ClobberBlog | Mormonism, Evangelical Christianity

On Tuesday morning, we got up and drove out to Salt Lake City to Sandra Tanner’s bookstore. I interviewed her for a paper I’m working on for one of my classes.

Then we headed to Cafe Rio for lunch. I had been prodding the group to try the food while we were out there. They were not disappointed, and even suggested eating there again, but we never made it for seconds.

We then made our way to Temple Square and asked the sister missionaries for a tour. When they asked me what my favorite story in the Bible was, I said it was the one about the two bears who maul 42 “youths.” I then said I was kidding and talked about how much I liked Judges 4. I’m not sure they appreciated either answer.

Finally, we headed out to the Heart of the Matter studio to meet up with Shawn McCraney. (Re-posting the following story from a comment I made at another blog.) Since we were 20 minutes early, the group was unsure about going in early and bothering them, so one of the women suggested we stay in the car and pray. After we had been praying for a little while, I opened my eyes and noticed that there was a Shawn McCraney standing outside our car.

Then I noticed that his shirt was unbuttoned and he had a lot of chest hair poking out. Well, if I’m going to insist on wearing shirts like this, I suppose I have to support Shawn’s right to bare his man-cleavage. Egalitarianism and all.

Shawn tapped on our window and told us to get our butts inside. We talked in his conference room for a while, then piled into his friend Derek’s suburban and headed to Subway for dinner. Derek owns several Subways in the area and they were treating us for free.

I enjoyed my conversations with Shawn. Truth is, I think I have a lot in common with him, not the least being that we’re both smart-asses. It’s what we do with that common ground that differs. I’m still assessing how I feel about his approach.

Then we attended the taping of the show. He mentioned that there was a group from TEDS visiting. You can probably see me in the studio audience at the end of the show (it’s the 3/9/2010 show and I’ll post it when it becomes available).