Hurlshort

Was I not nominated?

Day 13 - Travel day to Denver, with a nice stopover in Nebraska at Scotts Bluff. It was a beautiful drive, and now I'm doing laundry and drinking South Dakota brewed beer. Logan got a bit nervous about rattlesnakes. What the heck is this? There were quite a few odd skulls here. Tomorrow we get a rental car and explore Colorado.

Is that Crazy Horse on the left? No, that is Korczak Ziolkowski, the sculptor who began the project in 1948, and his wife. This was their living area. Their ten children are still working on it, and a couple of them live on the property.

Almost 74,000 people kickstarted PoE. If every one of those people were turned off by the direction that Fallout has gone, it would still be a drop in the bucket. It sold 12 million copies in the first couple days. It had an introduction on Conan. I'm not happy about it, but the game no longer being much of a traditional RPG and the game becoming a mainstream hit might be connected. Most of us are niche gamers. Bethesda doesn't want to turn us off, but we are not the priority.

That's terrible Bart, you have my condolences.

Here is what Crazy Horse will look like some day: Here is what it looks like today: Ok, so it may seem a long way off. There is also a plan to build a University and a medical center on the land. But the place was packed when we arrived. It was just as crowded as Mount Rushmore. And something about it made me want to throw money at the project. It is epic and I hope I can go back someday and see it done, even if that is at the end of my life. There is an entire museum here that is well worth the price of admission. Without further ado, here are all my pictures: The story of the artist behind this is pretty amazing as well. Logan was getting a bit tired at this point, but he still ran with me as I geeked out over all the amazing sculptures and artwork. It was a great day. We headed back to Fort Hays for a dinner show, and now off to bed.

Mount Rushmore was interesting. It's obviously a well documented landmark, but it's hard to capture scale in pictures and video. It should be seen. They originally wanted to make it to the waist, but money ran out. Here is the smaller scale version. It was a nice hike around to see it from some different angles. But honestly I was still more excited about Crazy Horse, so I got better pictures there. After this we went to lunch in Custer State Park at a Game Lodge where Calving Coolidge and Eisenhower spent a summer. The food was great, and it was a beautiful area. I can see why a President would vacation there. We swung by a majestic looking place called Silvan Lake and dipped our feet in the water. Next up will be Crazy Horse.

Day 12 - This was a doozy of a day. I will probably need to break this up over a couple posts. I decided to book one of those travel bus tours to get to Rushmore and Crazy Horse. I typically avoid large groups of tourists, but every once in awhile it is worth it to jump in the crowd. Today was definitely worth it. We started off at a place called Fort Hays, which is built around one of the buildings made for Dances with Wolves. They gave us breakfast and then loaded us into this bus: Now this bus took us through on some crazy roads. We kept going through smaller and smaller caves. The bus was 8 feet wide, and the last cave was 8 feet and 4 inches. It was intense. The driver was extremely entertaining though, halfway through he took a break and then drank a bit of Maalox for dramatic effect. We went through the scenic Needles Highway and saw some fantastic rock formations: Yeah, we are rocking matching shirts. My next post will be about Rushmore. Here is a teaser: Yes, we got the bus through that tunnel. Interesting fact, there are 3 tunnels on Needles Highway, and they all frame Rushmore.

Day 11 - Took it easy getting out of camp, then headed to a winery called Prairie Berry for some tastings. They were a bit fruity for me, but there was a brewery right next door where I tried some nice IPA's. We ate some lunch as well. It was a very nice little area near Rapid City. After that we headed to Target. I try to shop local when we travel, but sometimes you just need a touch of home, and going into Target does the trick. They all look the same and carry the same stuff. So we are fully replenished for the rest of the trip and checked into our campground. Tomorrow we go on a tour of Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse.

Day 10 - Happy 4th everybody. We lazed around the RV well into the afternoon, knowing that it would be a late night. Eventually we made it to Lead, which is right up the hill from Deadwood. It's pronounced with a long e instead of short, which is a missed opportunity. The big feature in this town is a huge mining pit called the Open Cut. There was a bunch of mining equipment to look at as well, including this: My daughter asked if it was a teleportation portal. I have raised her right. We didn't get home until 11, so I'm sleeping in tomorrow.

Freedom is serious business!

Ok, so they have Iggy and Livingston for another year. Bogut is probably not going to be too hard to trade. Ezeli is a restricted FA, can they afford to keep him?

