My alarm went off at 6:30. Most weekdays I get up between 6 and 6:30, so this wasn't way outside the normal. Most Sundays however, I sleep in until 7:30. So that was a bit unusual.
I got up, showered, dressed and had breakfast. My normal Sunday morning routines also include emptying the dishwasher, filling everyone's pill dispensers for the week and going around to each room and emptying the trash. So I went ahead and carried out those duties.
In addition to he previously mentioned Saturday night service, I also lead worship during the Sunday morning service. Normally I leave the house around 9 AM on Sunday mornings, as the service starts at 11. I was going to maintain this routine, and leave for my trip after the church service. When I miss a service the pastor has to fill in for me, and I know he's not real comfortable leading worship. By waiting to leave on my trip until after the service I won't put him in that situation.
I finished packing and loaded up the bike. It had been a year since I had mounted my luggage so I had to scratch my head for a minute and refresh my brain on how everything attached.
Speaking of luggage, I am still loving the new tail bag I purchased prior to the 2020 motorcycle trip. It is incredibly more useful than my previous bag, and still looks brand new after several thousand miles. Once again, I didn't mount the roll bag to the top of the tail bag, but strapped it onto the passenger seat. Putting it on top of the tail bag made the whole thing so tall it looks goofy. I know that looks shouldn't matter, but for some reason it does.
In regard to the roll bag, I filled it with all of my cold weather gear (chaps, jacket, gloves, etc.) I figured that would be an easily accessible place should I need them. As it turned out, I didn't open it a single time and could have easily left all the cold weather stuff at home. Better safe than sorry, I guess.
With the bike loaded I rode across town to church, about six miles. My wife drove separate as my plans were to leave for my trip directly from the church. I did make a stop to fill up the tank with gas, as I hadn't done that yet.
I got to church and parked right out front. Our church is an older building in a rather bad area of town. We had just gotten the church painted a couple months before, so it's looking pretty sharp in this picture. I have no idea why the file cabinet is sitting there. People toss their junk on the church lawn all the time.
Because of the aforementioned bad part of town, I didn't want to leave my luggage outside on the bike. The odds were too good that someone might rifle through it, or worse unhook it and abscond with the bag and its contents. So I unloaded the motorcycle and brought everything inside with me.
I'm not complaining about where our church is located, as the location is perfect for the unique kind of ministry we've been called to provide. At the same time, however, I don't need to be stupid about leaving valuables out where they can easily be pilfered.
Then I hit a snag. I keep my guitar, amplifier and gear locked in a cabinet at the church. We've had too many items walk out the door to leave them unsecured. In fact, one of the youth who plays guitar with me on Saturday night had his guitar stolen the previous month shortly before the service started. The crook came in and didn't see anyone around, grabbed the guitar and ran.
So back to the locked cabinet, I keep the key to the lock on the key ring with my car keys. Unfortunately I realized that being on my motorcycle, I neglected to bring my car keys. Everything I needed for the service was securely locked out of my reach.
Slapping myself, I told the others in the church band what I had done. Normally we have time to set up and run through all the songs before the service starts. I was going to have to head back home to get my key, but by the time I returned there would only be time to set up. No practicing would happen this morning. We would have to do the songs cold, just reading the music. Thankfully everyone was quick to forgive.
I didn't bother putting everything back on the bike. There were enough people around the sanctuary that I just left my luggage there. I rode home, grabbed my keys and then rode back to the church. Well, that's an extra 12 miles I didn't plan on riding. Because the whole 12 miles was through town, it took about 40 minutes round trip.
Back at church, I unlocked my cabinet and set up my gear. Thankfully the service went smooth with no major hiccups caused by the lack of practice.
During the sermon I usually go up to the unfinished balcony and run the sound board. This goes back to my natural social-distancing tendencies. I'm not a big fan of crowds. The balcony is in rough shape with old pews and chairs piled on top of each other, and an old organ gathering dust. But it works for me.
Because I wanted to leave ASAP after church was over, I went ahead and applied my sunscreen during the sermon. Don't tell the pastor. Oops, he's probably reading this.
After the service I had to strike the stage and pack up all the gear and lock it back in my cabinet. I helped with a few other things that usually is done by someone else, but that person was gone on this morning.
