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Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Wall, South Dakota.

WALL DRUG! WALL DRUG! WALL DRUG! Sadly they're closed right now, I'll go in the morning.

510 miles today, about as good as can be expected with the damn trailer. There was a pea-soup fog for the last fifty miles, which scared the crap out of me.

Lots of deer and antelope today. Not really playing. More eating. Or in an unsettling number of cases, being dead. I came across a whole bunch of deer in one spot that had been shot and just left where they fell. Unless there's some legitimate reason that a dumb city kid doesn't know about... someone's an asshole.

I used to divide the country into two parts: the part where billboards have a snazzy slogan, and the part where billboards have directions. I need to add a third part: the part where billboards have directions and they're 200 miles away.

I'm allowing myself one ridiculous roadside-attraction impulse purchase per day. So after three days of travel I am the owner of a pink flocked unicorn, a jackalope, and a Tyrannosaurus bone fragment. Or a rock. It could be that they sold me a rock. I'm kinda going on trust with that one. (The jackalope is real though.)

Today's life lesson: walking around after dark in South Dakota in the winter in a T-shirt is a very bad idea. I was just going about 100 yards, and I'm one of those people who never gets cold and will snowshoe in a tank top, and... HOLD FUCK THAT'S COLD HOLY FUCK. It was like walking on the moon without a spacesuit and about as smart.

This motel room has two beds. I guess that's just what they had? They charged me for a single, so whatever. Every motel so far has put me on the second floor. I think that's standard procedure for women staying alone, because the first floor is more vulnerable or something. And a woman alone, as we all know, is a rarity and a tremendous risk, and has to be treated with much more care than a human alone.

No, no, I shouldn't be bitter about someone trying to help me out, I don't really care which floor I sleep on and I'd rather have my pride offended than have my room broken into. But still.

I don't think I really understood the game "Sam and Max Hit the Road" until now.

Despite filling my iPod for the trip, I've preferred to listen to local radio. It's a much more interesting experience and there's useful road information. And it's culturally enriching! For example, I've learned that people out here really care about high school sports. Seattle radio gives a one-sentence announcement of the state champions each year and that's it; Montana radio contains hours-long in-depth discussions of changes in the Sugar Beeters' coaching staff and how this might affect their octofinals results against the Sheep Herders.

I've also experienced the weird contradiction of Christian radio, which is that it comes off for the most part as being composed of fundamentally sweet and loving people, who are always talking about charitable projects and how God should bless everybody and how much they love their friends and families and neighbors and country. Oh, and they hate gay people. Even when it's couched in "we love gay people, we just want to help them overcome their sin"... it's still really jarring.

There's something really extra-sad about a trailer park with three feet between the trailers when it's in the middle of a gazillion miles of totally empty prairie.

11 comments:

  1. Oh man, I hated Wall Drug. After all of those stupid billboards, my 10-year-old self had imagined some fabulous place full of fairies and unicorns and... well, I'm not sure what else, but certainly not the giant weird gift shop that we weren't allowed to purchase anything at.

    Drive safe!

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  2. SAM AND MAX HIT THE ROAD. HIGH FUCKIN FIVE.

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  3. I really loved South Dakota when I came across the country two years ago. Wall Drug was totally cheesy, but fun.

    http://dimethirwen.livejournal.com/524624.html

    (Pictures!)

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  4. "There's something really extra-sad about a trailer park with three feet between the trailers when it's in the middle of a gazillion miles of totally empty prairie."

    It's called:
    1) The land is parceled in 50-acre lots, I can't afford to buy that much, and the owners aren't bothering with minor land division
    OR
    2) The gov't owns most of the land out here, except for BillyJoeJimBob, whose uncle is a county board supervisor and helped him get a decent slice for a smoking price
    OR
    3) I barely scraped together enough money to buy the home, I can only afford to rent the land

    Land isn't free. Someone owns it. If it's the gov't, you have to wait until they're ready to sell. Otherwise, you haven't made a good enough offer. There are some barriers to entry, put in place by the regional big players. But by and large, it's a capitalist market. Except when the gov't gets involved. Then it's a mess.

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  5. "I came across a whole bunch of deer in one spot that had been shot and just left where they fell. Unless there's some legitimate reason that a dumb city kid doesn't know about... someone's an asshole."

    That's fucked up. Deer are considered pests by farmers, but if you're going to shoot them, the least you could do is skin and process them and give them to a local food bank.

    I agree--asshole move. >:(

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  6. LabRat - That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard!

    Mac - Why, thanks for explaining that, I clearly didn't understand. :p

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  7. You like Sam an Max? No way!

    We should've scheduled the blogmeet for your closest approach...

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  8. If there are a whole bunch of deer dead, then it means population control. And cleaning a deer is a real pain in the ass. Been there, done that, it takes a couple days. Leaving all the deer there means that the wolves and other predators will go after that first, instead of the livestock, or the cats. Wolves and coyotes have a real thing for cats.

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  9. Yeah, you lucked out as far as SD weather goes. This week is the first time it's been above freezing in months. It was pretty much stuck in the -10s and -20s all through January & February... NOT tank top weather! Also, holy crap, you're in SD!

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  10. Holly: no problem, I'm helpful that way. ;)

    My current projects have me eyeballs-deep in the intricate workings of our county assessors. And I was in a weird mood. My apologies for 'splaining.

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  11. Oh Christian radio. That's pretty much 95% of our stations out here where I live, so it's funny to hear it talked about as a novelty. I especially love that "hate the sin, love the sinner" shit they try to pull.

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