Fort Collins

We've been in Fort Collins 3 days now, and I can already say that I really like this place. The house is coming together nicely 1 piece of furniture at a time. We still need to buy a broom... but that's so boring. Have I mentioned the yard? It’s huuuuge. The pictures of the house that I saw only showed the back, which was stupid because it’s tiny and has no grass. So I had terribly low expectations, but we showed up and the front yard is amazing. It’s got two old elms and tons of space. Gonna have to invest in a hammock.

On another note, I got this awesome email from Mom reminding me that I left my room at home in shambles. I guess I hadn’t really admitted to myself that I actually wasn’t coming back for a very long time, and left it like I normally do when I’m going off to school… in a state that I will come back and fix. Woops. I guess I have a very good reason to make it home for the Holidays. Other than seeing family of course. Ahem. But yeah, this is part of the email:

BTW--your room is remarkably daunting. I think I did four loads of towels and linens on your behalf last Sunday, between what smelled funny in the laundry room and all the random stuff in your bedroom. I was so overwhelmed on Sunday and every once in a while went and looked at your room hoping for an inspiration as to how to begin. No luck. I am now collecting some boxes in which to store your crap. I was hoping to bury it in your closet, but it still looks full. Ugh. Didn't blog about that, didja??
Love,
Mom

So there. Blogged!! In my defense, the stuff in the laundry room smelled funny because it was old, not because I farted on it or something. Although I do have to get that problem checked out…

Anyway, Fort Collins is amazing so far. I even got to visit the Statue of Liberty! Finally! From the pictures I had seen, I could've sworn it was much bigger, and surrounded by water, and I always thought it was green. Must be those fancy movie tricks.












It really reminds me of a much larger Ithaca, and on top of that, it’s FLAT! Speaking of which, I got a bike today! Used, but awesome, and although it was a bit pricier than I think it should’ve been, it comes with a free tune up and free lifetime adjustments, so that’s pretty swell. Check it out:

It’s got a new seat and awesome handlebars.. ohh I can’t wait to ride to work. Although, with my luck, I’ll bust my ass outside the door. At least the bike will look good.

Sam and I took Laika for a walk in Lori State park a little while ago - here she is being herself and grazing.


Fiercest cow ever. I think she's beginning to realize that we're finally staying in one place for good. But she still hasn't gotten used to the fact that she can roam around the yard. Unless we're with her, she sticks to the path and the stoop. Silly dog. Soon enough. I think I'll take her to one of the dog parks tomorrow and see how she fares (leash laws around these parts are pretty strict, so dog parks seem like the only place that I can let her off and not pee my pants worrying that a ranger might find us).

Oh - first day tomorrow! It should just be getting set up and filling out paperwork. What fun! Til next time.

Denver, and the End

Today was the last straw. Not really, but we were getting pretty sick of the car. Having a wall of crap behind you can cause claustrophobia pretty quickly, and 6 days of it is no small feat. We did dilly dally a bit in terms of driving. Rather than hop on the interstate or even take a direct route, we drove all over the place in the black hills. We drove past Mt. Rushmore, and went to the Crazy Horse Memorial but pulled a U-turn when we found out it was $10 per person. What a rip. Then we drove through Thunder Basin National Grassland, which was pretty predictable in hindsight. BUT we got to see the largest surface coal mine in North America!!! It was really huge and depressing! They had the most enormous dump trucks I’ve ever seen. If one of the tires were laying flat it would span a two-lane highway. There were also these giant elevators that had trains running through them and filling with coal to go all over the country to provide power – lovely, sooty, dirty, dusty power. Hoorayyyy! That was very exciting. We were able to stop off at our place in Fort Collins to unload the car into the shed in the backyard, but we weren’t able to go in yet, since we’re not getting the keys til tomorrow. Now it's on to Denver to see my good friend Bryce whom I met while abroad in Australia. More tomorrow.

