100 degrees sucks and other random thoughts

ok. we are currently in chester, montana in a hotel that cost less than
$45 dollars for a night. it has a clean bed and a working shower so i think we scored. :) today it was 100 degrees across most of montana. i'm sorry, but that is bullshit. and the gusts of winds that come flying across the prairies are, um, rather unsettling on a motorcycle. especially when you are already dying in the 100 degree heat in your stupid thick, BLACK, body protection. but anyway....we rode 500 miles today...from Minot, North Dakota to Chester, Montana. we wanted to stop in a town an hour back, but the state fair is happening as well as some all state little league excitement and hoowee ALL the hotels/motels/skanktels were all completely booked...so we ended up here. literally in the middle of nowhere and somehow, someone has an unsecured wireless internet connection available. amazing. our motel looks out at a grain elevator. they have a lot of those in montana. and the trains still run here.

so instead of a picture journey, which I just don't have the energy for after today, let's just explore random thoughts.

1. Walmart really does seem to be killing small to mid town america. it's one thing to read about it or watch pbs, but it's quite something else to actually see it in action, state by state by state. even ithaca, ny has a walmart now! but it hasn't ruined the character there. yet. some towns look like the old main streets are ghost towns now till you get to the strip where the walmart is...where you will usually also find the DQ, the Pizza Hut, the Hardees, the Country Kitchen, the Wendy's and the Subway. it's really something....we want to look into it more when we get back....see if the phenomenon is real...but it seems to be...it's sad.

2. the sky is REALLY big out here.

3. north dakota has a surprising pretty license plate. who knew? i had never seen one before.

4. the fargo accent is for real.

5. the south park guys don't even go far enough with their canadian accent 'aboot' mockery. it's even MORE amazing in real life.

6. bikers really do stick together. there is this incredible instant comraderie that you have with other bikers. almost everyone puts out their arm when you drive past one another as a show of greeting. and every biker we've met, from the awesome woman Ky from monterey that we camped next to last night in ND (and went to Pizza Hut with)... to Kirk Anderson, the town undertaker in renfrew, ontario, who we met at the county bluegrass festival and who just totally set us up with excellent info, great stories and good alternate routes... to Mr. Right who we met somewhere in canada who came from outside of Pittsburgh and who totally looked like the quintessential rough harley man, but by the end of our brief chat, offered to put us up if we ever went through his hometown, to the scores and scores of older couples and random people we've met in restaurants, outside gas stations, etc. who wanted a friendly word and generally to offer some excellent advice from past experience...all these bikers were totally and monumentally different, yet you somehow feel like part of this huge family network. it's amazing. you feel like you have something in common with the vietnam vet and the conservative christian and even the french canadians and well, all of them. it's really incredible and has maybe been one of my favorite parts of this trip. this blending of humanity...so much that you can look past 'these colors don't run' stickers on bikes, because the person you are talking to is totally real and awesome and isn't judging you in anyway except that you are a fellow biker and therefore you are part of the pack. amazing. in such a fragmented and polarized time...it's really amazing.

7. We saw Harry Potter in Devil's Lake, ND. it was so great to be in air-conditioning. young potter is growing into quite the handsome lad. it cost us $9.50. for both of us.

8. did i mention that 100 degrees is unacceptable?

9. michigan is WAY prettier than I thought it would be and Minnesota is less pretty than i thought it would be.

10. minnesota has the most evil mosquitoes in the world.

11. i have broken my no-kill vow. many mosquitoes have died by my hand on this trip. not nearly enough. but many....

12. i've been eating ice cream every day because i deserve it. two days ago, i did an experiment in Minnesota. we needed to get going, so I got a vanilla chocolate twist put into a cup and tried eating it on the back of the motorcycle. it worked better than expected. i made it 1/2 way through, but it was melting faster than I could slurp it down... but all in all it was more successful than expected...

13. you eat a lot of breakfast options on the road when you are a vegetarian. cause you can always have pancakes, omelets, french toasts, etc. even when everything else on the menu is meat.

14. a dead porcupine i saw in michigan made me sad. they are really cute.

15. the word of god is very popular. very.

16. hey - "don't meth up your life!"

17. i still remember most of the words to evita. it's amazing the things you start to do with HOURS of time with just you and your mind....

goodnight!