Woke up. Made coffee. Was on the road by 7.

Wanted to make good distance today. The distance between Vantage, Washington and Syracuse, New York on I-90 is over 2,500 miles. With detours (like to Devil’s Tower, Wyoming) it would be more. Reducing that number to under 2000 sounded good.

Started pouring just east of the Columbia River. Didn’t stop all day.

Somewhere in Washington I bought some doohickey that allowed me to connect my USB-C Samsung to an FM transmitter, so I could listen to an audio book through my car’s radio. Bought Wise Guy by Nicholas Pileggi. Wise Guy is the book that Goodfellas was based upon.

Wanted to hear the details of how the mobsters make their money. Don’t want to give a detailed explanation now. Essentially, you gotta be willing to bash heads, and scare people into giving you money. After that, things fall in line.

Listened to it for seven hours. Loved it. Henry Hill’s ingenuity was incredible. He could make money anywhere. Of course, he was human scum. So were his associates. Robbers, kidnappers and murderers. Nonetheless, this audio book made the drive much easier.

Along the way I got off I-90 at Coeur d’Alene, Idaho. Drove around the lake a little. However, I’d seen not just a few alpine lakes in Washington. This was not captivating to the point that I wished to delay my progress. Turned around and got back on 90.

Made it to Missoula, Montana. Got a good vibe from that place. Pretty. Charming. Cold mist hanging over green mountains surrounding the town created ambiance. So does all the money injected into that town for the 10,000 undergraduate University of Montana being there. Missoula’s quite gentrified.

What didn’t make Missoula nicer was the gay pride rally, of course attended by many students….

The homosexuals only wanted to get married… now we’re being told there are infinite genders and that you’re a bigot if you don’t send your child to drag queen story hour. Acceptance of homosexual “marriage” (which is not marriage at all but a STATE contract) was always intended to be a Trojan Horse for more acceptance of more hideous things. It is all so evil.

Nonetheless, I’ll still remember Missoula well. Gonna aim for there in July or August. Gonna aim for Kalispell and Whitefish too. There’s something stirring about Montana. It’s massive landscapes of mountains and prairies inhabited by few people. It fires perfectly romanticized notions you have of Western scenery. Maybe it’s just the name, but I don’t think so.

Passed Bozeman. Could see the Abrasoka Mountains surrounding Yellowstone to my south. They were covered in snow – probably deep snow. I pulled into a Livingston east of Bozeman to find a motel, with the intention of driving into the northern part of Yellowstone in the morning, but all hotels were booked. The tourist rocket ship has blasted off. Lingering cold and snow won’t stop the hordes of tourists in June – Yellowstone will be awful for the next three months. So, I left Livingston. I’ll return to Yellowstone later.

Did a Google search for hotels as I was passing by Columbus. It showed one for $60. Perfect. Of course it was filled with workers from a nearby platinum mine, and this being Saturday night meant that the Mexicans were blasting Tejano music, which prompted me at 10:30 pm to walk outside with an angry aspect to my being and ask them to turn it down. They did. However, it should not be that I have to tell any grown man to stop blasting music at a hotel at 10:30 at night because not all the other guests are enchanted with his noise.

Slept well after that.