Part 9 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: Minnesota

One of the most elaborate state signs, replete with governor… I guess when you have governors for 4 consecutive terms (see Tommy Thompson), it feels like something to etch on a sign:

The capitol, which we sadly forgot to take the camera into – overall, perhaps the nicest of the many state capitols I’ve seen:

On the way to the Dells, we saw this sign. Em was captivated, but we didn’t stop to sample the cuisine and compare it to Em’s beloved in Oakland:

This is more or less what most of the Dells look like. For some reason, it was not what I was expecting:

One of the cooler formations:

The “stack of pancakes”:

It occurs to me that while the subtitle for the Sunset to Sunrise Summer Sojourn 2009 was “National Parks and Baseball Parks”, it could have just been “Rock Formations”. I mean, really. We saw a few:

Green… in the wa-ter…

This picture… rocks.

Toadstool formation:

Those aren’t rocks – those are bricks!

There wasn’t a game within a number of days of our visit to Milwaukee, but they still let us in to a part of Miller Park, from where we could see the field:

Emily was enthralled by the AAGPBL exhibit, honoring the Wisconsin-based basis for perhaps her favorite movie, “A League of Their Own”:

One of the niftier takes on retractable roofs I’ve seen:

Tomorrow: Illinois

Read Duck and Cover at the Blue Pyramid.

It’s hard to believe that Friday night marked the ninth time I’ve seen Counting Crows live.

To this day, I would probably rather spend time watching them in concert than see almost anyone else I haven’t seen – actively choosing what would now be the tenth time I watched them perform over people whose performance before me would be unprecedented. Aside from another Simon & Garfunkel reunion show or Cat Stevens getting back out on tour with his full canon, it’s hard to imagine a musical act I’d be more excited about seeing. Even summer tour shows, even sets played almost entirely with other bands, are so emotionally charged as to put a spigot straight from an emotional well into the observer’s soul.

Fish and I had an eventful weekend, including my first visit to his Mole Street place, a trip to a classic Jersey diner, visiting Monopoly’s fabled Boardwalk (with hotels!), hours of overnight poker in Atlantic City, and my second viewing (his first) of the truly excellent “500 Days of Summer”. But the highlight, of course, was the Crows show.

It was a weird show in some ways – the show itself dubbed itself the “Saturday Night Rebel Rockers Traveling Circus and Medicine Show”, an effort combine CC with Michael Franti & Spearhead and Augustana into one epic 18-piece band. It was preluded by one of the most bizarre concert check-in experiences I’ve ever witnessed, where the Borgata Casino staff checked our tickets, issued numbered wristbands (a la Southwest), then checked our tickets again as they move the line up a few stairs, then checked wristbands, tickets, and stamped us with an invisible stamp (no joke – when we alerted them that the stamp hadn’t made a mark, they said it wasn’t supposed to), and constantly checked our numbers against each other. I felt old, as I often do in the early part of lines for rock shows, and wondered what proximity my #217 wristband would procure me.

Turned out, about third row. Which, somewhat remarkably in the face of all the other shows I’ve stood in line for and been able to touch the stage, was the closest I’ve ever been to Counting Crows. They just haven’t played all that many shows in places with a standing-room floor in the West lately.

The show itself was pretty remarkable, and not just because they were shuffling 18 people in and out at a rate that ensured that virtually no consecutive songs were played by the same collection of people. There were a ton of covers, including covers of Simon & Garfunkel, the Beatles, Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, and Woody Guthrie. I actually actively enjoyed “Hanginaround”, a song that often annoys me (in no small part because it almost always closes sets and thus means the set wasn’t closed by “A Murder of One”), since the crowd was so insanely involved and everyone was just screaming along by the end of the tune. I’ve become familiar enough with Augustana (they keep playing with CC) that I enjoyed most of their songs as well. And Michael Franti just kept making us jump. Which was fun.

We had intended to play poker for about an hour or so after the show, but it was 6:20 in the morning by the time we actually started rolling out of AC. We’d both more or less broken even (me a little more, Fish a little less), but we’d had quite the time with AC vacationers and bachelors-not-to-be alike. I’m not sure I’ve seen a more gregarious ten at a poker table.

Despite my tiredness at driving home, I’ve now pretty well converted my schedule to something resembling a dawn-to-noon sleep schedule, most conducive to writing and the creative life. Although the noon has been more consistent than the dawn – I still have a ways to go before regaining my youthful reliance on 4 hours or less.

Seeing “500 Days of Summer” again convinced me that it may be a perfect movie. Not that it’s competing with “Shawshank” or anything, but it may be flawless in delivering an emotionally honest, real presentation of the experience of love, in its full and many ranges. About a week ago, I was having a discussion about my top ten movies and the amorphous 5-10 that sort of hang out in the teen periphery of my rankings. I think “500 Days” is at least in that company, and possibly climbing.

And (though this is chronologically before most of what I’ve discussed) I was pretty disappointed by Atlantic City. Granted, it was a stormy day and we got there in late afternoon, but the town did little to convince me it was any better than Santa Cruz or Venice Beach with a few casinos tacked on. The Boardwalk was nice, and pretty long, but it was no more amazing than many other beachside walkways. Maybe living near Seaside for much of my youth has jaded me to the wonders of beach communities, but I was expected something more epic, more grand. Maybe I would only have been satisfied by a full-scale reversion to the 1920’s, complete with sepia-toned eyesight. Yeah, AC probably didn’t have a chance against my expectations.

You know what did? Counting Crows.

Caravan
Hello Bonjour
Mrs. Potter’s Lullaby
Colorblind
Omaha
Sweet Virginia
Sweet and Low (Mr. Jones Intro)
Meet You There Someday
Boston (with Raining in Baltimore)
(You Gotta Walk and) Don’t Look Back (with Casey Jones)
[unverified Michael Franti song - possible cover]
All I Want is You (with Tainted Love)
The Gambler (partial, joking)
The Sound of Sunshine
I Got Love for You
Delta Lady
—–
When I Dream of Michaelangelo
Children in Bloom
Little Bit of Riddim
Yell Fire!
Say Hey (I Love You)
Just Like a Woman
Fire
Dust
Why Should You Come When I Call?
Hanginaround
—
Cecilia
Rain King (with Raise a Ruckus Tonight intro, With a Little Help from My Friends middle)
This Land is Your Land

Part 8 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Friday: South Dakota (part two)

One of the cooler state-entry signs:

The Jolly Green Giant in Blue Earth. It’s hard to see because of the trees directly behind her, but Em is standing under the Giant, between his boots:

The Blue Earth DQ. I love DQ.

The Metrodome! In its 30th-to-last baseball game ever:

Kirby:

The dramatic nightscape of Minneapolis on the postgame walk back:

Churchill:

Sadly, in the early morn rush out the door for the camping trip, I forgot to take my camera up to Duluth and points north. Thus I have no pictures of Highway 61 (yes, that Highway 61), Duluth, Lake Superior, Gooseberry Falls, or the campfire. This makes me sad, though I think one of the couples we camped with got some shots that may one day find their way back to us. So just imagine what those things might have looked like and we’ll see you…

Tomorrow: Wisconsin

Read Duck and Cover at the Blue Pyramid.

Part 7b in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: South Dakota (part one)

Today, we finish up South Dakota, with the Badlands through Mitchell…

The Badlands are a bit like a lunar landscape:

Or perhaps like Mars:

But with rabbits!

