Ely (rhymes with mealy) redux

I woke up somewhere in Kansas. The benefit of 25-hour days is apparent, by shifting one time zone per day I have been able to keep up a pretty good pace and still get up reasonably early. I walked across the parking lot to collect my complimentary breakfast and the first thing I noticed was the cloudless blue sky. The second thing I noticed was the cold. I tried blowing vapor rings in the still air, as always without success. The sun shone down like a cold, hard, diamond.

After a pleasant breakfast I hit the road, top up, windows up, and heater on. Before long I was hurtling across the high plains, especially appreciative of the higher speed limit when I crossed into Colorado. The fields were lightly covered with snow, which on the lea side of embankments had formed curvaceous structures. I snapped a couple of pics on the fly and then flew on.

I was still one hundred miles shy of Denver when the first snow-capped peaks rose over the horizon. Passing through the city was easy enough (note: I did not have a chance to tell you yet that St Louis drivers are the worst I encountered on this trip) and up into the mountains I went.

Wow! I’ll say it again: Wow! Interstate 70 west of Denver is a minor engineering marvel through some unbelievable scenery. Finally I just had to put the top down. I got out of the car to stretch and had quite a headrush. Who stole all the oxygen? I seems I was almost at Vail Pass (10,600 feet). Heading down the Western Slope I stopped in Vail to put on my jacket. Later I stopped for lunch and couldn’t get my fingers to work. The top went back up.

I’d never been through that part of eastern Utah, and boy does it look cool when the Sun is going down. I took a couple of pictures. Somewhere east of I-15 I left I-70 and headed out into the little-road version of the desert on Highway 50. Once it got dark I only stopped once more, to see what a 30-second exposure of the vast night sky would look like. I’ll let you know, but in retrospect I think I messed them up. I had to turn off auto focus but I don’t recall manually setting the focus to infinity.

Heading out into the desert night, I saw a sign that said “Next Services 110 Miles”. No problem, I had plenty of fuel and the car was running perfectly. An hour later I passed a sign reading, “Next Services 40 Miles.” I had to laugh. I wonder how many people have seen that and thought, “Man, I’m not sure I can make it 40 miles,” and turned back, only to see another sign 30 miles later reading “Next Services 40 Miles.” I mean, sure it’s good to know how far it is to the next gas station, but just what are you going to do about it? Perhaps the sign should have said, “Next Services 40 Miles. If you’re not sure you’re going to make it, pull over while you still have gas to run your air conditioner and get help.”

Now I’m in Ely (rhymes with mealy), drinking with the Lord, as Pants says. The Casinos are close by and the beer is free there, but I have no time for cards tonight.

I’ll put up the photos (and add a couple to this post) later. The top was up and the windshield dirty, so there aren’t very many good ones.

17 thoughts on “Ely (rhymes with mealy) redux

  1. I am recalibrating the squirrel alert system – the previous one had a feedback problem where merely posting the alert increased the measure of SSDC chatter, leading to a heightened alert.

    Speaking of Squirrels, Jesse is now a proud poppa. I got an email from him that, while brief did say that all were healthy.

    Congratulations, Jesse!

  2. The final episode? I claim that you’re homeless until you’ve rented your own cheerless bunker in which to hang your hat; crashing at you brother and Marianna’s place doesn’t count.

    I challenge you — make apartment-hunting in Prague compelling reading, while simultaneously writing a novel in 30 days.

  3. I won’t actually be doing apartment hunting for a few weeks; I’ll be housesitting here while pL and Marianna bum around the US.

    Rest assured, America! There’ll be a Seeger roaming your highways for a few more weeks yet. Only this one will have a fiancee in tow.

    Meanwhile, I’ve got a couple of episodes and a new poll to post, but there is technology I must first prodcure. How do you say WiFi/Router/Firewall in czech? If that turns out to be exhorbitantly expensive, how do you say “ethernet cable for hooking two computers together without going through a router?” Heck, I can’t even remember the right name for that cable in English. John S. mentioned it in a comment a while back, but that was many beers ago.

  4. Whoa!! Hold it right there pardner! What’s up with the “recent comments” section? It’s a freakin “alcohol and addictions help forum!!??”

    I come here for entertainment not help.

    / I’m no quitter! Bartender, a round for all my friends!

  5. I missed that odd turn of events. I wonder if feedsweep or haloscan was hacked by temperance nazis. This site would be a logical target for temperance nazis.

    As for entertainment, I can’t help you there.

    At any rate, things seem to be back to normal now.

  6. Somewhere in this town there is a WiFi/Router for sale, I’m sure of it. It’s getting pretty annoying not being able to post new episodes.

  7. At 9:00 a.m. PST on Tuesday, Nov 9, your “Recent Comments” side bar has been crosslinked to another site, not Muddled Ramblings.

    And, uh, it’s a rather, um, interesting site. Let’s just say I clicked two of the links and I now figure I am in violation of several very well conceived internet access rules here at work. I expect an HR representative and security to walk into my office at any time to escort me out of the building.

    Either shut down that side bar, or sue Haloscan, that’s my advice.

  8. Whoa, just refreshed my browser, and things went back to normal. (Well, as normal as they get around here.)

    Anybody else experiencing this phenomenon? Actually, a little link to a random other blog could be cool, like the poem.

    A third refresh just returned no comments at all. This is a very dynamic site you have here!

  9. I’ve seen said phenomenon. When I first opened the blog a few minutes ago, the sidebar was linked to “boxingForum.pl”.

    I’m sure those non-western-character-set-using folks were having a fascinating exchange about the sweet science, but I couldn’t read a bit of it.

    One reload later, normalcy (or at least what passes for that around here) reigns.

  10. I poked around the various bits of paper and whatnot she left for me here and I didn’t find anything. I’m assuming pL knows…

    [modified post to correctly reflect that I wrote it, not pL]

  11. After a protracted conversation with the (very patient) computer guy, my hardware is on the way and I’ll be able to put my computer on pL’s broadband connection. Yippee! My brand-new English-czech Dictionary wasn’t much help – it doesn’t even have the word “computer” in it. Finally I got exactly what I wanted, and it’s on the way! Yippee!

    As an aside, I went into a bookstore today to get a dictionary. The only catch: I didn’t know how to say dictionary. I had tried to memorize it the day before, but It hadn’t fully stuck. I greeted the storekeeper (Dobry den!) and said “Anglicky Chesky” while waving my hands back and forth. “Slovnik?” asked the woman. “Ano! Ano!” said I, and a deal was struck. She continued to say many more things to me in czech. She was nice and all, but I haven’t a clue what she was going on about, and considering my purchase, I’m not sure why she thought I might, unless perhaps she was impressed by the smooth and confident way I said “Dobry den.”

    I couldn’t even understand the number she said when she told me the price, so I handed her a bill I hoped was big enough. It was, and I was on my way.

  12. Marianna made it to New Mexico last night and is well and safe, but tired from the very long journey. We may all get together this afternoon. When I left for work this morning, Carol Anne, Gerald, Lee, and Marianna were all conscious and having coffee and a bite to eat.

  13. The weird “recent comments” phenomenon happened again this AM.

    When the site first loaded, the recent comments sounded suspicious at best. (Heeding Keith’s warning about Network Police & HR, I didn’t click on any.) Two refreshes yielded no recent comments at all, but the third time was the charm. It is always good to see comments from the usual suspects.

  14. I have a diffusion of responsibility problem going between haloscan (the comment guys) and FeedSweep (the guys that turn the recent comments XML into the html you see). I think it’s feedsweep, but they don’t. I’m looking for alternatives.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *