Michael Jackson died, some other stuff happened

Let's face it, everything in life has been trumped in importance by the passing of Michael Jackson. The media should disband. The world should stop turning. Joe Jackson should be made president.

Actually, Joe should be launched into outer space with irate howler monkeys who are given an escape hatch after gnawing his face off and then he should be blown up.

But that aside, I'm on a road trip! And I've slacked off on my consistent documenting of said trip. So here's a highlights reel.

*Rapid Falls* I can't believe neither Linda nor I have had proper time to articulate how awesome our stay there was. We checked into some overpriced axe murderer hotel and strolled down the main street, where college kids were playing bluegrass on the corner, and went to eat at some local TGIFridays called The Firehouse. It was packed, due to the excessively awesome cover band playing in the back area, featuring many of your favorite Rock Band songs, so we headed up to a bar that was located in a t-shirt store/theater. That's where we met Nico, our vest-clad Romanian friend, who took us on an epic adventure that included line-dancing to hip hop, puking, and photohunt.

*Mount Rushmore* So then we drove across South Dakota and hit up that strange monument to leadership, Mount Rushmore. I ogled over the obeseness of Americans, giggled over the founder's name, and watched as a kid chased a chipmunk around. I cannot begin to tell you readers how many horrible parents I've witnessed on this trip. In fact, the best behaved kid I've seen was the toddler ginger with a mullet somewhere on the fringe of Minnesota. Yeah, a woman who would shave her kid's head into a mullet before he can walk is doing a better job than waspy tourists. Oh, and I finally snapped at the Chicago Zoo and made a disparaging comment about a mother who was letting her little asshole pound on the glass separating him from the gorillas.

*Minneapolis* I'd never been there before, although it's the birthplace of many of my favorite bands, particularly Soul Asylum, you guys know how I love them. We didn't take the Skyway, but we did visit a museum and I'll post pictures of a particularly amazing painting of a 'woman' that I found. We also had a fantastic time at the beautiful home of AJ and Lili Jackson. See, this was just the beginning of the significance 'Jackson' was going to have on our trip. They fed us meats and cheeses.

*Milwaukee* We just passed through, but I took pictures for my grandma, because it's where they made her!

And then it was on to Chicago, which deserves a post in itself.
Special thanks to our sponsor, Red Roof Inn.