When I Had to Leave Church

I should preface this with the stated fact that we do not leave our church meetings.  I won't say it NEVER happens, but it rarely happens.  Our children learned very early that it would be more fun to stay in the chapel and worship (with crayons and pencils and paper) than to leave. 

The other thing we did with our children was sit very near the front of the chapel.  That way there were fewer distractions.  When it was stake conference, I often got ready an hour early just to save us a row in the chapel, because we knew the children would hear NOTHING if we were in the cultural hall. 

Once we had a member of the Quorum of the Twelve coming to our stake conference.  I got to the chapel too late to get a row in the chapel; so we opted to sit in the Relief Society room, where we had sound only, just so we would actually be able to hear what he said.  (P.S.  We were so grateful!)

Sunday was our stake conference.  Taylor is on a mission.  Bri and Ash are in the YSA ward.  It's just Landon who goes to church with us these days.  I thought, "We are all grown ups.  We can just sit in the cultural hall."  They have two projection screens up so everyone can see.

What I did not count on (because I'm stupid, I think) were the two families in front of us.  One of them had seven children.  I'm going to be horribly judgmental here and just say it:  I don't think all the lights were on at their house.  In fact, the mother was the biggest distraction in that family.  The other family had six children.  Wherever Mom was, things were under control.  Dad, on the other hand, was completely oblivious to the fact that the three children near him--who were old enough to know better, BTW--were talking with full conversational voices.  They were coloring, so their backs were turned to the speakers, which meant we heard every word they said.

I guess I'm either really juvenile or seriously OCD or something worse, because I could not tune these families out to save my life.  I tried.  I really did.  But finally I had to leave.  I went into the (amazingly quiet) foyer for the last 20 minutes or so of the meeting so I could hear what was being said.

I have several questions: 
1.  Is whispering a lost art?
2.  Why does stake conference have to last for two hours?
3.  Why do I care?