I woke up to a sunny morning and the birds were going crazy singing their asses off. It was a pretty pleasant morning with a temperature of about 75 but it was still pretty sticky and about the upper end of my comfort level. 

I had some coffee and breakfast and got everything packed up to leave after I stopped at the dump station and had a look at the atlas again.

I went on south towards North Platte to catch eastbound I-80. That is as far as my planning went and I would play it by ear from there. I had a couple of thoughts on when to start heading south to Kansas since that was my final destination.

I made a pit stop at a rest area and saw this cool trailer:

I went back-and-forth on my route but eventually decided to go on over to I-29 and head south to get to where I was going. According to Apple Maps it was the fastest route so I took it. I have had enough of the horrible weather and just wanted to get to where I was going.

I went south a little ways and it was so hot and humid you could actually see the air. Yes, you could actually see the air. 

It was also 94°. 

OPPRESSIVE.

I got a little farther south and it ended up being 96° and still humid. As luck would have it, when I stopped for gas a guy walked up and told me there was a piece of trim coming off of the side of the trailer. Around the wheel wells is a channel that covers the edges of the siding and it actually goes up over the top on each side. The rubber trim pops into a channel and it keeps water from getting into the screw holes that secure the trim and siding – a kind of weatherstripping.

This could only mean one thing – I had to lay on the pavement on a 96° day and fix it. I grabbed a throw rug out of my trailer to lay on the ground as insulation as well as to keep my skin from the scorching pavement and from getting dirty. I got it fixed quickly and easily but couldn’t leave quite yet.

The refrigerator in my trailer runs on either propane or 110V shore power. Unfortunately there is no 12V setting on my refrigerator and you can’t run propane while you’re going down the highway. On a hot day like today things started heating up quickly inside the trailer, so I figured while I’m fixing that trim problem I would just fire up the propane refrigerator and then go into the convenience store and wander around a bit so the refrigerator could cool off.

I got back on the road about 30 minutes later and got to the house. I probably won’t have many updates for a few days since I will be holed-up in the air conditioning avoiding the carnivorous insects and passing out from the heat.

It is so damn hot and humid. It is so uncomfortable even into the late evening. It is affecting my allergies and my breathing pretty badly so I do not know how long I can stay. It is in the mid-to-upper 90s and what feels like comparable humidity levels. I need to fix a few things at the house before I head back north though. 

I cannot walk in the grass here, as the chiggers are horrible and they crawl up and get into places like inside your socks and underwear and chew your skin. The oak mites are even worse – they are blown around through the air so they cannot really be sprayed for (unlike chiggers, since they crawl in the grass). They start chewing on whatever they land on looking for oak trees. You cannot see either one of these little bastards so there is really no prevention short of staying out of the grass and, better yet, indoors. If you have never had the pleasure of either one you are very fortunate. So are your nether regions.

Yesterday I saw a sign that had a phone number for “stump grinding”. I am not sure I want to know what that is about.

Or, do I?

Check back in a few days!