The .Plan

I had always wondered about the career path of David Eddy, one of the ‘fathers’ of “evidence”-based medicine. Cardiac surg, Stanford Ph.D., teaching posts at Stanford then Duke, and then:

By 1985, Eddy was “burned out” by the administrative side of academia, he says. Lured by a poster of the Tetons, he gave up his prestigious post. He moved to Jackson, Wyo., so he could climb in his spare time. He and a friend even made a first ascent of a new route on the Grand Teton, now named after them. Meanwhile, he carved out a niche showing doctors at specialty society meetings that their cherished beliefs were dubious.
–John Carey, “Medical Guesswork”, Business Week, May 29, 2006

From the Washington Post, on how to avoid the crash-and-burn:

Occasionally, both guys will walk over to the target at the same time. More frequently, the wingman makes the first flyby. Say the target has arrived with another young woman who, like Pouty Girl, would not win any beauty contests. “The wingman talks to that girl,” Waclawiczek says, “and the girl that your friend is after is like, ‘Oh, what’s going on? Why isn’t he talking to me?’ That’s when your friend moves in.”

The wingman delivers the introduction, knowing that his job is to make his buddy look cool.

“Hey, you only have a couple of minutes to make an impression,” Moniello continues. “So if you have to save a baby seal from an oil spill in Alaska, you have to save a baby seal.”

Moniello says his hometown wingman — good wingman relationships never die — is as adept as they come. “If I go to the bathroom, he’ll make me look like Jesus. . . . The girl I’m after will say something like ‘I hear he’s a player’ and he’ll convince her I’m really in love with her.”

If the wingman is the least bit interested in the sidekick girl, he’ll signal that to his partner-in-crime and include himself in the lie.

“You can’t assume that every girl with a wingman is ugly,” Moniello says. “She may be very attractive. If she is, then me and Jay own all the Ben & Jerry’s in the Northeast.”
–Laura Stepp, “A Bud for The Ladies”, Washington Post, May 31, 2006

When Bill & Melinda Gates dumped a big pot of gold into the ring a few years ago, many observers thought that they would destabilize the world of global philanthropy. That hasn’t happened yet AFAIK. I used to think that GF was the 800 pound gorilla of the foundation world, but I guess for the strong, there’s always a stronger…

The parent for all IKEA companies is Ingka Holding, a private Dutch-registered company. Ingka Holding, in turn, belongs entirely to Stichting Ingka Foundation. Valuing the Inkga Holding group is awkward, because IKEA has no direct competitors that operate globally… Using [an estimated P/E ratio of 20], the Ingka Holding group is worth €28 billion ($36 billion). If Stichting Ingka Foundation has net worth of at least $36 billion it would be the world’s wealthiest charity. Its value easily exceeds the $26.9 billion shown in the latest published accounts of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which is commonly awarded that accolade. Measured by good works, however, the Gates Foundation wins hands down. It devotes most of its resources to curing the diseases of the world’s poor. By contrast the Kamprad billions are dedicated to “innovation in the field of architectural and interior design”. The articles of association of Stichting Ingka Foundation, a public record in the Netherlands, state that this object cannot be amended. Even a Dutch court can make only minor changes to the stichting’s aims.
–“Flat Pack Accounting”, The Economist, May 11, 2006

Hat tip to AbFab2theMax.

Today I was reminded about what a forgetful person I am.

In one of the church services I attended this morning, the pastor preached on the first chapter of Paul’s second letter to Timothy. Remembrance figures prominently in this chapter, with words like “remember” and “recall” and “mindful” and “remind” popping up here and there. The pastor diverged at this point to issue some vague exhortations about “you need to be Christians on more than just Sundays blah blah blah“, but I remained fixed on Timothy, lost in contemplation about what remembrance means (or doesn’t mean) in my life.

I have been rootless since October of last year, and the road trip was supposed to be the crowning endpoint of all this wandering. Now the heart is weary and begging for a rest. But my version of the plaintive “Give me rest” is more or less a pathetic “I want to sit on a beach in Miami and sun myself” — a revision that simply does not square with the call issued by the Author of my life and Editor of my mistakes:

Come to me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. (Matthew 11:28-30)

Here, rest does not entail promises of sun and beach, it involves shouldering a yoke that, while easy and light, is a yoke nonetheless.

Perhaps I am like the grumbling Israelites, who, even though they benefited greatly from unmistakably clear indications of God’s presence in their lives and his desire for them, promptly forgot about him the minute they thought his back was turned. I think that’s why the patriarchs were such avid historians. When I first started reading the Pentateuch, I always wondered why they kept repeating the Exodus story. Over and over. and over. and. over. again. Same damn story, every single time. But then I realized that they had to keep repeating the story, because the Israelites were such a forgetful and ungrateful people.

Which reminds me of one of my favorite passages in the Bible, Joshua 24. Joshua recites the exodus and expansion stories, and this remembrance of course demands a response from the people. His own response? Not “I want to sun myself in Miami”, but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. May it be so in my life.

The United States, not content to poach physicians from developing countries, is now looking to poach nurses as well:

As the United States runs short of nurses, senators are looking abroad. A little-noticed provision in their immigration bill would throw open the gate to nurses and, some fear, drain them from the world’s developing countries… Senator Sam Brownback, Republican of Kansas, who sponsored the proposal, said it was needed to help the United States cope with a growing nursing shortage.
–Celia Dugger, “U.S. Plan to Lure Nurses May Hurt Poor Nations”, New York Times, May 24, 2006

WTF? I would expect someone like Sen. Brownback (remember Jeff Sharlet’s Rolling Stone profile, and remember also Nicholas Kristof calling him “perhaps the most intriguing man in Washington“?) to have thought more carefully about the labor market dynamics of such a policy.

The pecking order is well known: the U.K. and Australia both poach doctors from South Africa; Saskatchewan and Alberta poach doctors from the U.K. and Australia (and South Africa); Ontario poaches doctors from Saskatchewan; the U.S. poaches doctors from all over Canada (and the U.K. and Australia and South Africa).

But what about countries like South Africa? Does it poach doctors from neighboring Zambia and Uganda? No. A few years ago S.A. undertook not to participate in the musical chairs game — even though it really needs more doctors — and actually prohibited the recruitment and importation of physicians from other countries, excepting physicians from certain countries like Cuba and Germany with which the S.A. government has made special arrangements. There may or may not have been sinister or childish machinations driving the policy — with South African politics you never know — but for now S.A. gets a few points from me for taking one for the team.

Kimchi is good, but is it that good?

Last month, scientists at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute unveiled a kimchi especially developed for astronauts to prevent them from getting constipated in space. A researcher at Ewha Woman’s University in Seoul reported that kimchi lowered the stress levels of caged mice by 30%… The library of a kimchi museum in Seoul holds more than 2,000 books about kimchi and thousands more dissertations. (”A Kinetic Model for Lactic Acid Production in Kimchi” was among the recent titles.) New theses are being added at the rate of 300 per year.
–Barbara Demick, “Koreans’ Kimchi Adulation, With a Side of Skepticism”, Los Angeles Times, May 21, 2006

The longing for home is so universal a form of longing that there is even a special word for it, which is, of course homesickness… I also know the sense of sadness and lostness that comes with feeling that you are a stranger and exile on the earth and that you would travel to the ends of that earth and beyond if you thought you could ever find the homeland that up till now you have only glimpsed from afar.
–Frederick Buechner, The Longing for Home

Six years ago, Thom Mannarino published in the The Mars Hill Review an essay entitled, “On Finding Home”. That winter was my second darkest winter in Cleveland — a small prelude to the darkest winter that would arrive two years later — and, for that reason, I think, I appreciated Mannarino’s essay all the more. The occasion for the essay is his leaving a comfortable but aimless life as a doctoral student in Florida for a six month lectureship in London (that cold, dark city where I fortunately avoided getting stuck for a year after college), and he writes compellingly about feeling lost and anonymous in the sea of Londoners.