With the motorcycle loaded for the 2nd time, I was ready to hit the road about 12:45. My wife came out to bid me farewell. When we were younger romance would dictate we say meaningful things to each other during our goodbyes. After 27 years of marriage I got, "I just noticed you've got a real salt-and-pepper thing going on in your hair these days." That made me laugh.
Riding away, my first stop wasn't too far down the road. I wanted to grab a quick lunch before I left town. There was an Arby's about 4 miles down the street that I would be riding right by, so I figured that should be a quick stop. A Jamocha shake sounded really good, but in a couple hours I would be riding through the "Ice Cream Capital Of The World", so I figured I would stop for a snack and have ice cream there. I skipped the shake.
As it turned out, I ordered too much food even with a cup of water replacing the shake. I finished it all, because I'm a pig, but quickly started to regret it. It wasn't a "need to stay close to the bathroom" kind of sick, just an upset stomach pain kind of sick. So I went ahead and hit the road even though I wasn't feeling that great.
Tonight's destination was Des Moines, IA, a little over 300 miles away. My hope was to arrive there by about 7 PM. It was currently almost 1:30, so I was already a bit behind schedule. Oops.
I headed south out of town on highway 115. I hadn't made it too far down the road when I hit construction. They were resurfacing the road, and had scraped the top layer of pavement off. What was left was a deeply grooved, rough surface that made the bike wander a bit. I've learned not to fight it. The bike may wander, but it will tend to keep itself upright. If you grab the handlebars tight every time the bike wiggles then you wind up swerving all over the place.
The highway "teed" (not sure of the proper spelling for this colloquialism) at highway 18. I headed east about five miles into the town of Canton, SD. My grandmother lived in Canton for a time, along with some other distant relatives. In fact, there's still a drug store in Canton that bears my grandmother's maiden name.
In Canton, I turned right on 482nd Ave. This is a small highway that will take my right by Newtwon Hills State Park. There is about a six mile stretch of highway between Canton and the park that is fairly pretty by eastern South Dakota standards, which is why I chose this route.
I'm not yet on the scenic part of the road yet, so this is just a picture of the street in Canton.
While I was stopped to take the above picture, a couple of motorcycles went by me. I didn't think much of it at first, until less than a mile down the road I caught up with them.
The bike in front of me had dealer plates. I'm not sure if they were a brand new rider or just very timid, but they rode 35 mph the entire stretch from Canton to Newton Hills. Unfortunately, this entire stretch was also a no passing lane.
I putted along behind them at what felt like a snails' pace. We would slowly roll around curves that would easily handle 60 mph speeds. After a relative eternity, they pulled into the entrance to the state park and I was able to resume the speed limit.
On 288th street I headed east and passed by Lake Lakota. I had been at this lake once before as a young child, back in 1974. I have two vivid memories of that day: first, "You Make Me Feel Brand New" by the Stylistics was playing on the radio. Second, my parents had left my brother's shoes sitting on the hood of the car while we were wading in the lake, and when we returned someone stole them. Weird how those memories stick around after all these years.
The section of 288th street (it's called "street" but really it's a highway) that I rode isn't very long, but it's rather pretty. Some gentle curves and a lot of up and down hills. Again, it's decent riding for eastern South Dakota.
288th street ended on 486th Ave, just south of Fairview, SD. From there I headed south again. I was slowly weaving my way through back roads until I reached Iowa.
Hudson, SD is a small town about a mile from the Iowa border.
As I crossed into Iowa, there is a one lane bridge over the Sioux River. On either side of the bridge is a stop light to keep traffic from meeting each other while crossing the river. As I approached, the light turned green so I wound up not having to stop and wait.
Crossing the bridge into Iowa I looked down at the river and saw how incredibly low it was. We've had a pretty bad drought here in South Dakota this year. Very little snow over the winter, and not enough rain during the summer resulted in grass growing in the middle of the riverbed in places that would normally be underwater.
Now in Iowa, I continued east towards Sioux Center. The road got straighter, flatter and less interesting. This would be the story for a good portion of the rest of the day, so I had to accept the fact that it was going to be a bit boring for a while.
When I reached highway 75, I turned south and rode into the town of Sioux Center.
Sioux Center is a medium sized town of about 8k people. One of the things I really liked about Sioux Center was when my son was little there is a park with a huge amount of play equipment. It was plenty to keep him entertained for hours, and was a good place to stop to let him burn off some energy if we were traveling and passing through. The park also has an extremely large tree right in the center that I would always admire while visiting.
