days eleven, twelve and thirteen

our brief foray into the greater denver area was little more than an oil change (dad mandate - must get oil changes at the dealership), some subway, a jovial conversation with the checkout guy at 7-11, and some playing on the monkey bars at the global leaders academy elementary school. tornado warnings in the counties north of us had us a little hesitant, but we're invincible young men, not mere weather-susceptible mortals, so we pressed north to wyoming.

the drive was probably my most difficult of the trip. i took the whole six or so hours through some pretty torrential downpours, substantially iced roads, and heavy winds on the clearer segments. once you get north of the rockies, the land turns into an endless sea of small rolling hills with some rocky outcroppings poking through every once in a while. some comic fighting for the front seat ensued at a rest stop up north. wade won out. a word on the rest stop - it was basically a glorified outhouse. the toilets didn't flush. it was like using a port-o-potty, but with a little more distance between you and the waste. still, a little weird. athens, take note. hopefully we don't end up with port-o-potties in the slc, but you know. whatever saves water.

we got in to the dime horseshoe in sundance at about 9. the place was hopping, the free popcorn was hot, and the pool table was wide open. we met wade's friend sam yemington, who told us about the time he came to atlanta, but wade wouldn't come hang out. apparently, wade was "busy" watching heroes. with us. wade has tivo. we made fun of him. we also met sam's brother will, who had gone to school in chicago but moved back to sundance with his girlfriend alanna. sounds like "atlanta," but without the t. she has a degree in bookmaking and was working on the yemingtons' ranch to make some money for supplies and such. basically, she makes handmade moleskines. the three were very good company, and we had a great time that night. we slept in sam, will, and alanna's living room. shadow the cat slept with gabe, and i shared a mattress with grits, a really friendly airedale terrier.

will and alanna

the next morning, we went out to the yemingtons' ranch, about ten miles outside of sundance. i loved it. we shot guns, we saw the branding equipment, i drove a tractor, we shot more guns. we toured a house on their land that hadn't been touched since the fifties. it was full of treasures, like an old sears catalog and a can of hi-c. we met sam's mom, who was very nice and happy to see us. we then went and saw will's white house, situated on the property across the street from the ranch. some digging around produced a couple empty beer cans, which we set up on a pile of scrapwood for target practice. gabe "shooting merit badge" shaukat, wade "afraid of cliffs" wisdom and i all managed to at least graze a can. pretty good for our first day.

sam "remington" yemington

from there, we headed to the carlile store to play ropeball, a game we were familiar with due to its popularity at football tailgates. first, we needed to go inside to get the equipment. i couldn't believe what i saw - four 12-packs of game fuel. just sitting there, waiting to be bought. gabe paid for them, and we exchanged numerous high fives before we secured them in the back seat of sam's suv. gabe and i dominated wade and same in a chilly game of rope ball, then we headed to devil's tower.


along the drive up to the tower was a field overflowing with enormous prairie dogs. sam told us about a creative guy who cast a marshmallow on a fishing pole out into the field and managed to catch one. he was apprehended pretty quickly and got in lots of trouble, but it's hilarious either way. devil's tower was rocky and impressive. we grabbed some lunch and headed back to the ranch, where sam got a phone call from his mom. she had snagged her left thumb in a lead rope when she was feeding horses and needed to go to the hospital. wade, gabe and i played trivial pursuit (fyi - the baby boomer edition sucks and is impossibly difficult) until he got back. apparently, the damage was pretty severe. later on that night, we found out that she had the tip of her thumb amputated. pretty bad thing, but she's still with us.

we got back into sundance, showered, and headed out for another night on the town. the bar of the evening was turf, which featured a decent cover band, dollar cans of bud light, and seemingly the town's entire population. there was plenty of dancing and revelry. pool cost a quarter to play, but some ill-advised bets against jerry, the town psychologist, left wade about $20 in the hole. gabe held his own. we hit the hay at about 12:30, knowing that we had a long day of driving ahead of us.

after waking the next morning, we got in the car and got on the road by 9:30. we took a brief detour to mt. rushmore for pictures and such. the photos look pretty fake, but rest assured, we were actually there. we headed on. and on. and on. gabe took us all the way through south dakota (boring), i took us all the way through southern minnesota and wisconsin (mostly boring, some pretty barns), then gabe finished us out. we got into wade's uncle greg's place in chicago at about 2am, where we crashed.

more has happened since then, but i'll save that for another post.

here's to shooting guns, whiskey and water, and the yemingtons.