12-1-04
Well I made it to MO. I left in the little Subaru
that I bought from my bmw mechanic Bob. He ran it for several years and now I am
planning on running the legs off of it. it has a lot of miles but still runs
like a champ and it has four wheel drive which can really come in handy.
I loaded it up with clothes, gear, tools and E dog.
We headed down the road with beautiful clear skies and brisk temperatures. South
Dakota was just blue sky and brown prairie. The wind was howling most of the way
and the little car was buffeted around some. Here is a photo of a metal
sculpture around ‘old town’ that reminds me of an early day dog man must
have been like. now we have somewhat smaller pets.J
Somewhere
around Sioux Falls I finally headed into a motel for the night. The little car
is just too small with all the stuff to sleep in. E dog liked being inside on
the carpet as she has been totally spoiled by her visit with the Gephart’s
last week while I was at Bob’s shop working on the motorcycle.
Somewhere down the road I saw this pile of corn
outside a terminal. I guess the crop was just so big this year(maybe it always
is) that they had to store it in a big pile outside. The pile is huge.
the next morning it was again gorgeous weather and
I had a great trip down the Missouri river banks. There were lights in the
fields the night before and I guessed they were combines, and during the day I
could see that is exactly what they were. There were a few trucks with ear corn
on the highways as well. By the time I got into the Northwestern part of
Missouri it had started to get cloudier and by the time I got down close to
Susan’s it had started to snow. It was a wet snow and all the road signs were
completely covered. I couldn’t tell where I was unless a little town had the
high school with its name on it by the road. The snow wasn’t sticking but the
temperature was dropping and I figured it was going to be icy soon. I finally
found a motel for the night.
The next morning (today, Monday) has been just
beautiful all day. I guess it was around the 50’s all day. I drove down to
Susan’s farm and found it totally unprotected. It wasn’t until I knocked on
the door did the ‘dogs’ know someone was there. Tova has been visiting Susan
and she had her two dogs and Ike inside the house. When she opened the door all
three dogs overwhelmed E dog. She doesn’t like that and there was a lot of
growling and showing of teeth. E dog is a real bitch and shortly had everyone
lined out that she is TOP dog. She isn’t very big, but feisty for sure.
Susan’s farm looks nice and green, but of course
the hardwood trees have lost their leaves. There are a lot of evergreen trees
around which make up a lot of the woods around here.
Susan looked tired but she has good color and seems
to be doing well. I didn’t stay long as I wanted to find a place to live and
get settled in.
I drove into Bunker, which is the closest town.
Yuck, what a dump. It was as I remembered it but I was trying to put a better
take on it this time. It is hard to do. I asked at the Bank about apartments or
rooms and was directed to a guy that runs a sort of store and restaurant
combined. I walked in and he had hillbilly music (good stuff) playing loud and
smoking. The place reeked of old smoke and the store was dark and a place you
wouldn’t want to buy anything in, unless you were out of food and hungry. I
explained what I was looking for and he said he thought he might have one or two
available. We hopped in his truck and went to look at them. Oh, boy, what a
mess. The place was a duplex built quite a few years ago. There were two broken
windows, the place was paneled in the cheap paneling, no furniture, moldy, dirty
shag carpet and who ever lived there must have smoked a lot of cigarettes. It
was horrible. When we got back I thanked him and never looked back. The next
place I checked the gal tried to get me signed up for the senior citizens
housing units. She says that they are nice but I will have to go though some
sort of government scrutiny which doesn’t sound good. The next place I was
told to check was a service station. It was not your normal service station for
sure. Lots of broken down trucks and the door was so greasy and filthy I could
hardly see through it. When I was inside there was just a small place to stand
surrounded by racks of tobacco products. This is the place to buy your stuff in
Bunker if you chew it seems. There was a woman (I assume) sitting behind a small
counter that didn’t even make an attempt to get up. She is an amazing animal.
I have no idea of her size but she appears from where I stood to be a huge round
blob with a head. I don’t want to be mean, but she was unusual looking to say
the least. This small place was so smoky it made my eyes burn. If you know about
my nose changing a couple of years ago you know that anything smoky really makes
me sick. She was really nice and directed me to a lady down the road who as it
turned out, didn’t have anything. Her rentals were three rundown houses on the
main drag that I couldn’t bring myself to live in anyway. Bunker as a town
leaves much to be desired.
I split form there and headed to Salem, which is
about 28 miles north. It is a bigger town and even has a Wal-Mart!!!! I found a
room in an old motel that rents by the week. It isn’t much, but it is clean,
has a frig and stove, sink and indoor plumbing. Oh, I don’t want to leave this
out as my friends will all want to know that I now have a ‘TV’ that must be
hooked up to a cable as it gets lots of channels, like old movies!!! Yee gads,
what will happen next to Rex?
I took
a little walk around this part of town and it isn’t that bad a place. Gosh,
there is a McDonalds right across the street! There is a Chinese eatery and part
of this motel is a Catfish southern style restaurant. There is a bank next door
and it is the local hangout for the skateboarders after it closes. I guess the
best thing about the place is that it gets half-ass cell phone reception. In
Bunker if you go to the top of the hill near the Gazebo you can get cell phone I
was told. I went there and got a connection, but it was analog and it was
roaming. That won’t work for my computer hookup and would be pricey even if I
could.
I will go to the farm tomorrow and see what I can
do to help. The sheep look good, but they need to be sheared. Tova said that it
has rained for the past week and the shearer was scheduled to shear them after
thanksgiving. I guess that will be done soon.
Cheers,Rx
DezertDog.com
(Rex)
1375 MT 59 S
Miles City,
Montana 59301
406-853-1940
(cell)