I continued south towards Le Mars, IA. Le Mars is the self proclaimed "Ice Cream Capital Of The World." Wells Enterprises is headquartered in Le Mars, and they are among the largest (if not the largest) manufacturers of ice cream in the country. Their largest brand is Blue Bunny, but they also produce smaller brands such as Blue Ribbon, Bomb Pop, Cheesecake Factory and Weight Watchers.
Originally I had thought Le Mars would be a good spot to take a short break. It was about 90 miles from Sioux Falls, and via the route I took was nearly two hours away. They have a big visitor's center that, not coincidentally, sells ice cream. As I already mentioned, I had purposefully skipped my Jamocha shake at lunch so that I could have ice cream in Le Mars.
Unfortunately, by the time I arrived in Le Mars I really wasn't feeling very well from lunch. Usually I can eat almost everything without worry about an upset stomach, but for whatever reason today wasn't one of those days. My mouth wanted ice cream, but my stomach was in no mood to tolerate it. I regrettably decided to skip the ice cream.
I still wanted a short stretch break, though. As I rode through town I turned east on what would become highway 3. I was looking for a park, or at least somewhere that was a little more "stop worthy" than just pulling over on the street.
I saw a sign for a park, so I veered off on a side street. About a half mile down the street I still didn't see the park anywhere, but I did see the Plymouth Country Fairgrounds.
I pulled over at the entrance and got off the bike. I could have ridden into the fairgrounds, but nothing was going on there and I didn't see anything interesting enough to make me want to explore. I just got off the bike and stood for a few minutes without my helmet and earplugs.
The day was getting a little warm. I wouldn't have described it as hot, but mostly because it was very overcast so the sun wasn't beating down on me. However, the humidity was extremely high. This made the air feel sticky while I was standing off the bike, and caused a very slight chill in the air as I rode. Not enough to put on a jacket though.
I was only stopped for maybe five minutes, just long enough to get the blood flowing. I then got back on the bike and headed east out of Le Mars on highway 3.
As I rode east I noticed the skies growing dark, especially to the north. It looked like some rain was coming. I had purchased brand new rain gear before I left on the trip. I had no great desire to use them, but at least I knew that if it did start to rain I was better equipped than previous trips with my $5 Walmart hunting rainsuit. It turned into a moot point, as it never started to rain.
In Cherokee, IA, headed south on highway 59. I was in need of another short stretch break, so I stopped at Spring Lake Park.
Again (like in Le Mars) I only stood there for maybe five minutes before I got back on the bike and continued south.
The first four days of this trip were extremely humid. Most of the time the humidity level was higher than 95%. One of the interesting things I noticed was when it's this humid, smells are amplified. Every pasture, grain elevator, ethanol plant, etc. had an extremely pronounced odor. Those things tend to have some unique smells associated with them on a normal day, but the humidity brought a new intensity to the pungency. Occasionally this would be a good thing if I passed by something that smelled good, like a BBQ joint. Most of the time though, the amplified smells weren't good.
I arrived at Holstein, IA, which isn't necessarily picture-worthy, but it gave me a chance to stand up for a few seconds. As I rode through the town there was a ball game going on and it looked like most of the residents were attending.
On my MC trips I enjoy trying to avoid freeways if possible. Sometimes it's not possible, and other times it's just not practical. Holstein, IA was one of the "not possible" moments. Highway 59 came to a "T" on highway 20, which while it isn't technically a freeway, it is a high speed four lane limited access road. 59 merged east with 20 for about a mile, and then branched south again.
Continuing south on highway 59, I arrived at my planned gas stop in Ida Grove, IA. This is a very interesting little town, primarily because of a single reason: castles. The entire town is full of castles, and castlesque (is that a word?) architecture.
Apparently in the 70s there was a man in town named Byron Godbersen who owned a large business, and liked castles. He modified his company's building to look like a castle, modified his house property with castle-like structures and even built a 1/2 scale replica of the HMS Bounty to float in his private lake.
His love for castles caught on, and over the years the town's buildings have adopted this castle theme. When I first pulled into town I stopped and took a couple of pictures of castles, but I quickly figured out that there were too many to photograph them all. A person could spend a day in this little town just taking castle pictures.
