Mountain View!

As I type, it is Thursday night, about 24 hours since I first arrived here. It took me five days to travel 3000 miles, and today I bought a new car (first car I've ever bought!) and signed a lease on a new apt (according to google maps, it's a 6 minute drive to work :)

It's certainly tempting to take a break tomorrow, but I still have to move in to my new place, and start looking for furniture!

Thus ends my nyc2mtv adventure. What's next? Time for some heavy-duty puppy-preparing research :)

oenothera speciosa

These pink primroses were growing in the back parking lot behind a McDonald's.

California trees

California, at last! Passing along steep slopes, I was suddenly in well forested lands.

electron arteries

Communications with THE COMPUTER

At a small town near the Nevada/California border, I tried to withdraw some money from an Automatic Teller Machine (sometimes called an "Ay Tee Em"). Unfortunately this one had lost its communications. I wonder if The Computer was angry.

Nevada terrain

Driving farther west I started to see signs of the Sierras. We're not in flatland anymore :)

dinner at Wendy's

It's actually kind of difficult to eat healthy meals on the road. This is my attempt to do so at Wendy's. I'm not sure I really succeeded -- they even add bacon to their caesar salad. (By the way, that's the book I'm reading right now -- giving me lots of ideas for some cool future plans :)

center pivot irrigation

I saw quite a lot of these in Nebraska. They are hundreds of feet long, and spread water across a field. Since they pivot around a fixed point, the well-irrigated part of the field becomes a healthy green circle, and you can easily see many such circles from a plane or google maps :) The image below is from wikipedia (and NASA, indirectly).

Wyoming sunset

numerous fences of unknown purpose

These leaning wooden fences were all over the plains. I'm not really sure what they're for. Any guesses?

wind towers

There must have been at least 50 of these towers along the road. They were mesmerizing, turning together, but not quite in sync. It's possible that I was looking at the Foote Creek Wind Project.

oversize load

This is a pretty big right cylinder. I wonder what it will be used for.

The Bruckheimer tree

I took this picture specifically because it reminded me of that very brief introductory animation to some Jerry Bruckheimer movies.

rock formations

the sky

The building-imposed valleys of New York streets feel a little like caves compared to the wide open expanses of the great plains.

a train

I read that the first transcontinental railroad lines were completed in 1869. There's still an impressive amount of train traffic running near I-80, although there also seems to be about a 1:1 ratio between cars and semi-trucks.

bugs!

I'm amazed by how many bugs hurl themselves sacrificially against the front of my car. Sometimes, especially at twilight, it actually sounds like it's just starting to rain. (My license plate was clean when I started my trip.)

Tuesday's drive

Today I drove 725 miles - essentially from one edge of the Mountain Time Zone to the other. It was the longest day of my drive, with over 10 hours of solid driving time. Accordingly, I took boatloads of pictures (to be posted soon).

Huge bird turd?

Shortly after cleaning my windshield at a gas station, I heard an impressive SPLAT in front of me. Trying to look out at the traffic past the smearing mess covering half my vision, I was confounded to figure out what in tarnation could've left such a massive deposit on my car. At the next gas station, I very briefly inspected the solidified goop for any signs of insect parts, only to find no discernible exoskeletal pieces. My best conjecture remains as "bird turd".

Nebraska Sunset

Compared to the vague change-of-guard at night in New York -- by which your source of light becomes a myriad of streetlamps, billboards, and lit store windows rather than some distant, oft-skyscraper-hid monosolistic sphere of fusion -- the sunsets out here look pretty nice :)

Stops in Iowa

Corn, corn, corn.


This windmill was part of a Danish welcome center. I asked them if there was anyplace nearby to eat, and they said no. Then they said I could try the gas station. But, other than the lack of food, they were actually very friendly and welcoming :)


This is a typical Iowa house. Haha, no just kidding, actually this is a reconstruction of a colonial house near the Dutch welcome center.

My Monday route

I also took a little detour through downtown Des Moines to get an oil change. When I told the woman behind the counter that I worked for Google she shouted to the garage "hey! we got a celebrity here!" That gave me a kick! :)

Big things by the road

The coolest thing I saw today was what appeared to be a gigantic propeller blade being transported by a semi truck. I couldn't get a photo quickly enough since it was headed the other way, but it was unquestionably the largest propeller blade I've ever seen -- at least 50 feet long, to be conservative. In retrospect, this could not actually be a propeller blade for any known boat, turbine, or wind tower, since 50 feet is way too big (even for aircraft carriers -- I checked). What the heck was that thing??


Moving on to recognizable things, I did see a few functioning wind towers along the way. I like wind towers :)


Here's a happy water tower. I wonder if they paint it sad when it runs out.


There was an aerospace museum nearby. They probably ran out of room for this plane and just threw on the side of the road like this.

Driving to Iowa

My next stop was Davenport, Iowa (that's where I slept Sunday night).


When you're driving west, you get a nice long view of the sunset.


My Sunday drive was serenaded by fields, farms, and gorgeous billowing clouds.

Mom's place

First stop for a night's stay: my mom's place near Kent, Ohio.


This is Baby, an impressively gregarious and playful kitty :)


Hi, Mom!


I'm enjoying the lake view from the porch, after a great meal of peaches and pepsi :)


Mom's chocolate chip cookies!! Sweet.

Chez Hsu

I stopped by Jean's place on my way through Jersey to Ohio.


These are some of Jean's family's chickens (correct apostrophe placement, anyone?). They were noisy and apparently hungry when Jean threw in a freshly-plucked asian pear from her orchard.


Hi! That's me.


Here's Jean ambulating her way into the orchard where we tried a few pears (they were good!)

moving out!

After loafing around Maria's place for a nice week or so, I decided now might be a good time to stop by the west coast. So I rented an SUV, put a couple things in it, and drove off into the strange foreign wilderness of Jersey, my first stop along the way to Mountain View.

(The pic is Maria's sloping street in Harlem. That's my beige rented SUV illegally double parked for packing.)