Midwest Fun!

Yesterday was another eventful day on the road. We traveled from Western Missouri thru Kansas and finally into Colorado. It was still slow going as the high temps reached over 105 degrees, making frequent stops necessary so we could let the car engine cool.

Things to know about the Midwest:
- It's FLAT. Pretty boring to look at unless there are some lightening storms in the distance and then it gets cool.
-There are a lot of billboards asking me to repent (or else!) and to not murder babies. I think everyone has their own church out here, which leads to the next point...
- People are REALLY nice. It completely puts me off guard, but I'm getting used to it. Living in Philly really has lowered my expectations of people, which is kinda sad.

We did have an another unfortunate car incident. The tire on the trailer blew out around 3pm and we dialed AAA for assistance. Due to our remoteness, the closest person they could send was over 130 miles away. Fuck...All we really needed was a jack and could do it ourselves, but for the time being we were stuck. Ginger was on the phone with a local farm co-op, when a utility truck pulled over and out jumped two teenage men who looked like they were on their way to work on a farm. They pulled out their tools and with the speed and precision of a NASCAR pit crew, changed the busted tire! We were amazed. These two guys took time out of their day to help strangers and they didn't do it because they wanted money (which they adamantly refused) but they did it because that's what people do for each other. We joked that if that happened in Philly we would have been carjacked and possibly assaulted. Lisa was able to get them to take some cash ("give it to charity") and we hopped back in our car and were on our way again.

We scheduled a stop in Dodge City so we could let the car relax and get the dogs out for some activity. It was sorta sad. You could tell it was bustling at one point, but it was clearly an empty shell. We found a bar for some grub and much needed beer and waited for the sun to go down a bit. A cowboy came up to the bar with his horse and tipped his hat to us and tied his horse up outside. He said I could "go love up on his horse" so I pet her for a bit before we left. He had just ridden her over 350 miles from where he bought her so this guy was a for real cowboy, sweet!

Some high, some lows, but getting closer!
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry