11 States 11 Days

We did it! We drove across and around the damn country and it was pretty great. We left, what, two Wednesdays ago. The first day was just driving. A lot of driving. Across Arkansas, across Oklahoma, across Kansas, and a little bit into Colorado. The drive was just fine. You hear a lot of things about how horrible that part of the country is to drive across. That it's so so boring. It actually wasn't that bad. It had its own sort of beauty. It was less that you were driving across nothing, but one monolithic singularity. The vastness was something in and of itself. It was entracing to look at. And the sky. So much sky. You can lose yourself staring into it. I got pulled over just into Oklahoma. But the guy ended up being pretty nice and only gave me a warning. Phew. It was kinda stupid, 'cuz I'm driving along, not going terribly fast but I look over and see it's a cop that I'm next to and passing. Then his lights came on. Doh. Mary Beth's car doesn't have cruise control and that came at a point when I wasn't monitoring the speed so closely anymore. We stopped off somewhere late that night, as I said, a little bit into Colorado. We woke up and drove the next few hours to Denver.

Denver was a bit dinkier than I was expecting as a city. I don't know why I was expecting more. But after my initial impression and being in it a little while, I started to enjoy it and find its own charm. The first thing we did when we pulled into town was eat at this place called Biker Jim's Gourmet Dogs. It's Denver's version of Hot Doug's. It was some damn good stuff too. I had a dog that was rattlesnake and pheasant and the toppings were like cactus and stuff. Mmmm. And they had a Boylan's soda fountain. Mmmm. We walked around the street it was on a little bit. We went to find Wax Trax. I had a little trouble finding anything to buy. I did like the way they labeled their cards with information and stuff. I did end up getting Talking Heads: The Name of This Band Is Talking Heads. Mary Beth apparently found a great bookstore next door but they were just closing when she got there. Also, talking to the people there she found out that The Denver food to get is green chile fries. We stored this information for later use. We had some downtime at some bar (Cheeky Monk). Then we cruised down the street that has all the stuff on it. Down at the end of it (or the stuff anyway), we went to Tattered Cover (the bookstore people talk about). I got a few used ones: A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes, Homesick by Eshkol Nevo, Northern Lights by Tim O'Brien, and Butcher's Crossing by John Williams. Next door was another record store (Twist & Shout). The feel of the place was a lot cheesier than Wax Trax, but in the end I had an easier time finding stuff: Tangerine Dream: Encore, Francis Bebey: African Electronic Music 1975-1982, and Erik Satie: Piano Works (a 5 disc box, maximizing my minimalism). Then there was another bookstore we had seen at the other end of the street Mary Beth had wanted to get back to, but I took to long looking for cds and it was just closing when we got there. Oops. We also saw something down the street that looked like it should be one of these arcade bars that are apparently things in multiple cities. It was called 2 Up (in arcade font) but the building was very nondescript. Well, it sure as hell was an arcade bar! It was much less nerd-fantasy decor than Ground Kontrol had been. Aside from the walls of machines, it had the "decor" of a standard dive bar. I actually liked it in its own way. Very low key. I played my $5 worth of coins and had my fun playing games terribly. It turns out to be the second location of an arcade bar called (surprise) 1 Up. More on that later. Well, now it's eating time. Mary Beth had two places picked out and they were both closed (for the holiday, I guess). Well, now we wanted to try Denver's green chile fries so I made use of my new smart phone (this damn thing helped out so much on our trip, awesome) and found a place to go for it. Oh, it's closed too. We found ANOTHER place and this time we were much luckier: Pete's Satire Lounge. Not sure what it had to do with satire or lounging, but it was a good Mexican restaurant and the green chile fries were incredible (and they filled us up so much we didn't have any more room for our main courses). Okay, getting kinda late, better check into our damn hotel. It was this round tower kinda sorta similar to the place we stayed in Philly that time. And it was right next to Mile High Stadium. Well, our day in Denver just happened to be the Fourth of July so we're getting into our hotel as it's night and fireworks are going off all around us all over the city. Many from the stadium right next door, some from other locales around the city. The hotel staff knew who we were immediately because we were the last to check in for the day. Our room was facing downtown so there's fireworks all across the city. Some probably from the amusement park right in front of us along the little stream of a river. Some from the baseball stadium to our left. Some from somewhere off in the distance over to the right. Some sounds from the next door stadium (off to the right where we couldn't see from the room). Anyway, I'm not super into fireworks or anything, but there was something a little magical about the incidental nature of it all. Back out to the city. Mary Beth wanted to try this bar in a hotel downtown. It was very crowded, but it was all art deco'd out. When we left it was kinda crazy 'cuz the holiday festivities were ending and everybody was going home or to drink or whatever. We were nearby, so we thought we'd try the 1 Up bar. It's also right next to the baseball stadium, one of the centers of the evening's happenings. Didn't get to see the bar really. It's somewhat subterranean, we could see inside a little bit, but it was too crowded to get into. And lots of fratty types, where we were and the timing and all (though I read something about how that location is a bit like that and that's why 2 Up is better). Well, it was fun to know it's there anyway. Back to our moderately (for us) fancy hotel to sleep.

Now it's Friday and time to drive up to Idaho for the wedding. This brought us driving through Wyoming. Holy crap. Wyoming is one of the most beautiful states I've ever seen. The constant contrast of so much open plain and so much mountain hitting up against each other everywhere. It's silly, but this drive was a major highlight of the trip. In some ways, the landscape reminded me of my distant memories of New Zealand: the green, the hills, the rolling countryside. Then Idaho was beautiful in a way I wasn't expecting either. Kinda similar to Wyoming, but some differences. The first, major thing you notice is as soon as you cross the border...there are people. Oh yeah, I should remark on the town of Opal, WY pop. 96. Also, in Idaho we were more within the mountains. They were also softer somehow than the mountains of Wyoming. It was more pastoral. It reminded me of what I imagine the Irish countryside looks like. We got in pretty late and checked into our hotel and I looked at my phone to see if we could find someplace to eat and we did: Portneuf Valley Brewing. A little restaurant/brewery. They even make their own sarsaparilla. It was really good. It had a deep, complex flavor. The texture was a little weird (a goofy word for a liquid, I know). It wasn't very carbonated and didn't have quite the feel of a soda, but the taste helped balance that out. Okay, hotel and sleep.

Now comes Saturday and the whole reason for the trip. The wedding. First we get up to have breakfast at this place next door to the hotel called Elmer's. Didn't look like it from the outside, but turned out to be a chain (though only in the far west). It was pretty good and I even got to have "german pancakes" ("dutch baby" as I'm used to Mary Beth calling it when she makes it, never seen it anywhere out before though). Then we cruised around to check out the town. We found a little bookstore nearby where I picked up a couple: Aberration of Starlight by Gilbert Sorrentino and Obabakoak by Bernardo Atxaga. We ended up in the old downtown area, which was cute. Peeked in a thrift store. Peeked in a music gear store. Peeked in another bookstore. This one was better than the first. Big and old and stacked with shelves and shelves of books. And the old proprietress, a half-deaf hippie woman. Didn't end up getting anything myself though. I did like the feel of the place. Then it was time to rush back and get ready for the wedding. It was at the ski area Sarah's parents own and where she pretty much grew up, I guess. Up on a mountain, of course. The drive up was pretty nice and we got there faster than expected. The place wasn't like I'd imagined. I guess I have movie/tv images of ski resorts, all fancy and large etc. But it was small and felt like remote campground facilities. You know, just a center for people when they go skiing. The ceremony was held in a very small field next to the lodge on the mountainside. The view was abso-fucking-lutely incredible. I mean, you're just looking out across an expanse of mountains and valleys and it was pretty breathtaking. It was actually really hot up there. The sun, pretty much the whole trip, was a present force. Waiting for the wedding to start, we were all seated out there in the field. I was wearing the damn suit I'd dragged across the country just for this moment. While waiting, I took off my jacket. The actual ceremony was one of the nicer I've been to. It was what they called "hybrid-Jewish." Probably mostly Jewish at core, but incorporated other stuff too. Nate enjoyed being able to step on a glass. The reception was nice. We sat next to the only other couple from Memphis (though TFA implants from Wisconsin). We did eventually slow dance to "Spanish Lullabye." It was a lovely evening. Then back to our hotel.

