The drive seems like a blur that includes about 16 hours and 900 miles.
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Shortly after getting out of the SLC metropolitan area, we passed into the state of Idaho.
Neither Tomko nor I had a very good idea of what the upper, leafy part of the potato plant looks like. At the beginning of Idaho, we saw a lot of corn and occasional hay, but nothing else: Particularly, we expected to see fields and fields of unidentified crops, which we could quickly assume to be potatoes.
By observation, Tomko and I determined that potatoes have above-ground parts that are kind of like soybeans in height and greenitude. We have not yet checked with the internet to verify this one way or another.
We were ahead of schedule--we were going to Portland and then leaving for Olympia at 2am--so we were somewhat leisurely about our drive. We decided to stop in Boise, since who doesn't want to be able to say that they went to Boise? Also, it was about 4pm and I figured that if we wanted to hang out at a public library, then we better do it sooner than later (before all libraries close).
There are many reasons that you will find homeless punk kids hanging out around a library. We ran into several when be pulled into the library, asking Tomko for cigarettes. Libraries are great places because they have: climate-control, electrical outlets, computers and internet access, potable water and sanitary facilities, and because you don't need to justify being at a library. You can hang out and that's just what you're supposed to be doing. If you have no money but want to hang around a nice place for a while, libraries are where it is at.
After we chatted with the punk kids for a while, we went inside. The first thing I remembered to do was to call VW parts places to see if they had headlights that would fit my car. The first place said yes. $62 each, including bulbs and orange plastic bits and so on. Great. Fine.
I am shocked that I managed to get from Baltimore to Boise without front turn signals, without being pulled over a single time.
We went to the place and got the new turn signals. I got someone to come outside with me to see if I was attaching them correctly, and as I was putting in the driver's-side one (the one that simply disappeared and I never got to see the inside workings of), I realized exactly where the hook on the spring was supposed to go. I made sure everything else was lined up and the light was plugged in, then yanked the spring into place. Horray!
The passenger's side one (the one that fell out because I had not placed the spring correctly) was a lot harder and took a lot more time, because unlike the driver's side, this had pieces of the engine blocking most access to the place where you wanted to put the spring. After I repeatedly bruised the top of my hand and knuckles shoving against gravity and springs, and then using miscellaneous silverware from the car as levers, Tomko managed to place the spring onto a piece of metal. It was not the correct piece of metal, but this isn't relevant. I yanked on it and couldn't get it loose, proclaimed Byzantium healed, and we got on our way.
Boise has adoooorable rush-hour traffic wherein we were stationary for about thirty seconds.
Oh, also we got a sleeping bag in Boise. Apparently, my mother reports to me, there were like three sleeping bags in the garage that I could have taken from Maryland but no one checked the garage to find this out.
On and on we drove. We hit Portland around 1am, and then hung out at a gay bar waiting for our friend Davi to get off work an hour later. Then he jumped into our car and directed us to his house in Olympia, Washington, where we quickly fell asleep.
Showing posts with label place: salt lake city. Show all posts
Showing posts with label place: salt lake city. Show all posts
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Saturday, August 14, 2010
Adventuring with Mary and Patience
Since Mary was with us and had her camera, we actually took a lot of pictures of these things that don't have the horrible resolution of my phone camera. You can see our pictures here.
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Our first mission for the day was to drive to Antelope Island. There isn't a lot to say about that that isn't contained in the pictures: We drove about, we saw buffalo and an antelope and various other wildlife and it was terribly exciting. The island is surprisingly large and we spent a few hours there.
When we left, we headed for a thrift store. (First we detoured to Chipotle and ate burritos. Mmmm.) In Utah, thrift stores means Deseret Industries, the Mormon version of the Salvation Army. It was actually an awesome thrift store. We got some cool stuff, like:
- Pillows! We left our pillows at my mother's house.
- A camp set of nesting cookware that screws together nicely including a pan, pot, and cup
- Books to read
- Bags to organize our things so that we can have easier time keeping track of where our stuff is
- Boots for Tomko!
- Small plastic bin to use for laundry and other washing-type uses
And then we went to Temple Square, just for fun. Mary started conversations with a number of missionaries, and they tried to explain Mormonism, although the placards on Mormonism are funny as anything. And Mary brought us back to Clay's, although Clay and Lisa are at some soccer game, so we are watching TV and hanging out for the rest of the night. Perhaps early sleep.