Today’s playlist:
Blitzen Trapper – Wild Mountain Nation
Blitzen Trapper – Furr
Neil Young & Crazy Horse – Live Rust
Neil Young – Harvest
The Rifles –
AC Newman – Slow Wonder
Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Blitzen Trapper – Field Rexx
The Beatles – White Album
Born Ruffians – Red, Yellow and Blue
Caribou – Milk of Human Kindness

Day Five: To the Badlands!

Yeah, so remember when I said yesterday was boring? Well, lemme tell you about South Dakota. Actually, it wasn’t quite as flat as Iowa, and it’s full of ridiculous billboards. My only complaint is that when I wasn’t driving and was trying to read, Sam would compulsively read the billboards out loud. It made it very difficult to get into a reading flow when every two minutes I heard “Budget Burger?! That sounds horrible” or “NEW T-REX!!…but that sign’s at least 20 years old..” Damn you, Wall Drug.
While we managed to avoid getting sucked in by those amazingly enticing Wall Drug ads, we couldn’t resist the Corn Palace. Their billboards are just too good: “Corn Palace. World’s ONLY!” and "Corn Palace. It's A-MAIZE-ing!" and "Wish you were EAR!" Man, how can you say no to that?! I promised Sam that it would be a short stop, and it certainly was. The front was under construction, so there wasn’t much point at looking at that, although the skinny teens in cut-off T-shirts mounting corn husks to the façade were pretty glorious. On top of the lack of outdoor spectacularity, the inside is one of the more depressing places I’ve ever been. We bought some postcards and hit the road. And that was that. Best Corn Palace visit yet.
We made it to the Badlands around 6, and after a roundabout decision-making process, ended up camping at the far site (with no water). It was far less populated and more serene. The other ones had tons of tourists and kids and bluaahhhhh gross whatever. It was really cool – the campsite was surrounded by prarie dogs, and on the way in we had to sit and wait for a bison to cross the road. Laika nearly leapt out of the car to smell his butt. Thank Jeebs for leashes. The guys in the site next to us were very cool, and we got to hear all about their travels after doing recycling work at the Bonaroo Festival in Tennessee. I think my favorite conversation of theirs was the “what were you doing when you were 23?” conversation. For the most part, the answer was “Gosh, I don’t even remember, man. Like, I think I was working.. no wait, I had a house on the beach, like, it was like, an abandoned house and like, we lived in it… wait. What year was I born?” They were sweet. Dude.

Today’s Playlist
Built to Spill – There’s Nothing Wrong with Love
Wilco – A Ghost is Born
Talking Heads – Remain in Light
Talking Heads – Fear of Music
This American Life – Go Tell Your Father

Chicago to Omaha

Last night we stayed with Sam’s brother-in-law, Nate in Chicago. We kept it pretty low-key. We had a delicious dinner a few blocks away (no deep-dish pizza, but I’ll take ahi tuna tacos any day), watched some TV, and hit the hay early. Today was forever. Very flat. Very boring. EXCEPT the hour we spent in a crazy-ass downpour lightning storm thing. I was very surprised that we weren’t picked up and spat out in Munchkin Land.
We drove on 88 and 90 the whole way. Whooee! Before the storm, we tried to have a dog walking stop, as we had done the other days, but it didn’t work out as well as we had hoped. We found Rochester State Park in Google Maps, but soon after we got off at the exit, we were on a dirt road winding through farms and hunting preserves. We finally found the “parking lot” for the “park”, and quickly realized that it was a measly little picinic area and mess hall that probably hasn’t been used since 1956. It was super creepy and really tiny, even though the map said it was huge. Weird. It came complete with an abandoned truck and an empty box of condoms. Now that’s what I call a wholesome walk in the woods. Oh, and there weren’t woods. It was lame. Laika had a blast, of course. She got all wet playing around in the river and avoided us until she was ready to get back into the car. So I guess the goal was achieved, albeit in a sketchy manner. Anyhoo, back to Nate. One of his good friends recently moved to Omaha, and he was kind enough to call him and ask if he would put us up for the night. So we got another free night of lodging, and got to see the beautiful Omaha burbs (ummm they’re basically like every other super nice suburb). Oh, and he had a crazy dog that was the Yin to Laika’s Yang. Or vice versa.. whichever is gender correct. They had a good time chasing each other around on his immaculate wood floors.

