Southeast bound and down

Loaded up and truckin' to Denver

Aug 09, 2023

OK, that title is pretty cliche, and I’m driving a U-Haul not an eighteen wheeler, but there are two good songs that always pop into your head when you’re road trippin’, and that’s one of them:

The other is of course…

I’m helping my buddy Rick get his mother moved into her new living arrangements in Denver, her home town. She came to the Bitterroot during the plandemic but wants to be back near her friends. Rick thought I might like getting away from the pond weeds for a week. So far it’s been fun. (and it gives me time to put up a stackpost)

70 degree evening with a cool breeze, everything is green, Rocky mountains and first time in Wyoming. My joy-o-meter is reading above average today.

We asked the guy at the hotel desk here in Sheridan why everything is so green in August. “It’s raining like crazy and it won’t stop! It’s like we’re in the tropics here!”

Suits me ‘cause I like the springtime-looking landscape more than the usual yellow, dusty August. NPR reports that the earth suffered through the hottest month since the big bang. North-central Wyoming didn’t get the message.

Trip highlights so far: You can’t judge a town only by the outskirts that touch the freeway- it’s blaa wherever you go, unless you are in to the same fast food restaurants and gas marts over and over; then it’s exciting. (“Hey Chloé, there’s an Applebees at the next exit!”) However, judging only by scenery, the cars and the drivers on the outer roads of Bozeman, it does feel a little like a chunk of southern cal has been imported here. Two cars that were blocked in their own lane cut in front of me without a glance or a thank you wave for the space I gave them. In the Bitterroot you usually get some kind of friendly gesture. In Japan it’s customary for the guy who pulled in front to put on the hazard lights for a couple seconds to say, “thank you/thank you/than….”.

When I-90 splits from I-94 and heads south toward Wyoming, you enter a section where you’re driving through the Crow Nation for about an hour. Rick made sure we gassed up just before that. He says you don’t want to be stuck among the Crow for any reason. I expected some flat, Dakota-esque stretch with tumbleweeds, shanty-towns, rusted cars and refrigerators and rough-looking taverns, but it was beautiful. It kind of reminded me of the Paulouse, only with more trees, streams and the Rockies shooting up in the distance. Every few miles there would be a green freeway sign with a town name on it. Under the town name it would say, “NO SERVICES”.

I gotta cut this short as we’re loading up and truckin. Here’s a few happy memes to brighten your day: