Home At Last

  It's been a long haul but we're almost at the end of our epic journey. Tonight we're sleeping in a little part of Indiana on the east side of Lake Michigan. Tomorrow, we have an eight hour drive home that brings us to the end of our 18,000 km loop:

  The last few days have been a bit of a whirlwind. Monday we took our friends' son, Alex, and his wife, Jen, to see a Minnesota Twins ballgame at Target Field.

  Aside from the game being a total bore the ballpark was a pleasant surprise. Unlike T-Mobile Park in Seattle we were treated to open concourses and decent food at affordable prices. There wasn't much of a crowd there but, even with a normal crowd, I don't think it would be as difficult to navigate as it's Seattle counterpart.

  The ballpark is right downtown (near the pointless Nicollet Mall from an earlier episode) with lots of parking and nice views of the surroundings:

  At the game Alex asked if we'd been to the Spam Museum (yes, it's a thing) as he and Jen had been there over the weekend and had a good time. As we're always up for a good time that doesn't involve eating live insects or jumping off bridges attached to giant rubber bands, we decided Tuesday would be an Atlas Obscura day and headed off to explore southwest Minnesota.

  Our first stop was Clear Lake, Iowa. Wait. Yes, I said southwest Minnesota but this is special. If you're of a certain age you'll remember a certain megahit from the early 1970's that was played endlessly on AM radio (look it up kids), "American Pie" by Don McLean. The backstory to the song refers to "the day the music died", that is, when the airplane carrying Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and The Big Bopper crashed in a field near this town in 1959.

  Although we didn't hike the half-mile through the corn field to the actual crash site we did see the memorial tribute to Buddy Holly:

...and the shout out to Don McLean:

  Then we hopped back in the car and took ourselves to the aforementioned Spam Museum.

  Austin, MN, is home to Hormel which makes Spam and also owns a number of well-known brands. I won't bore you with the details as you can always look it up. The museum is devoted to the history and marketing of its eponymous product and manages to do it with tongue firmly planted in cheek.

  There is an exhibit focused on Monty Python (spam, spam, spam and eggs, etc):

  They also offer an explanation of how "spam" came to describe junk email. Apparently, a careless sys admin mistakenly forwarded an email to 200 people and, like the Pythonesque example above, the repetition suggested it would be an apt description of his mistake. History explained.

  There's another exhibit that asks you to assemble a can of Spam and times your efforts, then tells you how many would have been produced at the nearby factory in the same timespan. My personal best was 15 seconds during which the factory would have churned out 107. I think it would be a better test of my ability to find out how long it takes to get this stuff out of the can as I remember fighting with it on many occasions over the years.

  The nice people who run the place also try to expand your horizons by serving samples of the different varieties of their product. When we visited, the "Tocino" and "Jalapeno" versions were offered, both of which we found quite tasty, which resulted in our purchasing said product from the in-house shop.

By the way, "tocino" is a Filipino BBQ-style sauce. Now you know.

  After a thorough viewing of the entire place we said our goodbyes to the friendly Spam people and headed back home by way of Rochester, MN, home of the Mayo Clinic and this work of art:

  It's also worth noting we came across a roofing company whose motto is, "Our roofs block alien abductions". This raises a whole shitload of questions. How did they test their roofs? Are alien abductions a thing in Minnesota? If aliens have the technology to travel thousands of light years to find us why are asphalt shingles preventing them from snatching the locals? What's special about Minnesotans that spur aliens to come all this way to examine them? I have so many more questions but I think you get the gist of it. Truth in advertising.

  On our way we stopped off for dinner at the local BBQ joint and were pleasantly surprised to eat some of the best BBQ we've ever had. In Minnesota. I mean, who goes to Minnesota for BBQ? Texas, the Carolinas, Memphis, Chicago? All good. Minnesota. Not so much. Of course, we just did the same thing back in May when we had to stop in Delphos, OH because there's a great Mexican restaurant there. In Ohio. Stop laughing.

