REAXblog

I slept on the couch in Jean’s cabin. It wasn’t long enough for me of course, but wasn’t bad. As usual, I woke up before everyone else. I don’t really remember what I did, probably hung around and talked to anyone who was up. We all gathered for a big breakfast; Jean arrived back again with Ella in tow but not Troy, who was shipped out. They seemed to be in good spirits.

I moved my van so that Barry and Mandy could squeeze out of the driveway, in doing so, I slammed Dave’s  monster truck, which he mentioned was alright. Neither vehicle seemed worse for the wear. After breakfast, Izzy and I headed back to Minnesota. We stopped in Blaine, and I watched more ultimate, but not for too long. Izzy was intrigued but he is not like me and wouldn’t be happy to watch all day. We continued on to Izzy’s place in central Minneapolis where we chatted and he made me lunch. I left, I don’t know, around 1pm or something?

It was east on I-90. I felt tired, sleepy, as I frequently was in the midday after eating. I stopped at a travel station and picked up some energy drinks. Monster M-80s have become my drink of choice, on sale, 3-for-5. I also dumped a few more quarts of oil in Van Go. I was getting low, two left from the case of 12 I had purchased in Bozeman. I drove on, but Van Go never felt quite right.

I called Jay - my cousin - in Madison, and asked if he’d like to get together for dinner. Yes! I had never really hung out with Jay much and only briefly met his wife - it had been something like 5 years now. I pulled in to their apartment in Madison after gassing up. I added more than 19 gallons to my twenty gallon tank, I’d got more than 400 miles out of that one for the first time. 20+ MPG, too.

At Jay’s place, his wife made some nice spaghetti, which we ate with abandon. Later on, Jay showed me around Madison, around the capital where he worked, around the campus area. We looked at fine girls and enjoyed some ice cream from a special icre cream place they have there. It was getting late, and I still had to make Chicago, so we cut the tour a little short; I drove Van Go off into the night.

In Illinois, the exit signs get all wonky. I paid a toll here, but who know how far it was to Chicago? I’d see a sign, O’hare, turn off here, and think I was close, but I was wrong. Trucks were everywhere, even this close to midnight. They raced each other, passing freely and often. I tried to stay out of the way. I paid another toll, and another, and eventually reached my exit, near Wrigleyville. I somehow got turned around, and suddenly my map made no more sense. I drove in each direction to get my bearings, something very difficult to do in Chicago, as they run street into street and avenue into avenue, and finally got re-tracked.

I parked off Magnolia Avenue, in the north side. I called Micah, and he came down from his cousin’s apartment to get me. I hadn’t seen him in more than a year, but it felt like it’d been just a week or something. We hugged it out, I grabbed my sleeping bag and headed upstairs. I was introduced to Alvin (Micah’s cousin) and promptly went to sleep.