Glasgow VA is 1200 miles away. I have to give in and take the Interstates. It's going to be a mad dash across Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, West Virginia, and into Virginia itself. Of course, driving the Interstates means I won't get to see any of these states: on the Interstates, I only get to see the road ahead.
Today is Labor Day, the official end of summer. But I get off to a good start, and am half way down Wisconsin (at Lake Wisconsin, Dulcie told me) before the first jam. There were more at Madison (capital of Wisconsin), and, of course, through Chicago. When I was last in Chicago, enjoying breakfast on Route 66, I didn't realise there are these enormous freeways carved through it.
Actually, I shouldn't say "freeways", because these are toll roads in Illinois. The map would have warned me, but Dulcie didn't. I found myself in the wrong lane, too late to change, cut off by dikes, and bundled through the electronic paying lanes. I expected my tires to be shredded by spiked strips, but nothing happpened. The man at the next toll plaza (yes, that's what they're called) was very kind, and gave me a leaflet telling me how to pay in arrears on the internet.
I almost didn't make it into Illinois. I think it must have been a relatively bad accident. I covered about 6 miles in an hour, but there was no sign of what the delay had been about.
I was planning to stop the night in Gary IN, which is really in the hinterland of Chicago. As we picked up speed in heavy traffic out of Chicago, we were cut up by a swarm of bikers. Not your put-put Harleys, your screaming Japanese bikes, with their unbelievable acceleration: ridden by boys, sure of their immortality. It was quite terrifying to watch. None were wearing helmets, and a few had little girls clinging desperately on the pillion. One of them was actually carrying a helmet on his arm.
When I got to the Gary exit, they were all waiting for me, parading all over the exit ramp. I reminded them of my association with the San Bernardino chapter ot the Outlaws, and they hurriedly retreated.
The book I am presently reading informed me, apropos of nothing at all, that the great J J Hill, the Empire Builder for whom the train that stops at Glasgow MT was named, died of an infected hemorrhoid. It is one thing to poke fun at people's heroes, but it is quite another to firmly attach this kind of slur. I will never see the great man in quite the same light again.
But is does remind me of my childhood. When I was about ten, the teacher set up this spelling game, where we had to find a word which we could spell, but the other children couldn't. Yes, you've guessed. I managed to pick "hemorrhoid". I can't imagine what the poor teacher thought, with this word being hurled back and forward across the class. Of course, I didn't know what it meant.
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