Okay, so now we're off Sunday morning to go down to Utah. We got to eat at an actual Del Taco (not bad for roadside food). Before Salt Lake City, we did a nature excursion to Antelope Island on the lake. It was yet another great experience. The island has a large plain and some large hills with a few small roads. There was this buffalo just hanging out a little off one of the roads (to "Buffalo Point" no less). We looked at him and it was cool. Then we went to Buffalo Point which was one of those large hills and climbed up and climbed and could see everything expanding away from us. (I could even see the buffalo in the same spot, but now a black speck). Afterwards, sure enough, Buffalo Friend was still there and we stopped and (I) got a closer look. He was laying down now. But after a little bit, he shook around and gave himself a sand bath and got back up again. Okay, now we're heading back to SLC, which we're pretty close to. First thing when we get in town is to go to this bookstore, but it was all new stuff and I didn't get anything. Then there was this nearby record store I checked out. Skater/punk/metal fare. All the cds were behind the counter where I had to strain to still not see them. Then the dude told me they don't really buy cds anymore. Well, we went to try out a different part of town. I looked up a record store that seemed much better. Hm. Where is it? Oh, it closed a year ago. Okay, We went to Squatters which was another brewery. They also made a root beer. It was also very good. It wasn't quite as flavorful as the last but it did have a sharper fizzy feel which was nice. Next we found a hotel to check into amongst things. Then we went to The place to eat in SLC: Red Iguana. They had a bunch of different mole sauces and we ate and ate and stuffed ourselves beyond recognition. We went to one bar after that that should have been open but wasn't so we went to another bar. It had the cool feature of having a strip of coldness along the bar (all iced over) to keep your drinks cooler longer. I only had a water to put on it though. It was called Beehive Pub. I had no idea before this trip that Utah was such a beehive state. Now, as a city, I thought SLC was pretty lame, but the surrounding nature in Utah was pretty awesome.

It's, what, Monday morning? We had breakfast at a place called The Blue Plate Diner. Good diner food. Now we're off for the long drive to Albuquerque through southern Utah and Arizona. Okay, to be continued later. Jacques just showed up.

West

So we left off driving through the otherworldly beauty of southern Utah and Airzona. Some of the most incredible lanscapes of the journey. In spite of some arguments, it made for a lovely drive. We made a stop in Arizona at Canyon de Chelly. We went around the southern part, stopping off three times, I think. I was surprised at how green it was down below, with the trees and farmland. The Navajo farm the inside of the canyon. At our second overlook, there's this open area where you can walk around the open cliff top without any rail or wall. There was a family already out there and the little girl kind of started to sprint away from the canyon and tripped and fell and scraped herself. It was pretty freaky 'cuz if she had tripped the OTHER way she would have fallen to her death. Anyway, it was a beautiful spot to look at it and fun to play against my fear of heights, making myself mildly nervous and all. The road that leads to the canyon comes off the highway in a really small, depressed-looking town. Most if not all of the people were Indians. Afterwards we ate at the A & W (had never been in one before, the root beer from the fountain is actually better than what you get bottled everywhere, that was something). Well, as we were leving this creepy guy asked for some change. I feel bad because he freaked Mary Beth out and I didn't realize he got so close to her as I was going to the car. We're back on the road. We even saw a few arches off the road in parts of the drive. I don't remember which state it was (UT/AZ/NM) in which a sheep ambled across the road in front of us. Oh, and earlier, as we first hit real DESERT, The Terminator theme played on my mp3 player and it was pretty perfect music for entering a desert. And I know I've heard this before, but the desert is a lot greener than you expect. I mean, not forest green, but there's a lot more than just sand and rock. Did I mention the rain storm just before SLC the day before? There was also a rain storm before and entering Albuquerque at night. No rain in the Pacific Northwest this summer, but we see all our rain in the frickin' desert? (There was even another storm the next day). We got into Albuquerque pretty late and found a motel. Then we decided to have a look at some of the town. We went downtown to a little strip. We went to a bar called The Library, which ended up being a pretty fratty place. The bartender was wearing a very short skirt similar to those worn at The Flying Saucer and I have a suspicion she wasn't wearing panties either. So the decor was shelves of old books and Budweiser or whatever banners about how they have the sexiest staff in town. There was also a dj bumping really loudly to a small number of patrons. I'm sure it's more hoppin' on other nights (and even less tolerable).

