Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

A more interesting than usual trip to the cannery. (Although the last trip was pretty interesting in its own right when we turned out to be the only people who showed up.) As Im sure you guys have figured out, Im not a Mormon. Although the Mormons are the Shaolin masters  of prep-fu, I cannot join them in their fight against dark forces and jello-less meals. Quite simply, Im just not a religious person. Theres also that little matter of belief…

Anyway…last year when I was wanting to start visiting the cannery I did some research and was told that many canneries do allow non-members (read: non-Mormons) to use their facility. I checked with my local cannery and they said that although they used to let non-members use the facility, the policy had changed to exclude non-members. The way around this was, naturally, to go as the guest of a member. Ok, I can swing that except that I could count the Mormons I know on ..well…no fingers.

The universe provided, however, and it turned out that I made the acquaintance of a local fella that had similar beliefs as me and the LMI and he invited me to accompany him on his trips to the cannery. This is what i’ve been doing the last several times Ive been out there. Each time I visit I try to make sure the guy in charge knows who I am and that he knows Im a fairly cool person…this is so that at some point I could ask if maybe I could come up there some time without the accompaniment. (Because I really hate inconveniencing the fella who has been quite generously letting me accompany him.) Matter of fact, today was the day I was going to suggest that perhaps I could come up by myself some time.

So as we’re wrapping things up, the gal who is the wife of the guy in charge (theyre a retired couple that manage the facility) said “Oh you can come up anytime, you dont have to come up just on the scheduled third Friday of the month.” I said thats great but I needed to come up with the guy I had been previously coming up with. She said, no, I could come up on my own. I said that I was under the impression that the facility was not open to non-members. Her husband piped in and said that the policy had changed and that while there was a time of ‘heightened security’ (his words) they had changed that for a couple reasons. One reason was that the leadership of the church now believed that the folks in charge of the regional population unit (a ‘ward’) were not only responsible for each other but for everyone, member and non, within the ward. Additionally, he said that by allowing nonmembers to have access to the facility it allowed them to prepare and thus not be a threat to the the prepared membership if things got tough. Basically, if the Mormon’s neighbors have their own food stoarge, then the Mormons own food is safer than if his neighbors were starving.

Quite the mindset these Mormons have. I like them.

So, the girlfriend and I can head up there pretty much any time we want to make an appointment. This is good. However, having already gotten 90% of the stuff I needed under the old bring-a-buddy policy Im a little annoyed at finding all this out now. But, really, I have not a bloody thing to complain about. The Mormons very graciously and generously let me use their facility and I have nothing but nice words about them and their hot women.

I should raise a toast of Jell-o shooters in salute.

Todays haul, by the way, was six #10 cans of sugar, 3 #10 cans of dried onion, and 3 #10 cans of sliced apples. This gets added to the #10 cans of wheat, pasta, legumes, milk, carrots, potatoes and other fine foodstuffs Ive already acquired from them.

Oh…and I brought the girlfriend this time to help make me seem more human. I think it worked.