Happy 420 folks!!! To all my smoking buddies out there, I hope you toked to the marijuana gods and thanked them for such a wonderful plant that will hopefully be legal nation wide someday. Just a little back story of where the term “420” came from, to honor this magnificent day.

The Grateful Dead actually made the term popular in the 70’s. I guess they over heard police officers calling in marijuana busts as a 420, so the group started referring to marijuana as 420. Well, the magazine “High Times” got wind of this and made the term what it is today. Now onto my shitty day.

So, I stayed at another rest area/truck stop last night in Sutherland, Nebraska. It was really nice for a rest stop and I slept amazingly, as usual.

Here’s some pictures of the rest stop. Very pretty. Now, I did wake up with really bad allergies. I couldn’t understand why they were so bad. I had not experienced allergies like this since I lived in NYC. So, I took a shower, blew my nose about 500 times and hit the road. But before I could set that cruise control I had to empty my my septic tank because the shitter was full…

Here’s some pictures of Hershey, Nebraska. Nothing fancy but it’s Nebraska… what do you expect? After a couple of miles driving I found a nice, little RV camp site to dump the tank in Platte, Nebraska.

At least it appeared nice. It cost me $10 to dump my tanks and fill up my water reserves, which is a standard price.

Here we are doing the dirty job. You didn’t get to see this side of the Millennium Falcon in “Star Wars” but I’m sure they found a way to vaporize their poop or something. But until that day, I am stuck doing this.

It isn’t really that bad though. You just put some gloves on, hook your hose up to the RV and put the other end in the septic tank. You drain the black tank first, which is the nasty one… then you flush out the hose with your gray water tank afterwards. Your gray water tank is all the water from your shower and sinks, so the soapy water from that basically cleans the hose out after you have dumped the disgusting stuff. Then you just throw the hose back in it’s compartment and your done. It takes 10 minutes at the most.

Of course I had to take a picture of a Georgie Boy RV that was on site. I met an older gentleman named Dave. I asked him if he would tell me a little about his RV. Of course he did, gladly.

His Georgie Boy was 3 years newer than mine but has 80,000 miles on it. He said it is the best RV he has ever owned. He and his wife use it all the time to travel and it has never let him down.

He also told me how Georgie Boy went out of business. I guess they had a new line of RV’s coming out with retractable rooms, that expand when you are camping to make more room, but retracts to make the vehicle smaller when traveling. Then the inevitable 2007 recession hit and they couldn’t recover from their investment because the banks wouldn’t loan them the necessary money. So they went out of business. Very sad to know because I love my RV and they obviously make a great product. Why didn’t we bail them out?

So anyway, I finished the dirty job and a great conversation with Dave. Now it was time to hit the road again… but I had to pee first. Since I had just dumped my tank, I didn’t want to refill it already. So I drove over to the RV camp’s public restrooms. But just as I was walking towards the restroom this nasty woman comes out of the front office asking me if I camped there over night. I said “no” of course and explained to her that I just paid $10 to dump my tank. She goes on to tell me I can’t use their restroom since I didn’t camp there. I explained to her that I just wanted to use her toilet quick and didn’t want to refill my tank since I just paid $10 to empty it but she didn’t care. I was so flabbergasted by her ridiculous rule, I just hopped in my cab, said a few choice words and drove away.

Just down the street there was a great fort I had to take pictures of before I left. So I pulled over and snapped a few.

But as I was taking these pictures, my mind was fuming about my last encounter with that lady. People who know me well, know it is hard for me to just let things go, so I grabbed my receipt and decided to give the bitch a call. I told her that I think it is disgusting that I paid $10 to dump my tank and she wouldn’t let me use her restroom. She went on to make this ridiculous excuse that she thought I was going to shower or something. How am I going to shower without a towel and toiletries? What a load of crap. So I lectured her on how I will never return to her RV site and will be sure to spread the word about her ridiculous treatment of her customers. She eventually hung up on me but I just couldn’t let such a ridiculous occurrence go without offering my piece of mind. Hopefully she will have more tolerance in the future but if you are on a RV trip, bypass North Platte, Nebraska. It’s not worth it dealing with such stingy assholes when traveling.

So I finally started my journey through Nebraska and all I can say is, what a shitty place, I mean literally.

  

Everywhere I drove all I saw was fields and they smelled horrible. Then I suddenly realized why my allergies were out of control. It was all the cow manure. I never new this before but I am obviously allergic to cow crap, which is understandable. If there is something I wouldn’t mind being allergic to, it’s cow crap but unfortunately Nebraska has endless fields covered in it.

I saw a lot of Christian crosses and Jesus signs. Some were very beautiful, like the one above. I guess I would be praying everyday also if I was stuck waking up to this smell every morning. I’m sorry Nebraska but growing up in your state must be a nightmare, especially if you have allergies. I couldn’t get out of there quick enough. I actually found myself praying not to see another damn cow field and I’m not even religious. I had to turn off my air because it was blowing the smell into my cab and killing my sinuses.

Nebraska did have some interesting bridges though. I like the plain one. It’s so minimalistic and linear. Look… I’m trying here! There isn’t much to show you but bridges and cow fields… What do you want from me?

So finally I made my way out of Nebraska to find myself in another manure farming town, Council Bluffs, Iowa. But at least Iowa was more visually pleasing. It had it’s moments but was a much better drive than Nebraska.

Here’s some more interesting bridges and a sign that warns you that there have been a large number of fatal traffic accidents in Iowa this year. This sign disturbed me because it warns you to not become another number… I was thinking to myself, what about the people who lost family and friends to these fatal traffic accidents… How do they feel about this sign? It’s basically stating that their family and friends are now just another number. I understand the purpose of the sign but what an insensitive way of going about it. Maybe I am too liberal about this but I know I wouldn’t like to see this sign if I had just lost a family member. I’m surprised no one has complained about this. Folks, none of us are numbers… They would like us to believe that but it’s not true. You all matter to me dead or alive. Aaaawwwweee…..

Here’s  some of those famous wind turbines in Avoca, Iowa. Now I was always up in the air about the look of these things and how they effect the American landscape. But after driving through Nebraska and Iowa, trust me, it doesn’t make a difference. I actually believe it improves their landscape visually because all you see is farms, fields and cow manure. So put all the wind turbines you want in these states and power the rest of the country from them. Trust me, it doesn’t make a difference! Again… sorry Nebraska and Iowa…

Here’s another cow manure field…

Then here’s another Jesus sign directly after… Anyone seeing a pattern here? These poor people don’t need Jesus… they need to move for Christ’s sake!

Here’s Des Moines, Iowa… Their State Capitol building… it’s roof is covered in 23 karat gold… Why not 24 karat? Did the budget fall short at 23 karat? lol…

Anyway, sorry I didn’t have more to show and tell but there will be days like these, as the song states… I will leave you with this beautiful sunset as I drive into the night… looking for a place to camp…

Also, please bear with me with the blog. I will get to the point of posting everyday, it’s just hard getting started but I’m getting there fast. I would say this blog will be firing on all cylinders by the weeks end.

Again, happy 420 and please go out there and represent! We need all the help we can get!