On Meeting the Family

This weekend, the LA and I were in Utah to visit the LA's family. The occasion was the 90th birthday celebrations of her grandfather, who is a charming man with a good singing voice and a wonderful fund of stories. In attendance were his sister, his children (all four, and that was a small family for this family, if you see what I mean) and numerous grandchildren and great-grandchildren. A good time was had by all, and I find I have learned several things.
A bulleted list follows.

• This family has many similarities to my father's family, in size (although this family is far larger overall), in packrat tendencies ("Don't throw that away, I can use it!"), in use of gardens (they grow very good vegetables), and in sense of humour (I was conversing much as I did with my great-uncle a couple of years ago when he turned 90, and was getting laughs).
• I got on well enough with the Texas contingent to gain an open invitation to visit, partially because of my Cornish ancestry (having explained that Cornwall is Not The Same as England, much like Texas is Not The Same as the rest of the USA).
• The Great Salt Lake is an average of 13 feet deep, and very pretty.
• Utah as a whole is very pretty, in fact.
• I want to go to Utah on holiday sometime. I missed out on geode beds and the World's Biggest Man-Made Hole (despite going around the mountain range in which it sits), and I want to see them.
• Salt Lake City airport security are somewhat more alert than LAX security, and as a side note, I need to be more careful about checking what's in my bag. Fortunately, the US mail is pretty good at not losing packages...
  
• The LA's laptop seriously needs to be nuked and paved (and I've been assigned to do that)
• It can be freezing even with the sun out. We're talking single-digit Centigrade, low 30s Fahrenheit. Brrrr!
• You get pretty dang tired at 4500 feet up when you're not used to it.
• The LA's family really are the black sheep of the family.
• You can get upholstered toilet seats.

All in all, a fun trip.

Note to self: call the Tooele Chamber of Commerce tomorrow and correct their grammar. Although what they had printed is grammatically sound, it conveys the opposite meaning to what they had intended, and this could prove problematic if people are smart enough to understand it but dumb enough to not think about it.