Our first day there, it was quite stormy:

There are paths atop most of the formations, leading out from the ridgeline upon which people can walk:

‘Twas nice and windy too:

The formations are all quite dramatic, a bit like getting to drive through the base of the Grand Canyon:

It had cleared up some by the time we headed out for our camping trip:

We were advised to register in the Backcountry log so someone would know we were out in the hinterlands – there are no other passes, fees, or registrations for Badlands camping!

Inspiring:

A view of the rock formation which we camped against:

See?

The line cutting diagonally across this formation is a different type of rock that looks for all the world like a ribbon or a sports field line:

A rabbit?

An eagle?

A sunset!

A moonrise…

The next morning, it was plenty bright:

Still windshield with grasshopper:

One of our hikes later in the day involved this epic ladder:

It was worth getting to the top, though:

A Martian metropolis?

Bubbly formations in close-up:

One of the widest-spanning views:

We depart…

…for Mitchell and the Corn Palace!

San Francisco, a la corn:

This is a pretty corny scene:

Next up: Minnesota

Yesterday, I completed* the first short story that I’ve written in years – possibly more than five years. Entitled Name Game, it still needs some editing before too many other people read it (hence the asterisk), but I think it has a good deal of potential. More importantly, it took me just two writing sessions over two days to write the whole thing, which weighs in around 7,000 words. If I can write 3,500 words a day, I’m going to be in good shape.

Granted, I’m here in this situation now to write books, not really short stories. Though I have been newly inspired to write some stories, they aren’t exactly intended to be my focus. So this success offers a bit of a dilemma – how much do I divert my efforts if the stories keep coming? On the one hand, stories have a lower threshold for publication and indeed may almost be a prerequisite for getting a larger work printed by a significant press. On the other hand, my success in writing books is going to depend on setting a deadline and making it stick. And if my daily 3,500 words are being diverted from longer works to shorter works, it’s going to be hard to keep to the deadline.

All of this is coming at the same time as I contemplate a major overhaul of the Blue Pyramid, both the front page and subsequent pages. I’ve decided, for example, that it’s time for me to have a navigation bar. The BP is suffering its biggest drought of traffic since the quizzes came out, which is hardly surprising in the face of how much I’ve neglected it. And I don’t want this to distract me from any sort of writing, though one can’t be writing 24/7. And I can’t help but think that a traffic revival could only help the general momentum of all my projects – getting my name out there and having something serious and creative to refer people to when they’re asking who the heck I am anyway.

Regardless, I was contemplating all this and wondering what to do about having a possible writing section of the BP linked on the nav bar when I remembered that I once assembled my so-called collected works before. And I was shocked to rediscover that I wrote no fewer than 51 short stories in a 3-year period from September 2003 through August 2006. Fifty-one! Now that’s productivity.

Granted, of course, few were of really sustainable value (other than the process and its incredibly helpful practice in improving my writing – hard to imagine being able to write Loosely Based without that kind of narrative experience behind me) and many of them were outright absurd. Although, it does make me wonder how many plots are retrievable – rarely were the ideas the dealbreaker in the stories so much as the execution. But still, 51 stories while going to school and living a full teenage life. That was some dedication. I really used to be so much cooler than I am now.

So I’m newly inspired as I stare down my tentative deadline of December 15th for American Dream On and contemplate a full slate of stories to compete with its completion. Surely I should be able to outpace my fourteen-year-old self in volume of output. Surely, like anything, enough work input will lead to worthy output.

And speaking of output, if you’re interested in being on the list of potential readers for either stories or the novel when they’re ready, let me know. I sort of threw Loosely Based at most of my close friends at the time it was done, with mixed results. Some of the recipients still haven’t read it. I’d prefer to take a much more measured, opt-in approach to the next stage of my writing life. A few folks have already volunteered through Facebook, which is great. My only request would be that you are completely honest in your readings and that you look on the work as an attempt at art, not an opportunity to try to analyze me or find yourself in my writing. You won’t be there. And I don’t need cheerleading – I need earnest, critical feedback.

Standing in the shadow of my youth, here I go.

Read Duck and Cover at the Blue Pyramid.

Consider this a brief follow-up to last week’s examination of existing home sales figures…

Good news! (Again.) New home sales are soaring, exceeding expectations, and signaling that despite people not having jobs, money, or much credit, everyone’s buying a home. Yes, that may have had something to do with the problem in the first place, but let’s not worry about this. New home sales were up almost 10% in July!!

But I’m not going to need to run a statistical analysis of whether this rate really indicates growth or not. Because not only are the year-over-year sales prices down 11.5%, negating the month-over-month 9.6% rise in total sales, but the year-over-year total sales figures are down 13.4%.

Surely I don’t need to draw a graph showing why a 13.4% reduction in sales combines poorly with an 11.5% reduction in price. This is a sign that the housing market is recovering!

Of course, it’s actually just another sign of the bubble being created by the temporary tax break for new homes. One anomalous month that is only good in comparison to surrounding months and still represents total regression on an annual basis does not a recovery make. In fact, it should make you dread the fall numbers that will drop so sharply that it will likely crush this inflated optimism harder than it would had the numbers never started to look artificially good.

The only actual positive indicator in this whole report is that the supply of new homes is starting to dry up, to its lowest level in a decade and a half. I’m no fan of American capitalism, but I’ve been saying for months that if your really wanted to save it, you’d put in a five-year home-building moratorium nationwide. If you combined this with a bunch of WPA-type programs, then the construction industry wouldn’t fold completely and it would keep the supply of houses in check long enough for the existing homes to start to recover some of their value. But as long as people are building new homes, an already over-glutted market will continue to deteriorate further and this will never lead to the recovery of the market.

Unless, I guess, you just open the borders completely, which I’d also support. Then there might be enough demand for American houses to counteract the extreme bubbilicious glut we’re facing now.

I can’t wait to see what good news comes out next!

Part 7a in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Day before yesterday: Nebraska

I have decided to divide South Dakota into two parts since there’s so much to cover. Today will cover Wind Cave through Wall, while tomorrow will be the Badlands through Mitchell. Never been to South Dakota? It may be the most underrated state in the union.

This is a lot of America stuff for one sign:

Wind Cave National Park is actually one of the oldest, if more obscure. Here our intrepid tour guide on the Natural Entrance Tour demonstrates how fast the wind is coming out of said cave:

Wind Cave is famous for “boxwork” formations, which look like this:

I saw an old pirate skull in the cave!

Wind Cave is the largest source of boxwork in the world. It’s different than typical stalactite/stalagmite cave formations, but no less cool:

This ranger at the Wind Cave station was a great animated storyteller:

Buffalo!

We went for a hike in the Wind Cave area, looking for wildlife:

We found another cool rock formation instead:

The buffalo didn’t really show up in earnest till we crossed into Custer State Park:

Classic bison pose:

There was a herd:

Mother and child reunion:

Other large mammals:

Another buffalo herd – we saw well over a hundred buffalo in CSP:

A calf getting a snack:

These antelope looked for all the world like they’d leapt in from the African savannah:

This is pretty much funny only if you’ve visited the Taj Mahal. Emily’s simulating the motion that many tourists were making when posing for pictures in front of said Mahal. The problem is that I didn’t have time to take the shot from the correct angle because all these militantly patriotic people were looking at us like we were urinating on their vision of America. So we had to make it quick. In some ways, though, I think that makes this shot even funnier:

Not only did the world change on 9/11, but apparently so did Mt. Rushmore. There are all these new installations to deal with the increased patriotic traffic. But this Bush administration contribution was our favorite – naming Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus as one of his 4 (four) “National Highlights”:

This was my actual favorite part of Mt. Rushmore – evidence that its sculptor saw the project more as a memorial to a country that would someday be gone, not a swaggering announcement of American permanence. This statement contradicted so many of the other quotations about the carving, which stated that it showed America would last for a million years.