One winter afternoon, he ducks into St. Martins-in-the-Fields to dodge a downpour and finds himself reading notes pinned to the “Prayer Requests” bulletin board. After reading through them all, Mannarino ponders:

There were more than two dozen notes pinned to that board, a compendium of the fears, the confessions, the vulnerabilities of strangers like myself. I read them all. Maybe I shouldn’t have. They were, after all, folded up, pinned to the board, addressed to someone else, namely God. But just reading those words, hearing those voices, so raw and unguarded, brought me to a safer place. It was like being stranded on a desert island and discovering a bottle on the shore, and inside a note from soneone on the very next island: ‘Hey, it’s lonely on this sandbar. What’s it like over there?’
–Thom Mannarino, “On Finding Home,” The Mars Hill Review, Winter 2000

That essay really has nothing to do with anything related to the present, but for some reason I always find myself drawn to it when I arrive at a new destination homesick and despondent, with new uncertainties and a heightened (usually exaggerated) sense of my vulnerabilities. That’s probably it. The geographical exile is confounded by the passing away of the old securities and comforts. As Augustine of Hippo wisely prayed, God you have made our hearts restless until they rest in you.

In the meantime, what is a guy to do? He cooks. The apartment smells new and cleaned, but it smells nothing like home. Out comes the bottle opener, and off come the bottle caps. A Bostonian twist on the Black-and-Tan: Guinness topped by Sam Adams. Chicken thighs, skin and fat and all. There is no other activity in the world that sings more loudly the praises of slowness than picking fat off of chicken thighs; if you rush it, you waste good, dark chicken meat. Soy sauce, slivers of ginger, slices of scallion, dry sherry, a dash of cinnamon, star anise, and a bit of coriander all tumble into the glass bowl after the chicken. The mixture gives a satisfying squish, squish in my hands and then goes into the refrigerator for half an hour while I have a seat on the balcony and enjoy my patriotic Black-and-Tan. One pint later, and the chicken is ready for the wok. And as the chicken sizzles from pink to pale to brown, now, and only now, the apartment smells as it should.

The road trip is over; this is not really Day 6. But the days will be numbered until I can get over myself and bring you back your regularly scheduled daily dose of impersonal research citations and political commentary…

No rest for the weary. Every night this week I have set my alarm for 8:00, but every morning I have somehow woken myself up at 7:00 or earlier. I woke up this morning at 6:00. After thinking it over for a few minutes, I decided to book it to Seattle, rather than hang out for an extra day or two in Yellowstone / Grand Teton / Craters of the Moon as previously planned (see yesterday’s entry for details). With that, I hit the road.

In the 45 minutes it takes me to drive to Big Sky, Montana, the temperature has dropped 20 degrees and the wind is furious. US191 north between Yellowstone and Bozeman is beautiful. Much prettier than US14/16/20 (the byway that Teddy Roosevelt called “the most scenic 52 miles in America”). During high school, I secretly harbored a fascination with wanting to visit Bozeman, as it was the place where Robert M. Pirsig (of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance fame) taught rhetoric and composition in his previous life as “Phaedrus”. My ZAMM obsession was short-lived, but I still wanted to see Bozeman. So I did, today. Bozeman is underwhelming, and I don’t bother taking out my camera.

Cool. From my balcony, I just watched a seaplane land on Lake Union. Very cool.

After Bozeman, I am on the interstate. No point in taking back roads anymore — I’ve got a mission (get to Seattle), and I want to complete it as quickly as possible. There are no more pretty trees and mountains — just flatness. The rain starts to fall at 9:15. As I head west to Butte, the clouds have swallowed the sky, but it clears up by noon. I look around Butte for familiar landmarks and see none. I’ve been here once before — 8 years ago, when a business school professor I did research for asked me to fly out to interview some execs at some random technology incubator.

The interstate crosses the Continental Divide just west of Butte — today is my fourth crossing (in addition to crossing it in Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico) — and here the interstate becomes interesting as it winds its way through the mountains. At 10:00 I stop for a power nap. I’m really starting to peter out, even though it is a beautiful drive — all the way to the Idaho border, the interstate is 100% sweeping curves that can be taken smoothly at 60-70 mph.

