Author: April Fools

Announcing Auto-Pray!

Are you feeling pressed for time? Just don’t have the energy to remember prayer? Download the new Auto-Pray (TM) app today! You’ll spend about ten minutes in initial setup. Using handy check-the-box options, indicate your prayer preferences, such as the standard package (1 morning, 3 meals, 1 evening) or any of a number of custom packages. You can go with the basic prayer (“we thank Thee for this day,” “we thank Thee for this food”) or add options of your choice. Want to thank God for the missionaries during morning prayer, and the Prophet during evening prayer? It’s as simple as check-the-box! You can build your own linguistic nuances right in, too! Want to make sure to include important terms like “moisture”? We’ve got that option! Want to add lots of extraneous Thees and Thous, passive-voice construction, and archaic verbs? We doth haveth that one, too! You can even customize your prayer to be in Yoda form (“these blessings, we thank Thee for”) or even Pirate talk (“Arr, ye have our thanks”). Once you’ve personalized Auto-Pray to suit your needs, just press the “Pray now” button on your phone, and the prayer of your choice will be delivered at the same speed that people give bank disclosures on the radio (plus auto-compression of long words) allowing even the longest prayers to be recited in less than five seconds. It’s Enos-level blessings with Laman-level effort — and easier than mumbling “bless…

12 Questions with DKL

Q: So Dave, how did you come up with the idea for LDSelect? A: It’s a long story. The concept goes back to when I was dating Fawn Brodie, a few months after I got kicked out of Hogwarts . . .

New Feature: T & S Karaoke

We’ve been in close negotiations to purchase some used karaoke equipment from a despondent Steve Evans. Given the course of negotiation, we’re confident that we’ll close the deal soon. And so, without further ado, it’s time to announce our latest regular feature: Times and Seasons karaoke! Once we get a few technical bugs worked out, we’ll post the first installment, which is Nate’s not-to-be-missed performance of My Way. We expect to follow shortly afterwards with Kristine’s rousing rendition of Dancing Queen, as well as a special performance of The New Kids on the Block – Please Don’t Go Girl, sung by Matt and Kaimi. As far as the rest of the schedule — well, we’re happy to take your requests. UPDATE: You drive a hard bargain, Steve Evans. So you really won’t close the deal for the karaoke gear unless we include your rendition of You Make Me Feel (Like a Natural Woman) on the blog? Well, never let it be said that Times and Seasons is unreasonable. We’ll accomodate your wishes and change the schedule; we’ll be leading off with your masterpiece. I’m looking forward to it.

RIP, BCC

Wow — I didn’t see this one coming. It is with a heavy heart that we announce a major shake-up in the blogosphere. Steve at BCC is calling it quits. We would say that we enjoyed reading BCC; that its posts were always top-notch; that it made the sunshine brighter and the birds song sweeter. But none of that is really true. I mean, how far can a blog really expect to go when its founder is a Canadian? But we’ll miss BCC around here. We’ll miss having them around as a convenient foil. We’ll miss the cautionary tale element — I could always threaten my co-bloggers “we don’t want to become like BCC, do we?” We’ll miss the unintentional laughs, and a few intentional ones. And most of all, we’ll miss that color scheme, which we all lovingly nicknamed “Life After Airsickness.” Rest in Peace, BCC.

Book Review: Green Eggs and Ham

Theodore Geisel’s treatise Green Eggs and Ham (Beginner Books) is an ambitious work. It seeks to unify themes of longing, friendship, anger, acceptance, and culinary conformity. In addition, the book delves into Mormon themes — as one might expect, given Geisel’s little-known affiliation with the Mormon church — including blood atonement, polygamy, eternal progression, Kolob, Facsimiles One and Two, and sugar beets. Covering all of this ground would be a hard task under any conditions. And Geisel’s attempt to do so in a mere 62 pages is breathtaking in its audacity. One must give the man credit for his gumption. And given his past success in covering similar themes in The Cat in the Hat, I went into this book with high hopes. Ultimately, however, Geisel’s project fails, and this reviewer is left saying, “I do not like green eggs and ham, I do not like them, Sam I Am.”

Polygamy Restored!

The leaks are just too many to ignore. It’s apparently official. Following the legal victories of alternative marriage advocates in state and federal courts, the Church will announce this weekend that the doctrine of plural marriage has been restored.

12 Questions for Zelph

We’re happy to announce our next installment in the 12 Questions series. Our new participant is someone you’ve all heard of, and whose name is often discussed in the bloggernacle itself. Yes, that’s right — we’re going to be doing 12 questions with Zelph. Zelph, as you all know, was a white Lamanite and a righteous man. He participated in some of the great battles of the late-era Nephite-Lamanite wars, and was a personal friend and follower of the prophet-general Onandagus. We’re very excited to get a chance to interview Zelph and get a glimpse into late Nephite culture. So please post your questions for Zelph; we will select 12 of them, and send them to Zelph for his responses.