By now everybody knows that Obama picked Joe Biden as his running mate. I think its a good pick, although history has shown that to win, somebody on the ticket needs to be from the south. Biden is from Delaware which isn’t exactly Georgia, although some people might consider Delaware kind of the south. What I find alarming about this pick is that when you put the two last names together, what does it look like? You all know I’m as liberal as they get and am a pretty big Obama supporter. But when I saw an Obama-Biden sign in the paper (you know the ones that have Obama’s name on top and Biden’s directly under it) I did a double take at what it COULD look like. And although I’d like to think most people are smart enough to look past what it looks like, we should not over look the dirty, scummy ways of the Republicans. Subliminally the signs could be changed and although I don’t know if doing things subliminally actually effects people, leave it to the Republicans to try to find a way. All I know is that this is too close of a race to take a chance on wondering if the connection of the names will have an effect. Never underestimate the lengths that the Republicans will go to steal an election. They will lie, cheat, steal, forge, embellish, cover up, and pay off to win an election. I’ve been saying all along that I thought they would win this election because they will find a way to steal it. That being said, the Democrats are the ones who are usually dumb enough to do shit to not only lose but also help the Republicans along the way. Shit, McCain is even using Hillary Clinton in some of his ads. And now this, its almost like they are gift wrapping this tactic for the Republicans to use. And I’m sure that Obama didn’t even consider the names together issue when he made the choice. Or perhaps he said “I realize it, but fuck those bastards, I’m going to do it anyway”. And I’m sure Biden is a fine choice and would probably make a good VP. Either way, this is just more ammo that can be used against the Democrats.

 Hell, if I see it, anybody can see it. And if you don’t see it please let me know because I want to know if I’m the only person out there who sees it.

Even though I just had a vacation 3 weeks ago, I need another one. I have been going pretty much non stop for the past 2 weeks. Granted, its not nearly as bad as all the stuff Dave has been doing, but still, I’ve had very little time to myself lately, which is unusual for me.

Not that I’m complaining, after all, some of the stuff is fun. Yesterday for example was our annual family reunion with my dad’s side of the family. That is always a good time. The Kennedys have touch football, our family has 16 inch softball. We battled to a 14-14 before we had to stop. Because of the tie, the winner of next year’s game gets home field advantage in the World Series.

Today after exercising and eating dinner I went over to help Dave with some more stuff. Tomorrow is probably going to be more of the same. Its ok though, I like helping out anyway I can.

I did have time to think about things though. And I was thinking about cocks. Of course, that’s pretty par for the course with me. But, here is what I was thinking. They say that gays on average have bigger cocks than straight guys. I have a theory as to why this is. Only another guy can truly appreciate a big cock. Even girls who sleep around still aren’t with cock as much as any guy, especially a gay guy. Its safe to say that gay guys see WAAAAAAY more dick than girls or straight guys. When we see a big cock, and I mean a REALLY big cock, we know how to appreciate it and value it as nobody else can. After all, not all guys have big dicks. When we see a really big one, we admire it for what it is: a piece of art.We can look at it and say “holy shit, that thing reminds me of a fire hose.” Or “wow, I wish I could use that as a baseball bat.” Most gay guys don’t get an inferiority complex when we see a guy who has a big dick instead we just drop to our knees and try stuffin the whole damn thing in our mouth. When a straight guy finds out that another guy has a bigger cock, it starts some sort of war in which he has to try to make up for a smaller cock by beating the guy in other things such as sports, loud motorcycles or just a thorough ass beating. As gays, we not only can handle when a guy has a bigger dick than us, but we also hope a guy is larger.

Shit, this would have been much funnier if I had come up with clever names for cock and dick instead of re-using the same terms.

I finally have at least a little bit of time to post. This month of August has really been unusual. It started with my vacation which got postponed a day. Then there was the situation with Dave. Now Danel’s grandma has died. Today I got an invitation in the mail for Cara’s wedding, which is pretty surprising seeing as I really don’t talk to her. The wedding is in Vegas and had I not just taken a trip a few weeks ago I might have gone. So what is next for this month? The month still has a week to go so I guess anything could happen.

Today we went to Dick’s Last Resort in Chicago. I was trying to talk everybody into going to a piano bar called Howl At the Moon afterwards and even volunteered to drive. But everybody else wanted to take the train into the city. Nothing against the train, in fact, I love trains. But, the last train leaves the city at like midnight which means that it would be an early night and most of these bars don’t really start to get going until well past 10. I didn’t let any of it deter me though. I still drove while everybody else took the train. Well, just about everybody else. John was going to take the train but he wasn’t ready in time so he rode with me.

We got down there about 3:30. We wound up being at the same tables we were at the last time we went. Our waitress was really cool, she was a fun chick who I kept jawing back and forth with.  The whole time w e were at Dick’s,  Mark kept taking pictures of everybody’s cleavage and sending them to Rusty and making him guess who each one was. It was pretty damn funny.

Now as you might know, there is no smoking in public buildings in IL. So, everybody had to go outside and smoke right next to the river. Mark’s friend Greg was wearing sandals and while he was smoking sitting over the ledge, one of his sandals fell off and landed in the water. He was trying his damnest to get it and wound up having to use a plastic chair to pull it back to him.

I was wearing a shirt that says “Welcome to the gun show” and has a picture of a guy flexing. What makes it so funny is that I’ve got these tiny little girly arms and me wearing the shirt makes everybody laugh. The waitress of course saw it and found it funny. I decided to take it a step further by writing my phone number on my left bicep and showing it to her. I even asked her if she wanted to touch it. A little while later there was a bachelorette party with a bunch of young hot chicks walking in. After coming back in from a smoke, I walked past all of them and lifted my sleeve and asked them if they wanted my number. I’m thinking they were a bunch of snobby chicks because none of them found it funny, not in the least. Everybody else did, including everybody I was with and the people working the door.

We finally decided to go to Howl at the Moon about 7:30ish. It really wasn’t all that long of a walk. We had to stop off at my car to drop off a bunch of glasses that everybody bought at Dick’s. We made it into Howl probably about shortly after 8. Now I have longed to go to this bar and it was every bit as cool as I thought it would be. Of course there were quite a few bachelorette parties going on. I walked up to one of them and asked them if they wanted me to give the bride to be a lap dance. They thought it would be a great idea so I walked up showed her my arm with the phone number on it and started to dance with her, grinding on her and being all sorts of goofy. I even offered to strip for them.

Fuck. I just don’t want to post anymore, me tired.

Sunday afternoon we played baseball. The highlight of this game was when Mark pitched to me during the last inning. I was using a lite bat which allowed me to swing quickly. I hit the ball as far as I ever hit it and then ran my asses around the bases as fast as I could. I wound up making it home, meaning I had hit a home run off of Mark. Sure, it was an inside the park home run, but a home run nonetheless. Oh, and I’m well aware that the center fielder was playing in not only because I’m a very weak hitter but also to make up for the deficiencies of the right fielder. None of that changes the fact that I hit a home run off Mark. Oh, and you better believe that I’m not letting him live that one down.

Today we were played beanbags. It was Dave and I against Mark and Dave’s brother in law Pedro. Mark and Pedro had already beaten Jt and Corleigh We then played them and lost. After they beat Jt and Corleigh again, we were up. I loudly announced that “we are going to win this game and I guarantee it.” Mark laughed and found this amusing. He was done laughing however after we beat them 21-1!  We played a 3rd game a little later on and lost a very close game 21-19.

All I can say about the past week is that my friends and I have the best friends ever. I knew this when my mom was sick and being on the other end of a greater tragedy I see it again. I’ve had many of my friend’s relatives say that we are such great friends and that most people aren’t lucky enough to have friends like this. I consider myself very fortunate and lucky to be among those friends.

Just wanted to make a quick post since I haven’t written anything since Tuesday. On Wednesday a very close friend of mine experienced a horrific and unthinkable tragedy. In the interest of privacy, I’m not going to get into details but will probably not be posting for the next few days as well.

