Dear Kids,
Dad and I are settling back into our normal routine. Dad started a new run this morning, because UTA always changes the runs when the ski work ends. Yep, no more ski busses, now that we have a huge dump of snow in the mountains. It’s always that way. Springtime in the Rockies.
We’re still trying to get back onto Utah time, after our trip to Michigan. We tried to stay up late while we were there, and sleep in late, but it didn’t work very well. (Now I wake up about 3 each morning and I’m ready for bed by 8 pm.) We had a lot of fun playing with Charlie and Matthew and Lucy, and we had a great time attending Seth’s dissertation defense, not that we understood a whole lot of it. Basically, lupus patients have more heart disease than the average person, because Type I Interferons in their blood keeps the blood vessels from repairing themselves. (Steven condensed it into three words: Interferon is BAD.) Seth was studying the effects of interferons in mice, because they’re so much more expendable than humans. (He expended hundreds of them.) Now he’s finished with his PhD, but he’ll still be working in his lab until they leave for Maryland in July.
It was really cold in Michigan–in the teens at night, and thirties during the day. Plus, it’s damp, and the wind blows. We didn’t spend much time outside. Seth’s family came the day before the presentation, so Dad and I spent our last two nights at the Lamp Post Motel. It was very funky, probably built in the fifties, with many layers of paint on the walls and many layers of caulk on the yellow tile in the shower. Very thin towels, some with holes in them. But everything was clean. And it was cheap. Can’t beat that. Our flight home was very roundabout: From Detroit to Philadelphia, and then a long flight from Philly back over Detroit, over a corner of Utah, and down to Phoenix. And our last leg was from Phoenix back to Salt Lake. I think by then we’d seen enough of the country for one day. We were glad to get home.
Conference weekend was great! Lotsa kids, lotsa food, lotsa fun, and we actually listened to most of the speakers. Sunday morning we woke up to a big snowstorm, which dropped 8 or 10 inches, but nobody went sledding. I think we’re about wintered out.
What’s up next? The Easter picnic at Al and Missy’s on the Saturday, the 23rd. Thank goodness there’s always some family event to look forward to!
Lots of love, Mom