Wall Drug!

Wall Drug is like a big theme park dedicated to kitschy stores and the Old West. I absolutely love it. It purports to be “America’s Roadside Attraction”. I think its restaurant inspired (or helped inspire) the design of the Frontier in Albuquerque. Where else can you see a twenty-foot T-Rex that periodically rises up and roars with smoke and steam pouring through his nostrils?

Seven foot rabbit!

A riding jackalope!

Five-cent coffee! (Yes, they still sell it for a nickel a mug. I had several.)

Huge pterodactyl!

Tomorrow: More South Dakota!

Read Duck and Cover at the Blue Pyramid.

Part 6 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: Wyoming

The Good Life!

Having never been to Nebraska, I was in a rush to pick up my 47th state:

Obligatory self-portrait with the good life:

I had been told that Nebraska was entirely flat. This is not flat land, kids:

Sadly, we didn’t get the camera out for the diner in Chadron. So this is all the photographic evidence we have.

Next up: South Dakota

Part 5 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: Colorado

Forever West:

Wyoming purports to be the first government in the world to grant women equal rights, as this statue Esther Hobart Morris, an early Wyoming suffragette from the 1860’s, attests. Contrary to some rumor that Emily heard, this is a copy of the one in the national capitol’s Statuary Hall, so she is honored by Wyoming both there and on the state capitol grounds, pictured here:

The symbol of Wyoming, the bucking-bronco-bound cowboy, also on the capitol grounds:

Some irony in the genderization of the sign with the testament to women’s rights in the background:

Home of the Jackalope!

Double-take:

Tomorrow: Nebraska!

Part 4 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: New Mexico

Colorful (and dizzying) Colorado:

An intense game of Pac-Man in the massive arcade in Manitou Springs:

Also in Manitou Springs, Coke and Pepsi together again:

I almost came back, but Emily got me 7-5 in air hockey:

Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs – this is called the “kissing camels” formation:

Pretty impressive work by the rock here:

Union Station in Denver. I don’t know the percentage of cities whose train station is called “Union Station”, but it’s got to be high.

Gametime, Coors Field:

Fred Lewis is coming for the Rockies:

Glaciers in Rocky Mountain National Park:

A neat lake as we started our ascent into RMNP:

Emily checks the darkening skies as the horizon retreats:

And then the rains came:

People don’t like rain:

Emily’s hat is waterproof:

Mine, less so:

The rain was in the upper elevations, so we retreated to the lower Moraine Park:

Emily found the river a place of peaceful contemplation:

As did a coyote:

Next up: Wyoming

Today’s headlines have been overwhelmed with dancing in the streets. No, not the dancing in Libya, though that’s there too, but the dancing over the incredible housing recovery that now has cold, hard data to back it up.

Now, I like data as much as the next person – probably much more, in fact – and I miss aspects of my old job at Glide where I got to play with numbers and charts and such. So let’s look at this alleged data and see what kind of exciting housing recovery is already underway!

First, go here and read the brief article about the July home sales data. Please note the screaming headline about the 7% jump in existing home sales. Also, note that it’s an AP story, so it’s not Boston-centric despite being on boston.com… it was just the first place the story with raw numbers popped up on Google News.

If you’re scoring at home, the key stats therein are that sales totals were up 7.2% and sale prices were down (yes, down) 15.1%. Is this the economic model of recovery? Let’s run some numbers and find out.

But wait! Hold the phone! These numbers are apples and oranges. 7.2% is a month-over-month rate, from June 2009 to July 2009, while -15.1% is a year-over-year rate, from July 2008 to July 2009. So to do a real comparison, we have to find the year-over-year rate (much more stable, accurate, and revealing than monthly fluctuations) for home sales.

Ah, here we go. Hm. Only 5.0% year-over-year. That’s not 7.2%, but it’s still pretty good.

So, back to our experiment. We can run the actual house-price numbers in a minute, but I’m curious to see how it plays out in a simple economic model with nice round numbers:

Lets say you sell widgets. Rather expensive widgets, with a target price of $100. And since they’re expensive, you’re only looking to sell 100 of these a month. Keep in mind that in actual America, instead of our model, you’re actually looking to sell many more widgets and for a much higher price, since 2008 numbers are really depressed in both metrics from where you want to be. But we’re running a simple model to see if the current pace is growth/recovery or not, so let’s leave that on the side for a moment.

2008 – 100 widgets for $100 each

Great. Now, let’s run the sales growth rate of 5.0% units sold and the sales price declination of 15.1% and see what happens over time.

2009 – 105 widgets for $84.90 each
2010 – 110.3 widgets for $72.08 each
2011 – 115.8 widgets for $61.20 each
2012 – 121.6 widgets for $51.96 each
2013 – 127.6 widgets for $44.11 each
2014 – 134 widgets for $37.45 each
2015 – 140.7 widgets for $31.80 each
2016 – 147.7 widgets for $27.00 each
2017 – 155.1 widgets for $22.92 each

Great news! You increased sales by 55% in 10 years. The only trouble is that, over the same time period, your sales price declined by, uh, 77%. So unless you were making an 80%+ margin to begin with (who does this?), this is very bad, because you are now losing money on each widget and thus selling more widgets is actually a bad thing. And even if your margin was 80%, your margin has now shrunk to just under 3%, which means the odds are you aren’t really supporting your business anymore.

But this probably doesn’t make it clear enough. Let’s look at your gross revenue over time:

2008 – $10,000.00
2009 – $8,914.50
2010 – $7,950.42
2011 – $7,086.96
2012 – $6,318.34
2013 – $5,628.44
2014 – $5,018.30
2015 – $4,474.26
2016 – $3,987.90
2017 – $3,554.89

Yeah. That should put it as starkly as it needs to be seen. Gross revenue is down more than 64% in a decade with steady declines throughout. Certainly looks like a winning business model to me. Try walking into a venture capitalist’s office with this ten-year revenue trajectory (even in this economy) and see how quickly you get kicked out the door.

If you’re wondering what this looks like against the actual housing numbers, it’s going into July 2017 with an annual pace of 8.15 million existing home sales at a median price of $40,889 each.

Think about that for a second. That’s not a recovery, that’s a fire sale. A full-fledged housing panic.

How many of you paying $178,000 for houses right now would be heartened to hear that you can flip it in ten years for $41,000 in a market glutted with 55% more homes?

But the numbers are actually even worse than this. Because the July 2009 numbers, by their own admission, have been massively propped up by the $8,000 tax credit that’s set to expire in the fall. Left to their own devices, market forces would have led to far fewer sales and probably at an even lower price, since people don’t negotiate as hard for a deal when they know they’re getting a fat rebate (see also: Cash for Clunkers).

The indicator that this new report isn’t really good news is also buried in the story, that despite the increase in the number of sales, the stockpile of existing homes sitting on the market actually increased 7.9% (more than the 7.2% sales jump!) from 3.8 million to 4.1 million. They cover this by saying it’s a 9.4 month supply at the current sales rates, which is unchanged, but that fact alone should show you that the increase in sales isn’t outpacing the increase in market glut. Which may be part of why prices are down 15%.

