Push Me, Pullman

We woke and started readying our things around 7. Cringer could sense the looming car ride and had positioned himself right square under the bed. He had to be dragged with much protest from his protective covering. Amanda then administered a half Benadryl to help him sleep and placed him inside the carrier. Once loaded, we resituated the items stacked in our passenger seats to allow for at least some line of site to our passenger side view mirrors. Mine was through two mesh sides of the sugar glider’s carrier. This allowed for limited site of anything next to the van, but was a great improvement over the previous day’s pass and count method. We continued north until we had reached Sioux Falls, SD where we stopped for gas and a bite to eat. There was an elderly woman with a slight Fargo-type accent behind the counter. In front of us was another elderly woman. They exchanged sewing circle chatter that lasted long past the order’s fill. As we ate we noticed the dark rain clouds that were blocking our path and decide our next stop would be the Missouri River.

Southeast South Dakota looked just like Southeast Missouri, flat farm land occasionally bordered by a ridge or creek. The scenery wasn’t helped at all by the 200 miles of rain we had to endure. The van, weighted down as it was, had no problem trudging along. I kept a steady 75 miles per hour and increased the speed of my wipers until the driver side blade was thrown loose. The hook of the wiper loosely held on to the blade which with each swipe would now flop off the windshield then back again, sometimes tangling with the passenger side wiper before breaking apart causing a terrible rock hit windshield like pop. The rain ceased for a moment and I tried to report the problem to Amanda on the walkie-talkie. She didn’t answer. So I called her cell phone. She was over 5 miles behind me. Her car had started hydroplaning forcing her to a crawl. We met back up at an overlook for the Missouri River. After a brief rest and reattaching of the windshield wiper blade we hit the open road again. It wasn’t thirty minutes later that the van started stalling and the steering column locked into place. I had experienced this before when the van had thrown a belt. I pulled to the side of the road and radioed for Amanda to pull behind me and look to see if a belt had come loose and now dragging on the ground, but before she answered I saw the problem. I had run out of gas. The overlook had been the first and would be the only pit stop where we neglected to get gas. During the 15-30 minutes of sitting waiting for Triple A I noted that the van with the extra weight and wind break strapped to the roof was only getting 13 miles per gallon, a far cry from the glorious 30 mpg I’m accustom to.

We stopped at the next “town”, 1880 Town, for gas. I was listening to AM radio as I do from time to time. There was a year long period when both the CD player and FM tuner ceased to function, which left me swimming in a sea of conservative talk radio. Now I listened out of habit. Dr. Laura’s caring expert advice to another white trash family dysfunction was suddenly interrupted by an ABC breaking news report: The Michael Jackson Trial. The jury had reached a verdict, despite court reporters’ predictions earlier that they wouldn’t base solely on their dress. They began by giving a red carpet account of the king of pop’s arrival. Janet Jackson was held up at the metal detector. Had she snuck in a pistol to mercifully lay down her brother in case of a guilty verdict? As one reporter noted the 8 by 10 cells that hold the likes of Charles Manson is not the Neverland Ranch that Michael is accustomed to. Then as if to counter balance his condemnation he noted how unlikely it was that Jackson would receive a fair trial, pointing to the jury’s lack of African Americans. After many further speculative guesses and commentaries they were finally ready to read the verdict. They then over dramatically rambled off judicial jargon which could conveniently be summed up later by scrolling news blurbs with Michael Jackson NOT GUILTY All Charges.

When we reached the Badlands the scenery started to improve drastically. The mountains looked like starchy wrinkled sheets tie-dyed in earth tones. This would be the first challenge for the van. The scenic bypass was 40 miles of winding road which twisted and turned in between mountain passings and along cliff sides. In Missouri on a bypass or any spot in the road that leaves one side with a nasty plummet there are guard rails, but here just asphalt and the occasional mile marker. It was at this moment staring off the side of the road into a cavernous ravine that I became increasingly aware of the van’s tendency to wobble from side to side. The prairies, that I imagine are normally dried and cracked when they haven’t had 2 inches of rain dumped on them, were a welcomed safety net. The Badlands was a nice departure from the rather boring drive thus far, but by the end of it I was happy to be able to use cruise control again.

We settled down for the night at our goal destination, Deadwood, which could best be described as Hannibal, MO with gambling. A short drive through the Black Hills reveals an old western town whose oldest surviving building appears to be no earlier than the 20th century. We took a stroll down the main strip which is now lined with casinos and souvenir shops. We went in the building that was built on the spot that the building in which Wild Bill Hickock was shot by the coward Jack McCall once stood which was then and is now a bar/casino. We then went inside the 10 Saloon, the only museum with a bar. The floor was covered in saw dust which isn’t very wheelchair friendly, but no more of a strain than shag carpeting. The rafters were full of animal heads and walls full of old photos. We sat down thinking we had reached the restaurant portion and ordered a drink. A Bloody Mary and Tom Collins was only 6 dollars, cheap enough for me to overlook the lack of a cherry or even lime. After finishing our drinks we relocated to the restaurant on the second floor for an expensive meal that we both agreed was just ehh.