I think we're at Tuesday? Okay, so we wake up for some more nature adventures and one of the most exciting days of the trip. We head up north through and past Santa Fe, which looked really cool with the blocky adobe buildings. What's that? Another rain storm? Yes, another rain storm. It paid off, because the rain had stopped when we reached our destinations and the places were cooled down. I'm a little out of order. Our first stop was BEFORE Santa Fe and the rain storm. Let me back up. We went to the Tent Rocks national monument. This time we walked through a canyon. The canyon walls and the tent rocks themselves were pretty fucking amazing. I was in awe the whole way through the hike. The tent rocks, like they sound, are large pillars of rock that are cone-shaped up at the top so they look a lit like tents. There are lots of them. Then we get to the end of the canyon and the trail leads up until we're at the top and looking down on all we just walked through and the whole countryside. The mountain top out to the very end was only as wide as the path. It was astounding walking out there, but also a little on the freaky side. I went out farther than Mary Beth. I had to sit down to hop over the last rock and be at the edge. I took too many pictures and was half-blind most of the time by sweat and sunscreen. That was probably my favorite part of the day, but everything that follows was outstanding too. Now we're back off through what I said earlier: rain and Santa Fe. We went to Bandelier National Monument. There was stuff about only being able to get to it on a shuttle, so we stopped at the information center in Los Alamos and the lady there said this late in the day you could just drive in and not pay (!?) so we did. The road out to it was small and narrow and winding around crazy mountainous curves. It was fun and slightly nervewracking. We did just like she said and drove around the gate blocking the road saying not to enter. So we got out for another little hike. The area was pretty impressive. The hills themselves were incredible, but we got to go up and look at the old cliff dwellings and even climbed up inside one. Again, I took too many pictures (so many that my phone's battery got dangerously low towards the end and I had to stop). We weren't sure we'd be able to make it to our last destination in time, but we figured we'd try anyway. The Sandia Peak Tramway is just outside Albuquerque up a very large mountain. It is one of the longest in the world (there were signs saying the longest there, but I don't think that's true). Anyway, it was or seemed like it was the highest we went up the whole trip. I don't feel bad about missing the Pebble Creek ski lift the day before the wedding, because this got that experience and then some. We made it there just in time to ride up before the sun set. It was setting while we were at the top of the mountain and then dark on the way down. Any later and we wouldn't have been able to get the view we had riding up. It was an incredible view. An exhilerating mix of astounding beauty and the feeling of imminent death. I mean, you KNOW the tram is safe but you sure get that feeling you're about to plummet (or at least I did). Again, it was an awesome experience. It was also much colder up top. The only time it really felt cold the whole trip. Well, after that awesome day we had a pretty rad dinner. We went to Frontier Restaurant and it's a pretty sweet counter diner (super fast, super cheap college kid fare). I had a green chile burger. Now that I'm talking about food, I realize I forgot to put in breakfast! Albuquerque's thing is red chile. We had some at Mary & Tito's in their adovada. Spicier than the sweet green chile. Anyway, Mary Beth was still restless afterwards so we went back downtown to try someplace else. This time we went to a bar called Downtown Distillery, which was actually the opposite of a distillery. Not even a tap, just bottles. Not that it matters for me. I just had a water and even that tasted funny.

Now we arrive at Wednesday morning. We're about to head off to Austin. Before leaving Albuquerque, we stopped off at Golden Crown panaderia for some fruit-filled empenadas to take with us on the road (and a few New Mexican cookies too!). I'll toss in my general impression of Albuquerque now. As a city, also pretty lame. But the nature stuff surrounding it is some seriously awesome shit. Alright, here were are, on the road between Albuquerque, NM and Austin, TX. I will leave us on this long drive for the time being, but don't worry! We'll make it. Just be patient.