On the edge of town, the first castle I encountered was an insurance agency.
Across the street was a skating rink.
I'd ridden about 170 miles at this point and while my tank hadn't yet hit reserve, I decided it was a good place to get some gas. I stopped at a station and filled up.
As I was pumping the gas I heard an extremely loud car. A guy in a clunker 80s Trans-Am went by and obviously had open headers. Then a few minutes later he came back the other direction and illegally passed another car while flooring his accelerator. It was pretty obnoxious. No doubt he was compensating for other areas in which he was lacking.
I wasn't in dire need of the restroom but decided it was probably a good idea to take care of it as long as I was stopped. I thought about grabbing an iced tea as well. As I walked into the store several people stopped talking and just looked at me. Normally I'm not one to get self-conscious, but it was obvious enough that it caught me off guard. They eyed me as I went back into the restroom. When I came out, they were gone so I guess it turned into a non-event. But it was weird.
I looked at the iced tea selection and didn't see anything at a price point that was appealing to me, so I decided to just skip it. I still had half of the liter of water I had brought with me. It was a little warm at this point, but usually I'm pretty oblivious to the temps of food and drink. My wife finds this odd.
I was still running behind schedule (surprise, surprise) for my goal of reaching Des Moines by 7 PM. It was now about 4:45 and I had a little over two hours to make it the 150 miles I had left on the day's journey. I started to accept the fact that 7 PM probably wasn't feasible, but I could try and make it as close to 7 as possible.
I headed south out of Ida Grove on highway 59. Or at least I thought I was heading south. I was riding along and after a while I noticed I hadn't seen a sign for Denison, IA, and it had been a while since I had seen a sign indicating I was on highway 59. About the time I realized something was amiss I came to the small town of Odebolt, IA. I pulled over at a gas station and consulted the map on my phone.
The phone pointed out that 59 had veered south about 10 miles prior, and I had missed that turn and was now on highway 175. I didn't feel like backtracking all that way to get back on 59, so I looked at the map for a different route. As it turned out, the corner where the gas station was located also was the corner of county road 39 which would take me south into Denison where I could resume my original route.
So that's the direction I headed. This unintended detour wound up adding about 13 miles to the trip. Not a ton, but more than I was wanting to add at this point in the day. It also wasn't going to help get me to Des Moines before 7 PM.
The good news was that county road 39 was very scenic. In fact, it may have been the most interesting road of the day. Lots of curves and hills, or at least more than you would expect to find in northwest Iowa.
One of the curious things that happened as I was riding on this road was a car came from the opposite direction, and as it passed the driver made an extreme effort to hang out of the window and give me the bird. I guess he was just having a bad day. There was nothing I could do but laugh at the absurdity of the situation.
When I arrived in Denison, I found highway 59 and headed south to resume my original route.
When I reached highway 141 I turned to ride east. This highway would take me the remainder of the way to the Des Moines city limits, which was about 90 miles away.
The first 10 miles or so of 141 were kind of pretty. Then it flattened out and got rather dull. I was getting tired. The temperature had gotten warmer in the last couple hours, and the heat and humidity were starting to wear on me. I could have used a break from riding for a few minutes, but the part of my brain that just wanted to get to where I was staying won that fight. I stayed on the bike and pressed onward through the dull.
When I reached the edge of Des Moines, I knew I needed to get on I-35 east. After that turn, however, I was unclear about where to go next without looking at my directions. Because it is rather difficult to stop and check my directions while on the interstate, and even more difficult to do it while simultaneously riding, I opted to pull over about a mile from the interstate and consult my notes beforehand.
I read through my directions and started repeating them over and over out loud, hoping this would cement them in my brain long enough for me to not have to look at my notes again. In a rare fit of mental prowess, it actually worked.
I took I-35 east for about eight miles to the central part of Des Moines, then got off on 2nd ave. As I got off there was a BBQ place that looked good. I had hoped to eat supper at Zombie Burger, but I decided to remember this restaurant in case those plans fell through.
My route took me through Union Park. As I rode through I noticed something out of the corner of my eye that startled me. It turned out to be a radio controlled dune buggy of some sort that was flying through the air after hitting a bump.
