Fortunately, it turns out that the reports earlier made about Johnny's Market were false - the old store is still standing and VOE is intact, as near as I can tell. The latest problem seems to be conflicting reports (made worse by some soulless wretch(es) deliberately issuing false information, or at best, unverified rumors); it's difficult to tell exactly how dire things are. RimoftheWorld.net has decided to post only verified information; other sources such as the SBMountains Yahoo group continue to be places where anyone can post what they've seen or heard, but they're still being urged to be as sure as possible before posting, of course.

Another problem seems to be the television news networks, whose "Low Content-High Sensationalism" approach to journalism has had to be corrected by eyewitnesses and fire personnel more than once already. Ironically, it seems as though most of my family's information on what's going on and where the fire has progressed is coming from me, half a country away. Of course, my family's not in a position to check the Internet (they're at my computerless grandparents' house), so they're stuck with shoddy TV journalism.

According to the most recent information posting, the San Bernardino Sheriff's Department has a composite sketch of the Old Fire arson suspect. I pray that they catch them. Ultimately, these arsonists will have to answer for their crimes before the Lord, but I'm praying they get an opportunity to answer for them before then.

It's difficult to think about anything else when I'm at home. The weather here has started to get wetter, giving us a bit of drizzling rain and, according to MPR, something called "snow showers," which is as of yet a foreign term to me. I wish there was some way of sending it all out west...

On an unrelated tangent, I'm beginning to get tired of listening to the BBC. They have more than one anchor who phrases his opinions in the form of a question every time he talks to correspondents: "There has been an unprecedented attack on the Red Cross in Iraq. What went wrong, how have the United States failed? Is the mood of the Iraqi people making them lose faith in America even more than they already had?" American TV journalists do this to a degree as well, but the Brits appear to be more obvious about it, and with that accent, well, it sounds about as snotty as one can get. What happened to objectivity and striving to be without bias in news reporting?