There was a fire at Long John Silvers early this morning in Pontiac.
There was a fire at Long John Silvers early this morning in Pontiac.
This intensely compelling advertisement was posted just below the WARNING portion of a buried cable sign at my lunch spot.
Last Modified on 8/27/97 at 20:35:48
Day's Narrative: I'm putting the latest schedule up every day for a while because I may have some bicycling relatives meeting me near Kentucky to ride to Munfordville. Aug. 28, Thursday --Charleston, Illinois. As I left the restaurant at dawn after breakfast, and cycled toward Pontiac I immediately came upon what was left of Long John Silvers restaurant after a fire earlier this morning (see photo). It was foggy this morning, and visibility was about 1/4 mile (400 m). I had bought a flashing red light to put on the back of the bike in case of fog and this was the first time I used it. It gave me a nice warm feeling having it there, but I really don't know how good it is. The fog had lifted by about 8:30 so I took it off. There is a prediction for more fog tomorrow morning. There was a slight tailwind from the northwest and I made good time. The weather is very humid. So humid that my clothes are usually soaked most of the time. That makes going into one of the air conditioned convenience stores a real experience. As I enter and the water evaporates, it feels like my temperature drops 10 degrees and I'm about to become hypothermic. It actually feels good to go back outside again. Every time I take my bicycle to the shop I strip off all the removable accessories. That includes the bike computer, map, camera, watch/altimeter/thermometer, luggage bag, water bottles and tire pump. Then I have to remember to put all this stuff back on when I ride again. After stopping for a Coke at the little town of Strawn about 30 miles (50 km) down the road, I looked down and discovered I had forgotten to put the tire pump on the bike. That meant if I had a flat I was stuck until Connie caught up. It also meant that I couldn't let her pass me without getting the pump from her. Otherwise, if I had a flat I was stuck until I could either reach her by phone, or until I could hitch a ride to get the tire pumped up. Maybe I would get lucky and not have a flat. I stopped in Gibson City, and ran into a convenience store to buy a sandwich to eat on the road so I wouldn't miss Connie as she passed. I never had a flat, and Connie caught up with me while I was having my sandwich lunch just outside of Rantoul about noon. [Connie] I Rule! as the kids say. Ray went 67.8 mi. and I went 72.4 mi. -- a difference of 4.6 miles. As Ray points out, the bicycle odometer is the more accurate of the two odometers, so my mileage may be lower than 72.4. I'm finally being less bewildered. There were a couple of occasions when I came to a crossroads, and, having a vehicle behind me, had to make a snap decision on direction without benefit of consulting a map. I have learned to turn or go straight or whatever, and then go on to the next place where I can pull over, usually a farmhouse driveway. After looking at the map, I can pull out into the highway going in the right direction or back to the intersection to start over. Today only 4.6 miles of this. This is the heartland -- Mid-America as they say, the location of small mid-western towns. Some of these are very, very small towns, bigger than the "blink towns" of my Wyoming childhood, but small. A "blink town" is one so small that you miss seeing it if you blink. Many are ghost ranch houses and an abandoned store or gas station. Today's small towns were true towns--perhaps better termed villages, with populations of 90, 150, 250, on up to 1300 or so. Ray's hometown of Munfordville, Ky toward which we are heading, has a population of about 1200. Our kids, raised in Los Alamos, NM, population 18,000 or so, often said as they were growing up, especially as teenagers, "There's nothing to do here." Kids in Johannesburg, South Africa, pop. 5 or more million, say the same thing. Ray doesn't recall being bored as a child in Munfordville, nor do I remember being bored as a [very young] child in Elk Basin, Wyoming, an oil camp with a population of 12 families. I wonder about kids in these towns and their being bored. It's probably the same as everywhere else. There's plenty to do if one doesn't expect entertainment to be delivered by someone or something else. The sky was gray, almost like that portending snow, all during the morning's drive. I can only be thankful for the lack of sun. Sun would have made it unbearable. The humidity must have been close to 100%. It wasn't raining, but the air was mostly water, hard for us desert rats to breathe. I can only wonder why the, pre-air-conditioning, early settlers wanted to be here on purpose. Later in the afternoon the wind came up, greatly cooling everything. It's hard on human-type and I would suspect all mammalian creatures, but corn and soybeans love it. That's probably the reason the early settlers liked it. It was rich land which didn't need irrigation for crops to grow. © Ray & Connie Poore, 1997
Aug. 29, Friday --Vincennes, Indiana.
Aug. 30, Saturday -- layover in Vincennes.
Aug. 31, Sunday -- Owensboro, Kentucky.
Sep. 1, Labor Day Monday -- layover in Owensboro.
Sep. 2, Tuesday -- arrive Munfordville, Kentucky.
Sep. 3-7, layover in Munfordville, Kentucky.
Sep. 8, Monday -- leave for North Carolina.Return