Trippin for 1,050 miles (1689.8812 kilometers)

April 3rd, 2011: Just made it back to the Detroit area after completing a staggering short 1,050 mile (1689.8112 kilometer) road trip originating in Lebanon, Illinois…a city that sits outside St. Louis, Missouri, for those non-geographic international wiz kids. For the past few days my friend Cecile and I successfully traveled through a wide variety of flat chested-like landscapes at an exceptionally slow DUI (Driving under Influence) like-speed with no major incidents besides a GPS that went on strike and a cracked windshield.

Being professional tourists, my friend and I visited a plethora of fast-food restaurants, visually bug free Super 8 hotels and a went to a string of cheese fed tourist traps - which include famous strangers’ childhood homes such as the writer Mark Twain’s in Hannibal, Missouri and the suicidal Ernest Hemmingway in Chicago, Illinois. There was even a brief stop in Winterset, Iowa to see the childhood home of the extremely bad Stallone-style acting movie star of the past, John Wayne.

I wonder if I will ever do something so amazing that someone will one day create a foundation and successfully be able to charge a ridiculously priced admission to enter my childhood home, freezing the décor in a year that they think is significant - roping off the bedrooms and bathrooms with some nice bright red impassable felt ropes. My friend kindly informed me that the easiest way to achieve this vision of mine was to become a serial killer. Hmmm…I think I would rather do without the Charley Manson status, keeping my forehead tattoo free.

For the past 10 years I wanted to see the covered bridges of Madison County, which is nestled in Iowa that is known as the Corn State. Now that I was only 7 short hours away from this tourist magnet AND I had a co-pilot that did not own a penis, I thought that this was a good time to see these bridges that were made extra popular from the sappy chick flick, “The Bridges of Madison County.” It starred Clint Eastwood who was a traveling Photographer/Writer for National Geographic and Meryl Streep being the farmers cheating wife.

Staying in Chicago for a couple days, Cecile and I had an unrealistic plan set into motion to maximize our time here. One day, it was to have a museum marathon seeing 3 museums in a row. The first museum we entered to achieve this goal was the Chicago Institute of Art, which was so gargantuan, we barely had enough time to complete the complicated rat maze as we feed on the cheese and rat poison of the art industry. I guess when you are paying $18 USD for an admission ticket, you should expect more than toilet paper, soap and a clean bathroom.

While visiting Chicago, we paid homage to Lloyd Wright while exploring his old former house, who was a once living architect a long long time ago whose decaying houses and buildings can still be seen floating around the United States today.

Finally, if you go to Chicago and do not eat a real North American Pizza – specifically, a Chicago-style deep dish pizza…you are probably a cheese hater or a pasty stinky vegan. We, being neither of the two wanted to taste a piece of Chicago prior to our departure back to the Detroit Area. Seeing the arrival of this pizza at our table, I quickly concluded how the United States can so easily create a grotesquely obese person. I myself could see me in real-time: my stomach inflating, man boobs forming and an almost instantaneous bootie produced after the consumption of this mammoth pizza.

Ending the road trip we reached Detroit in the wee hours of the morning after a necessary pit stop to help keep me from getting ticketed for a DWS (Driving while sleeping). Back at my childhood home, we will be staying at the future site of the “Anthony Supertramp Foundation.” Thankfully now, admission is free from 2 am through 3am…on Sunday mornings.

1st day in the US…and I run into a crazy bug eyed rosary carrying psycho

March 4th, 2011: 1st day in the US and I run into a crazy bug eyed rosary carrying psycho with my 15 year old nephew. I had to laugh as I sat there at the ice cream shop consuming a Superman ice cream cone hoping that this cone did not just taste good but had the ability to transform me into Superman – that is, the Superman before he took a spill on a horse made from kryptonite.

With my nephew who was facing me in the booth, the man in the booth behind him with his eyes bearing a strange resemblance of a bug who was angrily staring at me, mumbling words of profanity as he held the rosary – not sure if he was cursing at it or praying to it asking the Virgin Mary for the strength not to kill this frail looking man across from him. Scooting over so my 5’11” nephew would screen me from bug eye’s face, he would then scoot over so that he could continue to try to get me into participating in a starring match that I was uninterested in playing.

After 22 or so months with only minor difficulties in South America, I felt that today was going to be the day that I was going to fight a crazy man that was much bigger than me with my nephew there to watch. In my mind I scanned the ice cream shop looking for other that might be able to help me after I restrained him. Seeing 3 grey hairs and a work staff that consisted of a batch of unbutchy women, I came to the conclusion that I was going to be holding on to him for a while till the police arrived.

Thankfully, he went to the restroom to perhaps toss some water in his unblinking eyes and that was when I told my nephew that we should go, not wanting to go into detail on what has been going on behind his back the entire time. Leaving the ice cream shop, we escaped any possible confrontation on my 1st day back in the United States – though it would have been funny for something dramatic to take place now, when I pushed the so called envelope this entire trip.

Home at last! Home at last! Thank God Almighty, I am home at last! – or am I…home at last?

March 4th, 2011: Home at last! Home at last! Thank God Almighty, I am home at last! – or am I…home at last? Arriving at the Detroit airport I was picked up my friend Jean who is one of my few BFF’s - who didn’t even have to earn this spot by participating in some painfully dreadful Paris Hilton-like reality show.

From the airport we made a direct run for the border…more like Taco Bell. With this being my first meal back in the United States, I clearly knew I was no longer in South America as I would continue making visits to the bottomless soda machine capitalizing on free refills as I pumped gallons of caffeine packed Diet Mountain Dew down my throat as supplied my body with its fix.

With my parents out of town, I was dropped off at my empty childhood home, bringing life back into its empty corpse. Roaming around the house that I grew up in…I was shocked to see that my parents’ décor was not that of a couple in their 60s’…it was as if their style was somehow mirroring a much younger couple. I was proud of them since typically, people their age have a massively amusing collections of dolls, bells, spoons or some other clutter collections going on to fill up there excessive free time when they are not volunteering or conversing with other seniors.

A collection of guns, shot glasses or knives in a way sounds good when you think about most senior citizens / AARP members conversations are at best, 76% about their pill regime, aches, pains or about who has recently been incarcerated in a senior home, wooden box or urn…with the other 21% being filled with who has the best children / grandchildren in typical fishing story type fashion and the remaining 3% filled with good conversation.

After picking up the carcass of the dead plant that died from starvation in my parents’ living room, I walked back and forth as a duck at some carnie wanting to be shot with a BB gun. Painfully bored after 30 minutes in the empty house, I jumped into my car and headed up and down streets trying to find family and friends houses that I could no longer remember where they lived.

After several failed attempts of going to wrong houses and asking for people who they did not know…I gave up…I quit…and decided to go, shopping. Hitting the stores, I began to restock my backpack getting items for my departure in 3.5673 months. How awful I thought…after only a few short hours in the US, I was already planning / anticipating my departure back to South America – lost…and a bit...confused.