My in-laws were up for the weekend and good times were had by all, all except for the bulls. My father-in-law is a cattle rancher and I think it's safe to say he admires cowboys. In any event he is a fan of the rodeo and since there was a rodeo in town during their visit we took them to it. Much to my surprise my parents also joined us, and thus six of us spent hours upon a hard wooden plank watching men with more guts than common sense attempt to ride a thrashing bull for at least eight seconds. Most did not make the eight second limit, and while they lasted mere seconds the event lasted hours, some weird sci-fi twist of time I'm still puzzling out.

In the end some squeaky voiced 17 year old took first place, promising his folks he'll join the soprano section in the church choir come Fall. Well not really, but a 17 year old did win the event, and I must say it looked like hard work from where I was sitting. The evening was to close with an exhibition of extreme dirt-bike tricks. I was quite set on leaving before this happened, not because I do not enjoy watching these stunts, but because the announcer was kind enough to inform the crowd that the rider who injured himself the previous night is okay, even though he had yards of stitches sewn into his chest. To say I don't handle blood and bodily injury well is a gross understatement, so when I hear that he attempted two backflips and missed the landing on the second one I was dead set on leaving and watching such events on the television, trusting the networks to edit out anything serious. I was not so lucky.

I was shocked to find that it was the older generation who was keen and eager to watch this spectacle of youthful bravado. They got what they wanted and I am happy to say there were no mishaps apart from a few flutters of the heart followed or preceded by gasps. My in-laws actually enjoyed the dirt bike event, which still goes to show that I don't know them all that well.

Sunday found us doing something we had been talking about for a long time. My mother-in-law has wanted to see the Spruce Goose ever since she found out it was up here. For whatever reason we had never gone to see it, but no more. Six of us piled into the oversized Ford pickup and took the back-country route to the museum, then promptly spent more time than I though it would take to marvel at their displays.

The Spruce Goose was the headlining attraction, but the large building housed many more planes, some more impressive by far. There were WWII planes, replicas of early fliers, some 1930's era racing planes, biplanes, and to my wonderful surprise an SR71 Blackbird. We got to see a B17 flying fortress, at least one Nazi plane, and even a Titan II rocket. The time passed in awe and enjoyment; hunger finally won out and we bade farewell to the impressive array of planes.

It was sad to have to say good-bye to my in-laws as well. We all had a great time together, so much so that Sunday felt like a sunny day on a happy vacation. This will hopefully not be the last time we can vacation together, and I hear a trip to Victoria Canada might surreptitiously be in the works. It'll be fun.