Sir Grump Munch

July 20, 2006

Back From SD, Getting Ready to Ramble

Goddamn if I don't keep setting new records for lag time between updates, it's a wonder that anyone ever reads this site at all.

Well, I went to South Dakota and visited my mom and Grandma like I said I was going to, it was an incredible trip and very valuable in quality time spent with both. I flew into Minneapolis and took their new "light rail" system down to Lake St., very fast, tidy and efficient, I dig it. Good job, Minneapolis, keep it coming; other cities: take note. I picked up my rental car on Lake St. and stopped in for a quick lunch at Kihn Do, got some Mock Duck w/ Potatoes, that perennial favorite from so many years ago, nothing else quite like it, and nothing so sweet as tasting something good you remember distinctly but haven't had in many years. I had a full serving as leftovers and took them with me to my mom's house, she and her husband Nick (both meat-eaters), both loved it!

It's a long, punishingly boring drive from Minneapolis to Java, something to the tune of 8 hours over some of the most barren, featureless landscape that the US has to offer. I had a few mix CDs I'd made, and those (along with the great Mpls station The Current), helped me keep my wits about me as I drove. I stopped in Aberdeen to see my grandma Schnabel, who I planned to visit and spend a few days with on the return trip. I finally got to my mom's just after sunset and caught up with her, showering her with gifts from "the big city."

She was off work starting the next day so we got on the road about 10am and meandered toward those Black Hills over the course of that day, crossing some sad Indian Reservations, some wind-blown small towns, and finally getting into the pretty western part of the state towards evening. Stayed in Deadwood the first night, a tourist trap if ever there was one, nothing but Casinos and a few tacky gift shops along the old main drag. Next morning we headed down toward Rapid City via 385 and 44, a pretty drive (like most in the Black Hills). Walked around town, had some Vietnamese food at Saigon on Luther's recommendation, and found a nice hotel with a good Indian proprietor named Indra, the Castle Inn.

The next morning we headed down to Keystone to see those presidential visages carved into that rock, check that off the list of things to see before I die. Pretty impressive I guess, look for my own interpretation of this monument next holiday season. Then back to Rapid City for some more walking around and another comfortable night at the Castle. I went to a stripper bar called Shotgun Willies and spent a couple hours looking at naked girls, talked to a nice, bored dancer who'd also grown up in Michigan. I think she really liked me. ;)

The next morning we got some breakfast at a bowling alley, left Rapid and headed back northwest toward Spearfish via Nemo Road and the Spearfish Canyon, another beautiful drive. On Nemo Road at the Steamboat Rock Picnic Ground we met a good fellow named John who was busy working on a bow he was building from scratch, he entertained us for an hour or more with his stories and wit before we moved on.

To be continued tomorrow, too much to write in one night...

Okay, to pick back up. After going slowly through the Spearfish Canyon, we got to Spearfish itself, which wasn't particularly memorable save for a bunch of motel signs and some little college campus that I got lost in on my way out of town. What we were really after was Wyoming, so we got on the old expressway (the only time we took it during the whole trip) for an hour or so and made our way west to Sundance as the afternoon approached evening. We got fixed up at the Arrowhead Motel and then walked around the town to size it up. My mom and I both liked the place, pretty setting and cute little town. This is Sundance of "The Sundance Kid" fame, so they have a statue of him there. We checked out one tavern and then had a good dinner of Mexican, where I enjoyed my first "indian fry bread" in the form of a veggie taco(?) After this, my mom wanted to go to a different bar, and I wanted to drive around the town and outlying area some more and watch the sun set from a big hill, so we did. I met back up with her at the bar to find her "rolling dice," and got introduced to her newfound friends, a great cast of characters including an old cowboy named Swede, who was like a character from a Coen Bros. movie. We were both quite fond of him and his wonderful stories from a life rich with adventure and heartache.

After all that fun it was to bed so that we could get up and go see Devil's Tower (a 30 or so minute drive away in a fairly desolate area) the next morning. Another pretty drive, and the Tower was indeed a sight to behold. I bought a lot of good souvenirs at their fine souvenir shop (found a few good pre-Photoshop pieces anyway, an endangered species!). After being satisfied w/ the Tower and related gifts, we rolled southwest toward Moorcroft, our westernmost destination (because my mom didn't want to see any proper mountains and hated being in the car, so we compromised at this). Moorcroft was home to some fine Motel signage! We took Hwy 16 from here to Newcastle and back into SD at Custer. Gorgeous scenery in Custer Park, though we didn't see any buffaloes.

We ended up back in Rapid City for another night, this time at a different Motel (no offense to Indra or the Castle, we just wanted to try something unfamiliar). The one we picked, the Four Seasons, was two doors down from a topless bar, so my mom went with me to check it out (since she'd never been to one). Actually I'd never been to a "topless bar" before either, just fully-nude strip clubs. This was a weird setup, basically there's a topless "hostess" who just sits around smoking cigs and talking to customers, and they can buy these poker-chip tokens at the bar for $1 each. To "tip" the girl, they drop the chip on the floor and she bends over go pick it up, and they get a pathetic little show of ass-jiggling. Weird deal, but SD law says that a girl cannot be bare-breasted and handle cash at the same time, nor can she be nude and touch a customer (Shotgun Willies was the same, girls would cover their boobs when they picked up a dollar). Goddamn weird puritanical state laws. While we were there my mom met some of the local "regulars," and we sat with them for a couple hours and got their scoop on life. My mom is amazing in that she can walk into any place and immediately strike up a conversation with anyone, that's something I admire and need to cultivate in myself.

The next morning it was off to see the Badlands on our way home, we went via Scenic, along 44 over to 509, then east down the Badlands Scenic Parkway, over to Interior. Scenic was a dusty, barren little town, we stopped in the gas station there. Come to think of it, Interior was a windblown shell of a town too, only with an added tourist attraction of a saddled cow that comes into the local bar, that's some hard living out there in those Bad Lands. The Badlands themselves are everything you've ever heard them described as; alien, imposing, out-of-place, majestic, unholy.

Satisfied with having seen them, we headed back toward her home via 240 to 14 and took that to Pierre, a nice little town on the Prairie. Didn't see the capitol building, rare for any state not to make it the obvious focal point, maybe we were just on the wrong route. She needed to get back home and I needed to get moving on to spend a few days w/ my Grandma in Aberdeen, which I did, and it was fantastic. We had some wonderful conversations and I recorded her for 6+ hours speaking about her life and family. (I also interviewed my mom for 3 hours before leaving her, it was a great learning and documentation experience for me, and of course so hard to say goodbye not knowing when we'd see each other again).

After 2 or 3 days in Aberdeen with Grandma, Aunt Jean and Uncle Don I drove the boring-ass drive back to Minneapolis, this time sans mix CDs (I gave them to my mom, she's sheltered out there). I met up with Ryan and stayed with him for a few nights, going out on the town, getting some great food, and seeing the old sights. Also visited a few old friends from here and there, though not enough or for long enough. The highlight was probably meeting and having lunch with Dan Cleveland of Driver 23 fame, what an awesome experience that was! He was very gracious and friendly and let me record our conversation too (I was a tape-recording fool on this trip). An amazing 10 days, it's exhausting to even recall it all. Most of the photos are posted to Flickr now, still a 100 or so to work through and upload, so please be patient.

Hopefully my mom and I will be getting together a lot more often and she will break out of her shell and come visit me somewhere, I think this trip was great for both of us.

Posted by pj at July 20, 2006 12:50 AM