View Larger Map
Our first mission for the day was to drive to Antelope Island. There isn't a lot to say about that that isn't contained in the pictures: We drove about, we saw buffalo and an antelope and various other wildlife and it was terribly exciting. The island is surprisingly large and we spent a few hours there.
When we left, we headed for a thrift store. (First we detoured to Chipotle and ate burritos. Mmmm.) In Utah, thrift stores means Deseret Industries, the Mormon version of the Salvation Army. It was actually an awesome thrift store. We got some cool stuff, like:
- Pillows! We left our pillows at my mother's house.
- A camp set of nesting cookware that screws together nicely including a pan, pot, and cup
- Books to read
- Bags to organize our things so that we can have easier time keeping track of where our stuff is
- Boots for Tomko!
- Small plastic bin to use for laundry and other washing-type uses
And then we went to Temple Square, just for fun. Mary started conversations with a number of missionaries, and they tried to explain Mormonism, although the placards on Mormonism are funny as anything. And Mary brought us back to Clay's, although Clay and Lisa are at some soccer game, so we are watching TV and hanging out for the rest of the night. Perhaps early sleep.
Friday, August 13, 2010
Fueling Patience
Patience had been running off of diesel since Mary had gotten to SLC. We needed to find a place to obtain waste vegetable oil and take it. Here are some complications in this, for those of you who aren't familiar with veggie oil cars:
- you want to use waste oil, but you don't want to use really awful oil like that at McDonalds. No fast food sorts of places at all. I think it's also the wrong kind of oil, hydrogenated, partially-hyd... I don't know, but you can look this stuff up if you're that interested.
- the best places to get this waste vegetable oil is at Asian restaurants. Ideally, you want to get oil that has been used with minimal meat products and that was not used to deep-fry or fry many things. Japanese restaurants are rumored to most often be a success.
- the oil is filtered when it's pumped into the tank, so you don't have to worry about some contamination, but if the oil is black or, uh, generally ucky, it will overwork the filters and require them to be replaced or maybe clog them. All of this is obviously bad.
- at restaurants, waste oil is placed in the back alley just like the dumpster. It's generally right next to said dumpster. They're large metal barrels with lids. You want one that doesn't have a grate on top (you can't stick your suction tube into it) and that doesn't have a lock.
- it is technically illegal to take this from most places because (a) even trash belongs to the restaurant and (b) many restaurants have an agreement with biodiesel-producing companies who buy the waste oil from them, and they are contractually obligated to not let us take it from them.
Anyway, Mary repeatedly told her GPS to find "Food -> Asian" and hitting any random thing that popped up. We would scope out the alleys. If we saw a barrel, we would jump out and inspect. Most didn't have enough oil in them. Two of them were actually bone-dry, which Mary found unusual. But eventually we found some sort of Thai Noodle House that had more than half a barrel full of oil that was definitely not ideal, but it wasn't quite black, so Mary was willing to change out the filters in exchange for actually having fuel again.
We took 30 gallons: 14 gallons into Patience's veggie oil tank, and 16 gallons into three large red gas cans that Mary could use to refill later.
The green bin there contains the pump. The pump is powered off the van battery, in the sense that you pull up the back panel to show the engine (at the back of the van) and hook on little clamps like miniature versions of jumper cables. Then there is a tube flowing in and flowing out. I'm holding the intake tube in the first picture: All I have to do is make sure that the tube remains below the level of the oil in the barrel, and it sucks it up through a series of filters. It passes through more filter in the pump, and then is pushed out into a dispenser nozzle just like a normal gas pump.
After this, we celebrated with a success lunch and went back to Clay and Lisa's house.
- you want to use waste oil, but you don't want to use really awful oil like that at McDonalds. No fast food sorts of places at all. I think it's also the wrong kind of oil, hydrogenated, partially-hyd... I don't know, but you can look this stuff up if you're that interested.
- the best places to get this waste vegetable oil is at Asian restaurants. Ideally, you want to get oil that has been used with minimal meat products and that was not used to deep-fry or fry many things. Japanese restaurants are rumored to most often be a success.
- the oil is filtered when it's pumped into the tank, so you don't have to worry about some contamination, but if the oil is black or, uh, generally ucky, it will overwork the filters and require them to be replaced or maybe clog them. All of this is obviously bad.