Today’s Playlist:
Spoon – Kill the Moonlight
The Band – Music for Big Pink
The Byrds – Untitled/Unissued
Band of Horses – Cease to Begin
Radiolab – Stochasticity
White Stripes – White Stripes
Deleted Scenes – Birdseed Shirt

Day Three: To Chicago

We’ve spent Day Three driving across Ohio and Indiana – crazy exciting. We saw some corn, and more corn, and some factories… but there was a lot of nice shoreline. We stopped off at Mt Baldy (part of the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore) for an hour or so in the afternoon. It’s pretty cool to see again. You walk on this trail through the woods for a few minutes, and then suddenly you’re confronted by this giant wall of sand. I suppose it’s not really that tall (200 ft maybe), but it’s still spectacular. We went down to the beach and were able to find a nice spot sans tween campers and jet skis. If it weren’t for the incessant deer flies, I’d say it was a perfect little spell at the beach. It was really hot, but the water was freezing. I went under and my lungs seized up and my muscles spazzed out. It was pretty awesome. Laika was diggin’ it, but the flies kept biting her in the bum and the legs, so she rolled around in the sand and got it all in her face and deep in her fur. That made for an awesomely sandy backseat. Oh well.
The drive will end in North Chicago at Sam’s sister’s house. Unfortunately, she just left for Rome, but lucky for us her husband is still around. Perhaps there is deep dish pizza in my future… More later.

Today’s soundtrack:
Lindstrom and Prinse Thomas – 2
Leo Kotke – Instrumentals
Black Lips – Good Bad Not Evil
Beatles – Magical Mystery Tour
Rolling Stones – Beggar’s Banquet
Rolling Stones – Sticky Fingers
The Kinks – Muswell Hillbillies
The Kinks – Arthur or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire

And my favorite quote of the day: “Did you fart? Oh no that’s just Gary.” - Sam

Laika: Friend of Bears

Day two consisted of getting from Ithaca to Sandusky, OH via 86 and 90. We broke it up with a little hike in Allegany State Park, which turned out to be a little bit more eventful than we had anticipated. About halfway around the loop we were hiking, we heard a big growl and looked up to see a small family of black bears about thirty feet ahead of us. The two cubs started climbing frantically up the nearest trees, and the mom started lumbering away looking over her shoulder. Sam and I turned and jogged the other way. Laika, in her infinite wisdom, ran after the mother bear as if she were another dog looking to play. We called her and whistled to no avail. I guess she’s good with bears, because we didn’t hear any more growling and she came merrily down the trail two minutes later. Effin Laika – what a madwoman. I only wish I had caught a glimpse of what went down between the dog and the bears. I imagine Laika said, “Do not fear, Bear. These humans are mine and they mean you no harm. Now I must go tend to them, for they are unintelligent and easily lost. Farewell. Oh and your butt smells great.”


Today’s soundtrack:
This American Life - Watchmen
Radiolab – Stress
Radiolab – Placebo
Wait Wait… Don’t tell me – 6/13/09
Heartless Bastards – The Mountain
Jens Lekman – Oh You’re So Silent Jens

Day One: Nothing New

And the drive begins! We decided not to do anything strenuous or emotionally taxing on the first day - getting to Ithaca was all that our little hearts could handle. Actually, it just gave us an excuse to leave late in the day and drink the night away. I’d say the highlights were Brian and Corey’s blossoming bromance (they’re getting to the point where they order for each other at the liquor store, grocery shop together, and probably link arms every time they have a drink at the Chanty) and our obliteration of Frank’s Liquor’s Finest bottle of Evan Williams Green Label. Needless to say, we got a late start on day two.

Testing!

Hey ya'll. And by "ya'll", I mean me. I'm super bored at home, so I'm setting up a spanking new blog in preparation for my journey to Fort Collins (that is west of here.. yeah I get it too). Anyhoo, just testin' the colors and what have you. Yay!