Hello again.

This post is long.

It’s been a while since I’ve put up a post. The last time I wrote, I was leaving Seattle. After California, the remainder of the trip was all unplanned. And in many ways more rewarding, too. When you don’t have any expectations, you can never be disappointed. Because of the excitement and enjoyment of it all, I didn’t stay true to any blogging etiquette. My apologies to all of you who check daily (like, one person on good days). I will fill you in on the rest right now.

From Seattle, I made a twelve-hour drive into Emigrant, Montana. I met up with a buddy I met last fall in London, who was working on a ritzy ranch for the summer. We had a blast one day at Yellowstone National Park. That place is such an adventure, not to mention huge. There are so many different types of animals there, all within viewing distance in many of the park’s confines. It is essentially the Safari Zone of the real world (a Pokémon reference to all you heathens. Props to Red and Blue Versions. Special nods to Squirtle).

After Yellowstone, I headed south into Wyoming in order to see Grand Teton National Park. It’s more of a resort park. There’s a ton of resorts there. I met another friend there who was working at one of them. Unless you hike one of the peaks or take a family vacation, there’s not a whole lot of things for you to do there.

I will say, though, that Wyoming’s landscape is extremely diverse. Take a look at some of these photos from one day’s worth of driving East from the Tetons:

The next stop was Mount Rushmore, the only thing worth seeing in all of South Dakota. And they let you know it, too. Everything- EVERYTHING- in tourist and official state publications makes sure you know that it is there. Funny, because when one is not actually in the state of South Dakota, one cannot remember which Dakota Mount Rushmore actually resides in.

South Dakota sucks. Period. To make it even worse, I was there during the opening of the Sturgis Rally. For all of the uninformed: it is the single largest biker rally in the country. Over a million bikers flock to the towns along I-90 for this gayass event. They are the worst group of people on the roads. Traffic laws, driving etiquette, and not taking up the whole road with their mountains of leather and skin clad chumps mean absolutely nothing to them.

Fuck South Dakota.

After that terrible experience, I continued east, into St. Paul, Minnesota. Now, I grew up in the biggest and supposedly best city in the Midwest, but even after just three days in the Twin Cities, I must say that it is the crown jewel of the region. I stayed with another friend I met in London and his plethora of roommates in the house with the most couches in the world. Really. In fact, I even helped pick up a couch one evening.

We spent time doing all things Minnesota: Mall of America, canoeing, biking, and baseball. The Mall of America is obviously the biggest shopping center in the country. Every single store you have ever been to is within its walls. One cannot joke about this in the slightest. Like a full-on Best Buy. Not the cheap mini stores that don’t sell Macs you’d find in other malls. This place had that in addition to a full-on music instrument shop. And the food court had a Chipotle. Righteous.
There’s even an amusement park inside. We were lucky enough that one of the guys who lived in the house had a brother that worked for the mall, and he gave us free day passes to the rides. I don’t care if we were the only people there that weren’t under the age of twelve or without children of our own. It was awesome.

On my way out of Minnesota to Chicago, one of my dear friends got word that I was driving through Milwaukee, or “mill-e-wah-que,” which is Algonquin for “the good land,” (thank you, Alice Cooper. That guy knows how to party.). We went to grab some dinner together, and on the walk over, I saw a freshly mowed hill that was utterly irresistible to roll down. We did it over and over. I’m surprised by how much fun I had in Milwaukee in such a short time. It’s another Midwestern city that doesn’t get its fair share of credit. It’s a shame that I rarely paid it a visit growing up.

After that, I drove through the night for a measly fifty miles to Chicago. Again, this trip has given me a huge amount of perspective on how close together things really are. The end of Lake Shore Drive, which felt like a whole day’s journey to me growing up, is less than ten miles from my old house. What a mindfuck that revelation was.

Chicago was a great time. It was unlike other visits since I moved out of Chicagoland. I treated it like a part of my road trip, which it really was. I did spend most of my time with family, but I had enough time to do some of my own things, too. Like going to see a Friday night White Sox game, which are by large my favorite kind of Sox game to attend (other than postseason, of course, which I have been to once away from The Cell).

I spent time with friends, too. Had a short trip to my buddy’s house in Michigan, which is where I discovered that golf is an incredibly fun game in the company of good friends and lots of beer. Notice I wrote “game” and not “sport.”

Also, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is one of the greatest movies that people won’t immediately appreciate. But that’s okay. If you never had any desire to see it, rest assured, friend- it was not made for you. It contains many hysterical jokes that I had never seen done before in any media, and plenty of references to video games and pop culture that only a 90’s through 2000’s generation young adult could truly appreciate. But, if you ever get the chance to see it, do so, and bask in its greatness.

There was still plenty of road to be traveled between Chicago and Florida. Loaded with Vienna Beef hot dogs (as per my parents’ request), I cruised back down south. The only real point of destination was Mammoth Caves National Park in Kentucky. I wanted to make it down to Florida in time for my aunt’s surgery, so I didn’t have a lot of opportunity to see things in this park. However, it worked out in my favor; every cave within the park requires a guided tour, all of which are pre-scheduled and cost more dolares to be a part of. Except for one, which is a good introduction to a person who is going into a cave for the first time, but far from comparison to the brilliance of Carlsbad Caverns (woot!).  I did go to a really cool cemetery that day, then kept heading south.

