Eastern Lands

Heading East

The miles keep ticking over and we keep heading eastwards, and have now crossed the huge barrier that was Lake Michigan. OK, so we may have cheated by going on the ferry but we didn't fancy cycling through Chicago and Detroit, and it would have pushed us for time. So we're now in Michigan and our fourth and final time zone, Eastern time, woohoo!

  Walmart, with a person on an electric powered buggy

I was thinking the other day that although I often talk about the large number of fatties in America, I haven't talked too much about the food. I think me and Andy have both admitted to ourselves that if we lived here, we'd be considerably fatter than we are. Food is just so cheap and plentiful, at first the portions were a struggle but we're now eating our way through anything America can throw at us. Footlong subway every lunch time, easy, large Pizza Hut pizza, easier, large Dairy Queen ice cream, far too easy. With tea out of our diet, it appears to have been subtly replaced by Coca-Cola, and with refills, it's also very easy to drink a litre or so of that a day, it's like a whole new drug that we're hooked on, and the rest of America aswell.
Of course a lot of Anericans also find these things easy to wolf down too and they're not doing much exercise which is the problem, not even walking as there are barely any pavements to walk on which is very bloody frustrating. I was thinking however that the positive side of this is that if any country can eat its way out of recession, it's this one. I wonder what the economists think to that. Forget the recovery program, just supersize your way out and deal with the consequences later, that's how everything else seems to work here.


The language is something I've never really mentioned either. We may share a common language but that doesn't stop confusions arising. We've actually got quite good with the lingo, "utilizing the rest room" and not the loo or the toilet, but lunchtime at Subway is a constant source of entertainment. When we're choosing our "veggies" we always say "tomatoes" with our British accents, and not tomAtoes as it's said here. This generally leads to a look of sheer bewilderment on the spotty "sandwich artists" face, (Subway tranlations in brackets)

Me- "Can I have tomatoes, please?"
Subway - "ya me leddice?" he'll reply. (You mean lettuce?)
Me - "No, tomatoes."
Subway -"Ar righ, arlives?" (Ah, right, olives>)
Me -"No, tomatoes, please" and we point at the round red things.
Subway - "Ah, tomAdoes, ya guys speak differen, dontcha?" (Ah, tomatoes, you guys speak differently, don't you?)

I just can't bring myself to say it like they do!
Another episode was in Walmart, which was a smaller one than we've become accustomed to. When I asked if there was a deli counter I got a strange computer look from the machine like woman, and was then marched by this employee eager to help to the...Sport section. She had obviously heard "pedi counter", I was too busy laughing to try and tell her I wanted food and not the pedometer that she handed me saying, "There ya go." Very funny.
Andy also got told yesterday, "I love your accent, are you from Belgium?". As an English teacher, these things are all very amusing and it just goes to show that sharing a language only gets you so far in communication with people who are generally idiots or from another place on the planet!


I mentioned last week about the person that drove passed us and called 911, presuming we had bothdropped dead on the spot, without stopping to see if we were OK. Well I've since heard a possible explanation for this outrageous act - fear of being sued. This makes me irate just thinking about it, and come to think of it, we've seen loads of examples like this on TV, generally regarding pharmaceuticul drugs. It goes something like this:
"Have you suffered from a headache in the past 5 years and taken paracetomol? You may be entitled to some compensation."
Now, honestly, what a load of shit. These adverts, whilst maybe not being quite as stupid as that, aren't far off it, and just encourage people to sue the shit out of each other. The UK isn't much better nowadays I suppose, but all this originated here. What a rubbish export, it just makes life so much shitter for everyone else, everyone afraid of being taken to court by a "no win, no fee" lawyer and having their livelihoods ruined if they acted in a slightly incorrect way, in spite of their best efforts or good intentions, all so someone can make a quick buck, I'm no fan.

Kathy from Warm Showers

The last week has definitely been brightened up, and cheapened up too, by the advent of Warm Showers which I mentioned briefly in my last post. It's basically a Couch Surfing network, generally of cycle tourers, and can be a little erratic, but when it works, it's fantastic. Three households have now hosted us for no cost, just offering a bed or tent space for the night together with fine hospitality and friendship, and it really makes the trip much more enjoyable, not least because it's nice to be clean and cooked for! It's fantastic too to meet people who are very enthusiastic about what we're doing and also very friendly. The further East we go I imagine we'll need to be a bit more reliant on it as camping becomes more difficult and occasional motels more expensive. I think it exists all over the world, so if you're thinking of doing a cycle tour, check it out! Thanks to Bob and Kathy, Allan, and Joyce and Roger for putting us up so far.

Sleeping like tramps in Ludington

3,000 miles have now passed since we set off seven weeks ago on a scorching day in California, seems a long time ago, and we're just a day or so from heading into Canada.  I'm not sure how different it'll feel but it'll be a change of scenery and attitudes I imagine, if nothing else. Subway will still be as prominent as ever which is all we need really. We don't even need campsites anymore, we actually took to sleeping on streets in Ludington. With a thermarest it's surprisingly comfy, shame on us.