Since nothing was open in the city yesterday, I had to make it the Johnstown day, so today was to be the Pittsburgh day. It didn't quite work out the way I'd planned, as we were needed to guard my mother-in-law against a possible con artist. That's OK, she's why we came anyway.

In the morning we drove back to the Old Neighborhood. First we went to the cemetery (this was actually MY idea) and found my father-in-law and the aunt and uncles. Then we were going to go to the West End Overlook. However, they're rebuilding there, going to make it a tourist attraction. One of the neighbors came our and asked "can I help you?" which I recognize as homeowner-speak for "who the heck are you and you better not be planning mischief." She's lived there since '91 so didn't know the people Rich knew. She told us the ten houses along the view (which are enormously expensive by Pittsburgh standards) are called the Ten Commandments. They have historical interest but they don't have restrictions on them yet, so there've been some real structural changes on the renovations. She also told us how to get to an alternate view that Rich didn't know about. It's quite nice, and we got to see Heinz Field. PNC Park is behind it from that angle.

Then we looked at the old house, and the field near there, and Rich showed me another park which I'd not seen before, and then we took the surface roads back to Coraopolis to stay with Mom.

After the guy didn't turn up for 90 minutes, Mom thought maybe she'd told him not to come. Oh, well. It was a nice visit, anyway, and this time I saw some cardinals (they don't look real to me, but like cartoon birds!) and a tufted titmouse, as well as the chipmunks.

It was really too late to go into town and actually see anything, so we popped around to my brother-in-law's store. I kept telling Rich to turn on Saw Mill Run Boulevard so of course he missed it, he didn't think I meant it. He kept thinkng I meant to go through the tunnels (I don't actually think you CAN from that direction anyway, not around the mountain.

The store had customers! I walked across the street to pick up a postcard for Casey. I'd thought maybe a dinosaur one, but since we couldn't get downtown to see them, then I had to get ordinary ones. I got him a view of Three Rivers Stadium being blown up.

Back at the store I noted a "Yarnot" door knocker. Go figure.

B-i-L told us a simpler way to get to the parkway, and we missed a lot of traffic getting back to the house.

We took the family out to Red Lobster, where I once more got a Lobsterita so I could get the lobster beads. I wore them out, and now they'll either go onto the Christmas tree or maybe join our Mardi Gras bead collection.

Rich's next older brother and his wife came over. I like this lady. We had a nice catchup talk. She's now working for a Catholic college. After 35 years, we're gonna get her yet.

Instapundit has some opinions of San Francisco people.

"Jan Yarnot is a briefcase that sends and receives text messages and catches flies." You can type in your own. "fossilfreak is a diamond ring that works in the opposite way to that which you'd expect! It squirts water." And, "gharlane of eddore is a gas-mask that keeps drinks cold, mimics its user and is used by the US military."

Yep. Although "mimics its user" probably should be "mocks its user."