  During dinner we discovered it was Trivia Night so we hung around to see if we could whip the locals. We were killing it until the Final Jeopardy question (no, the answer wasn't Light Urple) when we had to identify which U.S. governor had written, "Do The Right Thing". Well, I thought that was a Spike Lee movie and I know he wasn't a governor. Penny suggested Arnold Schwarzenegger was the author and it sounded right to me. Being go big or go home types we went for it... and lost everything.

  Apparently it was written by Mike Huckabee who was governor or Arkansas a while back and who's daughter was Donald Trump's Press Secretary and is currently governor of her dad's state. It doesn't sound like he did the right thing there, if you know what I mean. We did score a gift card for the restaurant because we finished third... out of three. We'll be back, next time we're in the neighbourhood.

  Yesterday was spent with cleaning, laundry and packing so we could hit the road first thing today. It sounds like the homeowners are very happy with our work so that'll be another 5-star review to add to our housesitting resume. With that out of the way, off we went to Milwaukee to see an afternoon game at American Family Field (formerly Miller Park, which is a much better name).

  The Brewers' ballpark was a bit of an eyesore from the outside and it's situated in a suburb far away from everything... except an industrial park and some trees. Heading out to a local watering hole after the game is out of the question. From the inside, the sightlines were good and there was a decent amount of visual interest.

  Food was uninteresting and the lower concourse is enclosed and separated from the field by the private boxes. Although the spaces were a decent size there wasn't much worth sampling, unless you want a brat, and we'd had enough of that after two weeks in Minnesota. One thing that was worth hanging around for was the Sausage Race, an iconic event staged during every Brewers' game since 1993:

  And that brings us to this evening, sitting in this little slice of Indiana contemplating our return home tomorrow.

  I'll start by saying, as I've said before, three and a half months was too long. Not because we didn't enjoy the traveling, the places we stayed and the pets we cared for but it's too long to be away from family and friends. In future we're thinking two months away is a much more management timeframe.

  Having said that, a long excursion like this allowed us to really immerse ourselves in this new, to us, lifestyle. I'm taking a chance in speaking for Penny but I'd have to say it was a success. I mean, we just spent the last 109 days, 12 hours and 17 minutes joined at the hip and didn't kill each other. Sure, there were disagreements. Large disagreements. Did I mention there were disagreements?

  We saw large parts of the U.S. and Western Canada we hadn't been able to examine in depth during our previous travels. The difference between the typical A to B vacation trip and what we've done is significant. We've lived in these places rather than just visited. Yes, we saw the sights and did the things but we also bought groceries, took out the garbage, rode the transit systems and generally lived everyday lives. We saw the things you usually don't see because we didn't have a list of things we had to do, or a time limit within which we had to do them.

  We walked dogs, a lot, and made friends with them. Twice we left dogs that missed us after we left. We didn't meet a lot of people but we did get to know the homeowners a bit and, for the most part, we'd happily sit for them again. We did take care of cats too but, as everyone knows, cats don't care about you. Just put the food down, clean the litter box and let them in and out when they whine. Cats.

  We met up with people we know along the way, which was great. It's a joy to see familiar faces during a long trip. Video chats don't cut it, as we all found out during Covid. The conversations are stilted and rushed. Time differences make for awkward timing. Small cameras and screens make for crowded viewing. It's not ideal, but it's better than nothing.

  Tomorrow, we get to hug our kids and grandchildren for the first time since May 29. We'll see our grandchildren have grown and learned new things. Our kids have managed without us for the longest stretch in their lives. It's gratifying to know they're self-sufficient yet depressing to know they don't need us like they once did. This getting older sucks.

  Something I learned about myself is I'm like a shark; I'm happiest when I'm moving. And I eat just about anything. This bit of wisdom below sums it up for me:

  This adventure is drawing to a close but another begins in a month. I may not post any new episodes while we're home but I promise to get back to work when we hit the road again. Watch this space.