I decided to pull over and check my directions one final time. I was less than a mile from where I was staying, but I just wanted to make sure I got on the right street. Where I pulled over there was a rocket slide. This brought back a memory of mine from when I was less than 2 years old and my mom took me to a park with the same sort of slide somewhere in St. Paul. It's kind of amazing how you can retain little nuggets of nostalgia buried deep in your brain that pop out when you least expect it.
I verified the final turn I needed to make, and headed out for the last mile of my journey.
Before I go any further I need to give you, dear reader, some context of where I was going to spend the night. Let's momentarily backtrack approximately a month from the day I was riding through Iowa...
As I was coming up with my route and making hotel reservations, I was using my favorite booking website and comparing my options for places to stay in Des Moines. In the midst of the search results was listed "Union Park House". It seemed kind of unusual for a house to be listed on a hotel booking website, and the price for a night was listed as $28. It was enough for me to click on the link and read more about the place.
The description described it as a "unique home". It promised a clean, comfortable room in a large house that included a pool and a hot tub. The photos made it look nice. The reviews were overwhelmingly positive, and it seemed like the perfect place for me to stay. I don't need super-fancy. The next closest room at a name brand hotel I could find was going to be around $100 for the night.
It seemed a little "too good to be true" which I should have recognized as a harbinger of disappointment. But I didn't. Hey, we all let our guard down sometimes. I decided if nothing else it would be part of the adventure, so I clicked on the "reserve this room" button.
Back to present day, I rode to about where I thought the house should be. I think I was expecting a "bed and breakfast" type house with a sign out front. Because of this expectation, I had neglected to write down the address of the house. Not seeing any signs in front of any of the houses along the street, I pulled over to look up the address.
Connecting to the internet and locating the address took a lot longer than I expected it would. My bike was idling, and the heat coming off the engine was making a hot humid evening even more pronounced. As I was scrolling through my phone there was a lady working in the yard across the street that kept eyeing me. I'm sure I looked like a curious sight.
After what took way too much time, I finally located the address of the house. I then looked across the street where the lady was working and realized that I was directly in front of it. There was no sign, or any indication that this place was providing lodging. I backed up a few yards to the crumbling driveway and pulled in.
As I rode down the driveway, the lady started pointing for me to go around to the back of the house. I followed the broken pavement and found a small parking lot in the back. At this point she caught up to me and said, "I have a perfect spot for you," and pointed to a spot under a tree littered with junk. She started telling me this was their motorcycle parking, and proceeded to toss junk out of the way. As she was doing this she was saying something about the person who runs the house, but I couldn't hear her very well over my motorcycle. I got the impression that she lives at the house, but doesn't run it.
The "motorcycle parking" was a muddy patch of dirt layered with old ceramic tiles. She started to pick up the tiles and throw them with the other junk, but I stopped her saying I'd rather park on the tiles than in the mud. I pulled up into the space and moved a tile over with my foot so I could rest the kickstand on it. I can't imagine anyone who deemed this "motorcycle parking" has actually ridden a motorcycle.
The lady wandered over and started talking to some other people standing around the parking lot. I grabbed half of my stuff off the bike and decided to come back for the other half once I figured out where I was supposed to check in and get my room.
I started to walk down the broken driveway to the front door of the house when the lady hollered for me to go up the back stairway to the 2nd floor. I looked at the stairway, and it looked rather sketchy. Once I started to climb the stairs I found that it looked better than it was. Seriously, this stairway was downright dangerous, and this is coming from someone who rides a motorcycle. The steps were very uneven and loose, and the whole stairway felt like it would break away from the house at any moment.
I made it to the top without incident and found a combination lock on the door. I stood there pondering the situation for a minute when the lady hollered a code to me. I tried it and it didn't work. So then one of the people she was talking with hollered another code. That code opened the door. As I was going inside a third person was chastising the first two for yelling their door codes for anyone in the vicinity to hear.
I stepped inside the door and was immediately hit with the stale smell of cigarette smoke. I grew up in a non-smoking house, and have never smoked myself, but the odor evoked memories of friend's houses from when I was in grade school. Back then more adults smoked than not. I was a bit disheartened as the description on the booking website listed the house as non-smoking.
I was expecting to see a desk, or somewhere to check in. There wasn't. There was a hallway with lots of doors. As I looked at the doors I noticed one had a piece of paper taped to it with my name on it. Looking down, there was a key in the doorknob. Apparently this was my room.
