(written on the 9th from notes taken previously)
I definitely didn’t get very much sleep last night. Between going to bed at like 3:00 something and getting up at like 6:00 ish, it was a rough night. 😅
I left the neighborhood early because I didn’t want to cause problems, not that I would have, but I just didn’t want there to be any risk. I ended up trying my Utah strategy, heading straight to the nearest Walmart to try and catch up on my sleep, but no dice.
The sun came out, and Rover heated up so quickly, that it was pretty much pointless to try and sleep. It’s in the 80s now, so that means Rover’s going to get up to the 90s inside, I think.
Anyway, so no dice there. I think I went in and bought some food, and then I headed further into town, hoping to find a park or something where I could charge my power station and take a nap or something.
I did eventually find a park, after one failed attempt, and though there was no way for me to charge my power station, I found at least some shade that I could park in.
I again thought that I would try and take a nap, but once again, I just… couldn’t. I didn’t even really try.
I did notice some graffiti on the park sign, so I got my brake cleaner out and tried to clean it off, but the sign paint was so old anyway, that I was cleaning sign paint off in addition to the graffiti. 😕
So I gave up fairly quickly on that and just sat in the van for a good long time.
Eventually, I ventured out of the van and headed over to the little Creek that was in the Park area, sitting underneath a tree on the bank for probably a couple hours.
I pretty much spent the entire day just wasting my time on YouTube videos. 😕
At least until about 4:00.
From there I headed into town again, stopping off at the O’Reilly’s near my nephew’s house because he was going to be running late. So I found a little spot that had a little bit of shade, and while I was sitting there wasting my time on YouTube videos, my friend Cory called, and we talked for maybe 45 minutes or so.
It wasn’t until he called that I realized that I was way over the edge physically. When I tried to talk, I was just about slurring my speech, and I was super slap Happy and totally messed up in the brain.
It was bad enough that he was actually worried for me, so he suggested that I take some of my pills, which I did, and we chatted and laughed and what not for most of the 45 minutes until the pills kicked in, and I bid him farewell and headed over to my nephew’s place.
It was great to see my nephew. Things have been both hard and really good for him lately. We chatted about car stuff, he having accidentally bought a car in an auction, similar to what I’ve done accidentally in the past as well. 😆
We talked about what he’s been doing with the car, the work he’s had to do, etc.
Eventually his partner came home, and I met her and chatted with her for a bit, and then we all went out to a Mexican place nearby where I bought them dinner and we all chatted and laughed and enjoyed our time together, talking about life, talking about important things in the world today, and talking about the stuff I want to do with my non-profit.
Great stuff. I love my nephew, and his girlfriend is wonderful as well. 🥰
After we got back to my nephew’s place after dinner, he showed me his phenomenal home theater system, watching a clip from top gun maverick, and then an insane clip from Interstellar that just knocked my socks off, audio wise. He’s got the shaking seats, as well as like 8,000 point surround sound. 🙃
I wish my family were closer. 😞
Stinks to live so far away from everybody, but we all live so far away that it’s a major ordeal just to visit just about anybody in the family.
Six siblings, four states. Parents in an additional two states.
It’s about a 5,000 mi road trip just to visit my siblings, no detours, let alone any other extended family or sight seeing, like I’ve done on this trip.
If just… a lot. 😞
And where will I go?
😞
🤷
Working on it…
After saying goodbye to my nephew, I drove on down i-80 towards San francisco, stopping off North in Woodland to get gas at a station that was significantly cheaper than anything else that I was going to see. Despite the fact that it was probably 20 miles out of my way, it’s still saved me quite a bit of money to get gas there then to get it anywhere near San Francisco.
Free campsites.net directed me to a street just off the freeway where lots of truckers and other travelers Park to sleep, and I found the street, and it was indeed full of people camping for the night, so I bed down for the night.
Gratitude:
- I’m grateful for that little river today. It was nice to be there. I wasn’t the only other person there, as a homeless person came over there, a couple different ones, one of them rinsing himself off in the river, and the other bedding himself down on the dirt for a nap. Nice little place.
- I’m grateful for the migraine pills that were able to reverse the onset of the migraine.
- Grateful for my friend Cory. Great guy.
- I’m grateful to have been able to spend time with my nephew and his girlfriend, just hanging out and enjoying each other’s company. We talked about possibly doing some traveling together, so maybe that’ll be something we can do in the future.
- I’m really grateful for freecampsites.net. 🙏
Success:
- I’m not worrying much about not having made much money on the trip. I’m not stressing. 🎉
Improvement:
- Need to get more sleep
Lift the world.
Bring it on.
~ stephen
Lift the World 