Its time to finish up my trip. So, Tuesday morning I got up with several goals in mind. First, I was going to see the grassy knoll where JFK was shot and to make it to Tunica, Mississippi before the end of the day. Tunica was a 9 hour drive and I was planning on stopping in Shreveport, Louisiana for lunch and to gamble. So I got up about 9:00ish. After breakfast I checked out and had one of the front desk guys from the hotel drive me to Dealey Plaza, which is where the grassy knoll is located. Although I initially only wanted to spend about 15-30 minutes there, I changed my mind when I found out it was a 10-15 minute drive from the hotel. I didn’t want to make the guy drive me all the way there only to have to turn right around and come back and get me. He dropped me off shortly after 10. I walked around the area for a few minutes examining what happened on that fateful November day in 1963. For a minute I wondered if my dad had done the same thing when he came to Dallas 60 years ago. Then common sense kicked in and I realized that shit, my dad was here 15 years before Kennedy was killed.

With time to kill, I decided to hit up the JFK 6th floor museum. You can check it out here at this link:

http://www.jfk.org/

Although it was pretty interesting I don’t know if it was worth the $13.50 I paid to get in. Had I more time to really sit and examine the whole thing it probably would have been worth it. One thing I found fascinating was the similarities between JFK and Barack Obama. I’m sure some of them were intended similarities between the 2 by the Obama camp, but yet there were more that were not, such as the fear their Republicans rivals have injected into each race. In today’s day and age the media and Republicans try to strike fear of Islamic terrorists into our lives. Back in the 1950s and 1960 it was the same thing except the fear was communism. Obama is the first dark skinned person to run for president and that has brought a lot of fear and prejudice with it, in 1960 Kennedy was the first Catholic to be elected which brought lots of fear and prejudice with it. I will leave it up to you to come up with other similarities.

Getting back to the museum and Dealey Plaza though, it was humbling to be at a place where a great man like JFK was killed. It wasn’t quite as powerful or humbling as going to Lincoln’s tomb in Springfield, but still kinda stunning nonetheless. No, stunning is not quite the right word. Maybe moving suites it better.

I was back on the road by about noon. I was thinking I could make it to Tunica by about 10 in the pm which accounted for about an hour stop for lunch and gambling in Shreveport. I made it to Shreveport shortly after 3. Once again, it was very hot but not as bad as it had been the previous day. After a quick burger at the casino’s cafe, I went in to gamble. I was fortunate enough to be able to catch the last inning of the Cubs win over the Houston Astros as it was playing in the casino. I was also lucky enough to win $60 while I was there.

Soon I was back on the road. I had made a decision to drive through Louisiana to Mississippi instead of cutting through Arkansas. I thought this might be an easier route, but maybe a little longer. To get there though I had to get off the expressway in Mississippi and drive north on a state road. Well, this road was not nearly as………..er…………….statey as the other state routes I took through Oklahoma and Texas. In fact, it was a 2 lane country road in the middle of fucking no where. And out on those roads, I swear the miles are longer. I see a sign for a town that would say it was 66 miles away. It would drive for 45 minutes and then it would only be 60 miles away. Then I would see the sign again later on and it would say 38 miles. I would drive for another 30 minutes and it would say 39 miles. I’m sure this wasn’t the exact case, but it sure felt that way. With the sun setting, no signal on my cell phone and only intermittent signs of civilization, I debated getting a hotel at the next town which was probably somewhere near the Canadian-Wisconsin boarder. Even though I was driving a new car, I felt that if I broke down I would never be heard from again. Shortly after 8 in the pm I glanced down at the map and realized at this pace, I would not be there for at least another 4 hours. That’s when the road opened up to a 4 lane highway and a 65mph speed limit. After that I cruised.

I made it into Tunica right at 10 in the pm. I made my goal, now where the fuck were the casinos? I drove around town thinking they would be impossible to miss, yet they seemed to be nowhere to be found. The town itself was not as pretty as I imagined. In fact, for a town with a hair under 1100 people, it was kinda slummy. I decided to do the least guy thing I could do: I pulled over and asked a gas station attendant for directions. He said the casinos were still about 8 miles up the road. So off I went.