- at restaurants, waste oil is placed in the back alley just like the dumpster. It's generally right next to said dumpster. They're large metal barrels with lids. You want one that doesn't have a grate on top (you can't stick your suction tube into it) and that doesn't have a lock.
- it is technically illegal to take this from most places because (a) even trash belongs to the restaurant and (b) many restaurants have an agreement with biodiesel-producing companies who buy the waste oil from them, and they are contractually obligated to not let us take it from them.
Anyway, Mary repeatedly told her GPS to find "Food -> Asian" and hitting any random thing that popped up. We would scope out the alleys. If we saw a barrel, we would jump out and inspect. Most didn't have enough oil in them. Two of them were actually bone-dry, which Mary found unusual. But eventually we found some sort of Thai Noodle House that had more than half a barrel full of oil that was definitely not ideal, but it wasn't quite black, so Mary was willing to change out the filters in exchange for actually having fuel again.
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| I siphoned while Mary operated the pump and nozzle. |
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| Mary regulates the flow of waste vegetable oil. |
After this, we celebrated with a success lunch and went back to Clay and Lisa's house.
Perseids meteor shower in the mountains
Clay's parents recommended that we go up the canyon to watch the meteor shower instead of the salt flats. Mary and her orange 1982 VW Vanagon, Patience, arrived in the late afternoon. We all piled into Patience and then picked up Chris, and the four (five?) of us sped off at a strong forty miles an hour up the mountain to our viewing location.
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It took forever for poor Patience to make it up the hill, and the cars behind us were frequently frustrated into passing us over solid double yellow lines. So that was interesting. We passed ski lodges and kept trying to get to somewhere that was more isolated, less lights, higher location, better viewing, whatever.
Eventually we were like, "Okay, we've climbed high enough, let's park the van on this shoulder here," and then noticed a few cars ahead of us and a sign that said [P] for parking. They weren't making a lot of light, and apparently were also here to see the meteor shower. So we pulled up, taking in the last spot available, and set up shop.
Mary made us all dinner with ingredients from Patience's fridge and using Patience's stove. It involved ghetto thai peanut sauce, broccoli, and peanuts. I am not entirely sure what else was involved. (It was dark.) It got seriously cold during the night, and I put on my green peace hoodie and huddled in the front seat of the van, where the wind mostly couldn't get me, and tried to peer out from the passenger window. I could see the lower end of the sky, where the Big Dipper and Cassiopia were, but I couldn't actually see Perseus or Andromeda, so it was not an ideal viewing location. Eventually, Mary convinced me to get one of her sleeping bags from the van and huddle in that while sitting outside with her, eating our food. I pulled my boots off and instantly climbed into the sleeping bag before my feet had the chance to get cold(er). We sat there for a while and just watched the sky.
View Larger Map
It took forever for poor Patience to make it up the hill, and the cars behind us were frequently frustrated into passing us over solid double yellow lines. So that was interesting. We passed ski lodges and kept trying to get to somewhere that was more isolated, less lights, higher location, better viewing, whatever.
Eventually we were like, "Okay, we've climbed high enough, let's park the van on this shoulder here," and then noticed a few cars ahead of us and a sign that said [P] for parking. They weren't making a lot of light, and apparently were also here to see the meteor shower. So we pulled up, taking in the last spot available, and set up shop.
Mary made us all dinner with ingredients from Patience's fridge and using Patience's stove. It involved ghetto thai peanut sauce, broccoli, and peanuts. I am not entirely sure what else was involved. (It was dark.) It got seriously cold during the night, and I put on my green peace hoodie and huddled in the front seat of the van, where the wind mostly couldn't get me, and tried to peer out from the passenger window. I could see the lower end of the sky, where the Big Dipper and Cassiopia were, but I couldn't actually see Perseus or Andromeda, so it was not an ideal viewing location. Eventually, Mary convinced me to get one of her sleeping bags from the van and huddle in that while sitting outside with her, eating our food. I pulled my boots off and instantly climbed into the sleeping bag before my feet had the chance to get cold(er). We sat there for a while and just watched the sky.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Chilling in SLC
Since arriving in Salt Lake, we have been hanging out at Clay and Lisa's house. It is a cute house with internet access and beer, and we are tired and appreciative of such. This was all going quite well. Tomko was making some sort of dinner concoction of potatoes, fish, and seasoning, and I was arriving home from the pharmacy with the medicine that I hadn't been able to get when we were in Maryland, and Lisa was straightening up while Clay was in the shower.
