Bad Gas

We woke up from our slumber in Murdo. No murders in Murdo while we were there. We hit the road and drove east, and east, and east, and east. It was very windy--the kind of wind that makes you drive with the steering wheel aimed at 1 o'clock (okay, actually more like 12:20). We gassed up in Mitchell at a Cenex and headed east. Once again my mileage was off. We only got 240 miles on the tank instead of the 360. Just like my tanks in Vancouver. So is it bad gas? Or the wind? Who knows? We gassed up again in Albert Lea, Minnesota and the mileage was back to normal. But the wind also died down at that point. Why do all my mileage events have to have these extra variables so I can't isolate the gas as bad gas? Anyway I had a fun time talking about bad gas. Elena also enjoyed my bad gas jokes--for a while.

We got to Minnesota and then through Minnesota, finally arriving in La Crosse, Wisconsin. Then we headed 2 or 3 more hours to home.

We saw no police in South Dakota and Montana. But once we hit Minnesota and Wisconsin, there were police speed traps. In one case in Wisconsin, a police man decided to enter the highway right in front of us. So we had to wait until he pulled someone over before resuming our scofflaw speeding ways.

My parents expected us a day later and we didn't call. Just decided to drop in. At about 6:30pm we pulled up to the house, and I tried the door. Locked. Then I rang the door bell. My Mom answered wondering who it was. I got almost my whole line of "excuse me kind folks. Would you be willing to put up two homeless unemployed people?" before she realized who I was. About 5 minutes later my Dad came home. Then we all drank a 1.5 liter Yellow Tail Chardonnay and 2 Pizza Pit pizzas.

So we made it safely from Vancouver to Jefferson in 4 days! Very nice. No problems worse than the key fob stopping--and that was a worse problem for the people in the Motel 6 who had to hear my car alarm go off 3 times that night as I tried to fiddle with it.

The only regrets--I wish I would have taken some pictures of things that I wasn't aware of until it was too late:

• Exit sign in Montana "Anaconda Opportunity"
• Exit sign in Montana "469"
• Skeleton of man walking skeleton of dinosaur
• Every single kitschy Wall Drug sign for the miles before Wall, SD
  
• Perfectly cast shadow of the profile of our car on the wall next to us
• The Missouri River
• The Mississippi River
• The Buffalo Bar and Restaurant in Murdo