I'm more worried about them losing that great bench than I am Barnes. Bogut is a tough one. They still need a viable center. Festus should be better next year if he stays healthy, but he isn't the shut down defender or the playmaker that Bogut is.

Wow. I really didn't think it would happen. Crazy.

Day 9 - We headed into Deadwood to explore. It is a bit of an odd town, with a slot machine and a bar in pretty much every shop. I am sure during Sturgis it is a crazy place, but today it was pretty family friendly. I enjoyed drinking a beer in Wild Bill Hickock's seat, before my daughter tried to assassinate me. Murder in dem eyes. After that we visited the cemetery and hiked up to the Sheriff's gravestone. We had a steak dinner in a beautiful historic hotel afterwards,and enjoyed a nice walk before the thunderstorms hit. Great day!

I appreciate the enthusiasm for Obsidian, but this request is unrealistic. Fallout 4 was a huge success. It made a pile of money for Bethesda. It is far from dead, rather the franchise is bigger than it has ever been. I don't like the direction Bethesda has taken it either, but it is hard to argue with the sales numbers. Obsidian cannot afford it, and no kickstarter is going to raise enough to tempt Bethesda to sell. The best case scenario is that Bethesda gives Obsidian another chance to make a spin off game. But neither company seems to have much reason to do that now. Obsidian is busy trying to develop their own IP and Bethesda is going to be very careful with the Fallout IP right now, given its immense value to them.

Day 7 & 8 - Yesterday we relaxed in West Yellowstone a bit, enjoying a brief hailstorm and getting some rootbeer floats at a soda shop. It's a nice little town. We went to bed early, and got an early jump on the road for a 520 mile trek across Montana and into South Dakota. I knocked out the first few hours while the kids still slept in the back. We stopped in Billings for lunch. Just so you don't think it is all easy going, my wife and I got in a big argument as I tried to park the RV in the city. I was stressed and tired from driving so many miles, and parking was not fun. Lunch at the Montana Brewing Company helped smooth things over. We drove through the scenic Black Hills and passed by the site of Little Big Horn. Now off to bed, we can explore Deadwood tomorrow.

I just had a story pop up on my news feed about toddlers shooting people: http://fortune.com/2016/05/02/toddler-guns/ It's a few months old, but Jesus.

Those European confidence numbers actually show a pretty alarming drop for Clinton. Obama is at 77 percent, which is huge. Clinton, as his chosen successor, should be able to capitalize on that, but she drops by 16%. If we compare this to TV shows, Obama is Seinfeld and Clinton is The New Christine.

Day 6 - After consulting some maps in the morning, we drove back into Yellowstone with a better understanding of where everything was in the park. Old Faithful seems to be the central hub of the area, with a huge visitors center and stores. We had the kids take part in a junior ranger program, which was a great way to give them a little work on reading and writing without feeling too much like school work. We got to see Old Faithful, which was impressive. The water is shooting 150 feet in the air, and it surrounded by hundreds of onlookers. Definitely a different experience to see it in person. After lunch we started driving south. I had a goal to reach Jackson Hole, which people kept raving about visiting. It was a long drive, and I almost gave up, but once I reached the Grand Tetons it was well worth it. I love mountains. I'm a teton guy, for sure. I'll try not to get my mug in any more shots. Jackson Hole was pretty cool, we had a good dinner and did some shopping. I'll have to make more time for it someday, it was a long drive home (2 and a half hours) so we didn't get to soak it up too much. Tomorrow we will take it easy, do some laundry and grocery shopping, and rest up for another travel day.

Why would a liberal ever watch these videos? It's like expecting Christians to watch a video series titled Dear Religious Nutjobs.

Nope, I want to say it was Clepsydra or Spasm Geyser. They all kind of blended together. We didn't even get to Old Faithful, it was packed with tour buses. We will try again today.

Day 5 - We drove into Yellowstone (just around the corner, really) and headed towards the geysers. I was on the lookout for a visitors center, but Yellowstone is a huge park! I am spoiled by Yosemite, I suppose, which is relatively small and can be walked somewhat easily. So I was a bit lost most of the day. Definitely need to find a map for tomorrow. We found a lot of geysers. Some were packed with tour buses, so we stayed away from them a bit, but some we less crowded and just as majestic. Pictures don't really capture the smell and the feel of getting hit by the mist of these things.

Mission Accomplished!

My wife got better pictures of the the lava fields: It reminded me of Chronicles of Riddick. It was awesome how Logan went from being in tears about going into the caves, to leading the way across the flows.