Once I was done with Kentucky, I pretty much just wanted to come back and close out the trip. But, some things just cannot go as planned. When I was just south of Macon, Georgia, on the night that would have been my last night of driving, I had to drive through a construction zone on I-75 and accidentally drove over something that shredded my rear passenger side tired to bits. Son of a bitch.

Due to the circumstances of the next day being a Sunday, I had to wait until Monday for the local Ford service center to open. I was stranded in Georgia. I spent that Sunday sleeping and playing New Super Mario Bros. for Nintendo DS. I finally, after four years of owning the game, collected all the level coins. How sweet it is.

That day also made me realize how exhausted I was. It was the first opportunity I had to just stay in one place and do absolutely nothing. I wish that it hadn’t happened, because the sudden crash my body experienced didn’t wear off until days after I returned back to Florida.

I spent some time at my aunt’s house, and then finally came back to my home in Venice, Florida. It’s been over a week since my return. So why the delay in the update? This is because, after restraining myself all summer long, I purchased and have been playing Super Mario Galaxy 2 for Wii, learning to inline skate (read: falling), and, of course, looking for employment.

SMG2 has absolutely redefined gaming in my mind. It is the perfect platformer. It so seamlessly takes everything that video gaming has created- exploring, collecting, beating the clock, powering-up- and somehow throws everything you know about those aspects of gaming to create something entirely new. Every facet of gravity that gaming has come to depend on is gone. You’re in space, and there is no standard anymore. The strangest part is that it feels so incredibly familiar and simplistic when playing it. But it is by no means a cakewalk of a game, like its predecessor. I honestly believe that I have sworn more profanity while playing SMG2 than any other video game I have played in my life.

Inline skating (more commonly known as rollerblading) is a joy. I’ve been on skates for nine days, and can go forward, turn left, turn right, and stop. It’s a work in progress, and is a blast.

As I said, I’m also looking for steady employment, too. The difference between now and before I left is that I am more focused in what I want to do. And that was one of the great benefits to the road trip. After completing my own cross-country road trip, I must confirm what many have said about cross-country road trips: it really does give you some enlightenment.

I don’t want to get into all of the details, but I’ll give you an idea of what it did for me. Life’s struggles happen to everyone at every age. Taking this trip, at age 22, and at this time in my life, was exactly what I wanted and needed. There were struggles throughout the trip. It was not entirely fun and games. There were plenty of conflicts, and no one person has the complete story of what happened during it. Except for me. And I intend to keep it that way.

There were some ideas that I had going out there that turned out to be entirely different than what I had found. I wanted to fall in love with California. Really, I wanted to move out there. I’m absolutely glad I went. It’s a great state. But, it’s not everything that I had pictured it to be. There are far too many negatives to the state, and places that I thought would be golden in my mind were far from it. But that is just my own personal experience. L.A. is not a good place for me right now. It’s full of assholes, fake titties, and traffic. I like nice people, natural titties, and smooth driving. But that’s just me. San Francisco is no pleasant city, either. It’s cold, full of pompous dickheads and Asian tourists who have no idea where they’re headed, and there’s very little to do besides the tourist spots. The surrounding suburbs are alright, but pretty spread out. But again, that’s just me. San Diego is really nice. That’s all one can really say about San Diego. Comic Con was this shit, for sure. But the true joy of California resides outside of all those cities. My best experiences were trekking through the blistering winds of Death Valley, bodysurfing in the 65-degree waves in Santa Monica, and camping underneath the towering trees in Redwood Forest. There’s still a lot of California to be explored.

California was a huge turning point in my trip. It’s where I went through the most angst and frustration, for many reasons. That’s where my struggle came to a climax. But it’s also where I realized that I have no reason to worry. And for that, I’ll always remember the one month I spent there this summer.

Earlier, I wrote that when you don’t have any expectations, you can’t be disappointed. That’s the way I traveled throughout Europe, and during this trip, from Oregon onwards. In my honest opinion, that is the ideal way to travel (but not to have throughout all aspects of your life). You can gain the most knowledge about people, the world, and yourself simply by listening wherever you are. Once I abandoned all real planning, and just went with the general direction of my map, is when the most fulfillment came to me. Yes, planning a journey is exciting, but there’s always something greater out there.

I have one recommendation for you, reader: When you get the chance to travel for an extended period of time on your own- take it. And if you can’t recognize it when it happens, make yourself an opportunity. Do whatever you can. Don’t listen to people that tell you that it’s a bad idea, or you’re crazy, or you should be doing something else with your life. Damn the naysayer. You will be highly rewarded for your efforts.

This whole trip started last November, when I was sitting in a cafeteria in Harrow, London. I said to myself, “Damn, I really like living outside of the United States. I want to do this again for a while.” So I decided to make a list of all the things I wanted to see in America, starting with the Río Grande in New Mexico. Now, I’ve done that and a whole lot more. I’m satisfied with what I’ve seen in America. I’ve got some more things I want to do. It’s time to move on to the rest of the world.