Vacations are for Self-discovery

I have several faults. One is that I nearly always drip water on myself when drinking from a water bottle. Another is that I ALWAYS (or 99.99999% of the time) make a mess in the kitchen.
The third is that I rarely generate my own body heat.
In Texas, it isn't much of a problem...but it is in Idaho. Also Utah.
Guess where my family is.
Which is why we went to see Mark's fam--no, just kidding, they are in Idaho and Utah, too.
We still visited.

Nephew #3

We flew into Salt Lake and visited with Mark's brother's family to see baby Russell and adult penguins. Nephew #2, upon seeing me, declared that he was so glad I wasn't dead.
Sometimes you need to see things from a child's perspective to really appreciate what you have in life.
Mark and I then had some dedicated nap time on the bus up to Idaho, consequently missing most of the scenery, but making the journey seem pretty short.

Our trip coincided with the Open House of the Idaho Falls Temple, meaning we got to walk through it before it was dedicated and subsequently closed to tours. The open house was set up so that we [which included Mark, me, and Mark's parents] watched an introductory video at a nearby church, and then the various groups were led by various tour guides. The guy who stood up to introduce himself as the tour guide to our group did so slowly and in a monotone, and I wondered how such a speaking method would keep us engaged.

The answer is it didn't, because he never said a single word more. He walked very slowly, and periodically would turn around to stare us into an orderly line. We named him Lurch, and we followed his processional gait with the gradual realization that a bunch of other groups were getting stacked up behind us.

He was very influential.

This trip was a vacation, so that afternoon the four of us went bowling and miniature golfing. Mark got 4 strikes in a row, and I got a couple spares--one with my right hand, one with my left.

Guess which game I played with my left

I was last place overall. 

I'm not really that athletic.

I proved that point in miniature golf as well; seeing that there was a ramp on the course, I hit my ball forcefully in the hope that it wouldn't roll back at me. Actually, it didn't roll anywhere; it shot up, ricocheted off several walls, coming pretty close to my father-in-law, and made a landing somewhere out-of-bounds. Michael (my father-in-law) decided to place my ball on the green, probably to avoid another powerful ball-launching swing.

I was still last.

Oh well. The next day's activity was hiking, and I knew I could do that.

Cinder Cone

We went to Craters of the Moon [which is NOT where the moon landing was filmed, nor were the craters the result of the moon, but rather the result of calderas and volcanoes.] and I got to see a cinder cone, poky a'a lava formations, snaked blurby pahoehoe lava formations, and snow.

Indian Cave

I have seen snow before, but my father-in-law wanted me to jump into whatever snow pile we saw; since most of them were down in caves and ravines, we figured he was trying to get back about the golf ball incident.

I borrowed this coat from my sister-in-law, cuz I didn't expect it to be this cold

A strange barren landscape. But plenty of sun in my eyes.

While we were in Idaho, we took the opportunity to visit friends from both sides (i.e. my friend, Mark's friend) and to visit the Rome exhibit at the Museum of Idaho. We had thought about visiting the Gladiator exhibit in Houston, but changed our minds when I found out the tickets were $30 each. Idaho prices were cheaper. And the exhibit was pretty good: lots of hands-on models, several audio/visual presentations, and good efforts to connect the past to the present (e.g. how we use Roman technology today). Okay, there were grammar issues in the exhibit placards, and one of the docents was dozing in a corner, but that didn't much bother me. One of the other docents, however, did. He enthusiastically jumped in, from across the room, to "help" us with some of the models, and tell us how the root of "sinister" means left--which both Mark and I are perfectly aware of, of which fact I informed him--but he just kept talking. He also was ADAMANT that we not take his picture--so he freaked out when I held my phone out for a selfie, as he was in the path of the rear-facing camera. It was frustrating because his section of the exhibit was the most interesting, but being followed and talked at induced us to escape to the 2nd floor.

The whole trip was my first time seeing Idaho Falls in the summer. Yes, I still needed a winter coat (or at least several layers and some blankets). Yes, I still inexplicably dripped water on myself. And when I helped my mother-in-law make cookies, yes, I spilled some brown sugar on the counter and floor (sorry, Linda. I wiped it up...).
Vacations don't make my faults go away.