Suddenly, I noticed that water was coming from near the water heater, where water shouldn't be, and I started shouting for Lisa and Clay and hung up my phone. The sewage pipe had backed up and was leaking all over the laundry room floor. Lisa and I found a wet-vac in the garage and mostly fixed the immediate problem, but we officially could no longer use any water in the house. Clay had some technical discussion with his uncle and they determined that it could be fixed... but Lisa refused to stay in the house, so we all went over to Clay's parents' place, taking Tomko's dish of food with us.
They have the cutest new dog ever. Shadow is small and black and sleek and partially spaniel and partially something black and sleek. (I do not claim to be a dog expert.)
One thing that is interesting about Salt Lake is that it is a DESERT. This nice green grass that Shadow is rolling around in needs to be watered at least once or preferably twice a day. People have built-in sprinklers or ones on timers. Clay's neighbor had one of the ones that waaaaves baaack and fooorth, which is the only kind I remember from sprinklers to run through as a child. Sprinklers. Everywhere.
Clay's father, Jeff, works with water management and told us a lot about how Nevada was trying to take water from aquifers in Utah and how Nevada was screwed out of the Colorado River water from before Las Vegas existed and so on and so on. I never think this much about water. I usually think about "can I drink it?" and "will it make me ill?"
Tomorrow night, there's going to be a meteor shower, and we're going to go somewhere to watch it. Maybe a mountain, maybe the salt flats. Mary and Patience are supposed to arrive here tomorrow evening, so maybe we can camp out in Patience somewhere. We'll find a good spot.
Suddenly, I noticed that water was coming from near the water heater, where water shouldn't be, and I started shouting for Lisa and Clay and hung up my phone. The sewage pipe had backed up and was leaking all over the laundry room floor. Lisa and I found a wet-vac in the garage and mostly fixed the immediate problem, but we officially could no longer use any water in the house. Clay had some technical discussion with his uncle and they determined that it could be fixed... but Lisa refused to stay in the house, so we all went over to Clay's parents' place, taking Tomko's dish of food with us.
They have the cutest new dog ever. Shadow is small and black and sleek and partially spaniel and partially something black and sleek. (I do not claim to be a dog expert.)
 |
| Shadow rolling around the backyard |
Clay's father, Jeff, works with water management and told us a lot about how Nevada was trying to take water from aquifers in Utah and how Nevada was screwed out of the Colorado River water from before Las Vegas existed and so on and so on. I never think this much about water. I usually think about "can I drink it?" and "will it make me ill?"
Tomorrow night, there's going to be a meteor shower, and we're going to go somewhere to watch it. Maybe a mountain, maybe the salt flats. Mary and Patience are supposed to arrive here tomorrow evening, so maybe we can camp out in Patience somewhere. We'll find a good spot.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Trying Not to Get Lost in Utah
Unlike previous maps, this map does not exactly show the route that we took during our trip.
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This is because we're not entirely sure where we went. When we hit point B (Neola, UT) our map seemed to think that we would be able to go straight and continue on that road. We were confronted with a T intersection and picked the right, whereupon we got lost in the middle of the Indian Reservation, where apparently people are not inclined to include street signs or other important markers that might let us have some idea as to where we were going.
Eventually, we got lost again, ended up in Roosevelt, and made a much more reasonable journey from there. (It's sort of a straight shot down Rt. 40 to I-80.)
Driving into SLC on I-80 is pretty fun. It goes zoooooom up and then zooooom down. All the cars know what they are doing and don't want to go careening off the highway, so they're all perfectly reasonable and polite.
We were on our way to Clay and Lisa's new house. It was only a few blocks from the highway, but I got lost again and was required to call Clay. (This usually doesn't happen to me! I have my Google map directions; I don't understand why it's been happening at almost every new city we've arrived in.)
We found it eventually because you can't fail to find things in Salt Lake City due to the SLC grid system. It's amazing, while incredibly confusing to outsiders since it simply sounds like a list of numbers and cardinal directions. We marveled at the house (which has been extensively remodeled) and hung out with Clay's parents and uncle. We ate pizza and chatted and then once the adults left we took some showers and went to sleep on the side room futon.