But the largest problem of all these is not that the numbers are inflated by the incentive deals like tax rebates or Cash for Clunkers, it’s that such incentive programs actually create unsustainable bubbles which will crash even harder than the market would have by itself. This summer, everyone who was even thinking about buying a house or a new car is doing so, because of all the super-bonus incentives. Once those incentives expire, absolutely no one will buy a house or a car for some time, because it looks like an even worse deal than it would have otherwise, because people have come to expect a super incentive to buy. So the rebound effect of these programs is to create a quick brief spike that falls even further on the back-end.

I know the principle is to fool people into thinking that everything’s better with the spike so that stocks go up and people just start believin’ again and somehow we’re on an upward spiral. But when the super spiked data still has you on a pace to get to a median existing home sale price of $41,000 in ten years, somehow I don’t think the goal has been fulfilled. So go get your party hats and streamers if you want to, but I’m going to pass on this parade just yet.

Part 3 in a 16-part stately series pictorially documenting the Sojourn.

Yesterday: Arizona

From a car in the dark with a migraine:

In line at the beloved Frontier Restaurant:

My parents’ backyard has become home to a small squirrel colony:

Much of my time in Albuquerque was actually spent on the issue of public outdoor drinking fountains, such as this one here in Petroglyph National Monument:

My favorite petroglyph (or Duck’s eldest ancestor. Speaking of which, Duck and Cover should be back next week.

While not as scary as the centipedes, millipedes in Nuevo still pack a mighty scare. This was one of about 12 we saw on the trails at Petroglyphs:

My second-favorite petroglyph (they aren’t all of duck-like birds, by the way – I’m clearly spoiling your sample here):

My parents in front of my Dad’s nifty carriage house garage doors:

Madrid is one of my favorite towns in New Mexico, where most of the houses look something like this (it’s pronounced with the emphasis on the first syllable, which is pronounced just like the word “mad”, so instead of sounding like the Spanish capital for which it was surely named, it sounds like someone named Drid is upset):

One of my favorite buildings in all the world, the La Fonda in Santa Fe:

Two of my favorite things: Emily and La Plazuela, the restaurant inside the La Fonda. I know “the La Fonda” is grammatically incorrect, but it’s how I grew up saying it and now I can’t stop. Also, they have substantially ruined La Plazuela with its redecoration, mostly by making it too light and open when it used to be turquoisey and mysterious. I blame consultants.

Tomorrow: Colorado

Americans love hard-nosed binary conflict. Football has wholly eclipsed baseball as the nation’s pastime, replacing one contentious battle of grit and will with another more grueling, violent one. We were all raised on Disney movies that pit vile, monstrous, heartless villains against flawless, kindly, generous heroes (with two can’t-miss codes to determine the difference: dark and ugly is evil; light and pretty is good). Find me an American who doesn’t love either sports or Disney movies (or both) and I bet you most anything they love something else: politics.

We can play chicken-and-egg games all day about whether American predilections created the manifestations of binary conflict or whether we were fed binary conflicts to the point where we embraced them. The point is that nowhere can hard-nosed binary conflict be found more strenuously contended than in the arena of American politics. Two parties. Two allegedly diametric viewpoints. Everyone must choose a side and stay unflinchingly, unwaveringly, blindingly loyal to one or the other while spouting that everyone in the other camp is some insane species of self-destructive insect.

Despite dire warnings from the founding fathers about the dangers of factionalism, most Americans believe that the great Democratic-Republican binary choice is a fundamental and immovable part of our democracy. Despite periodic efforts to bridge the divide or do an end-run around it – ranging from the Unity08 movement to H. Ross Perot to Ralph Nader to countless third party candidates who slog through pyrhhic campaigns for a few thousand votes – everyone believes that the two parties are inevitable and impenetrable. After all, a majority of American voters exit polled in 1992 would have voted for Perot “if he’d had a chance of winning”. No greater proof is needed of how innately intractable the two-party system is in the American republic.

The problem (well, the main problem) is, of course, that the parties really aren’t all that different. Both parties have had whatever principles they may claim to espouse hopelessly co-opted by special interests, and almost always the same special interests who savvily play both sides of the coin to assure the steady influx of coin. Both parties are essentially centrist, diving toward the middle of the road on most every issue to ensure the appearance of reasonability and thus electability. (Interesting Firefox spellcheck aside: “reasonability” is not listed as a word, but “electability” is. What a perfect illustration of our society.) And the design of our republic is such as to almost guarantee the necessity of compromise on every issue, allowing the parties to present extremist rhetoric against a backdrop of very mild actual disagreement.

It’s this extremist rhetoric I want to focus on, though, because it’s getting so much attention lately. Obviously the poster-child here is Sarah Palin, who has been able to follow up her “palling around with terrorists” line about Obama with an even more quizzical warning against his impending “death panels” allegedly incumbent in his healthcare proposals. Though by no means is she alone (or is her side alone) in shoveling ridiculousness – countless numbers of my Democratic friends announced unequivocally that they would move to Canada if Bush defeated Kerry in 2004. Not one of them made good on this outlandish promise.

The aim of this rhetoric is to vilify the opposition, yes, but its far more insidious impact is to create the illusion of a wide gulf between parties and leaders who espouse and enact roughly the same policies. To hear the pundits, pollsters, and punters talk about it, one could not imagine two more different political viewpoints than those of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. Indeed, most everyone accused the United States of complete schizophrenia for being able to elect the two back-to-back. But an examination of their actual policies reveals something different: both have supported nearly identical economic approaches to dealing with the recession (throw as much money at everything as possible, print more, repeat), both have taken identical actions regarding foreign policy (wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and “on-terror” all full speed ahead) with admittedly slightly different rhetorical tones in certain contexts (e.g. when in Egypt), both have continually labeled terrorism (the phantom menace) as the biggest threat to society and acted accordingly (when’s Gitmo closing, exactly?), and both want nothing more than the promotion of free-market corporation-based American capitalism and its propagation across the globe. Yes, there seem to be some tangible differences on the environment, although Democrats and Obama talk a much better game about environmental protection than they enact. There are also some allegedly significant differences on abortion (the issue that itself sort of best illustrates these phantom divisions between D and R) that manifest in state-based policies so marginal they almost defy understanding. Bush put in place the Court that was allegedly going to overturn Roe v. Wade. And as was imminently clear to anyone paying attention, such an overturn would never happen, even with nine die-hard Evangelicals on the Court. But that’s elaboration for another post.

And then there’s healthcare. Since stocks are up and everyone’s thus convinced that a lack of jobs, production, demand, or valuation means the economy is fine, healthcare has taken center-stage on the American political scene. And despite Democrats having a super-duper-crazy majority in the Senate and alleged carte blanche to enact whatever policies they see fit, suddenly the public option has disappeared from the radar of “healthcare reform”. Which means that any bill enacted would only serve to bolster and bailout the existing system of private insurance that enables our broken plutocracy to keep on equating money with rights. Not only is the final bill likely to not be a step toward single-payer healthcare (despite repeated polls showing that a majority of Americans are most interested in single-payer), but it’s probably going to be a very Republican-looking sideways step into mediocrity.

But that’s not how they’ll talk about it. No, one side will claim crushing victory while the other warns against impending Apocalypse. Because we rearranged some line-items in a code that ensures that people’s lives and well-being are a for-profit business in a country that claims life is an inalienable right. Sarah Palin will wag her finger and warn about death panels while Joe Biden talks about how he and his friends single-handedly saved the lives of millions of Americans. And nothing will actually change. Except, maybe, some corporations will get richer while those on the margins get further marginalized and wonder why the media is telling them all of their peers’ lives are improving so much.

