My family usually can only get together on major holidays. Family dinners are a great place for me to get a sense how they're thinking, where my opinions are just part of the general chatter. Most of my family is considerably more 'worldly' than I. Not to say, they're right. But it's interesting to get a gauge on how they feel about things.

We had an old family friend join the table yesterday. She was thinking about selling her house. So I told her, I thought she should try to sell this spring and not wait until summer or fall. The brother in law who lives in Bend, chipped in, saying he thought that Bend was going to continue booming, that we were a baby boomer mecca.

Interestingly, our old friend seemed very receptive to what I said. I think because she had already been looking into the situation, and seemed aware of some of the developing dynamics. But what was interesting to me was that my B-in-L hasn't changed his opinion about Bend's growth whatsoever.

My other sister and brother-in-law chimed in that for 250k you could get a nice four bedroom house in Delaware. They are both professors at the U. of D. , and they mentioned that the one independent bookstore in town had all but dropped new books in favor of used books, cd's and dvd's. Both of them buy their books online. Period. No discussion. And Claus pointed to his two kids, and said, "Don't you think they are going to buy online?"

Encouragingly, both nephews are readers. I gave the younger one a copy of TinTin (which he was aware of) and one of Asterix (which he hadn't read). B-In-L Claus, being German born, was intrigued by the english translations. My other nephew got a Naruto novel and a Bleach graphic novel.

When they visited my house, earlier in the day, the 7 year old immediately took over my computer and bent it to his will. When they were ready to leave, we found him playing an online game, and my sister Sue was surprised that he'd managed to log on by himself.

I'm sure such discussions with friends and family are an everyday thing for most people. But I'm such a huge loner and usually cloistered in my store, so it is hard for me to get a range of views. What people tell me in my store is influenced by the fact that it's my store and politeness or whatever can soften people's opinions.

So I find it somewhat heartening that my brother-in-law has no doubts whatsoever that Bend is going to continue to boom. I find it valuable to know that my other brother-in-law is going to buy his books online. I find it encouraging that my nephews seem to be readers. (Though they both toted around hand held games.)