Sure enough within minutes I started to see signs of the casinos. I drove over to what turned out to be the biggest (or is it the second biggest) building in all of Mississippi: the Gold Strike casino. Check out their link:

http://www.goldstrikemississippi.com/

The hotel stood 32 floors high. Its was every bit the size of a Las Vegas casino, as were the 2 casinos right next to it. So, I got a room, asking the hotel clerk to give me, the guy with a big fear of heights, a room on the highest floor possible. This turned out to be the 25th floor. The room was nice and included a rather large bathroom and a flat screen 22 inch tv which may or may not been hi-def. Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure it was not hi-def. Although to be honest, I’m guessing on the size of the tv. After jumping on king sized bed and checking out the room, I went downstairs to grab some grub and commence gambling.

It seemed to be forever for me to get my food, and keep in mind this was not a sit down place but rather a little cafe. After that though I went right into the casino and started getting free drinks while playing roulette. A few hours and a 2 beers later I was drunk and probably $100 poorer. So, I went to bed.

I was able to sleep in the next morning until about 10ish. After showering and breakfast, I made my way back to the casinos, eventually finding myself at the Sheraton which is affiliated with the Harrah’s casino, which we have in Joliet. I have a players club card at the Harrah’s but did not bring it, so they gave me another one. These cards are really only handy for getting comped for meals and shit like that if you spend a lot of money. I started playing blackjack, roulette, and three card poker while drinking rum and cokes. I even took a couple of shots at a game called Mississippi Stud but since I got my ass kicked to the tune of something like $40 in three hands, I left that game never to speak of it again. Until now. And the times before that when I told people about my piss poor experience.

After a couple of hours I drunkenly made my way to the bar where I asked them to put on the Cubs game while I played video poker. They were more than happy to oblige my request. I then took my players club card and put it in the machine. Only problem is that it wouldn’t take the card. I put it again and again but nothing. So, I put it in again, you know because if I did it enough it just HAD to work. Still nothing. So I put it in the next machine, still nothing. Again and again and still nothing. I could not figure this out when the bartender came up to look at my card. She told me that it was my card for the Gold Strike casino. I put it back into my pocked and reached for my Harrah’s card. I then thought about it for a second “I don’t have a Gold Strike card.” Upon closer inspection, the card I repeatedly trying using was my hotel key card!

After a while I decided to eat from their buffet which was free thanks to my real players club card. After taking my drink order the waitress walked me to my seat and told me that I could go grab food from the buffet. Once again drunk, I loaded my plate up with food and headed back to my table. Only one problem. I forgot where I was sitting. I wandered up and down the section I was in looking for my seat. What made it even worse was that it was empty so I should be able to find it. I thought I was sitting much further away from the food then I actually was. I saw a glass of Pepsi at a table with a receipt. I thought this might be my table but wasn’t positive and slowly hunched up. I didn’t want to just take a drink of the pop without first confirming it was my seat. I glanced down at the receipt and saw my name on it. Ok, lesson learned, never go to a buffet by yourself when you are drunk.

After eating I was soon sober and had a couple of hours to kill before my Texas Hold Em tournament at 7 in the pm. I went back to my room, made a couple of phone calls and watched the Simpsons. I was also a little bit hung over. With in a couple of hours though, I was fine which meant that I had gotten drunk, been hungover and recovered all in the same day. Ahhh, you gotta love vacations!

As for the tournament I was at a table with a college student who looked a heck of a lot like Zach Braff. He was very cute and cool, a Memphis college student who happened to be a big Cub fan. Right next to me was an old lady from Texas. She was in Tunica escaping the hurricane that was hitting Houston. She had been playing poker for about 8 hours at that point, however this was a new game so she started with the same number of chips as the rest of us. She was probably well into her 70s, very sweet but also very touchy feely. She kept touching me every time she talked to me. So I grabbed her hand and shoved it onto my cock. Wait, no I didn’t. Nevertheless, although I’m sure it was just her Texan old lady way, it was still a little bit creepy.

