It took a little nudge, but Happy Feet the wayward penguin was indeed sent on his way home (hopefully) over the weekend.

The Associated Press has video of the moment when the little guy who ended up on a beach in New Zealand — thousands of miles from his home in Antarctica — slid into the Pacific Ocean.

When I was a kid, I assumed that in the future things would get better and better until we were all driving flying cars and playing badminton with space aliens on top of 500-story buildings. Frankly, I kind of counted on this happening. But now I don't assume that we'll just keep going up anymore.

As the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks draws closer, we're pointing to some of the stories being told about that day and the days since.

This morning, The Wall Street Journal offers "A Battered Firm's Long Road Back." It's a look at the investment-banking firm Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, which lost more than a third of its 171 New York employees when the south tower of the World Trade Center fell.

Good morning.

Wildfires continue to blaze in parts of central and northeast Texas, as we reported earlier. There are so many and they're moving so fast, in fact, that NPR's Wade Goodwyn says there just aren't enough firefighters and aircraft to battle them all effectively.

We'll keep an eye on developments there this week.

Raging wildfires continue to burn across central Texas and so far have destroyed about 500 homes, Austin's American-Statesman writes this morning.

The newspaper adds that "the scope of the disaster — perhaps the worst of its kind in the region's history — was not fully known by late Monday as officials struggled to provide a complete count of the number of lost structures."

A large convoy of Libyan soldiers accompanied by Tuareg tribal fighters left the central Niger town of Agadez on Tuesday and drove toward the capital but it wasn't clear if Gadhafi family members were in the heavily armed group, the owner of a private newspaper said.

The new Republican frontrunner, Texas Gov. Rick Perry, will take part in his first presidential debate Wednesday night. In advance of his debut, we looked back at key moments from the previous debate performances of the longest-serving governor in Texas history.

Five of the top six Republicans running for president spent Labor Day taking a grilling from the conservative wing of their party at a forum in Columbia, S.C.

Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina — who is a powerful voice in the early voting state and a Tea Party favorite — organized the forum, which started on a bit of a deflated note with news that Texas Gov. Rick Perry backed out at the last minute to deal with raging wildfires in his state.

Observation Post Mustang sits high in the mountains of northeastern Afghanistan, near the Pakistan border. At an altitude of 5,600 feet, the soldiers stationed there from the Army's 2-27th Infantry Regiment have a stunning view of the Kunar River Valley far below.

But it's not all just beautiful vistas and clean mountain air. On Sunday, the forward operating base that sits in the valley below took enemy fire. NPR's David Gilkey, who is embedded with the 2-27th Infantry, photographed American soldiers as they engaged in a firefight with insurgents across the valley.

The latest round in the legal battle over same sex marriage will be fought Tuesday in a hearing before the California State Supreme Court.

The arguments will focus not so much on same-sex marriage itself, but on Proposition 8, the voter-approved initiative banning such marriages. A federal judge has ruled Prop. 8 unconstitutional and the issue before the court on Tuesday is whether proponents of the initiative have the legal authority, or standing, to pursue an appeal.