60cities 2days - day two

I wake up in the downstairs bedroom of a home in glenwood iowa.

and it is glorious.

Mike gives me a huge spoon and i eat a big bowl of raisin bran. i never liked raisin bran before about three years ago, but let me tell you, theres something delicious and amazing about that stuff. its kinda gross though if you think about it.

i chill out in glenwood for about two hours, watch some cartoons, swing by the cemetery and then im on my way to kansas city.

kansas city, hey hey hey. what a great city to travel through. i mean, its part of missouri even though you might expect it to even be a part of kansas, but it isnt, its kansas CITY.

there was a rollercoaster along the road i saw as i was driving, and that was about the most fun i had there.

ok, so as i was going along the road to st. louis, i noticed that for some reason, that stretch of road is loaded with all these adult superstores. there are signs everywhere. i remember a specific instance i saw a long group of them as i was listening to a fiona apple record.

i wonder...what are these adult superstores? why do they call them superstores? what kind of fun things must be inside.

i can only assume that because it has the word "adult" in the name, it has to be something only adults would like. maybe it was loaded with diet cokes and vhs tapes of c-span, adults seem to like that stuff.

maybe ill never full comprehend the mystery of what is sold in these adult superstores. i couldnt look inside cause the windows were blacked out. maybe they were watching a movie or someone was in there trying to sleep.

a couple hours later, the sun went down. it got dark outside. real dark.

i had been driving for almost six hours before i finally made it into st. louis. i was tired and delirious.

i also got to a certain point where i didnt know where i wa. yeah, i was lost. i did the first thing i could think of, i called my dad.

the conversation was something like this:

Brandon: Hey...whats up.

Darren: Hey son! I'm at a church thing right now!

Brandon: (under my breath) Oh...F*&$...S@#*!

Darren: ...what?

Brandon: Nothing, I cant talk to you (hang phone up)

I eventually found my way out of there, and narrowly risked crashing my car in the middle of a grafitti laced tunnel so i could take this picture for your viewing pleasure. if you look close you can see the arch, and youd better look cause taking this picture wasnt easy.

then i was on to peducah kentucky, the second best place in america to get killed by idiots, or in this case one idiot. second only to laramie, a hotspot of yesterday. i had been driving now for a good nine or ten hours, and i was feeling it.

i stopped at a truck stop in nashville at 3am. i bought two 5 hour energy shots to try to keep myself going. i knew i should have stopped and slept for a little bit, but i had to do the ballsy thing andd just keep on truckin.

when the girl at the counter asked me my age so i could buy the energy shots, i couldnt exactly remember. was i born in 1987? 1988? yeah, it was something like that.

i ride on through chattanooga, slapping my face to stay awake hoping the sun will come up soon. i roll down the windows and blast abba on the stereo. i can stay awake. i can keep going to columbus.

i cross the georgia state line sometime around 5am. it feels so good to breathe in the georgian air. i make it into atlanta about an hour and a half later.

those folks in that city are crazy. theyre going 90mph in bumper to bumper traffic so they can get to wherever the crap they work. no job is so important that you have to drive like a total freaking idiot to get there, but i reckon some people feel different. i finally made it out of there as the sun was rising to the east, the left side of the car.

it was one of the most beautiful sunrises i could remember in a long time. the georgian sky looks different than anywhere else i have ever lived. the rising sun glows on the horizon and the clouds come in the most beautiful and vibrant colors.

i drive for an hour and a half to columbus with the windows down breathing in the morning air. i leave my arm out the window feeling the moist air on my hands.

i had been driving for 17 hours with the only stops being for gas. i was tired, feeling almost half dead. i was delirious and was losing sense of where i was and why.

but i was happy

i was home