Now I’m not saying, necessarily, that the Democrats and Republicans are in league together planning the same coordinated policy and then drawing up outlandish ways of making each other look silly while pocketing corporate money and whoring themselves out. However, I can’t imagine what would be different if they were in league. Surely having every President come out of the same two families was starting to look a bit suspect, but the Daily Show was doing a great job (for a while at least, haven’t seen them in a long time) of running Bush speeches about war and terror back-to-back with Obama speeches about same to illustrate that even the rhetoric on that front is virtually indistinguishable. If you poll most Americans, even most citizens of the world, they would have diametric understandings of Bush’s and Obama’s broad foreign policies. And yet when it comes to actually enumerating those differences, to actually making distinctions in actions, I think people would be heavily challenged to name one.

This is hardly a new phenomenon in American politics, but I do think it’s getting worse. September 11th (or, more accurately, American reaction thereto) certainly served to squash together the walls of what acceptable policy decisions could be, convincing both parties overnight that war-without-end was the only way forward for their nation. John Kerry’s inability to distinguish himself from Bush in any meaningful way was probably his second-biggest reason for losing in 2004 (first, of course, being his cardboard charisma), and Hillary certainly seemed Hawkish and Bushish on most every issue. People opted for Obama because they hungered for change, but what change have we truly seen?

The truth is that Obama doesn’t want change. Not real change. He wants to seem visionary, uniting, to claim credit for making changes. But he declines to take policy stands, instead asking Congress to craft change in its own measly watered-down way. He publicly states that the public option is non-essential to reform. Because all he really wants is to win. Like the football team or the Disney hero, what’s really essential in the end is victory at all costs. Being able to claim that your side crushed the other side, even if you’re really the same lousy side.

Because, as Americans, we know the good guys are the good guys because they win. And because we’re Americans and think of ourselves as eternal winners, we don’t move to Canada, we don’t change our policies, and we certainly don’t admit defeat. So as long as the winners and losers take turns enough, they can both be winners. And thus good guys. And thus hide the fact that they are both, all of them, really the bad guys.

Today marks the beginning of what will be a roughly two-week series chronicling our recently ended odyssey in pictures. I’ve decided to break it up by state, since that divides the pictures into pretty neat little chunks (who wants to look at 250 pictures in one sitting?) and it so happens that my first pictorial post of the Sojourn covered all the noteworthy pictures of California – no more, no less.

And, as a programming note, to help you index the Sunset to Sunrise Summer Sojourn information more efficiently, I’ve created a category called Summer Sojourn 2009. Just click on it above and you’ll see all the similar subject matter, neatly sorted.

To the pictures!

Obligatory blurry taken-from-moving-vehicle state sign picture (this is one of the best of the collection):

Emily’s first sight of the Grand Canyon (Mather Point):

Emily’s favorite tree near the South Rim at dusk:

View of our destination from the top – we were headed for Indian Garden, which is the collection of trees and greenery in the center of the picture, in the bottom of the near, visible ravine:

Heading down the trail in the morning, in good spirits:

At the bottom – 110 degrees in the shade. They have all these signs throughout the Canyon discouraging people from pushing themselves, lest they die of heat exhaustion or similar:

A view from the bottom:

We were going to wait till sunset to hike back up to the South Rim, but a thunderstorm was coming in, bringing clouds to offer us cover from the midday sun:

The trail behind us as we walked up:

Almost to the top:

Obligatory squirrel with don’t-feed-the-squirrels sign:

Emily, just shy of the top, surveying our journey:

Just too tired to smile (yes, that’s the shirt I bought in the summer of 2000):

This gives you a good idea of what the Bright Angel Trail is like:

And here’s a profile of some of the Bright Angel switchbacks:

Em’s favorite rock formations in the Canyon:

One of the neatest parts of the downtown Flagstaff skyline:

We showed up to Flagstaff pretty late in the day:

Albuquerque!

Standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona:

Me too:

Next up – New Mexico!

In Philadelphia last week, Mesco and I had a brief discussion of how introverted I really am. Somehow Myers-Briggs personality types came up and she took issue with my deep-seated introversion as part of my general INFJ personality type. (I think a lot of psych stuff is bunk, but I’m actually a reasonably big believer in some of the insights of Myers-Briggs, at least as far as my own personality.) Citing the fact that I have a good number of friends and enjoy spending time with them, she questioned whether I’m really the type who’d be just as happy at home with a book or a puzzle as out on the party scene.

Consider this my stirring rebuttal to her questioning my introversion. Although, as this will illustrate and we even sort of agreed on before I departed Philly, there is a wide gulf between how I regard my friends and how I regard strangers. Herein, as they say, may lie the rub.

The last time I was in New York City – a place I already have serious qualms with – I went to a bar in Manhattan in mid-afternoon with Drew and Greg. I’ll give you a few moments to digest that sentence. … Yes, Greg and I went to a bar in Manhattan. Before dark. We were looking for a distraction that had less overhead expense than basketball or bowling, but provided a similar level of entertainment in the relatively short time the three of us had together. A game of pool seemed as likely a candidate as any other activity.

Greg, despite being a tenured college professor and the lead singer in a band, is a bit of an introvert. Actually, I’d probably put him squarely on the fence between extroversion and introversion, but I’d bet his gut inclination is towards the latter. He likes people, but would rarely be the kind to go up and initiate contact, unless there were some sort of dispute he could mediate. Drew, on the other hand, is to extroversion what Michael Jackson was to dance. Not only does he embrace others with gusto, he embarks on mind-bending tours of personal exploration with total strangers to fulfill his inner curiosity. He is one of two people I’ve heard admit that they truly enjoy making other people uncomfortable in social situations and/or discussions. And unlike the other, I’ve seen it in action many a time.

Perhaps none was so personally felt as our encounter in this Manhattan bar where the three of us went in search of a pool table. The bar was half-empty, replete mostly with dingy career drinkers, most of whom were more than happy to be glued in equal parts to their stool and the crazily mounted televisions over the racks of bottles. Greg and I were both heartened to see that two of the three pool tables in the place were wide open.

But not Drew. He strode straight toward the one occupied table and introduced himself. Wearing a Red Sox cap in April in Manhattan, he couldn’t wait to make the acquaintance of the rail-thin elderly gentleman and his somewhat portly female companion, both teetering under a regimen of midday alcohol. Within seconds, he had challenged them to a battle of skill on the green felt.

Greg and I, hanging back, were horrified as the man (probably 68 going on 92) started blurting out random threats of our downfall and explaining, for the second time already, that he was called “Minnesota Skinny” for both his poolhall acumen and slender frame. A brief sidebar with Drew failed to convince him that we should refrain from poking this elderly badger. It was going to be a long day.

We proceeded to annihilate Minnesota Skinny and his counterpart, who proved to be his wife of some indeterminate number of years. M. Skinny’s primary contribution to the game was an unending stream of vitriol and putrid jokes at the expense of Mrs. Skinny, as his personality quickly revealed itself to be somewhere between a low-budget raunchy teen comedy and what I imagine 1940’s lounge acts were like. Greg and I were both a few years out of our last pool game, so the match was interminable as four of us bounced errant shots and waited for Drew’s next turn in the rotation to hear that pleasant sinking sound. Between shots (both his and ours), Drew would turn to us with his irrepressible face-wide grin and say “I love this guy! Isn’t this great?” To which Greg and I strained to make our looks blander and more slightly pained than thirty seconds prior.

To extroverts, it may be hard to explain exactly what made the experience so excruciating for me. Or it may be completely obvious that playing pool with a hypercompetitive elderly drunk stranger while he peppers us with sexist jokes and bad breath would be unpleasant. I really don’t know, because I don’t know what it’s like to look at a stranger and think the odds are better of enjoying interaction with them than not. As you may recall, I have a hard enough time thinking that about people I vaguely know.

