Womens Confrence-Don't be fooled this is not a spiritual post.

As most of you know Saturday evening was General Womens Conference. A couple of friends and I decided to head to the stake center together to watch the broadcast. Our stake center is about 45 minutes away, or an hour and a half if you have traffic and aren't exactly sure how to get there. We were in the later group! Sadly we didn't arrive until well into conference, in fact we only saw Sis. Thomspons talk and Pres. Monson. I'm not going to lie and say how sad I am that I missed most of the conference, because my main reason for going was all about "sisterhood", and the fact that we had decided to go to dinner following the conference. I use to go out to dinner with my Mom and sisters after Women's conference and I've really missed the tradition since moving away. Luckily all of my friends were more than willing to humor me. In reality, I was looking forward to dinner more than the actual speakers.

As previously stated the broadcast was in a different city than our own. We didn't really know our way around town, except that just around the corner from the stake center massive mansions had been discovered. Mansions that put all other homes that we once thought to be large to shame! At least according to Addy, as she is the one who inadvertently discovered the homes while lost trying to find the stake center for stake conference. This is important for the story I am telling. Remember that we live in New Jersey, and New Jersey is head quarters for the Mafia as all those who watch "Sapranos" already know. It's been rumored that the Mafia is alive and well in New Jersey, particularly around our Stake Center. Which makes sense when you think about it, that the best and the worst of the earth would be in such close proximity to one another. In an effort to be adventurous and save time we decided to eat at a restrautn close to the stake center. We had passed an Italian restaraunt on the way home and figured it would be just as good as any place to eat, and the parking lot was full of cars. From the outside the restraunt kind of look like a "hole", but we walked in anyway. To our surprise when we made it indoors, it was kind of fancy looking. There was a live band in the corner, when I say band, I mean a key board player and a singer, and maybe someone playing a tambourine, I don't remember clearly. Two things happened when we walked in, firstly the whole restaraunt turned and looked at us in disbelief and all talking stopped. Secondly, the weird, bony, Italian speaking host made a beeline for us, and basically said he wasn't gong to seat us. I asked if the kitchen was closed for the night, and he said no but then motioned us to a table, and said "sit here, I will be back". He went into the back to ask if we could be seated, which really made no sense since the place was hopping and there were several empty tables. He came back a few minutes later after apparently receiving permission for us to stay, and asked us where we would prefer to sit. We chose a table in the corner, because by that time we felt the awkward stares of the other customers and wanted to be as far out of the way as possible. It wasn't until we were seated comfortably in our corner that we were really able to look around at the others around us. Here is what/who we saw. White linens tables clothes, candles, a bar in the back, a band, women with big, teased hair, gaudy chandelier earings, scantily clad women, large men with Italian accents, dressed in suits clasping one anther on the shoulder, and waving their large hands about. This is about the time it started dawning on us that we had walked into a Mafia Den! I'm not joking, it was obvious that we were unwelcome not only by the attitude of the other customers who kept giving us the evil eye, and by our waiter who made it very clear that he did not want to serve us. He was rude, and made snide remarks and distorted his face when we let him know we didn't drink. At one point I asked him to wrap up my leftovers, he tried to refuse by telling me that I hadn't eaten enough. One of the other girls also later asked to have her meal boxed and he told her that she needed to eat more, so she told him she had eaten plenty of hers and had even had a few bites of Addy's ravioli. "There were only three" he exclaimed about the ravioli, apparently in an effort to let us know that he thought we were pathetic. I've never had such a critical waiter in all my life. I think he found us a nuisance since I could tell he was trying to schmooze with the mafia people, probably trying to get his foot in the door for some bigger money.

We paid the bill and were walking out the door just in time to hear the beginning of a "disagreement" between two men at the bar. One yelled at the other "why don't you just leave". Addy looked back at Shannon and I and said "we should leave before the guns come out". She was just kidding, but we were in a Mafia Den and those guys can be unpredictable!

Hands down most memorable Womens Conference ever! Is it wrong to hope for something just as exciting next time? I think we need to make it a tradition, we can go somewhere less exciting next time. Maybe someplace with Karaoke? Can't you just see us in our church attire up on stage singing "Spice Girls- If you Wanna be My Lover"? Awesome!