Helping Hands

On a completely unrelated note - I got back late last night from Hattiesburg, Mississippi. I went there on Friday with a group of 24 guys from my church to do volunteer hurricane relief work over the weekend. (More info here) The eye of Hurricane Katrina passed right over Hattiesburg and the people we talked to said that they had hurricane force winds for 12 hours! It's been four weeks now and life seems to be slowly getting back to normal, although there is still a tremendous amount of work to be done. Our team of 24 (along with about 900 other members of our church from the Raleigh region) mainly worked to remove giant trees that had fallen over in people's yards - often times causing major damage to their homes. We helped to apply tarps to damaged roofs and to clear away the massive amount of debris from downed trees. You have no idea how heavy a tree is until you try to haul it away! It was the most fun I've had in a long time, and I've got the sore muscles to prove it.