Picture of the Day - September 2010

I'm sure most people who read this (2 out of the 3?) know that I spent 2010 working on a project where I took one photo each day. That was pretty much the only rule; it could be the most exciting thing that day, something I thought was pretty, or just a hastily assembled still life because it was late and I had forgotten to take a photo earlier. All photos are taken with the same camera, and are unedited (except for one or two that are cropped). I still haven't broken the habit of carrying a camera around with me everywhere, and it is odd to look back on my life in a series of 365 photos.

Click to enlarge.

September 2010

September 1st

September 2nd

September 3rd

September 4th

September 5th

September 6th

September 7th

September 8th

September 9th

September 10th

September 11th

September 12th

September 13th

September 14th

September 15th

September 16th

September 17th

September 18th

September 19th

September 20th

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September 22nd

September 23rd

September 24th

September 25th

September 26th

September 27th

September 28th

September 29th

September 30th

EoB: Bamboozlery and Boise

I'm continuing to repost (post-dated) diary entries from my trip. I'm in DC now, but if you scroll down you can relive my Oregon Trail odyssey in real time. As always, pictures are click to enlarge.

Before getting to Boise, we figured we had enough time to stop off and see Shoshone Falls. but, we didn't have enough milage to take the scenic route along highway 30, so we were just going to pop off, look at the falls, and pop back on gain. We followed the brown signs to "waterfalls" but were BAMBOOZLED! Bamboozled onto the scenic route and we didn't even see the falls! To be fair, the scenic route was quite pretty during the second half, but the first half was all strip malls and no Shoshone falls. Incredibly disappointing to be hoodwinked in such a way.

The scenic route did redeem itself with multiple crossings of the Snake River:


And it did get pretty:


But this is not Shoshone Falls:


We got to Boise, had dinner and bounced around while we waited for Kristen, our couchsurfing host, to get off her shift at work. She took us home where Amy went to bed and I went out with her and her friends to a goodbye party. Our first stop was at her friend Angel's house, which is so cool. It's a converted grocery/corner store, so the whole first floor is big open space. She even turned the deli counter into a mini bar.

Idaho State House:


We took a (five dollar!) cab downtown to Mulligan's, a silly bar that reminded me of McFadden's, for (two dollar!) drinks. Once the goodbyes to the kid who was moving had been said, and we picked up a friend named Eric, we headed to other, more legitimate, places.

Woke up at 9 the next morning and hung out around Kristen's amazing apartment and wandered neighborhood until lunch. A few of her neighbors grow corn (!) in the little space between their sidewalks and curbs, which is SO COOL. We went to lunch at Donnie Macs Trailer Park Cuisine, as awesome as it sounds. We met Angel and Eric there, and sat on couches in the parking lot surrounded by old toilets used as planters. Inside the garage, they had a car on risers that had been converted into a table. Some little kids were eating there when we arrived (and we wanted to take advantage of the amazing weather), but Amy and I made sure to get a photo op.




Across the Street from Donnie Mac's was the Spearmint Rhino! When Amy was prepping for our trip, she Googled "Boise Night Life." The first thing to pop up was The Spearmint Rhino, a sleezy strip club with a website to match. Anyway, we joked about it the whole trip, and were absolutely thrilled to just stumble upon the Best Chest in the West!



After lunch, Kristen took us on a walking tour of Boise and the Boise State campus. We saw the blue turf, as promised. Boise is definitely a city, but it's super friendly and Kristen kept seeking people on and off campus that she knew. The city is also relatively small - the perfect size for biking.


After lolling about by the river a bit, we went to a few different happy hours, and then to Live after Five. Every Wednesday afternoon, there's live music and a beer garden in the center of town. It was really nice and had some pretty epic people watching.



Back at Kristen's, we hung out for a bit and collected her boyfriend to go to dinner at a brewery just out of town where I had amazing polenta. A lot of people know that polenta is something I feel passionately about, and I was very glad to see this incredibly underrated item on a restaurant menu.

We were all too tired to go out agin so we played with the kitty, chatted a bit and went to bed. This morning we ran a few errands downtown before heading out again. We stopped at a little coffee shop that happened to be near Kinkos for some coffee before hitting the road, and Eric was the barista! It was all very serendipitous and exciting and a really nice ending to an absolutely amazing stop in Boise.