View Larger Map
This is because we're not entirely sure where we went. When we hit point B (Neola, UT) our map seemed to think that we would be able to go straight and continue on that road. We were confronted with a T intersection and picked the right, whereupon we got lost in the middle of the Indian Reservation, where apparently people are not inclined to include street signs or other important markers that might let us have some idea as to where we were going.
Eventually, we got lost again, ended up in Roosevelt, and made a much more reasonable journey from there. (It's sort of a straight shot down Rt. 40 to I-80.)
Driving into SLC on I-80 is pretty fun. It goes zoooooom up and then zooooom down. All the cars know what they are doing and don't want to go careening off the highway, so they're all perfectly reasonable and polite.
We were on our way to Clay and Lisa's new house. It was only a few blocks from the highway, but I got lost again and was required to call Clay. (This usually doesn't happen to me! I have my Google map directions; I don't understand why it's been happening at almost every new city we've arrived in.)
We found it eventually because you can't fail to find things in Salt Lake City due to the SLC grid system. It's amazing, while incredibly confusing to outsiders since it simply sounds like a list of numbers and cardinal directions. We marveled at the house (which has been extensively remodeled) and hung out with Clay's parents and uncle. We ate pizza and chatted and then once the adults left we took some showers and went to sleep on the side room futon.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
Unceasing Corn: The Nebraskan Odyssey
Our intended route was from Omaha to Medicine Bow National Park, Wyoming, but this is not what happened to us.
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Upon leaving Omaha, we were made part of a gang war with automatic weapons at a Texaco. I believe the dispute was over the grade of their meth-corn. Wait, no, that's not right. We left in usually-trusty Byzantium, but her "Check Engine!" light came on. This was alarming, because it could mean roughly four hundred things, major or minor. Luckily, right off the highway was a huge Volkswagen dealership and repair shop. We pulled in there and they ran diagnostics. The sum of the troubles is that the car is old and could use some new widgets and wiring, but still runs good. While waiting for a while, we enjoyed free wireless internet and coffee. I abused the hell out of the free infinite coffee part, let me tell y'all. Eventually we left and got back on the highway, and the next several hours are a fugue-like dream that involves nothing but corn. Nothing. Endless fields and flatlands. I thought Indiana was bad! You readers are lucky.
TOMKO: Every time I see one of those little side streets, I want to drive down it until I get to a house, knock on the door, and demand WHYYYY.
CHRIS: There is land beyond the corn.
TOMKO: What, you mean like soybeans?
The sun began to set and weariness fell upon the drivers after the exhausting sojourn through corn-based nihilism. We saw a sign on the highway for a campground, which turned out to be just a bunch of acres owned by a single guy who rents it out as a camping stopover. He only wanted twelve dollars and change for taking up a spot and pitching a tent for the night. Not a bad deal, I'd say! Especially including the fact that the place had a (questionably up-kept) putt-putt course and a merry-go-round. Also, potable water, bathrooms and hot showers. The night was not offensively cold; sleep came easily, and we broke camp and hit the road early in the morning to finish the last of our trek through one of the most boring--and deceptively expansive--states in our union.
After an indeterminate time and at an indistinguishable place, the land began to slowly elevate and rise up, continuing to gradually do so as we crossed the continental divide. I was relieved to see rocks and hills once again, which I continued to see as we made our way to Salt Lake City, Utah, sleeping a night in a national forest in the interim.
View Larger Map
Upon leaving Omaha, we were made part of a gang war with automatic weapons at a Texaco. I believe the dispute was over the grade of their meth-corn. Wait, no, that's not right. We left in usually-trusty Byzantium, but her "Check Engine!" light came on. This was alarming, because it could mean roughly four hundred things, major or minor. Luckily, right off the highway was a huge Volkswagen dealership and repair shop. We pulled in there and they ran diagnostics. The sum of the troubles is that the car is old and could use some new widgets and wiring, but still runs good. While waiting for a while, we enjoyed free wireless internet and coffee. I abused the hell out of the free infinite coffee part, let me tell y'all. Eventually we left and got back on the highway, and the next several hours are a fugue-like dream that involves nothing but corn. Nothing. Endless fields and flatlands. I thought Indiana was bad! You readers are lucky.
TOMKO: Every time I see one of those little side streets, I want to drive down it until I get to a house, knock on the door, and demand WHYYYY.
CHRIS: There is land beyond the corn.
TOMKO: What, you mean like soybeans?
