Day 46: I Forgot to Take Pictures Again!

OK... this is gonna be a quick one.

I pick up some tubes in Uptown and mail Allison a bag of underwear and maps. Then head out to meet the trail that will take me all the way to Cosmos, MN... but it's really hot out today... so i'm kinda miserable... I take a break in Watertown and hang out at a grocery store and a library for a while. I continue on down the road and the rain that weather.com has predicted for 9pm looks like it might come early... Just shy of Hutchinson, MN I get poured on with GIGANTIC raindrops the size of golf balls... So I take shelter under a gas station... it's around 5pm and this seems like a decent town to stay for th evening... so I go "trolling" for hospitality... I hang out in front of the gas station and try to look sympathetic. Some guy named Gavin strikes up a conversation and asks me if I've eaten yet... I say no and he says to meet him in front of the Dairy Queen in 20 minutes.... I'm thinking this is my chance to sleep indoors during the major rainstorm that is predicted for tonight!

I meet up with Gavin and Anthony, a severely mentally handicapped schizophrenic that Gavin spends time with 3 days a week, and we grab some food. Well.. I quickly find out that Gavin wanted to grab dinner so he could "spread the word of Jesus" with me. I listen politely... but am not hearing anything I haven't heard before... Except Anthony is entertaining as hell... He doesn't make ANY sense, and he blends the strangest conversations together in bizarre patterns... His nonsensical ranting made the encounter bearable. Gavin gives me a copy of his book and eventually goes along his way... I find a large pavilion behind the Shopko in town, but it is very exposed and a part of a Veterans Memorial... I do some more "trolling" at Dairy Queen, but according to Allison... "I just look to scary" for people to offer to help me. Also... she says I look like I "could crush a small child". Huh?

After 9pm, I go to the pavilion and set up as the rain starts.... the police cruise by about 3 or 4 times within the first hour, but they can't really see me. I have a hard time sleeping, and so after an hour or so I ride my bike down to the motel that has rooms for $30. I talk to Matt P on the phone for a while, and watch that third Matrix movie that I had never caught.... I feel bad about going to a motel... I probably should have just stuck it out under the pavilion... but i slept pretty well. Oh well.... Tomorrow is a new day. And will be a cold day apparently...