I cross the Idaho panhandle into eastern Washington, and pretty soon there is a steady stream of eastbound cars, presumbly departing Seattle for the holiday weekend. On two more occasions I have to stop for power naps and am pretty much living on fumes at this point.

The closer I get to Seattle, the more and more doubts start creeping into my mind. And I start second-guessing everything. There are just too many uncertainties and too many variables — and no short-term foreseeable guaranteed upside. Fueling this internal monologue is a conversation I had with Harold just before leaving Cleveland about the pesky question that has been plaguing me the entire trip, that is, how one can know God’s will. And it can creep into all areas of life: Should I do psych or medicine? Who do I rank first? Should I rank Harvard #7 or #8? When do I pick up the phone and call her? Should I use a moving service? Do I want a Dairy Queen blizzard or ice cream sandwich? The questions are endless, and the answers, of course, are not forthcoming. All this time, I am well aware that preoccupations with knowing God’s will seem to be a phenomenon largely confined to well-educated, upwardly-mobile, North American Christians. After all, it is we who suffer from the embarassment of riches that bids us make decisions about which law school to matriculate to, which travel fellowship to take, and so forth.

I remember when, near the end of college or perhaps the summer after graduation, James visited Pastor Hugenberger’s office hours to talk about this very thing — an act which forever enshrined him in my “He Has Balls” pantheon of heroes. Hugenberger referred him to the lengthy discussion in Proverbs 16. Most Biblical wisdom imparted to me simply goes in one ear and out the other, so of course I don’t remember a thing of what James told me. But every time I start to puzzle about this question, at least I do remember to start with Proverbs 16.

During the summer after my junior year of college, I came upon Stanley Hauerwas’ book God, Medicine, and Suffering quite by accident, but I didn’t really engage the rest of his work until several years later, during medical school when I rediscovered the book. One of the central ideas Hauerwas has developed over the past 30 years is that, prior to the Enlightenment, there were no Christian attempts to distinguish between theology and ethics, and that only after the Enlightenment does one start to see Christians ask the questions “what do you believe?” and “what do you do?” separately and without reference to the other, as if the two questions could be asked independently.

From there, it is only a hop, skip, and a jump away from one of Hauerwas’ signature claims, which he makes in a short essay entitled “A Story-Formed Community: Reflections on Watership Down” (found in his 1983 book, A Community of Character: Toward a Constructive Christian Social Ethic): “the first social ethical task of the church is to be the church — the servant community.” Put another way, Hauerwas argues that Christians should be more concerned with questions about what kind of people they are to be rather than questions about effectiveness.

People who are preoccupied with wanting to know God’s will tend to approach it almost as one might aim for a bull’s-eye: God’s will is at the center of the target, and if you miss it, then you are completely hosed. That strikes me as a rather impotent and ungracious version of what one might expect of a divine, omnipotent, and perfectly loving being. After puzzling through this question all these years, I’m right back where I started, at Proverbs 16. But something occurs to me today. Verse 3 seems broadly consistent with Hauerwas’ claim. Perhaps I ought to be more concerned about the cultivation of virtue (”commit your works to the LORD…”), thereby becoming the type of person who would know what a joy and privilege it is to be in His will (”…and your plans will be established”). And in the meantime, I will prayerfully and with some trepidation continue to make my decisions — to put the pen to paper, to pick up the phone, and generally to do what needs to be done.

(There is much more that needs to be developed here, but this was supposed to be a blog entry, not an essay!)

Since leaving Ohio, I have not seen a single speed trap — that is, until I get to Washington. From Spokane to Maple Valley, I observe no fewer than 6 drivers pulled over by state troopers, presumably for speeding. While I’m puzzling over Proverbs 16 and cruising along to Kathleen Edwards’ alt-country — which is just made for driving — I start to daydream again. The speed limit is 70, and although I’ve been careful all week to go no higher than 5 mph above the speed limit, somehow I’m at 81 mph when I see the sirens flashing in my rearview. Cheeky. It was an unmarked car just cruising along with the traffic — since it wasn’t a speed trap, a radar detector would have been of no use anyway. Now I know why Seattleites are so careful about following the speed limit.

