Day 4

Post date: May 10, 2010 3:20:24 PM

Route

Four highways take you from San Diego to Fort Wayne: 15N, 70E, 465N around Indy, then 69N. 70E runs from the Rocky Mountains to Indianapolis, Indiana. Today I was making good time: 200 miles at 80mph with only two stops from Colby to Abilene. That’s when poop went flying.

Environment

Through Dorothy’s Kansas: wind, pasture, cows, oil rigs. Isn’t this “The Great Dust Bowl?” Eastern Colorado is the same makeup.

Technical

Here’s the poop: I’m pulling out of the Travel Store gas station, tickled by the road I’m devouring today, when pop goes the weasel, or the fuse, that is. Pull her apart out in the parking lot, flipping this and that switch, disconnecting accessories, etc., and I flash through five 20 amp fuses to no avail. A car dealership/repair shop next door says, “Nearest motorcycle shop is twenty miles east in Junction City.” Mmhmm. Right. 7000 miles on my motorcycle and I have to tow her to another town? A gentleman of a mechanic next door helped diagnose the problem as “the brown wire between the ignition switch and the battery.” I found nothing wrong with the wire. But, touching it fixed the circuit! I load the bike, ecstatic, and am about to run off when *click* she’s dead again. I look to the hotel next door at that point. It was 6pm.

Social

Kansasans are the kindest folk in the country. Cory from the car shop next door, denied pay for his two hours assistance. He said, “We’re slow anyways, and I get paid on commission.” We sat there in the gas station navigating the service manual I downloaded from Ebay to my netbook. He pointed and explained. I nodded and said, “Good thing you understand these diagrams!” He went to school for it, apparently. It showed. The gas station attendant empathized as well; she handed me a coupon book for hotels in the area. The one next door happened to be in it. What a perfect place to break down- surrounded by caring people with the knowledge and services I needed.

Psychoanalytic

Alas! Ay Vey! Woe! *%(#$(! Rush, Rush, Rush. I had forgotten the point of this trip—to put myself out there with the good, the bad, the ugly, and to revel in the diversity of the experiences. Today was a reminder to SLOW THE F*&# down. “Loud and clear! Loud and clear!”

Weird and Wild

Neither the gas station attendant nor their network administrator could seem to understand that their wireless internet, access to which is so extravagantly advertised on their front door, is locked by a security code. I showed them but they just shrugged. So immersed in this high-tech world, I’d forgotten people are still sheltered from its wonders and morbidity.