Saturday March 10, 2012

What a blurry, whirlwind past 36 hours. I got my second speeding ticket of the trip early this morning. It really is a shitty situation too. Since the first one during the initial drive out I have probably driving the last 8000 miles using the cruise control. Not entirely, but definitely for 90% of those miles. This morning I was south of SLC, heading north, and driving through a construction zone. It was just after sunrise on a Saturday morning and there was nobody working, I know that doesn’t make a difference. I thought the limit was 65 but it was 55. A cop caught me while passing someone. Because of the construction the traffic pattern was zigzagging, lane shifting, and annoying. It just really blows that I literally got caught during a 5-mile stretch where I was trying to get away from some awful, probably still-drunk, weekend morning driver.  Whatevs, could be worse. The officer was actually a really cool guy. He was nice, I told him my story, all I could do was apologize, blah blah blah. He didn’t write me up for the construction zone part, which could have been really bad. I told him that I saw the barrels and cones end, so I thought the zone was over. The funniest part is that after he got done disciplining me for breaking the law, he advised me to break more laws. I pulled off an exit ramp when I saw him behind me. I do this because I am a courteous criminal, always thinking of the officer’s safety and well-being. He told me that there was no way I could easily get off this exit and back on I-15. He advised me to go ahead and jump a few curbs and drive through a median to get back on to the interstate.

Yesterday, Friday, I woke up really early. I couldn’t sleep well because of my soar shoulder. I caught up on a little work and some TV shows while I awaited sleeping beauty. We went out to breakfast to a yummy spot in Telluride called Maggie’s…how great is that? After that we went to the mountain late, and left early. It was another stunning spring day on the mountain. We couldn’t stay all day because we had to pack up and get to the airport. We spent a few quality hours for Wifey’s last day on the mountain. I still can’t believe that she made it 6 days in a row! I still can’t believe she made me make it 6 days in a row. She was nice enough to capture some more embarrassing video of me. After the mountain we packed, had a late lunch, and drove to the Montrose airport. There were literally more employees at this airport than passengers. When she checked in she was told there was only 5 people on her flight to Denver. It must have been like flying private. It was quite a sad parting of The Sellers Superpowers.

As heart wrenching as the separation was the fact is that one of us had to muster up the strength, courage, and intestinal fortitude because the Carnival must go on. I tried to convince, kidnap, lie, and get lost on the way to the airport, but it looks like the rest of the expedition will be done solo. We did find 2 more reasons never to leave Telluride:

I drove through all of Utah and Nevada today. Nevada doesn’t screw around. The second you hit the Nevada border, BAM, casinos. I have officially gone coast to coast when I entered into California today. Not quite ocean-to-ocean, but I’m not ruling that out just yet. It’s a dream come true to have actually made it this far. Somewhere in Nevada I saw these guys. I wasn’t sure what to do, so I did the proper thing, gave them a lift.

When I cruised into the town of Truckee it was quite a site. The temperature was 50 some degrees, not exactly the greatest mountain weather. It was beautiful. All within the same eyeshot I saw ski slopes covered in snow with skiers living large, and people in the river fly-fishing. They are expecting some snow here this week, fingers and toes crossed. Regardless I am going to use this place I’m at now as a layover for a few days to rest the muscles and catch up on work. 6 days straight and 3 hours sleep in 48 hours is taking a toll. Once I get caught up and rested I’ll hopefully start my journey to British Columbia. On the way there hopefully I can make a pit stop in Spokane for a free lunch from a good friend. I can’t believe this place I am staying right now. It’s a giant 4-bedroom house, seems like a lot of abode for little old me. Not bad for $275 for the week.