The Graduate Cometh

I know, I know, I've been promising this post for weeks - literally weeks, gah - but I've been...I hesitate to say busy because that's lame - who isn't? - or occupied, that's too vague. Lazy might be more accurate but I'm not laying around watching television or playing Frontierville all day - really, I'm not - and I don't think I'm lacking motivation - it was a really great trip and we had a surprisingly good time. I want to share! (This missing post has been bugging me since we got back.) Maybe it's my lack of specific pictures.
Yeah, let's go with that.
And it's true in a way. I took a lot of photos, but not the ones you would think of. As it will become quickly obvious where we were I will save time trying to think of a cute name to disguise the town we visited. QC graduated in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah on Saturday, July 23rd. We flew into SLC Friday morning - we left at the ungodly hour of 4:30AM - again - why do we always DO that? - the ceremony and celebrations were Saturday and we came back Sunday afternoon. So there was time for sightseeing and relaxing which is a rarity on our vacations.
We stayed at a hotel that was literally across the street from Temple Square:

So I have a few photos of that building: Though it's smaller in real life than I thought it would be: I took a lot of pictures of Tarzan:
Tarzan with his Lebanon cedar tree:
He searched all over for this tree, having heard of it's notoriety - apparently it came from Jerusalem and once got trimmed incorrectly which created a wiggle in it's trunk - but not sure which of the many trees in the area it was. He asked every person who looked like they weren't tourists, scared a number of sister missionaries with his intensity and finally found the answer from a dude, dressed for the 100th anniversary of the Hotel Utah and who might have been around when the hotel opened.
What's fortunate is there are a lot of pictures of the actual graduation ceremony and since that was ostensibly the reason we went, I'm happy about that.

Rather wordy sign on the sports arena stairs:On the way in:

Gimme some tassel:Takin' my diploma:

All done graduatin':

After the ceremony we walked around Temple Square some more - there are a billion things to see there - randomly ran into a friend from school and his son:

And toured the conference center. It's ENORMOUS (This is not my picture):

I was impressed with the feat of engineering that enables every seat in the place to have an unobstructed view: That's right, no columns:
During one of the gallery walks, PhatFiddle, Liezel and Fuzzy (in utero):
In another huge space with pretty things on the wall, SBB (with Abe in utero), QC and MusicMan:
After all day interviewing, graduating, walking around and everything, he soon settled down in true QC fashion: Then came the feast of celebration wherein we all ate more than was probably healthy:On the way back to the hotel where we passed out this was the back seat:

Tarzan and me:

QC photobombing us:
Sunday the family was leaving at various times. Tarzan and I, having left our house at the most ridiculous hour we had, we did not rise with the dawn to go home. Again the proximity of Temple Square drew us in and we were able to see Music and the Spoken Word, which is broadcast every Sunday morning. I've heard it dozens of times but I have to say, nothing prepares you for the experience in person. This video is of the organist practicing the closing hymn the day before:

This is me and in all seriousness, Congratulations QC!