Opening the door I found a small room with a single bed, a chair, a TV stand and a small dresser. It looked like it had been furnished via a thrift store. To my relief, it looked fairly clean for what it was.
What brought immediate disappointment was there was no window air conditioner in the room, and if the house was air conditioned none of the cool air was making it up into this little room. I didn't see any air vents in the room where cool air might originate. After a day of being out in the heat and humidity, it was a huge letdown to not get a break from it in my room. There was two fans; one ceiling fan and a portable fan on the dresser. I immediately turned them both on full blast hoping it would bring some relief.
I thought about abandoning the room, forfeiting my $28 and finding a "real" hotel. However I was pretty tired and it was now pushing 8 PM. I decided that I could make it one night in this place. I went down to the bike and brought the rest of my things up to the room.
I wasn't super hungry, but at the same time I felt like I needed to go somewhere for supper if for no other reason than to have some sort of Des Moines event. I had heard good things about Zombie Burger and wanted to get there before it closed. As I was getting ready to leave, a guy stuck his head in my door and introduced himself. If I remember correctly, I think he said his name was "Burton." I forget people's names in a heartbeat so don't quote me on that.
He told me that he was a professional figure skater and that figure skating was shut down for the pandemic, so he was running his house as a makeshift hotel for income. He didn't really look like a figure skater, but then again I don't know what one should look like. I suppose that could mean that he skates as part of a performing group, like a "Disney On Ice" situation? I guess not every professional skater is Scott Hamilton.
He then proceeded to give me a tour of the house. He showed me where the laundry room was located, the shared bathrooms and then showed me other rooms I could have rented instead (which seemed weird he would do that.) He then took me downstairs to the living room, dining room and kitchen. We then went out back as he showed me the pool and the hot tub area. None of it looked quite as nice as it did in the photos. The pool was an above-ground version, and the hot tub looked like it had seen a lot of use.
As we were walking around the house a cat was following us, meowing the whole time. Burton said the cat's name was "Baby" because she cries constantly like a baby.
I was looking for an opportunity to cut the tour short, as I just wanted to get to supper and wasn't planning on staying at the house long enough to use any of the amenities. However, it's not in my nature to be intentionally rude, so I continued to listen to his spiel.
When he finally wrapped up the tour, he looked at me in my leather and my boots and then said, "I notice you have a spur on your boot. Are you a cowboy?" I thought that was a bit of an odd question. I don't think my riding boots look anything like cowboy boots.
I told him that I wear a spur on one boot, and a buddy of mine has the other spur on his boot. "It's a brotherhood thing," I said.
What I didn't take into consideration was what I just told him sounded like to someone from a different contextual reference point. He thought about it for a few seconds and then his eyes lit up and he said, "I know of a few clubs here in Des Moines that you may enjoy." He then proceeded to tell me where the various gay hotspots were located.
I realized what my words and attire may have appeared from his perspective. I actually found the misunderstanding pretty funny, but I didn't want to rudely bust out laughing as he continued to talk about the different alternative gathering spots in the area. I decided trying to correct him would make him feel more awkward than just going along with it, so I just smiled and nodded. I After a moment there was a break and I was able to interject, "Right now I'm just interested in heading out to Zombie Burger."
He gave me directions to get to the restaurant, which thankfully weren't too difficult to follow. I was only a few miles away from Zombie Burger. I thanked him for the tour and headed out to my motorcycle, which had already started to sink in the muddy parking area they provided. It took a little rocking, but I got it loose and rode away. I made a mental note to park more on the downhill slope when I returned so I would have gravity assisting me in the morning.
It was now dark out as I rode through downtown. I found the restaurant without any trouble thanks to Burton's directions. I parked and walked inside.
As it turned out, I had accidentally walked into the take-out counter portion of the restaurant. The guy behind the counter directed me to walk around the building, where I found a hostess who seated me at the bar.
They had a lot of burgers on their menu, to the point of being overwhelming. I asked the bartender what burger is the most popular, and she said the "Walking Ched" was by far the one that gets ordered the most. I said to bring me one, along with fries and a peanut butter banana shake.
She asked what size burger I wanted, "small, medium or large?" Not having any point of reference I went with "medium." I sat there waiting and watched "The Great Outdoors" with John Candy playing on the bar TV. I don't think I've seen that movie since the theater in high school.
