Minot Redux

My last training day in Salt Lake City had us drive up to Hill AFB to see some Minuteman IIIs being refurbished and put back together, as well as some huge storage facilities that house old 1st stages of the Peacekeeper missile. But they also have a mock-up MMIII launch facility and launch control center, bringing me shiveringly back to my three years on alert. Even though it's been 7 years since I stepped foot into one of the capsules, seeing the REACT console brought back tons of memories, eight ounces of which were good (one of our chefs, Airman Stephens, made a really good chicken sandwich).

With time to kill in the afternoon, my travellin' partner Eric and I decided to drive into downtown SLC, since we'd pretty much been on the outskirts all week. We took in "Temple Square", basically the capital of the Mormon religion. I thought that the Tabernacle Choir sang in the big castle looking cathedral thing I'd seen on TV, but the theater and organ et al are in the domed building in front -- unfortunately, re-opening after a two-year refurbishment two days later.

We didn't go inside the cathedral (which took 40 years to build in the late 1800s), but toured a couple visitor's centers, very slick multimedia affairs that just seemed oozing with money. Think Brigham Disney.

After a quick drive up into the foothills through the campus of the University of Utah, we headed back to our hotel, where I took in the pool since my back was bothering me and the hot tub was a tepid tub.