Road Trip

My wife and I drove to Sioux City and back this weekend to pick my daughter up from her two-week stay with her Mother. It's the type of trip that lends itself to idle thoughts and observations.......

When driving at the speed limit of 75 mph on I-90 and I-29, I got passed by other vehicles far more frequently than I passed anyone. The price of gasoline may be causing problems, but not enough to cause people to slow down. For the record, I averaged about 32 mpg for the trip, with a high of 36 thanks to a cool morning that kept the a/c off and gale-force wind assistance.

That wind was making things interesting for a boatload of fishermen on the Missouri River Saturday morning. Their boat was bobbing considerably amid the whitecaps as they were trying to sit still and fish. It seemed to me that the risk/reward ratio was getting a bit too high, but I'm not a fisherman.

In reference to a recent post by Dale over at Faith in Honest Doubt, I should note that I also saw a rare sight; a two-tone (blue over gray) Chevette moving apparently under its own power at highway speed on I-90 near Chamberlain.

We pick a motel more or less at random when we go there, and this time we chose the Quality Inn basically because it was conveniently located near both the riverboat casino and the street we needed to take to get my daughter. The motel itself was adequate, but the attached restaurant had a buffet with the best prime rib I've had in a very long time.

As for that casino, it was busy as usual on a Saturday night. My wife and I both like to play the penny machines. I treat it like I used to treat pinball; a source of cheap amusement. The "riverboat" description is amusing if technically accurate; it is on the water and accessible only by gangplanks, and does appear to be capable of independent floatation, but it's definitely not designed to go anywhere.

On the way back we saw a railroad car being hauled by two trucks; one with the box and one with the base and wheels. I hadn't seen that before, and for some reason it hadn't occurred to me that it was done.