Today was an extraordinarily weird day - rain, clouds, wind, mud, cold, tumbleweed. I began the day at Toadstool Geologic Park as rain fell intermittently and it was so cold that I wished I had brought gloves with me on this trip.

On the ‘gravel’ road near Toadstool, I drove through several very muddy spots were deceptively treacherous. Shortly thereafter, my car developed nasty vibration at highway speeds once I returned to the pavement. Fearing the worse, I detoured back to Chadron and stopped at a tire repair shop downtown. The very nice woman behind the counter told me not to worry - thick mud had likely stuck to the wheels and taken them out of balance. She directed me to a self-service car wash where I liberally sprayed high-pressure water at the inside of the wheels.

It worked. The vibration went away, no expensive repair required.

After my carwash visit, a literal ‘herd’ of dozens of tumbleweed rushed across the highway due to the high winds, hitting cars but amounting to little more than a peculiar annoyance.

The Red Shirt Overlook on the southern edge of Badlands National Park isn’t near much of anything but it is a really fantastic view. The only problem was that the wind was blowing so hard that I had trouble standing up and felt a bit worried about getting anywhere close to the edge of the abyss.

More 16:9 images for your viewing pleasure…

Post title: Haruki Murakami - Norwegian Wood

These two lanes will take us anywhere

Highway 18, South Dakota

High plains drifter

When it rains like this, it feels as if we're the only ones in the world