Driving Across the Prairie

I drove for six hours today.  Probably the longest I've driven in a while, if not ever-- I did have that ridiculous road trip from Chicago to Montreal once, but we swapped drivers a lot.  My colleague (and project manager), Tim, offered to take over, but I was actually having fun most of the time.  It helps that the speed limits were high and it was mostly in Wyoming, where no one seems to care about speed.  Unfortunately it was mostly on two-lane highways and there was kinda a lot of passing required.  Gets nerve-wracking after a while, especially driving a rental with an underpowered engine with no pickup, and the roads are hilly and curvy.

So now I'm in scenic Custer, South Dakota, where I'll be taking a look at another gravel road test section.  Livin' the dream, I tell ya.  At least I have a good job and I'm staying busy!

Ooh, one funny story from the road... We stopped at a rest area in the middle of nowhere, Wyoming, which was obviously not in an area with a) an abundant water supply or b) a sewer system.  Therefore, instead of flush toilets, they had vault toilets (aka latrines).  Let me say that these were the cleanest and freshest smelling latrines I have ever encountered in my life.  Really nothing to complain about.  Well, there was a family with stereotypical Georgia accents (think something out of an antebellum romance movie) where the woman and the daughter (despite the fact that "Mom, I really have to pee" and the nearest town is about 40 miles away) refused to use the toilets.  The girl kept "trying" as in lifting up the lid and screaming "EWWWW" and then they were all bitching nonstop: "why would they do this" and "I can't believe they don't have toilets" and "what is wrong with them??".  Some tourists should stick to the interstates.  And east-coasters need to understand just how EMPTY our part of the country is.

I tell ya though, my stir-crazy feelings during the long drive today are not making me optimistic for my next two trips, which will be driving all over eastern Colorado (AKA Kansas West) for airport inspections.  At least I won't have to drive for those, though CDOT's truck has a terrible suspension so the drive won't be comfortable.