Mega-Austin Day

I'm picking us up again, on the many small roads in western Texas. Eastern New Mexico and western Texas had some of the least interesting scenery of the trip, but incredible vistas would still pop up. We made real good time and got to Austin much earlier than expected, but it was still nighttime. We first went to get some food when we got in town and went to a place called Kerbey Lane Cafe. Good food. I had bison and wild boar frito pie (sorry, Buffalo Friend, I should have thought of you at the time). After that we went to a bar in the same part of town called Draught House Pub. Then we went to find a hotel. I first got directions to the wrong Super 8 and we got there and it was way too expensive but the guy whose smoke break we interrupted was still nice and told us where to find a restroom nearby. The other Super 8 was still on the expensive side so I took us to the Motel 6 that was nearby and on Mary Beth's list. They were out of nonsmoking rooms so I got us a smoking room much to the consternation of Mary Beth. This was the low point of the trip. She suggested we even cut the trip early and head back as soon as we could. In the morning I woke up early and was able to switch rooms so we were then able to enjoy Austin.

It's Thursday and we've got a nonsmoking hotel room and we skip breakfast because we got up so late (after a rough night being up pretty late). By skip breakfast, I mean we go straight to lunch. We went to the La Barbecue food truck and had brisket sandwiches. Holy shit. Holy shit. This is some of the best food I've put in my mouth. Their brisket seriously has the texture of butter. They gave us a sample before we ordered too. Oh my good. I'm drooling thinking about it again. Well, our hardcore day of enjoying Austin was off to a good start. Next I dropped Mary Beth off at a bar/coffeehouse and went to Switched On. Longtime dream realized! (Okay, I've only known about it less than a year or so or two years or so? maybe "longtime" is a strong word.) Well I had a blast. I pretty much knew which modules I wanted to get beforehand, but I got a chance to play with 'em first. I ended up getting an Intellijel Rubicon (through-zero VCO) and a 4MS VCA Matrix (just like it sounds, a voltage controlled matrix mixer!). Playing around with 'em made me realize I should get a little Pittsburgh Multiple module (also picking up some cables and a t-shirt, I'm getting ahead of myself though). It was fun playing with the modular, but I kind've knew what to expect. The most fun was playing the old synths! I played an Oberheim Two Voice and a Prophet 5! I can tell the Two Voice would be a LOT of fun with a lot time spent working with it. The voices being completely separate can lead you to a lot of interesting possibilities, but of course that makes programming it a little more involved. It was pretty sweet though. I spent more time playing the Prophet 5. Damn it sounds good! Just on sounds it does sound better than my modern Prophet 08. It's much simpler in its capabilities, but that's also its advantage somewhat. It doesn't take much effort to get great sounds, also the envelopes seem more responsive and "bouncy" (and the filter is better). It fulfills the whole "warmer" cliche. Anyway, I had a lot of nerdy fun. Now that I've been to two synths stores I can compare! I had known about Switched On longer, but ended up at Control Voltage first. Control Voltage was better for trying out eurorack modules. They had a ton all over the place. Switched On was fine for that, but they didn't have nearly as many. They excelled in the vintage stuff you could play (or buy). Now I'm picking up Mary Beth and we set out to this place she recently heard about: the cathedral of junk. This artist dude has his backyard dedicated to a two-story sculpture of junk. It was a pretty awesome experience. I guess he's sort of like Austin's Paul McLeod (except I don't think he's actually unhinged...apparent libertarianism aside). We again took tons of pictures and just wandered around it all. It was great 'cuz you'd keep revisiting a spot and each time see things you never noticed before. A baroque monument to trash. Next we went to a real museum: the Blanton Museum of Art. It was really nice. They allowed picture-taking so I again took to many pictures, mostly details. There was a lot of really good stuff. The modernist room was awesome. They even had a room of postmodern sculpture, typically not my thing, but the pieces in here were really well-done. A good way to spend the afternoon. Free and COOL (and great art, how can you go wrong?). Then we went back up to this part of town that's hip or whatever on Congress Ave. We walked up a bit and found a bookstore that way the fuck overcharged on everything, but I found a couple unusual items I picked up: The Dramatic Symphony/The Forms of Art by Andrey Bely and Kafka: Toward a Minor Literature by Gilles Deluze and Félix Guattari. I looked up a record store that was down the block, but had SLC flashbacks...it was no more! Well, I had also looked up a record store over on 1st St. A little place called End of an Ear. Um...holy fuck! Holy mother fucking fuck! What a great fucking record store! It was pretty big for an indie place. It had good categorization of stuff and it was easy to find amazing electronic/experimental/composer stuff. As you will soon see, I got quite a haul of amazing shit. They also had a good bit of more standard rock that I didn't find the time to look through as much. They even had listening stations and they weren't afriad to to put weird stuff like electronic and musique concrete on 'em (that's how I found out about the Paul Bowles I got, great writer as he is, I'd forgotten he was a composer too and didn't know he'd done anything experimental, but I guess it was just put out this year so how could I?). Well, here's the verdict: Paul Bowles: The Pool K III, Einstürzende Neubauten: Drawings of Patient O. T., Nurse with Wound: Chance Meeting on a Dissecting Table of a Sewing Machine and an Umbrella, Raymond Scott: Soothing Sounds for Baby Volume 2: 6 to 12 Months, Raymond Scott: Soothing Sounds for Baby Volume 3: 12 to 18 Months, Daphne Oram: Oramics, 23 Skidoo: Seven Songs, Suzanne Ciani: Lixiviation, Harmonia: Live 1974. Susie Ibarra: Drum Sketches, Conrad & Gregor Schnitzler: Conrad & Sohn (reissue with bonus tracks, thanks to Creel Pone for paving my way to this day), and Bruno Spoerri: Glückskugel. Ah! I also got a version of Autechre's Gantz Graf that I thought had the dvd, but didn't (that's why it was only $3...I took it back the next day to see if the dvd was supposed to be there or not...the guy at the register that day got all excited about how great that single and video are...that was endearing). The girl checking me out, upon seeing the Raymond Scott, asked if I had a baby. Heh. Well, now it's time to see some fucking bats! We parked in the newspaper lot and made it down to the little park where people were gathered to watch this awesome spectacle. So, when the Congress Ave. bridge was rennovated in the early 80s, the way the beams or whatever on the underside were situated led to ideal conditions for this colony of bats to start living in the spring and summer and early fall (they migrate to Mexico in the winter). At dusk, a million or so bats (I'm NOT using this figure figuratively) start flying out in file to go eat and do bat stuff. We watched for about 20 or 30 minutes or so and the colony was still on its way out (though I believe the main thrust had passed). Really awesome to watch. I just read that during the summer there are more bats than people in Austin. Pretty cool. We had dinner at a place called Polvos. Some good texmex stuff. I also drank a ton of horchata in all these places we went. Okay, so we go downtown to this speakeasy bar Mary Beth wanted to try. It was in the middle of Austin's Beale St. analog. It was actually pretty neat in that context. Drunk people loudly roaming the middle of the street amidst loud bars and there's this small, signless door. Just a fake doorbell directory (you have to know the right button to push, Mary Beth said she would've known anyway because it's some famous cocktail dude's name). They happened to have a reservated table's occupants not show up so we got lucky and got a seat. I even had some tasty mocktails. Then back to the hotel. That was all one fucking day? Did I say how much I fucking love Austin? Well, hey, there's even more!

Friday wasn't quite as crazy-awesome-fuck-shit as the day before, but it was still a great day. Well, looks like it's getting to be time to break this post up. How weird looking is that last paragraph amidst these stubs?

