{"id":360,"date":"2011-09-25T19:36:56","date_gmt":"2011-09-26T00:36:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/?p=360"},"modified":"2011-09-25T19:36:56","modified_gmt":"2011-09-26T00:36:56","slug":"murdo-sd-i-think-maybe-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/?p=360","title":{"rendered":"Murdo, SD (I think – maybe not)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m in Murdo, SD, tonight – or at least I think<\/em> I am. Murdo is supposedly 275 miles or so from Gillette, WY where I stayed last night. But there’s a really weird vibe here. Sort of like the old Twilight Zone intro: “You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension – a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You’re moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas. You’ve just crossed over into the Twilight Zone.” <\/p>\n

To give you an idea, the first lodging I came across was called “The Lost Souls Inn (and Anchor Tavern).” Wisely, I decided to skip that and head for a more recognizable brand. I checked in at a Days Inn, where I seem to be the only guest. When I opened my room, I was greeted with this piece of art hanging on the wall:<\/p>\n

\"Headless<\/p>\n

It appears to portray a headless guy on a horse, holding a lantern in his right hand, with his skull in the crook of his right arm. The image is actually a lot darker than this in real life – all I could make out initially was indistinct shades of black and the lantern.<\/p>\n

Sorry for the angle of the picture – I couldn’t flash it from straight on or all you’d see would be the reflected light from my camera flash. And I didn’t want to take it out of its frame to get a better picture – that might make it mad… I wonder if “Murdo” is related to “murder”?<\/p>\n

After leaving my luggage in the macabre motel room, I headed out to the “Buffalo Restaurant and Lounge” for dinner, as recommended by a menu laying on a table in the reception area of the motel. On arriving there, I was greeted by the bartender who was wearing a shirt that said “Have you seen my zombie”.<\/p>\n

While I was eating my dinner, I overheard the only other patrons in the place, 2 elderly couples, talking about church today. One of them was saying “You know the usher, the little one? He makes his own guns out back.”<\/p>\n

After rapidly finishing my meal, I went to wash up in the men’s room. There was a sign above the urinal that said “No chew in urinal – use bucket”. (Chewing tobacco)<\/p>\n

Anyway, I’m back in my motel room now, where the headless dude is watching over me. Soon, night will fall…<\/p>\n

Tomorrow I should make it past Sioux Falls, but whether it will be in this dimension or another, I can’t say. Stay tuned…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m in Murdo, SD, tonight – or at least I think I am. Murdo is supposedly 275 miles or so from Gillette, WY where I stayed last night. But there’s a really weird vibe here. Sort of like the old Twilight Zone intro: “You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=360"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":361,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions\/361"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.atomacrossamerica.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}