We survived!

We got up early on Friday to drop the dogs at my mom's, then come back to pack the car and get on the road. Unfortunately, we didn't get out as early as hoped - Alex struggled to get up and get moving, which is honestly pretty standard, lol. It's not a terribly long drive (only a bit over six hours), so there was no reason we HAD to be out super early or anything, so that was fine.

The drive up was fine. We did unfortunately miss one turn, which led to a detour that added maybe 45 minutes to an hour, but it was a pretty nice section of the trip. It went through some national forest areas, which were SO much more interesting than the fairly empty grasslands the previous hours had been.

We saw maybe 40 or so pronghorns, split into 5 smaller groups. I love them! A few deer in the forest. No other terribly exciting wildlife (other than roadkilled porcupines and badgers.)

So then we got to Rapid City.



I would NOT recommend the Motel 6 in Rapid City, FYI.

Alex and I unfortunately have a lot of experience with pretty awful hotel rooms, but this was definitely top five worst. We weren't expecting luxury - we did choose the cheapest option, and we know it. But still, this was not good.

- we arrived and were told there was no hot water. The boiler had started leaking propane, apparently, so... yeah, no hot water. But no one was going to fix it until Monday at the earliest, because they didn't want to pay weekend work rates.
- room was... pretty filthy. Floor was dirty. Walls and ceiling had all sorts of mystery stains and splatters in varying shades of brown and red. Most were around the mirror and sink, but others were around the toilet.
- smelled bad.
- mold in the shower.
- a really gross layer of dust over the ceiling vent.
- the room was FREEZING when we checked in, and took a while to warm up. One of the beds was pushed all the way against the heater, which seemed like a fire hazard, but here we are still, and at least the heater worked.
- the headboard of one of the beds was on the floor behind the bed, leaving the sharp bent brackets sticking out of the wall right above the mattress.
- noticed a candlelight memorial of sorts set outside a room on the second night when we got back on Saturday night - LED candles spelling out initials, shooter bottles of booze set around them - ...in front of a room with bulletholes in the door. cool.
- on Sunday morning, while I was in the bathroom and Alex was in bed, the cover over the light on the sink randomly fell off and crashed onto everything on the counter.

But whatever, we lived, lol.



We were in South Dakota for a model show, and Alex did really well!

He came away with 47 NAN cards (meaning first or second in a class), as well as one section champion, which went on to win the entire division, plus an additional divisional champion!

The sectional + division champ was for the original finish division (meaning models as they come from the company that produced them), which is the largest division, so very exciting to win it!

The other divisional champion was for the entire custom division (which is models that other artists have done custom paint jobs for, like what Alex and I have sometimes done for that annual painting challenge.) That one was exciting because it was a model he'd done the finishwork for, rather than one purchased from someone else, and his work beat out some pro stuff that was shown that day.

Everything went late, but it was a good, successful day!



Got the sort of sad news (for me, on a small scale) that the sim game that I've played for about 10 years (it will be 10 years later this month) is no longer receiving development time from the creator. It's just not a popular or profitable game, and she can't justify giving it time any longer. The game is staying up as-is, but will get no additional updates or bug fixes, and if something major breaks or it gets to a point where it isn't paying its own hosting costs, it will go away altogether.

It's "just" a silly browser horse sim game, but I HAVE been playing it for a decade! It's been a constant thing that I've enjoyed, that's been my wind-down of choice to spend an hour or so on. There are lots of horse-sim games out there, but none of the others I've poked at appealed. Either they're very kid-oriented and cartoonish, or they're so complex and serious that they become un-fun. (Or they're extremely pay-to-win, to the point that being a free player, or even one who just pays a very small amount for premium currency, means you basically can't do much or ever succeed at the game.)

I plan to keep playing it as long as it's around, but it's a bummer to feel like it's sort of on borrowed time. The game got a couple pretty big updates recently - one only a week ago, overhauling a huge part of the showing system - so it feels a bit blindsiding to now learn that it's basically done.

Sunday morning, again, my hope was to be out fairly early, though not crack of dawn. And again, that wasn't really how it worked out, and we made it out only about three minutes before checkout. Bleh.

On the drive back we made great time, probably in part because we *didn't* miss a major turn, ha. Though honestly, next time (if there is a next time), I think we'll plan on taking that longer detour anyway. The rest of the drive is just so... empty.

No issues on the drive up, but on the way back Alex got dozy a couple times. We stopped for a few leg-stretches, but it was rough.

We finished reading Kindred, finally. It had been our road-trip book, but then we stopped having any long drives, so it didn't get much progress! Still a deserved classic.

Switching gears almost entirely, we started reading The Infernal City, which is an Elder Scrolls tie-in novel. I bought it and the sequel for Alex in the hopes he'd like them.

We picked up the dogs from my mom's house. She said they were both very good while they were there, which was a relief! Cy loves staying over there and he's always good, but it was the first time we've had Bella stay anywhere overnight, so I was hoping she'd behave and not be a terror. Sounds like she did great!

I didn't think the trip was THAT exhausting - we've certainly had much longer drives and days! - but I was wiped out. Fell asleep early last night, woke up late today, took another nap anyway... And I'm still tired, even! I'm extremely glad I didn't have work today and don't have work tomorrow.

I definitely have some catching up to do, but it might take me a couple more days.