"Declan Murphy" <declan_murphy@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3EDAC02D.2030807@hotmail.com...
> I met the old man for the first time last night, the future
> mother-in-law I'd met briefly before, but hadn't had the chance to talk
> to. MIL was delighted. The old man was fairly quiet, first 15 mins or so
> wanted to know how long I'd been here, what I did, future plans etc. By
> the end of the main course he was asking me if I could fix his computer.
> He seems OK with everything. Relieved perhaps.

I spoke with my wife's parents on the phone a few times before we were
married. She spent a couple months back in Japan while we were dating, and I
used to call her up at home. When the old man answered, he'd keep me on the
line for about 15 minutes before handing the phone over. Seems he was just
tickled about talking to a gaigin in Japanese or something (at the time my
Japanese was pretty pitiful BTW, so I only understood about 1/3 of what he
was saying). All the while I'm going "sou desu ka" and thinking of what my
phone bill is going to look like.

-- 
Regards,
Ryan Ginstrom