Not a really long day today, the drive lasted only about six hours including stops, and I'm settled in a hotel room in St. Louis. I'm taking the car to a mechanic my friend Geoff knows tomorrow, and with any luck, they'll be able to take care of the Air conditioning leaking problem.

I started off the day pretty early, not as early as yesterday, but woke up with a pretty painful neck cramp, making me unable to turn my neck more than about 70 degrees to the left. I honestly don't know what it was, since the hostel beds were pretty comfortable, for hostel bunk beds. A little small, but the temperature was right both days in Chicago.

In any case, I left around 9:30, and contemplated stopping to get a deep dish pizza before leaving. I would have, but the restaurants didn't open until 11, and I had to meet Geoff and Paul for lunch in Manchester, MO at a Thai place called Manee Thai. Regrettably, due to some missed communication opportunities, Geoff and Paul ended up at the restaurant an hour and a half before me. We did end up meeting, but we both ate at separate times.

I checked into my hotel, and because of my tiredness and soreness, I decided to take the rest of the day off. Tomorrow is going to have a bit more to do, and I have a fairly full schedule.

In any case, I wanted to expound upon the trip thus far, and give some completely random observations from my trip so far that haven't really merited mention in my main posts thus far, so that's what I'm going to do:

1. There are quite a few things I dislike about the american interstate highways, among them the tolls, the constantly shifting speed limits, and the exits which require you to cross three lanes in order to get to the proper actual exit (probably not very well described, but trust me on it), but one of the things I LOVE is that there are rest stops every 10 or so miles, with restrooms, water fountains, benches and parking in case you need to do anything to the car. We could really do with some of these in Ontario.

2. The prices and sizes at fast food outlets, which I had previousy remembered as being smaller and larger, respectively, have either changed in the last ten years, or I completely misremembered, and thus, misrepresented, in several chats with friends about the states. I was both a little happy and a little disappointed about this.

3. I was honestly a little apprehensive about possible theft and/or muggings in both New York and Chicago. I'm happy to report that not only were there no thefts, pickpocketings or crimes of any kind that I witnessed (other than a lot of red-light running by both pedestrians and motorists in New York City), but I did, at one point, leave my wallet in a starbucks in Chicago, and had someone run after me to return it, money intact inside. I have had nothing but positive experiences with folks in both cities, and I'm very pleased about that.

4. I'm 20% done with the trip, approximately, and I've spent more money than I thought I should have. I'm eating better than I thought I would have, and I'm also finding it harder to keep organized in my bags. I'm taking more pictures than I thought I would have, and I'm also finding it much easier to find things to do and see than I thought I would.

5. Today, I lost the "keeper" on my watch band. (I had to look the name of it up on google, because why would I ever know what that part of a watch strap is called?) that made me sad.

6. Today, before lunch, I went to a grocery store in Manchester, and realized that I had literally not seen one single grocery store in the United states. Probably not because there weren't any, but more likely because I don't know the name of any grocery stores in the states, and every single one I thought I found turned out to be a pharmacy.

Anyway, Cheers!