Gentlemen, Start Your Engines!

We decided to drive to Portland instead of fly out. This is for several reasons: 1) shipping cars across the country is expensive (like $2000) 2) we suspected Oliver (our cat) might not like air travel too much, and 3) we thought it would be therapeutic for us, you know, like a rite of passage or something like that.

It just so happens that some of our family lives in strategic locations so that we could drive for about 10 hours west/northwest each day, and then could stop and stay without having to pay for hotel rooms. So, after packing up our house we set out to our first destination, a short visit with my Grandma who lives in Oklahoma. It was a short, uneventful visit with one exception. As we were driving through Arkansas (somewhere between Little Rock and Fort Smith) we passed a chicken truck on the highway. It looked like this:

It was kind of crazy, I mean, I guess I just never really thought too much about how my food gets transported, but it is wild and a little unsettling to see that many chickens crammed together. It definitely makes me glad I only eat free range chicken & eggs, and also makes me re-think whether I should become a vegetarian (something that's been on my mind lately).

Sidenote: Justyn thinks I would be an excellent vegetarian, because I get so grossed out by raw or undercooked meat. I can't even go to the meat counter at the grocery store, and really don't enjoy eating meals where the food resembles any sort of living thing (even fish). I even have a problem with eggs from time to time...I know... it's weird. It's not a cruelty thing at all, it's something else... just can't put my finger on it. Portland is supposed to be a very "veggie-friendly" city, so maybe I'll think about that some more.

Anyway... the chicken. We pulled into the left lane to pass the chicken truck and this is what we saw:

Okay, I have a small confession. This is NOT what we saw. I, being the passenger at that particular time, did not have easy access to the camera, so I stole this picture from some other guy's blog, who apparently saw something quite similar and has cat-like reflexes so he managed a picture. (I don't know him, and I've never read his blog but I figured I should link to it just to be honest). What we actually saw was quite a bit more dramatic - the chicken was out of its cage about 5-6 levels up, and it was facing outward so we could see the look of distress on its beak. It was squawking like crazy, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't saying "I'm FREE!!" Anyway, apart from that, I found Arkansas, Oklahoma, and Kansas to be quite uninteresting.

The most interesting thing in Kansas was in a little town called Sedan, where the main attraction is an actual yellow brick road. We didn't stop (there was no time, and we thought it best to get out of Kansas as soon as possible) but I found this picture on the Sedan, Kansas website:

I don't know about you, but that picture makes me glad I didn't stop.

The only other thing that happened in Sedan is that we stopped for gas and the owner of the gas station talked Justyn into buying some homemade hot sauce made from Carribean red peppers. Justyn is a sucker for hot sauce, and likes to support the little guy.

Next stops: Colorado & Utah. Those states were SO incredibly beautiful they deserve their own post, so until next time...