With Dr. Robert Alexander, aka my brother-in-law Bob -- outside his home outside Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Hail! to the victors valiant/  Hail! to the conqu’ring heroes/  Hail! Hail! to Michigan,/  The champions of the West! 

There, I’ve done it.

I’ve kept the little bargain I made with Dr. Robert Alexander, aka my brother-in-law Bob, whose only condition in exchange for my surprise visit and overnight boarding in the home he shares with my lovely sister-in-law Mary in Kalamazoo, Michigan, was that I post a picture of us together on my blog.

(O how easily these new web-based journalists can be bought and sold…)

In fact I’ve met that bet with Bob and seen him one better — by reciting the Michigan fight song in honor of his extraordinary son Robby, who (thanks to a special grant from NASA) is currently conducting break-through research on sounds from outer space while earning his doctorate at the University of Michigan.

Then again, what would a road trip be without paying a surprise visit to a brother-in-law or two … or three?

And I could say the very same thing about dropping in on my Alaska-Home-Grown niece and nephew(s) Karin and Patrick and David in Portland, Ore. … and nephews Andrew and Tim in Fort Collins, Colorado …  and in-laws (of-my-in-law) Penny in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, and Victoria in Bozeman, Montana … and ALL their assorted spouses and children.

Su casa es mi casa — si?

Or as New England poet Robert Frost once put it:

“Home is the place where, when you have to go there, They have to take you in.”

Nice!

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