Sunday was a day to see family, and take care of an errand. Got up at a reasonable hour and sailed up I‑35 to Des Moines. First stop, the T‑mobile store in West Valley Mall to get a replacement for my dead Cliq XT, and give them back their oh-so-stylish lime green Motorola loaner phone. A few minutes waiting for an ‘associate’ and I start into my spiel: broken phone, cust. Svc agreed to sell me a stopgap phone at full discount, notes are in the account, but Austin couldn’t do it due to an area-wide policy: no price overrides. Period. I believe the Austin-area sales manager for T‑mobile is an idjit. Anyway, twenty minutes of quizzical looks from ‘Stacy’ and I had my new phone. Powered it up, and gave a half-hearted try to get though the silly Motoblur setup. It didn’t work, and I resolved to take care of it after I got to Emmy’s place out in Panora.
Short ride to the west, and I arrive. Out of the riding gear, take a few pics, and try to get the phone working. Oh Crap: no t‑mobile out here. After some visiting with various family, and a nice dinner, I got back on the bike and rode 30 miles back towards Des Moines, got on the T‑mobile net, and got the phone working. Sheesh. A non-bypassable external dependency to get a phone working is a really crappy user experience. Oh well.
While hanging around in Panora, I got a look at my brother Shawn’s latest project:
It’s a ’55 caddy hearse chassis with a custom camper built on the back. It’s been sitting in a pasture for the last 20 years. Shawn bought it cheap and plans on putting it back in running and camping shape. Including restoring and redoing the flame paint job. Awesome!
Started looking at weather forcasts for Monday: hmmmm, whaddya mean tornado watches through most of central Kansas, Nebraska, and the Dakotas?!. Guess I’ll get up early and make tracks west before the atmosphere get’s all hot and bothered.
So Monday dawns clear and warm in Des Moines. H head west on 44, taking 44 and 30 all the way to Grand Island. Warm and humid, with the unrelenting south wind, but no rain or thunderstorms. Some classic rural scenery on the way west:
I proceed on west to North Platte, NE without too much incident. By the time I get to a North Platte hotel, the wind is blowing 35mph and gusting higher. One of the desk clerks looks and me and asks “how’d you get here on a motorcycle, today?” “ at a 40-degree angle”, I mime. We all laugh. But I’m beat, sore arms and hands and lower back.
So I’m sitting here in a hotel room, watching thunderheads grow outside, and clouds race by at 50mph. getting’ nastier by the minute. Hopefully all this blows over tonight and I don’t have to ride through too much more of it tomorrow. Another evening of exciting Weather Channel TV!
Be good, y’all!
blackdog