(Incidentally, the linked post above is 8th out of 9,000 webpages for the phrase “ducking behind pillars”. Neat. Perhaps even more fascinatingly, all of the other top-page references are about first-person shooter experiences, 8 of them in video games and one in Baghdad. Hm.)

Fast-forward to today. I walk Emily to her first class in Math Camp, a three-week session that serves as the prelude to her two-year Master’s Program at the Woodrow Wilson School (and also explains why we’re here already in mid-August). Being still without a coffee-maker until mine (probably smashed, but who knows) shows up tomorrow, I head out to Panera, which has become our coffee stop of choice on and after this trip. After acquiring a coffee and cinnamon roll, I am searching for some reading material near the newsstand before heading outside to sit. Sitting nearby, an elderly gentleman with a cane and a strange curmudgeonly smile (think twilight-years Kurt Vonnegut if he were shorter, overweight, and seemed slightly autistic) says “Hello” a little too loudly and I realize he must think that I’ve come to sit in his vicinity. Being both uncaffeinated and me, I decide to pretend I haven’t heard him and dash outside.

I’m sitting outside, contemplating a recently developed idea for a short story (I have finally hit the point in my life where I’ve detoxed enough from work to clear my mind out and am hit almost daily with new ideas, which is extremely exciting and inspiring [I note with some chagrin just now that Mozilla Firefox's spellcheck seems to have no problem with "detoxed", which is both colloquial and based on an abbreviation, but cannot accept "webpage" {perhaps more disconcerting, it also seems to not have "spellcheck" in its, well, spellcheck dictionary (I guess the real issue here is whether or not these words require hyphens, which is probably begrudgingly acceptable)}]) and watching the drowsy citizens of Princeton try to put some morning spring in their step, when out wanders Pudgy Vonnegut, slow-stepping it with his cane and a look that the whole world makes him grumpy.

At first I assume he’s leaving Panera, since I’ve been out there for a good ten minutes and he was pretty clearly there before I was. But something about the way he glances at me and then flits his eyes away tells me otherwise. And sure enough, he’s shuffling over toward the only table that’s open of the three outdoor offerings, gradually settling in the equivalent chair to mine at the neighboring mesa. We’re now separated by about three feet, each with our back to the restaurant’s front windows, gandering at passers-by (oh come on, Firefox, “gandering” is no good either?).

I dare not look over overtly, though I’ve already noted with some chagrin that he doesn’t even have a comestible with him. He’s just got his cane on the tabletop in front of him as though that were sufficient reason to take up a table at Panera. And just as I’m making peace with the idea that he’s come over to pursue small-talk with me, he utters the dreaded words: “Nice day, isn’t it?”

It isn’t that I have some social anxiety disorder (if such truly exist, which I doubt) or eternal dread of human contact. It’s that conversations which start with bland observations about the weather are insanely unlikely to produce anything other than drivel throughout their course, and I detest drivel. There’s something about the act of making small-talk with a stranger or a small-time acquaintance that makes me yearn for the opportunity to sweep floors or do dishes or perhaps pick the lint off of a couch cushion. Not only is there nothing redeeming about the activity, but the activity strips me of my belief that anything good can come out of this species. Some of this is irrational and extreme (I know, you can’t believe it), but it’s rooted in how meaningless small-talk makes my soul feel: small and meaningless.

I admit that it’s a nice day and already I’m starting to sweat. (Stop diagnosing me – I just feel uncomfortable when I sense that I’m either talking to someone who is disinterested in talking to me and thus burdening them, or the reverse. I think this feeling is a perfectly reasonable reaction to human autonomy, dignity, and courtesy.) It quickly becomes clear that this guy is a serial conversation-starter (on the east coast – how bizarre) as I learn that he is about to turn 67, has a girlfriend, his wife is deceased, his friend died of diabetes, he has diabetes, his diabetes isn’t that bad, one should really watch their diabetes if one has it, his girlfriend is 65 and is working three jobs, the location of each of these three jobs in proximity to our present location at Panera, that he is looking for his friend who is portly and 72 (here he actually pauses to wait for me to say something, wherein I inform him that no, I have not seen this gentleman this morning), that his friend comes by sometimes zero, one, or two times per day and he was hoping to see him, that his friend lives in an assisted living facility where you can come and go as you please up to twice a day, that his friend often goes twice a day and has to be home by eleven, that it costs $1450 – can you believe it, $1450! – a month to live in this place, the specific itemized prices of each of the additional utilities that his friend pays, that he himself wouldn’t mind living in such a place but that $1450 plus utilities is just out of the question, and so on.

Now my staccato listing of the ground covered in our “conversation” may make it seem like this went by in a hurry. Quite the contrary was actually the case – this man took his sweet time saying things and would often pause looking for the right word and repeat his information a couple times just to make sure it was clear. Which was just as well, since he had little idea of the appropriate volume at which to communicate verbal information, the product of either hearing impairment or too much time talking to himself (or very likely both). I often missed details or whole pieces of information as trucks were going by or some other conversants passed in front of us at high volume, but I was deep into smile-and-nod mode and was not really wild about dragging out the narrative or the pained nature of the interaction by asking for clarification.

It may occur to my readers that I am, in fact, heartless and cruel for begrudging this painfully lonely man a slice of my quiet morning contemplation time. Indeed, pangs of guilt overrode my general discomfort (I actually sweated through my shirt, which is challenging for someone as chronically cold as I am) at times, especially the times he said he would “leave [me] to whatever [I was] doing” and would “be quiet now and leave [me] alone”, both clearly products of feeling like he had imposed on other conversation partners before with his slow streamy monologue. Granted, he followed up those decisively conclusive comments with resumption of his meandering narrative almost immediately, and I didn’t really have reason to feel guilty since I was humoring him to the utmost. Although, to be humored isn’t really what we want, is it?

At the same time, he was pretty well precluding the chance of a traditional two-way conversation with the pace of his own commentary and his inability to really distinguish between the vaguely affirmative things that I said in response. It became fairly clear to me that his approach to oral communication was more or less hard-wired into this dysfunctional morass of information to be glacially ejected at passive listeners, the ironic product of not finding enough listeners in the past and being medically incapable of listening properly (he did admit to a hearing impairment at some point, indicating his right ear, which was sadly devoid of a hearing aid, making me again contemplate why so many elderly seem averse to such devices, prioritizing some weird perception of dignity over having functional interactions with others through speech … the second that my hearing starts to fade, I’m getting two big hearing aids, preferably in teal or forest green).

The question that develops from all this comes in two parts as I see it. One, how can an introvert properly treat strangers with the dignity they deserve and still escape soul-crushing small-talk? Two (and much more importantly, for my money), what can we do for the desperately lonely elderly in our society to build friendships and community as they become increasingly isolated by their own dispositions and the inevitable deaths of their existing network of friends and associates?

The first query is really unimportant and easily dispatched. While I am tempted to say that the answer is for me to wear a T-shirt when alone in public that states my status as an introvert and kindly requests that others refrain from initiating small-talk with me, I can actually imagine no better way of attracting the attention and verbiage of others than by doing precisely that. Maybe I should design and sell such T-shirts so that others may engage in this experiment, but I will personally refrain. The real answer is that I (and others like me, such as there are any) need to suck it up and deal. After all, this experience gave birth to this narrative exploration, which you are still reading and thus getting something from.

