My wife, son and I were fortunate enough to be out of Florida for the most recent hurricane, Wilma. It landed near Naples, FL and headed northeast toward West Palm Beach. Winds near 100 mph were reported near my home in Miami. I have no idea yet of the status of my house — everybody I have called is still hunkered down. Luckily, we were able to get all the shutters up, so we should be fine. I won’t be home until Thursday.

There will probably be some work to be done in southern Florida in the coming months to help people rebuild. I’ll be sure to provide details of service opportunities.

Update: I reached someone by phone who said my house is still standing and that none of my shutters have blown off. So far, so good. More on Thursday night.

Another update: My house is fine, but South Florida is not. People are really struggling with no power and long lines for gasoline. I have friends who have spent hours every day just looking for gasoline. People don’t have enough gas to get to work or to Church. It’s really a mess. Send some prayers down South Florida way.

Click the title of the post to go to the trailer. Two observations:

1. I laughed. It looks funny. Maybe there are only 60 seconds of funny material in the movie, but that’s something.

2. Somebody back me up here: as the camera pans during the opening prayer, the very first guy you see on the non-uniformed team, very quickly, is the also present on the farm where Napoleon asks “Do the chickens have sharp talons?” Anybody?

(hat tip: A Motley Vision)

Yes, we’ve been remiss. No BOMBlogging since 1 Nephi, and it’s time to be finishing Alma. Truly sorry, everyone. There are several half-finished posts on the intervening books (you should see the doozy I half-wrote on Jarom, it’s AMAZING!), but I’m ready to just move on to the present.

So, here’s what I’ve learned from reading Alma: Mormon and Alma don’t think we are marionettes on a stage with two competing puppeteers vying for control. (Okay, actually nobody thinks that). What do they think we are? Two huge corporations vying for market share.

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I hope you won’t mind a bit of Friday-induced levity. . .

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Sometimes it’s instructive to read articles like these. To summarize: a leftist, anti-religious writer for the on-line version of the SF Chronicle finds it offensive that a woman just had her 16th child.

We keep on hearing from the secular world about how intolerant and judgmental we Christians are. Hmmm. Tolerance from the fanatically secular? Not likely.