The sun began to set and weariness fell upon the drivers after the exhausting sojourn through corn-based nihilism. We saw a sign on the highway for a campground, which turned out to be just a bunch of acres owned by a single guy who rents it out as a camping stopover. He only wanted twelve dollars and change for taking up a spot and pitching a tent for the night. Not a bad deal, I'd say! Especially including the fact that the place had a (questionably up-kept) putt-putt course and a merry-go-round. Also, potable water, bathrooms and hot showers. The night was not offensively cold; sleep came easily, and we broke camp and hit the road early in the morning to finish the last of our trek through one of the most boring--and deceptively expansive--states in our union.
 |
| Our surprise campsite even had WiFi! |
After an indeterminate time and at an indistinguishable place, the land began to slowly elevate and rise up, continuing to gradually do so as we crossed the continental divide. I was relieved to see rocks and hills once again, which I continued to see as we made our way to Salt Lake City, Utah, sleeping a night in a national forest in the interim.
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Frederick, MD to Indianapolis, IN
We woke up at the house of our friends, Laura and Noah, in Middletown right outside of Frederick. Being in Frederick cut at least an hour off of our day's drive, and besides we hadn't had the chance to see them for a while.
So our first day of driving didn't actually start at my parents' house, but we let late enough Tuesday evening that it seemed like we might as well stick it into this map.
View Larger Map
When we left Laura's house in Middletown, we had to backtrack a few miles east to Frederick, MD in order to pick up some prescription medication and meet up with Chris at a Rite-Aid. Chris's friends dropped him off and we wandered the store and eventually left en-route to Indianapolis!
A bit about Chris. He's a guy from the Baltimore suburbs. He responded to a post I made on Craigslist Rideshare offering a ride from Baltimore to Indianpolis, Omaha, Denver, Salt Lake City, Portland, Seattle, or Vancouver Island. His plan is to get to Portland, stay there for a few weeks with some friends, and then get a ride up to Alaska, his intended final destination. He buys every third tank of gas and shares driving duties with me so that neither of us fall asleep on the road. Good deal.
Since he had friends in Frederick, he had no problem meeting up with us that morning, and we got underway.
The drive to Indianapolis was largely uneventful. It is a drive that I have taken many times before, because our end destination (in Lafayette) is the house of Penny, Tomko's mother.
On our way, we dropped Chris off at a Trader Joe's near the house of his friend Rachel and planned to meet back up there the morning of Thursday, the fifth.
It was pretty late when we arrived at Penny's house, maybe 10pm, and we crashed out asleep soon after arriving. The following day was full of missions and visitations. We saw Penny's parents and two of Tomko's four siblings, along with a niece and nephew who dropped by. We missed seeing a third sister, Maria, because we fell asleep again before she got off of work. But we did manage to see a good many people before we set off the next day.
So our first day of driving didn't actually start at my parents' house, but we let late enough Tuesday evening that it seemed like we might as well stick it into this map.
View Larger Map
When we left Laura's house in Middletown, we had to backtrack a few miles east to Frederick, MD in order to pick up some prescription medication and meet up with Chris at a Rite-Aid. Chris's friends dropped him off and we wandered the store and eventually left en-route to Indianapolis!
A bit about Chris. He's a guy from the Baltimore suburbs. He responded to a post I made on Craigslist Rideshare offering a ride from Baltimore to Indianpolis, Omaha, Denver, Salt Lake City, Portland, Seattle, or Vancouver Island. His plan is to get to Portland, stay there for a few weeks with some friends, and then get a ride up to Alaska, his intended final destination. He buys every third tank of gas and shares driving duties with me so that neither of us fall asleep on the road. Good deal.
Since he had friends in Frederick, he had no problem meeting up with us that morning, and we got underway.
The drive to Indianapolis was largely uneventful. It is a drive that I have taken many times before, because our end destination (in Lafayette) is the house of Penny, Tomko's mother.
On our way, we dropped Chris off at a Trader Joe's near the house of his friend Rachel and planned to meet back up there the morning of Thursday, the fifth.
It was pretty late when we arrived at Penny's house, maybe 10pm, and we crashed out asleep soon after arriving. The following day was full of missions and visitations. We saw Penny's parents and two of Tomko's four siblings, along with a niece and nephew who dropped by. We missed seeing a third sister, Maria, because we fell asleep again before she got off of work. But we did manage to see a good many people before we set off the next day.
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