There hasn't been much on our drive so far today. (Literally, ranches in Eastern Oregon are 100 miles apart, not to mention small towns or gas stations). It's beautiful but desolate. We listed to a really awful right wing advice show on AM radio, and the first Britney Spears CD, and stopped for lunch in the bustling hamlet of Burns. We've decided to stop in Bend for the night to make the car rop off and catching a bus easier tomorrow. I'm looking forward to a sketch motel.

I can't believe our trip is almost over! It's so spacious and free here that I get a littler claustrophobic and scared thinking about flying back East. But that's in a week or so, and for now, we have the Oregon badlands!


~L

EoB: Children of the Corn and Oregon Trail in Real Life

The Mississippi was pretty cool. It was small because we were so far North, and my pictures are pretty lame, but it was my first time seeing it. How American!


Shortly after passing through Iowa City, we decided to stop in West Amana to sit in the World's Largest Rocking Chair. We got a bit lost trying to find West Amana, but we flagged down a friendly farmer who directed us to Regular Amana. Once there, we found out that the Amana Colonies (Regular, East, West, South and High Amana) are a Quaker resort! We had lunch at the Amana bakery and bought postcards at the Amana bookstore and learned about the history of the town, and marveled at all the couples wandering about. Then we headed to the furniture shop to see the chair.

This is what Iowa looks like:


The chair was not a joke - it was pretty big and carved out of solid walnut. However, the sign behind it informed us that the chair had been downgraded from World's Largest to Iowa's largest! I would like to know what other state had the nerve to build a bigger chair. (**addendum: it's Oklahoma. Figures. The chair is no where near as awesome looking as the Iowa one**).



Anyway, back to route 80 and on to Omaha. We drove for about 4 hours through various levels of corn. No children in sight!! (Contrary to popular knowledge, Children of the Corn was filmed in Iowa, not Nebraska. We were a bit scared of the drive/running out of gas). Look how safe we were from being abducted:


It also down-poured, the kind you cant really drive in. But it cleared up for Omaha.

Our couchsurfing host, Marissa, lives right downtown in a really cool modified loft above a bank. After getting settled, we went to a brewery down the street for dinner and had Nebraskan beer. After dinner, we went to another apartment building to meet up and hang out with Marissa's friends before going out.


They all worked as food scientists for Con-Agra, which was a crazy weird concept that Amy and I had never really heard of. Marissa conducts test to see if people like the food. She has a masters degree in food tasting! Her friends did product development and stuff. It was pretty niche and interesting. Also interesting was that they were all transplants. I can't imagine moving to Omaha for work right now. Omaha!

But, Omaha nightlife was pretty exciting. We went to a country western dance club that was actually called the Whiskey Tango. There were two party busses parked out front (school busses painted purple and red). The first was filled with bachelorettes, and the second filled with actual cowboys! They were wearing hats and plaid shirts tucked into Levis and big belt buckles and some even had boots!

And the best part: frequent line dancing kept occurring! Anyway, we went home at 2 am; totally successful evening.

We were up bright and early this morning to try an be on the road by 8. On the way out of Omaha, we stumbled upon the Omaha farmers market which was pretty awesome, and huge. We got coffee, breakfast burritos, and Omaha farmer's market t-shirts.


Back on good ol' I-80 we encountered a ton of traffic all the way to Lincoln. It didn't take long to notice that every other car was filled with people wearing red and yellow - there was a Nebraska State Huskers game at 11. We even saw people tailgating in the median! The highway median!

Our next stop was a brief on and off the highway for a photo-op with the world's largest covered wagon (which is now a golf shop). Then on to Gothenburg, Nebraska, home to the Pony Express Museum, the World's Largest Plow and the Sod House Museum.



The Pony Express Museum was inside of an original Pony Express Stop. It was small, but informative. Across the street was a museum on the history of Goethenburg, a town of 3,000 which has been around since it was settled by a bunch of Swedes in the Pony Express days.

The Sod House Museum was the best. It had a sod house (like the pioneers used to live in) a bunch of Old West artifacts, a buffalo made out of barbed wire, a covered wagon, and a fun little old lady who regaled us with tales of Gothenburg's wild west past. We actually learned quite a bit. We also saw the World's Largest Plow there.



This is me dying of dysentery. ie, we played Oregon Trail in Real life the entire way through Nebraska.


We grabbed lunch at a diner called Lisa's Kitchen, and then cruised downtown Gothenburg (the number one economic sector is alfalfa farming).



Ever since, we've been watching the corn roll away into the great plains. We just crossed the Colorado border, turned back our clocks, and should be in Denver by dinner.