While waiting a guy a few chairs down had a burger delivered to him. It was huge. I really hoped that wasn't the "medium" size I had ordered.
When my food arrived it was confirmed that the huge burger the other customer had ordered was indeed the "medium." It was too big. I should have ordered the small. The other thing this burger featured was a top and bottom bun made out of breaded deep fried macaroni and cheese. It also came with two beef patties, bacon, onion, cheddar cheese, mayo and a bunch more macaroni and cheese piled on it.
The burger was good, but I found the non-traditional bun a bit overwhelming. It made it not taste like a hamburger, like more of a pile of ingredients mixed into noodles. It was very difficult to eat, as you couldn't really pick it up like a burger, but when I tried to use and knife and fork I couldn't get a bite that had all the ingredients at once. In retrospect, I should have picked a more traditional burger.
The fries were good, but because of the size of the burger I didn't eat all of them. The milkshake was excellent, by far the best part of the meal.
In a rare occurrence, I didn't eat everything on the plate. I left a few bites of the burger and about half of the fries. I knew I was going to have a hard time sleeping that night as it was, and eating myself into complete acid reflux wouldn't have improved the situation.
I paid for my meal and left to head back to the house or lodge or hostel or whatever it is that I was staying at. As I walked out into the street the night seemed unusually dark. Not sure why.
On my way back I passed a gas station and decided it would be good to fill the tank tonight so that in the morning I can just hit the road. As I was filling up I felt that the area I was in was giving off a bit of an unsafe vibe. Once I had gas I didn't linger and rode back to the house.
I parked the bike, remembering to not roll it all the way up to the flat area and leave it on the slope. I climbed the rickety stairs and was reminded of the stale cigarette smell as I entered the house. In my room I found that Burton had left a long "house rules" packet comprised of a bunch of pages stapled together. I skimmed them and realized I wouldn't be staying long enough to break too many rules.
I turned on the TV hoping to find a baseball game or some sort of sports event. Except the TV wouldn't turn on. I fiddled with the obvious things like making sure it was plugged in, before I gave up and decided I could live a night without TV.
I sat down in the chair. Not very comfortable. It was the kind of chair you could use while tying your shoes, but not something that you would want to relax in with a book. As I sat there I realized I could hear every conversation going on in the house, and there seemed to be a lot of them.
I called my wife, but didn't talk too much about where I was staying as the walls have ears. No sense offending anyone.
Afterwards I decided I might as well shower and call it a night. I went into one of the shared bathrooms. It was interesting. Clean enough, but definitely the bathroom of an old house that looked like it had been non-professionally remodeled. There were a ton of toiletries, shampoos, etc. to choose from, but they all looked like it was the remnants of what was left behind by previous guests. I brought all my own so I decided to skip the amenities provided.
To my surprise, the bathroom door did not have a lock on it. I thought this rather strange for a place having shared bathrooms. They abide by the "door open: bathroom is available, door closed: bathroom is in use," policy.
The shower had a small window that looked down on the rickety outdoor stairway I used to access the second floor. That was interesting. There appeared to be no activity so I quickly showered and it's likely nobody saw me. With my body, had anyone been peeping in they would have been on the losing end anyway.
I laid down on the bed, which I discovered was rock hard. As I laid there I could hear people chatting, and the wall next to me was vibrating from the washing machine in use on the other side. Although I had tried to limit how much I ate, I still ate too much. But the worst was the overwhelming heat and humidity.
I turned the ceiling fan on full blast, and pointed the room fan directly at me. I then laid on top of the covers and was still miserable hot. This was going to be a long night.
At one point someone went outside next to the hot tub and had a loud phone conversation. With the paper thin walls it sounded like they were right in my room. I banged on my window hoping they would get the hint, but they didn't.
Sometime late I finally succumbed to exhaustion and fell asleep. The sleep wasn't deep though, and I continuously woke up throughout the night due to my discomfort.
I got up in the middle of the night a couple of times to use the restroom. Both times there was someone having a rousing conversation somewhere downstairs that was clearly audible. I kind of wondered when these people sleep?
In hindsight was this room worth the $28? Maybe, maybe not. It definitely wasn't worth $29!
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This page last updated on 11/05/2021