No, the important issue is what to do with an aging populous that seems almost predestined to be its own worst enemy in staving off the isolation and breathtaking loneliness of advanced age in America. I am not so short-sighted as to be unable to imagine myself in Pudgy Vonnegut’s place, approaching young strangers who remind me of myself from half a lifetime prior and besieging them with details of my rapidly becoming less interesting existence. (I am after all, a writer, and one who through this very medium here [the blog] turns the pen [keyboard] on my own life a fair bit.) And as fewer people feign interest, the frenzy to hurry the narrative and get the information out to someone, anyone, dear God please just listen to me for five minutes so I don’t have to tell my cat or the wall again, well this is just human nature.

This is the portion of our program where I should present to you some futuristic invention, such as the ListenerBot 9000 TM, which placates grandma so you don’t have to, or I unveil some wise social practice that seems so simple and was universal amongst the Huguenots of sixteenth-century France before they were persecuted for their compassion for older generations. Sadly, dear readers, this problem seems intractably elusive of either such quick-fix. I am tempted to say that the burden to solve this problem rests more heavily on the shoulders of those such as Drew, who at least seem to derive some utility from random interaction with what Barenaked Ladies termed “the old and the bored”. Of course, I also know that some modicum of Drew’s entertainment from these interactions is that he can gently poke fun at such people… I think he would have been far less likely to take on Minnesota Skinny without the ability to both make Greg and I feel uncomfortable and socially challenged and to make some sly jokes at Minnesota Skinny’s expense, while winking to Greg and I. Nothing against Drew – we all have our ways of making pedestrian aspects of our lives more palatable to ourselves and I would do the same were I naturally more extroverted.

But I’m not. And so I will cringe away from Minnesota Skinny and Pudgy Vonnegut and give the name “Jimbob” wherever I have to do so to order food so I don’t have to explain the story behind Storey (or worse yet, answer to Torrey, Stormy, Stony, or Stuart). And Pudgy Vonnegut will continue to accost strangers while his girlfriend works three jobs and his friend goes for walks around Princeton and wonder if anyone is really hearing him when he talks about the importance of staying on a proper diet for diabetics.

Good luck, Pudgy. I wish I had better answers for us both.

At some point, I will probably feel inspired to write more specific details of the second half of our trip just ended, replete with photographs and witticisms and anecdotes and the like. That day will probably not come in an icy fluorescent computer cluster, rolling past midnight and anticipating sleeping in an overwarm empty house, using twin six-foot pool floats as a mattress.

What I can offer you today, however, is the below summary of the trip, which I offer in equal parts to posterity and to you. I can also offer you this fact that I learned today: there is such a thing as pigeon racing. On the way to see the film “In the Loop” today, Emily and I were behind a truck full of racing pigeons. There is, apparently, no limit to the human capacity to exploit birds.

SUNSET to SUNRISE SUMMER SOJOURN 2009
Summary of Events

Day 1 – Tue, 7/7 – Berkeley, CA to Tracy, CA
Highlights: Departure, seeing all three apartments lived in during time in the Bay Area.
Movie: “Ice Age 3D” at the Grand Lake in Oakland, CA.
Book: War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy (begun before trip and only book read subsequently unless otherwise noted)
Night in: Tracy, CA (Home of the Guitar Hero)

Day 2 – Wed, 7/8 – Tracy, CA to Fresno, CA
Highlights: Going to the park with the nieces and nephew.
Night in: Clovis, CA (Garin Homestead)

Day 3 – Thu, 7/9 – Fresno, CA
Highlights: Detailed discussion of educational policy with Em’s parents.
Night in: Clovis, CA (Garin Homestead)

Day 4 – Fri, 7/10 – Fresno, CA
Highlights: Swimming and board games with the Garin clan.
Night in: Clovis, CA (Garin Homestead)

Day 5 – Sat, 7/11 – Fresno, CA (with King’s Canyon NP, CA)
Highlights: Boyden Cavern with rock-hopping in nearby river.
Hike: Small loops near sequoias (KCNP)
Night in: Clovis, CA (Garin Homestead)

Day 6 – Sun, 7/12 – Fresno, CA to Yosemite NP, CA
Highlights: Epic hike into Ostrander Lake, quick tour of Yosemite Valley.
Hike: Up to Ostrander Lake (YNP)
Night in: Yosemite National Park (camping, Ostrander Lake)

Day 7 – Mon, 7/13 – Yosemite NP, CA
Highlights: 6th wedding anniversary dinner at Wawona Hotel Dining Room.
Hike: Down from Ostrander Lake (YNP)
Night in: Yosemite National Park (Wawona Hotel)

Day 8 – Tue, 7/14 – Yosemite NP, CA to Los Angeles, CA
Highlights: Dinner with Russ at Mao’s Kitchen.
Night in: Beverly Hills, CA (Chez Gooberman)

Day 9 – Wed, 7/15 – Los Angeles, CA
Highlights: Games with Russ.
Night in: Beverly Hills, CA (Chez Gooberman)

Day 10 – Thu, 7/16 – Los Angeles, CA (with Altadeena, CA)
Highlights: Visiting Pandora’s summer home, epic life talk with Russ.
Night in: Beverly Hills, CA (Chez Gooberman)

Day 11 – Fri, 7/17 – Los Angeles, CA to Grand Canyon NP, AZ
Highlights: Loopy discussion with Emily about GCNP’s dystopian future, Em seeing Mather Point for first time.
Hike: Test-hike half-mile down Bright Angel Trail at dusk (GCNP)
Night in: Grand Canyon NP, AZ (Maswik Lodge)

Day 12 – Sat, 7/18 – Grand Canyon NP, AZ
Highlights: Returning to the Canyon’s trails, creek at Indian Garden, three-mile-house stop on upward journey.
Hike: Bright Angel Trail to Indian Garden and back to South Rim (GCNP)
Book: This is Water, David Foster Wallace (in entirety at Indian Garden)
Night in: Grand Canyon NP, AZ (Maswik Lodge)

Day 13 – Sun, 7/19 – Grand Canyon NP, AZ to Albuquerque, NM (via Flagstaff, AZ)
Highlights: Rim hike and shuttles, lunch at the Bright Angel Lodge, Em’s big driving stint.
Hike: South Rim Trail to Mojave Point (GCNP)
Night in: Albuquerque, NM (Casa Clayton)

Day 14 – Mon, 7/20 – Albuquerque, NM
Highlights: The Frontier and Hurricane’s, catching up with the parents.
Movie: “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” at the Century Downtown 14 in Albuquerque, NM
Night in: Albuquerque, NM (Casa Clayton)

Day 15 – Tue, 7/21 – Albuquerque, NM
Highlights: Touring parks with Dad.
Night in: Albuquerque, NM (Casa Clayton)

Day 16 – Wed, 7/22 – Albuquerque, NM
Highlights: Morning coffee run, El Patio, balloon puzzle.
Hike: Petroglyphs National Monument
Night in: Albuquerque, NM (Casa Clayton)

Day 17 – Thu, 7/23 – Albuquerque, NM to Colorado Springs, CO (via Santa Fe, NM)
Highlights: Seeing the La Plazuela in the La Fonda reopened, for better and worse.
Night in: Colorado Springs, CO (Marriott Extended Stay Hotel)

Day 18 – Fri, 7/24 – Colorado Springs, CO to Denver, CO (via Manitou Springs, CO)
Highlights: Waffle House, Manitou Springs arcade walk.
Hike: Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs
Baseball: San Francisco Giants 3, Colorado Rockies 1
Night in: Denver, CO (Tess’ Place on Clayton Street)