As for the game itself, I only lasted for about 45 minutes before losing. I then went to one of the other casinos and played more slots and three card poker. By about 10:30 in the pm I had enough of losing and pretty much cut myself off from gambling. Although I did have a great time, the only gold strike was the casinos into my wallet. I watched some cover band for a few hours before going to bed. The next morning I was up and gone by 10am. The ride home was non eventful and I made it to Mark and Amy’s for Addison’s birthday party about 7ish.

A couple of things I did not mention was that I saw quite a few Obama bumper stickers in about 4 or 5 of the states. As for McCain, well I did not see a single McCain bumper sticker.

With each road trip there is always a song that you seem to hear several times on various radio stations. I heard several All American Rejects songs throughout the trip. Also one of my song highlights was cruising down a Mississippi back road listening to the Doobie Brothers “Blackwater” which is really a great song to listen to in the middle of nowhere. As much as I love those songs, the song that kept coming back to haunt me throughout my vacation was the hated Journey song, “Don’t Stop, Believin‘” which I heard played in the casino over the intercom. If that wasn’t bad enough, the cover band played it both nights I was there. Then I went to Romeofest on Friday night and the cover band there played it. The next night, while sitting at home watching tv I could hear the cover band in the distance at Romeofest playing it again. I have never liked that song. Then it became the anthem for the 2005 Chicago White Sox so I hated it even more. It gained some points with me when it was used in the final episode the the Sopranos but I still hate it even more so now then ever.

As promised, I’m now going to write more about the trip. For reasons that will be left unsaid, I was not able to leave until Sunday afternoon instead of the original plan of Saturday afternoon. Since my car is 7 years old and has nearly 90,000 miles and no cruise control, I rented a car and wound up with a Kia Spectra, which was actually a very nice car, especially for the hardcore driving I was planning on doing.  I walked out of my house about 12:50 in the pm and opened the car door. A sudden wave of excitement and anxiety came over me and I quietly muttered to myself “this is it.” I got in the car and was off and driving. I had no idea what to make of the trip, this was the first time I would be going on a vacation by myself. This meant that I was responsible for all of the driving. Its also meant that I could pretty much do whatever I wanted. I could go wherever I wanted. Since I had made no hotel reservations, I could have up and driven to Boston or Seattle if I wanted to. I could listen to whatever music I wanted to. There was a liberating feeling of being alone on a road trip. It meant that whatever I said goes, I had nobody to tell me no or stop me from doing whatever I wanted to do. This was kinda nice. No, it was very nice. That being said, I started off by listening to the Cubs game. With WGN’s signal being about as powerful as they come, I was actually able to listen to the whole game which was about 3 hours long. I didn’t make my first stop until Springfield, which is about 2 1/2-3 hours.

After Springfield I drove another 3 hours until I was midway through Missouri for dinner. I was determined to avoid eating fast food and wanted to try to eat at truck stops and small cafe/diner places as I’ve heard these types of places have the best food. I found a place in this little down that I can’t remember the name of. I got a t-bone steak which was not as good as I expected.

Since eating alone can be a bit boring, I decided to bring a couple of books with me. The first book I started reading was one I have heard a lot about called Devil In The White City. Its a fact based book about the World’s fair in Chicago in 1892. I know it sounds like it might be boring, but its actually pretty interesting. Did you know there was a serial killer on the loose in Chicago at that time? That is part of what makes the book so interesting.

Also another nerdy thing I was doing was playing cds by musicians who were from the states I was driving through. For example, Illinois I listened to Rage Against the Machine because their guitarist, Tom Morello is from Libertyville. Also, Disturbed is from Chicago so I listened to them. In Missouri, it was Sheryl Crow. Oklahoma has the All American Rejects, Texas Don Henley, Mississippi John Lee Hooker, Arkansas Johnny Cash, Tennessee, well I didn’t have any Elvis and was actually only in Tennessee for a short time anyway.