A Wrap

We wake up and get breakfast tacos at Juan in a Million. Walking in the door, you're immediately greeted by Juan who is bursting with enthusiasm and hearty handshakes. He was very nice, though both Mary Beth and I had the impression he's a ballbusting perfectionist to his employees, maybe still nice to them when things go well. So we got to have migas (in taco form). I got a few different tacos, the migas one was the best. And yes, more horchata. Damn, now I'm craving horchata for some reason. Shouldn't I be sick of it by now? After breakfast it was off to Barton Springs, the half-swimming pool/half-natural body of water that is so popular among Austinites. It's also famed for its cold water. That was nice in the heat we were in. All throughout the trip, I was super-vigilant about applying sunscreen. I did this day as well, in the hotel, before breakfast, with my shirt on. I got my face and neck and arms and all that. I, as usual, did not get anything under the shirt-area. This was really stupid as I was going to go swimming that day, without a shirt. Well, the swimming was awesome and the springs were great. Ended up very red on my shoulder area that evening. Doh. It seems to be healing pretty quickly though. Still there, but mostly fading. We did another museum, also downtown: the Mexic-Arte. It was much smaller and much more contemporary. One room is dedicated to screenprinting. Half the stuff in that room was really great. Let's see. Nearby, another old-timey type bar. I had more mocktails. The bartender was really nice. Leaving, I realized it was 5 minutes past our metered parking time! We made it back to the car and saw a ticket on the windshield! No! But turns out to be another warning. Then I was confused because the time on the warning was before we'd expired. But it was just a warning for not having our receipt displayed in the proper place. It's weird the way they do it, but I guess now I know. What's next? We did have a more leisurely pace this day. We made it to a taco truck. Was that before the museum? I think so. Oh, I'll make a note here even though I'd gotten it the night before: Maine Soda is fuckin' awesome. Okay, back on track. I think this was around the time we went back to End of an Ear to check on that Autechre (and I was good, I didn't even look at anything else!). We returned to the Draught House and Mary Beth and I spent some relaxing time reading. Now it's getting more dinnertime-ish so we make our way up north towards this relatively remote place that's supposed to be really good. On the way, we passed a Half Price Books. Mary Beth had heard good things in spite of what it is so we checked it out. I got some cds and a couple books: Klaus Schulze: Dziękuję Poland Live '83, Klaus Schulze: Dune, Klaus Schulze: Blackdance, Klaus Schulze: Timewind, Philip Glass: Koyaanisqatsi soundtrack, Philip Glass: Powaqqatsi soundtrack, Memories of the Future by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky, and Rub out the Words: the Letters of William S. Burroughs 1959-1974. Then we make it a little later to Taco More. I ordered a few tacos that were very good, but the prize was in the goat soup that Mary Beth ordered and I ended up eating most of. Once again, one of the best things I've eaten. Ah, so good. I also got horchata even though I was telling myself before I ordered that I most certainly would not. I don't know why I did. It was good though.

What day is it? Yesterday. We're waking up and getting ready to leave Austin and bring closure to our wonderful road trip around the damn country. I must say, driving across the country is an amazing experience in and of itself. Seeing these places that seem foreign and then other places that seem foreign from where you just were as well as where you came from. As cheesy as it sounds, you get a better appreciation for America. Anyway, now I'm in Austin and checking out of the motel and heading to Cisco's for a breakfast of straight-up migas. Now we're driving through more Texas and back through Arkansas and back home. Nothing too eventful about the drive back. We got in yesterday evening. We cleaned up cat filthiness. Jacques had seen Horace twice and Tudy none during his tenure watching them. But I saw Trudy in the window when we got back so I knew she was okay even if she still hid when we came in. I found Horace under the bed, but he scooted away from me. After we unloaded, he was out but ran away; however, he only ran to his table which he sat on in plain sight and greedily caved in to much petting. He put up a strong front for about a minute, but he did not hold a grudge long. We unpacked. I was up far too late rotating photos on Facebook that my phone did not properly rotate. I picked up some Huey's. Mmmm. I also put all of my new modules in my eurorack case, though I have not gotten a chance to play them yet. It's now qualifies as an actual synthesizer! And most of a row is close to being filled. That's something.

Woke up today and met some folks at Swanky's Tacos (ironic, considering where we just came from, in both levels of quality and pretension). It was Courtney's birthday. Got to see Dustin and Courtney and Daphne and Josh and Molly and Maria and Lila. That was a lot of fun talking to 'em all. Not much else. Just settling in. Posting a ton. Jacques came over for a minute to return the key and we gave him his rewards. That be about it. I'm starting to feel the fact that I haven't eaten in almost ten hours. Well, I had an amazing trip with an amazing wife. Again, she's the planner so she's the reason all the great stuff got done. Now I bow out. Maybe I'll have some random stray notes to add later.