NOOOOOOOOOO. I’ve been so careful for almost 3 years to get those speeding tickets (from my last road trip) dropped from my driving record. I explain to the state trooper that I’m moving to Seattle to start a new job at the county hospital — that seems to work in Cleveland — and what do you know, he lets me off with a warning. Thus chastened, I drive the remaining two hours to Seattle at a careful 72 mph. So, very thankfully my car insurance payments, instead of becoming astronomically high, remain just very freaking high (at least until September, when those tickets roll off of my record).

817 miles covered today, some 12+ hours, no breakfast, no lunch break. I’m about to die of weariness, but I really, really want to take a bath tonight (but not before I bleach the bathtub and scrub it clean). I pick up my keys and head for the apartment. There I am greeted by a horrifying sight:

Looks like the boxes I shipped on Monday arrived ahead of me. I move all of the boxes into my apartment. Driven by nothing more than strength of will, I head for Target in search of cleaning supplies. It’s only 5 miles away but seems like another 20. The bathtub is now clean. I draw a bath and drop in two bath bombs from Lush. I’m off to enjoy my bath. Hello, Seattle.

Tomorrow the unpacking begins.

Five songs from today’s “Seattle, Ho!” playlist:

• Gwenyth Paltrow & Huey Lewis - Cruisin’
• Patty Griffin - Forgiveness
• Frank Sinatra - Fly Me To the Moon
• Goldenhorse - Maybe Tomorrow
• Dixie Chicks - Cowboy Take Me Away

More photos from my barren apartment on my flickr feed — click here

This morning, I walked around the tourist trap of Deadwood and snapped a few photographs. Wanted to go check out the gravesites of Wild Bill and Calamity Jane, but I was hoping to make it all the way to Yellowstone by sunset.

Heading south from Deadwood, I take the Spearfish Canyon Byway in search of the ‘Dances With Wolves’ filming site. The byway is beautiful — it’d be great for motorcycling, with plenty of sweeping curves and no switchbacks. When I get to the filming site, I am very, very underwhelmed.

Soon I am on the Interstate headed to Yellowstone. The earth turns orange near the Wyoming-South Dakota border and is beautifully set against the green of the lingering grassland. Gas is satisfyingly cheap in Wyoming. Why? As I head further west, the Bighorn Mountains come into view distantly to the west — challenging, “see if you can cross”. Have to stop at noon for a 5 minute power nap. I get off on US14. Fortunately, the melting snows have just opened up US14-alternate, and so I take the Bighorn Byway west. The road twists and winds its way to the top of the Bighorn Mountains much like the Moki Dugway in Utah. On the way up, I catch a glimpse of some mountain deer playing tag right next to the road.

At the top of the Bighorn Mountains, the sky opens up to a burst of blue pocked with scattered stay-puff marshmallow clouds. If you get out of the car and listen closely, you can hear trickling, running, gushing water. The snow has not yet melted away completely. I’m looking for the Medicine Wheel of the Crow, and when I finally find the turnoff, I find that the National Park Service has closed off the road due to snow. Boo.

At the end of the Bighorn, the byway heads back down the mountain. A sign warns truckers appropriately:

Fourteen miles of 10% grade. Just to see if I can, I switch my car into neutral and coast. The car reaches speeds of 60 mph easily, and I have to ride the brake all the way down. There are 3 turnoffs for truckers to cool their brakes. At one point the road stops twisting and heads straight down, and just to see how fast the 10% grade will get me, I let up on the brake. I hit 95 mph before deciding that brakes are a good thing.

I cruise into Cody and skip the Buffalo Bill Museum. But it’s 3:00 and I haven’t had anything to eat all day, so I stop by Dairy Queen for a blizzard. Soon I am on my way east along the Buffalo Bill Cody Scenic Byway — a stretch of land that Teddy Roosevelt once referred to as “the most scenic 52 miles in all of America”. It is pretty, but I think Roosevelt was exaggerating slightly:

The byway ends at the eastern gate to Yellowstone.

All of these trips over the past few years, and I’ve never once stopped to think about what it means to travel alone. But just 30 minutes into Yellowstone, and I find the beauty overwhelming. Places like these were never meant to enjoyed in isolation — they were meant to be appreciated in fellowship with other human beings. At this point, an extreme heaviness (I don’t want to call it a loneliness, but perhaps these are just semantic games) weighs upon me, and I don’t want to see the rest of the park. I just want to close my eyes and save the experience to share with others later. Almost as if I don’t want to “use it up”. I take a few more photographs — the bison are cute, especially when they frolick about in the dust — but my heart simply isn’t in it anymore.

By 8:00, I reach West Yellowstone and sit down to think about this over a steak dinner. Tomorrow I had planned on seeing more of Yellowstone and then heading south through Grand Teton, but now I’m thinking I’ll just drive the 800 miles straight to Seattle. I’ll be back another day. What should I do? Will it be another 5 or 10 years before I can make it back here?

Five songs from today’s “Seattle, Ho!” playlist:

• Kathleen Edwards - What Are You Waiting For?
• Mark Knopfler & Emmylou Harris - Beyond My Wildest Dreams
• BB Mak - Back Here
• Johnny Rown - Porque Te Amaba Tanto
• Caedmon’s Call - Before There Was Time

More photos from day 4 on my Flickr feed — click here

Got a late start this morning, 8:00. Grassland across South Dakota — beautiful. Makes me want to pet it, as if it were Sulley’s fur (from Monsters Inc). One thing I have always noticed about driving across the midwest is the abundance of cheesy billboards (see May 28 ‘03). Just west of Sioux Falls, even though Mount Rushmore is on other side of the state, the billboards have already begun:

RUSHMORE CAVE — NATURAL BEAUTY
WALL DRUG — FEATURED IN PEOPLE

You also start to see billboards advertising “Corn Palace”.

EAR-CHITECTURE — CORN PALACE
CORN-SIDER VISITING CORN PALACE!
WE’RE ALL EARS! CORN PALACE
PREPARE TO BE A-MAIZED!
EARS TO YOU! CORN PALACE
YOU’RE ALMOST EAR! (last one)

The billboards are so corny that I just had to go and see for myself. Turns out that there actually is a palace made out of corn. Sort of. When the first corn palace was constructed in 1892, it was entirely made out of corn. But the modern structure is built out of traditional materials, and only the exterior is made of corn.

Soon I was back on my way. More billboards:

COSMOS MYSTERY AREA — FEEL THE FORCE!
DEADWOOD — WILD BILL LIVES
DEADWOOD — 1400 HOTEL ROOMS
ABORTION: THE CHOICE THAT KILLS (featuring a flatlined EKG rhythm strip)
REPTILE GARDENS — WE SELL REAL INDIAN SOUVENIRS

I haven’t seen a single speed trap since leaving Ohio. What is it with those cheeky Ohio state troopers? Crossing the Big Sioux River into Lyman County, the terrain changes; it becomes more hilly, and the roads follow sweeping curves. Twice this afternoon, a tuft of tumbleweed rolls across the highway in front of me. Cool. The whole time I am thinking to myself, it would be fantastic to come back here with a motorcycle.

With the exception of caving in that one time to see Corn Palace, so far I had successfully avoided getting sucked in by any of the billboards. But then one catches my eye:

PIONEER AUTO MUSEUM — THE REAL GENERAL LEE

And it has a picture of the Dukes of Hazard car. Now if that isn’t totally cool, I don’t know what is. So I decide to go check it out. Murdo (South Dakota) is coming up in about 30 miles anyway. When I drive into Murdo, I feel so foolish, but like a moth I continue up the road to the Pioneer Auto Museum. The exterior is as gaudy as they come:

I step inside. Still feeling foolish. “Are you here to see the auto museum?” “Yes, ma’am.” (not willing to reveal that I only want to see the General Lee) “That will be eight-fifty.” Ouch. This had better be worth it.

Inside, the auto museum turns out to be nothing worth photographing, not even comparable to the worst of the Route 66 museums. I make a beeline for the General Lee, muttering under my breath, for eight-fifty, you had better cough up some pretty pictures.

So that was Bad Buy #1. I get out of there as quickly as I can.

More billboards:

SOUTH DAKOTA’S ORIGINAL 1880 TOWN
BADLANDS PETRIFIED GARDENS — SEE 15 TON LOG
PRAIRIE DOGS RANCH STORE — NONE MEAN / REAL KEEN
PRAIRIE DOGS RANCH STORE — NO HOWL / NO GROWL

They all sound fascinating, but I have learned my lesson. I push on to the Badlands. Terrain-wise, I would have to say this is my favorite of the national parks, or at least #2 (second to Bryce Canyon in Utah). The wind is whipping up a fury, and the dust in my eyes dampens my enthusiasm somewhat.

The trails are well marked but are covered with this pebbly stuff that makes scrambling up steep inclines incredibly difficult. I pretty much wilt in the 80-some degree heat. What a glorious feeling.

I continue on to the Sage Creek Rim Road, through the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands. The prairie dogs are way cool. (In South Africa I missed out on my chance to see meerkats; I guess prairie dogs will have to do.) The bison are not as cool; all they do is sit there and eat — no wonder they got hunted to extinction.

After exiting Buffalo Gap, I continue westward to Mount Rushmore. Impressive, but very underwhelming. You aren’t allowed to climb up there. For some reason I was anticipating scrambling around on Lincoln’s nose, like Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint in ‘North by Northwest’. Boo.

By this time, I’m just trying to squeeze everything in so that I can make it to Deadwood’s Gulch by nightfall. In quick succession, I zoom through the Peter Norbeeck Byway (where I have a close encounter with a goat), Custer State Park (more bison, yawn), Needles Highway (perfect for motorcycling; just perfect), and the Crazy Horse Monument.

My last stop, Crazy Horse, is still bothering me. After exiting Needles Highway, I come to a T-stop. I can either head straight for Deadwood and a comfortable bed; or I can check out the Crazy Horse Monument. I should go pay my respects, I think. Okay. Crazy Horse it is. I drive south. When I get to the monument at 7:30, the station clerk says, “that will be $10, please.” $10, WTF? I hand over the bill while asking, “what time do you close?” He answers evenly, “tonight, about 8:30 or so. But you should be able to see plenty of stuff.”

I get out of my car and start hiking down the road towards the monument. I just want to see the unfinished Chief Crazy Horse leaping out of the mountain, bigger than all 4 presidential carvings at Mount Rushmore combined. A guard comes zooming up on a motorcycle. “You can’t be walking here.” “Huh?” “This is a construction site. You can only see the monument by getting on the tour bus.” “When’s the next tour bus leave?” “The last one was 6:00.” Grr. Bad Buy #2.

Back on US-385 headed north and west, I twist and weave and wind my way towards Deadwood. During the last half hour, while Laura Cantrell’s “Too Late for Tonight” comes on the iPod, I start to daydream. A deer appears out of nowhere in front of me. I’m only going 60 mph, but it startles me out of my reverie and I finish off the next 30 minutes on high alert. It’s 9:00 by the time I get to Deadwood, and I’m exhausted. I find the first flophouse with Internet access and plunk down my $40 (not a bad deal). Originally I was going to hit up one of the 30 bazillino casinos in town to win back the $18.50 I spent on bad buys today, but after seeing all of the old ladies frittering away their social security checks, I decide to go back to the flophouse.

Five songs from today’s “Seattle, Ho!” playlist:

• Golden Earring - Radar Love
• Celia Cruz - Me Voy a Pinar Del Rio
• Mary J. Blige - No One Will Do
• El Gran Combo - El Menu
• Laura Cantrell - Too Late for Tonight

More photos from day 3 on my Flickr feed — click here