After dinner I didn’t stop again until I was about a half hour into Oklahoma. It was about 10:30 and I decided to stop for the night. I found a small motel just off the expressway. I got out of the car and stepped on Oklahoma ground for the first time in my life. In spite of it being late a night, it was still very hot and humid. I checked and and headed for my room. After struggling to get the door unlocked for a few minutes, I swung the door open to find a dingy, crappy and hot room. And not just hot, but steaming, as they did not have the air conditioning on at all. It was so hot that I was probably completely butt ass naked before the door behind me was closed. I instantly cranked up the AC, after all if I was going to get to bed in an hour or so I needed to have that shit take effect as soon as possible. Being a small room, it did not take long for it to cool down, which was a good thing.

The next morning I was up and out of the motel well before 9. I went to a little place next door for breakfast. It was one of those classic places in which everybody knows everybody, except for the short, strange dude from Chicago. Much to my surprise, the food was not nearly as good I thought it would be. Actually, it was disappointing. Ok, so far, I was 0-2 on the little non chain restaurants.

I drove for about another hour before stopping at a casino just outside Tulsa. I wasn’t there for long, just long enough to go to the bathroom, buy a shot glass for Dave and drop $40 on slots and a game called High something Texas Hold Em. Damn, I don’t remember the name of the game, I shouldn’t have waited nearly a week to post about it. Then again, if I had won I’m sure I would have no problem remembering the name.

Soon I was on my way again. Later that afternoon I stopped at a truck stop in southern Oklahoma for lunch. I got a ham and cheese sandwich with tater tots. I had not had tater tots in a long time, so it was cool to finally have them. The food was actually pretty damn good. So this was the great truck stop food I had heard so much about.

The further south I drove, the hotter it got. It made the air conditioning a total necessity. I swear, I don’t know how my dad did it 60 years ago without AC. I’m sure it wasn’t as hot as the weather I was about to experience in Dallas, but it was probably still very hot.

Texas is not exactly the most ideal place for a gay, liberal atheist from Illinois. A part of me never wanted to go to Texas. It was kind of fitting that as I crossed the boarder into Texas, Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down” played on the radio. I saw the welcome to Texas sign which as you might expect had the words “Home of President George W Bush” on it and it made me cringe and my skin crawl. I then cranked up Green Day’s American Idiot album which contains several anti Bush songs.

Shortly after you get across the boarder they pull you over and search your car for guns. If you don’t have a gun, they kick you out and tell you not to come back until you have a couple. They said that Texas is a two gun minimum just to get into the state.

Ok, so I’m kidding about that last part. But as I drove down the highway, I couldn’t help but think that most of the drivers who were passing me or driving next to me probably currently had guns on them or at the very least in the glove box.

I got to my hotel in Dallas shortly after 3 in the pm. As soon as I stepped out of my car, I could feel the blistering Texas heat I had heard so much about all of these years. The cute valets at the hotel were dripping with sweat. It was easy to see why, the people on the radio said it was between 106-108 in various areas of Dallas. And later on the Walgreens right next to my hotel had a reading in the sun of, and I swear to you I am not making this up, 119 degrees. Being from Chicago I have experienced hot weather myself. There was a time in the summer of 1995 in which we had a massive heat wave the made the temps sore to 105 with a heat index of 112. I remember that and it was bad. Dallas though was worse, or so it seemed. This was the hottest weather I have ever been in. I didn’t have to stand outside for long before I started sweating.

The hotel was another story. It was very comfortable inside there. This was the nicest hotel I have ever stood in, my room was even nicer than the Swiss Otel in downtown Chicago. Unlike the motel, my room here already had the AC on. And it was a huge room with a giant king sized bed. The view was good too, even though I was on the 7th floor. I guess the best way to show you the hotel would be to just include the link to their website:

http://www.warwickmelrosedallas.com/

I was not actually in downtown Dallas, but instead in what would be the equivalent of the Lincoln Park area in Chicago. Actually now that I think about it, it was probably more Boystown than Lincoln Park. I was definitely in the gay, liberal area of Dallas. I found this out later when I saw a pair of Barrack Obama underwear for sale in a store window.

