Super Great Basin

I have been good lately about writing detailed letters to my missionary siblings about all the fun things we've been up to lately -- the trip to Boston in late August, the bike rides, the playgrounds, the children's museums we went to before our pass expired, etc.

And, for whatever reason, since I've already written it down once, I don't feel like doing it again. I don't feel like letters and blog posts quite translate over for me, so I don't want to copy and paste them. Plus add pictures.

So what I'm saying is you might not get updates that way. My sister Leslie was in town Thursday-Saturday while Kevin was in Ann Arbor for a conference, so maybe I will blog about that.

But not tonight.

Nor will I blog extensively about the latest political outrage and my corresponding rants. I have just one quick thought that makes me infuriated so I will bring up just a little bit: There is a lot of ugliness that has surfaced in the past 16 or so months (oh heavens, this debacle has been going on longer than Matthew has been alive), and . . . the Clinton campaign and DNC are complicit. They actively encouraged positive press time for the looniest and slimiest candidate alive. Why? Because they wanted an easier win for their candidate at the expense of the nation as a whole.

I think this should frustrate everyone -- especially Clinton supporters. There really are reasonable arguments for someone to support Democratic policies, and one would hope they would have merit on their own without completely suppressing the competition. To say that her arguments wouldn't stand a chance against arguments from someone such as Rubio or Kasich is insulting to everyone's intelligence.

But then again, maybe there isn't that much intelligence in the nation to be insulted. After all, plenty of people still don't even care that a candidate for president is proud that he gets away with assaulting women. Because at least he's not Hillary Clinton.

Long month ahead of us. We all want to think Trump is done, but I have seen lots of Trump signs in rural Connecticut and Kaylie has seen lots of Trump signs in rural New Jersey (which are both states that usually bleed blue) so there may yet be a surprise. All I ask is that Utah vote for Evan McMullin instead of Donald Trump.

Whew. That was more extensive ranting than I was expecting.

Let's switch from ranting to dreaming. I have mentioned before I know what I want in life -- a house a certain size and a certain age and a certain cost, a yard a certain size, a certain distance from family, etc.

I've realized a few problems with my dream -- one is that Utah is too crowded. (By the way, part of the dream is being in Utah close to family.) I mean, most of it is super super empty (I didn't realize how empty Utah was until I realized how empty Connecticut is, and it's one of the densest states), but then you've got this small area 80 miles by 10 miles with a few million people squished between lakes and mountains and only crazy-busy I-15 to connect it all. Not all of it is crowded, but more and more of it is getting filled in every year. I imagine buying a house and every year my expectations go down a little bit as the costs rise and the lots shrink.

So here is my dream instead.

Once upon a time there was a state called Nevada that wasn't really that lovely (except for Lake Tahoe and the occasional national forest, I guess). It was mostly desert. But then the climate changed and the rains fell and the underground reservoirs came out of nowhere and then it turned into lush land with gentle rolling hills and forests and meadows and rivers that looked like the eastern United States.

Gradually, it got built up enough to have a really great university and lots of good restaurants there, but the traffic was never bad. Since it had previously been a desert there weren't too many physical landmarks in the way of building a few different freeways for people to get around. (This, by the way, is how lots of the US is, including Michigan and Connecticut.) Remembering its desert past, it was never humid in the summers, but it still rained enough there to keep it green. It was still landlocked so there were no hurricanes, and tornadoes were no more of a worry than they were during the desert times.

And then we moved there. And lived within a half day's drive of grandparents and real mountains. The end.

I am sure there is some geographical benefit from having a big pile of desert between the Rocky Mountains and California, but right now this is what I would rather have.

ps -- Okay, I have learned way more about Nevada than I was expecting doing this spur-of-the-moment blog post. There are some pretty green parts, and some mountains. But on the whole it's pretty barren.

pps -- this story doesn't have to be about Nevada. Western Utah, eastern Utah, western Colorado and Wyoming, southern Idaho, and southern Montana are all welcome to have this magical transformation. (And . . . it would be nice to have Kevin's dream job in these locations too.)