in my prayer!" and "Should I...do I...can I stop the prayer and say in the  'oops I didn't mean to say that'" and my mind was racing "what should I say now" and so I said two other things which I can't remember while I was also thinking "this is the most awkward moment of my life - I just said a prayer in church and called another man in the rooms wife beautiful" and when I said amen I was about to have a panic attack but luckily my friend broke the awkwardness and said immediately after my prayer "yes Andrew I agree my wife is beautiful" and the tension was broken and the entire class started laughing and I said to the class "oh my gosh I didn't mean to say that - this is my best friend I just got nervous" and my words faded out as a few people stood up and started walking out of the room while others were looking up at me half smiling and wondering what kind of a weirdo I was.