My plans for the night were to grab some dinner, go to a Texas Rangers game and hit up some of the gay bars in the area. I wound up having dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant right near my hotel. This was my first time eating Vietnamese, and although it was good it was not too much unlike Chinese food. That being said, they got me my food very quickly, which was not hard since I got there just as it opened and I was their only customer.

After dinner I was off to the ballgame. I was concerned I might not make it for the first pitch because the ballpark was a half hour away and it was now rush hour. But, I managed to not only get there in time but was at my seat a good 25 minutes before first pitch. The stadium itself was very nice. The Rangers were playing the New York Yankees and since I don’t like either team, it left me with no rooting interest. The Yankees are the most popular team in baseball, so that meant there were a lot of Yankee fans in attendance as well. In spite of the 101 degree game time temperature, there were 33,813 people. I know this because I personally went seat to seat to count each person. Even though we were in Texas, the crowd was almost evenly split between Yankee and Ranger fans.

I sat in my seat for the first 2 innings. Then I walked around and toured the stadium, trying to catch a few pitches from all sorts of different places in the park. I also found out that in spite of the park being only about 15 years old, they are building a new one across the street. This doesn’t make a damn bit of sense to me and there does not appear to be anything wrong with this park.

The game itself was good. I decided to leave after the 7th inning stretch so that I could shower and head out to the bars. Although it was an exciting game, it was also a slow paced game and I did not have the luxury to sit through a 4 hour game in 100 degree heat and then fight traffic to get out of a packed parking lot.  As it turns out, I missed one helluva an ending, as the Rangers Marlon Byrd hit a walk off grand slam to win the game in the bottom of the 9th for the Rangers.

This was my first time in a gay bar. I actually went to 2 of them. None of them had a lot of people in them, I think being a Monday things were kinda slow. One of the bars they were playing some sort of video trivia game on stage. Another bar had karaoke. I stood out until about midnight before heading back to my hotel.

That’s the end of the first couple of days, will write more tomorrow.

Good news and bad news everybody. The good news for me is that I survived the trip to post another day. The bad news for you is that I lived to post another day! Obviously there is a whole heck of a lot to write about, so I’ve decided that this first post I’m going to give you some general details and facts about my trip. Also its late at night and after driving so much over the course of the past 5 days, I don’t think I have a full hour long post in me. So, you can chew on this for now.

• Number of states I drove through: 8 And since you asked, here they are in the order of which I drove through: IL, MO, OK, TX, LA, MS, TN, AR.
• Number of state capitals I drove through: 1, just Springfield in my home state of IL.
• Number of times I crossed the Mississippi river: 4, Illinois into Missouri, Louisiana into Mississippi, Tennessee into Arkansas and Missouri into Illinois.
• Total number of miles I drove: Over 2000, however I didn’t keep track.
• Total of hours driven: Again, I didn’t keep track but here is an approximate: 34 hours.
• Number of cds I listened to: 25. I did listen to one of those cds (Green Day’s American Idiot) twice and also listened to the entire 3 hour Cubs game on Sunday, the day I left.
• Amount of time I wore shoes and socks: 0 minutes. It was so damn hot, I didn’t have the need or desire to wear them. I had intended to wear them inside the bars and casinos, but left the shoes in the car which was taken away by the valet and it would have been a big pain in the ass just to get them.
• Number of states I gambled in: 3
• Number of casinos I went to: 4
• Number of times I ate fast food: 0. Although this one is up for debate, as I did at lunch at Subway today, but I’ve never considered them true fast food in the sense that they are much healthier than true fast food.

When one spends 34 hours alone driving in a car, it gives you plenty of time to think. When I have time to think, comedy comes to my head. Now I was going to be sending text messages to friends and family with updates on the trip. Midway through Missouri, I was trying to think of something funny to say about Texas. Ok, I should clarify, I was trying to narrow it down to only one thing to say about Texas. I then decided that I would make up a state motto for each state to announce to everybody that I had made  it to another state. The first one I did was Texas, which means that I didn’t have one for Oklahoma. So, here is an internet Xanga exclusive, the Oklahoma state motto that nobody else has heard. Along with each of the other states, which everybody else has heard: