ADVENTURER’S LOG: EARTH CYCLE NINE - MONDAY #1693

WILLISTON, NORTH DAKOTA

This was at mid-day today...

Where're looking for hoodies.

Took a short side trip to the Canada border...

"To" is the operative word...not over. With the weaponry I have I may have never gotten out of their jail.

Wife needs to upgrade her Garmin. It had us drive for miles on a dirt road...

But in all honesty, all the roads look exactly alike and I have never seen so many lakes in my life...I'm talking thousands and thousands...

When we told someone we were driving across America on Hwy 2, he actually said, "Hell, there ain't nothing to see." I beg to differ...

The problem with the road above is that you can just pull over and pee. Both the wife and I were about to bust when I spotted this road with...of all things...a tree. The problem was it was too narrow to turn around so I had to back all the way out...

First sign that we were nearing a boom town...

This is a mancamp...

 Sometimes they just use campers...

And this is what all the fuss is about. That is the range of the oil field.

Remember all the dire predictions about the US running out of fuel? Well, that has been postponed.

I showed you a night shot of the US taken from the ISS and Williston showed up as a large lit area. 

Someone told me it was because of the huge flames at each rig...and there are tens of thousands of rigs like this one...I think it's because all of the thousands of work sites are lit 24/7...

I figured that there would be a bunch of whorehouses. I spotted this one because of it's not so subtle sign...

Seriously, most of the bars out of town have several campers out back...ummmmmm.

Went for a drive and tagged a guard cable. The cable bracket looked like it was made for me...

That copper fastener holding it on is what farmers use to attach ID tags to cow and pig's ears.

 The room was somewhat....problematical...

 My wife fucked with these AC controls for thirty minutes before she noticed the thermostat on the wall.
All that time I was trying to plug my computer into this socket. It simply would not fit, but there was a lamp plugged in and mine and it's plug were identical.

 My wife called the desk and they said, "Oh, we're so new it's just tight." I am here to tell you that the plug would not fit...I finally found another outlet in the bottom of the lamp.
Then there's this...

 Zimmerman not guilty...

But if we learned anything from the whole sordid affair, it was not to bring tea and Skittles to a gun fight.

OBSERVATIONS OF A TRAVELER

We've only met one person from North Dakota. We met a lot of people, mind you, but they are all from some place else.

I learned that many banks (and the Federal Government) kept the mineral rights to the land they sold to farmers, so many of the farmers only made "Land Damage" from this boom. That means that when the oil company ruins the acre or so land where they are drilling, the farmer gets about $10K. If they have to cut a road you get more, but what with horizontal drilling, most of the wells are right next to the road.

Met a delightful, and pretty, young woman named Jordan; a waitress from Atlanta. Her and her boyfriend bought an old camper and drove to Williston. They both work in food service...double shifts at two different restaurants and are making a fortune...on average $300 a night per restaurant. She said that up here the dish washer makes $18.35 an hour.

Jordan also told us that with so many young men in one place, they make just about anything a felony. I understand the iron hand when you think about how hard it would be to take control once you lose it.

 One Mexican restaurant had a menu that read: Not authentic Mexican...it's North Dakota Mexican.
We went to eat there but the line was out the door, and Ralph Henry don't stand in lines.

 I've learned that before you marry a person, you should first make them use a computer with slow internet to see who they truly are.

 I swear...I'm convinced I run faster in hotel hallways than anywhere else.

This is a real, un-retouched photo...

I usually have one ironclad rule about what I post...if my wife knows about it, I don't post it...

I figure that if she knows it, then everybody on the planet knows about it, and a I an exception with the pilot thing. I wondered if the graphics guy who did that would ever get a job again.

Famous paintings of people painted on people...

What do you think this is? Take a minute before scrolling down...

It's a man's arm after using a belt sander.

My daughter gives people these as gifts for favors. I think that's cool.

Am I the only one to notice that Harry Potter didn't age at all in 9 months of school, but then ages like hell in 3 summer break months?

I brought her weed because flowers can't get her high.

Fuck these bastards...

This is good news, right.......right?

I've always wished somebody would ask me to paint a mural on a wall like this...

 Those zany Egyptians...

In my opinion, one of the brightest moments in UN history...

"Oh, no, that's not funny. There are some things you can't joke about."   Fuck you.

Street art at its best...

Another photo that looks like two...

"The way to a man's heart is through his stomach."
Yeah, what frigid bitch made that shit up?

Even with the ISS and the Hadron Collider, I'm still in awe of stuff like this...

Sometimes I miss my pre-internet brain.

The first rule to being a husband is you're going to spend your life doing crap you don't want to do.

How much lube do you need for anal?
A buttload.

 Need proof...

Remember that Saturday Night Live skit: "Save the liver!"
Made you smile didn't I?