Received graduation announcements from my niece's twin sons down in California's Inland Empire.

One of the boys noted his college plans. He intends to study electrical engineering at Cal Poly-Pomona. And that got me thinking.

Should I, their distant great uncle, have tried to get them to go to school in Spokane? You know, as my personal contribution to the city's economic development efforts.

People do that, right? Grandparents lobby their grandson in Wyoming to come study at Whitworth. Uncles encourage nieces in Alaska to enroll at Gonzaga. And so on.

I'm sure it happens all the time.

What could my niece's boys have expected from me if they had matriculated here? Well, they could come over for dinner once in a while. They could have been drafted to help me haul some stuff to the dump.

And, if youthful high spirits got the better of them, I could always help them find a good defense lawyer.

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