Day 19 – Sat, 7/25 – Denver, CO
Highlights: Finding out about our moving van’s accident.
Movie: “Public Enemies” in Denver, CO
Night in: Denver, CO (Tess’ Place on Clayton Street)

Day 20 – Sun, 7/26 – Denver, CO
Highlights: Seeing Yana and her son, Lyle Lovett at Red Rocks.
Night in: Denver, CO (Tess’ Place on Clayton Street)

Day 21 – Mon, 7/27 – Denver, CO to Douglas, WY (via Cheyenne, WY)
Highlights: Epic mountain thunderstorm, wildlife in Moraine Park.
Hike: Lake-hopping hike shortened by thunderstorm, Moraine Park jaunt (Rocky Mountain NP, CO)
Night in: Douglas, WY (Motel 6)

Day 22 – Tue, 7/28 – Douglas, WY to Wall, SD (via Chadron, NE)
Highlights: Picking up Nebraska (state #47), Wind Cave, wildlife in Custer State Park, too many Harleys.
Hike: Wind Cave Natural Entrance Tour, Centennial Trail meadow hike (Wind Cave NP, SD)
Night in: Wall, SD (America’s Best Value Inn)

Day 23 – Wed, 7/29 – Wall, SD to Badlands NP, SD
Highlights: Wall Drug, Em seeing the Badlands, aborted scrambles down rock formations, just beating thunderstorm to set up tent.
Hike: In toward the rock formation (BNP)
Book: The Tales of Beedle the Bard, J.K. Rowling (in entirety in tent overnight)
Night in: Badlands NP, SD (camping, unnamed rock formation)

Day 24 – Thu, 7/30 – Badlands NP, SD to Sioux Falls, SD (via Mitchell, SD)
Highlights: Buffalo herds, rock scrambling, Corn Palace.
Hike: Out from the rock formation (BNP)
Night in: Sioux Falls, SD (American Budget Lodge)

Day 25 – Fri, 7/31 – Sioux Falls, SD to Minneapolis, MN
Highlights: Jolly Green Giant and DQ in Blue Earth, walking downtown Minneapolis.
Baseball: Los Angeles Angels 11, Minnesota Twins 5 (11 innings)
Night in: Minneapolis, MN (Churchill’s Palace)

Day 26 – Sat, 8/1 – Minneapolis, MN to Gooseberry Falls SP, MN (via Duluth, MN)
Highlights: Highway 61, Lake Superior, tree-climbing, campfire stories.
Hike: Around waterfalls, over rivers, and to the lake (GFSP)
Night in: Gooseberry Falls SP, MN (car camping)

Day 27 – Sun, 8/2 – Gooseberry Falls SP, MN to Minneapolis, MN (via Duluth, MN)
Highlights: Discussion of religion with Ike/Mo and friends, lunch in Duluth.
Hike: Along lakeshore and up to the abandoned fireplace (Split Rock Lighthouse SP, MN)
Night in: Minneapolis, MN (Churchill’s Palace)

Day 28 – Mon, 8/3 – Minneapolis, MN to Madison, WI (via McGregor, IA)
Highlights: Picking up Iowa (state #48), lunch at Latino’s Mexican Restaurant in McGregor, views of the Mississippi.
Hike: To various viewpoints of effigy mounds (Effigy Mounds NP, IA)
Movie: “500 Days of Summer” at Sundance Theater in Madison, WI
Night in: Madison, WI (Holiday Inn)

Day 29 – Tue, 8/4 – Madison, WI (with Wisconsin Dells, WI)
Highlights: UW campus, Wisconsin state capitol, the Dells.
Hike: Very brief “hikes” on Wisconsin Dells boat tour (the Dells).
Night in: Madison, WI (Holiday Inn)

Day 30 – Wed, 8/5 – Madison, WI to Chicago, IL (via Milwaukee, WI)
Highlights: Breakfast with Angelo, oil change and Miller Park visit in Milwaukee, Ray Bradbury Park in Waukegan, IL, nice hotel staff.
Baseball: Chicago White Sox 6, Los Angeles Angels 2
Night in: Chicago, IL (Holiday Inn Express, Magnificent Mile)

Day 31 – Thu, 8/6 – Chicago, IL to Detroit, MI (via Ann Arbor, MI)
Highlights: Walking all over Chicago, Michigan campus, Japanese food in Ann Arbor.
Movie: “Food Inc.” at the State Theater in Ann Arbor, MI
Night in: Detroit, MI (St. Regis Hotel)

Day 32 – Fri, 8/7 – Detroit, MI
Highlights: Walking much of Detroit, amazing lunch, People Mover, return to the Renaissance Center, fireworks at Comerica Park.
Movie: “Orphan” at the Ren Cen 4 in Detroit, MI
Baseball: Detroit Tigers 10, Minnesota Twins 8
Night in: Detroit, MI (St. Regis Hotel)

Day 33 – Sat, 8/8 – Detroit, MI to Cleveland, OH
Highlights: Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Night in: Cleveland, OH (Holiday Inn, Airport)

Day 34 – Sun, 8/9 – Cleveland, OH to Pittsburgh, PA
Highlights: The most absurd “National Park” ever, 10th row 1st base seats at PNC Park for cheap, chess.
Hike: Early morning towpath walk around bikers (Cuyahoga Valley “NP”, OH)
Baseball: St. Louis Cardinals 7, Pittsburgh Pirates 3
Night in: Pittsburgh, PA (Extended Stay America Hotel, Airport)

Day 35 – Mon, 8/10 – Pittsburgh, PA
Highlights: Duquesne Incline, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, massive thunderstorm.
Night in: Pittsburgh, PA (Extended Stay America Hotel, Airport)

Day 36 – Tue, 8/11 – Pittsburgh, PA to Philadelphia, PA (via Carlisle, PA)
Highlights: Return to Dickinson College campus, Hershey’s “Factory” Tour.
Movie: “Julie and Julia” in Philadelphia, PA
Night in: Philadelphia, PA (Messily Manor)

Day 37 – Wed, 8/12 – Philadelphia, PA (with Easton, PA)
Highlights: Visit to Crayola “Factory” Tour in Easton, PA with Mesco/Afsheen (not driven by our car and thus exclusive of 6,206 miles), dinner at Ariel/Michael’s.
Night in: Philadelphia, PA (Brickhouse of Books)

Day 38 – Thu, 8/13 – Philadelphia, PA
Highlights: Mugshot’s coffee shop of slowness, reading, talking, lounging.
Night in: Philadelphia, PA (Brickhouse of Books)

Day 39 – Fri, 8/14 – Philadelphia, PA to Princeton, NJ
Highlights: Dropping off Ariel at the airport, Route 1 to Princeton, arrival.
Night in: Princeton, NJ (The New Place)

—

Wow, that took a lot longer than I expected to type. Please excuse the fun names I used for people’s various places of residence/hosting. And many thanks to those people, namely the various members of Emily’s family, my parents, Russ, Ike/Mo, Mesco/Afsheen, and Ariel/Michael. And extra-special thanks to Em’s sister Holly for helping us book Hotwire rooms from the road, which probably saved us hundreds of dollars. Seriously, we stayed at some ridiculously nice places for absurdly cheap.

Really looking forward to how hot it’s going to be back in our new place right now. This computer cluster joins much of the state, apparently, in over-air-conditioning the world when it’s a little hot outside. I’m going to have to carry a jacket everywhere in New Jersey summers, just in case I want to set foot in a building without catching pneumonia.