Brain Fog Revealed

I have been off again.
So many things on my list to accomplish
before I head back to school once again.

Do I take time to write?
Do I take time to snap pictures?

No.

......but this morning......

What an awesome sight.....the town across the field disappeared in the fog.  Completely enveloped and lost in the gray mist.

This is my life....feeling swallowed by this mist.

....and as quickly as the fog dropped on our lazy little town....

...it was gone.

Sunny skies ahead.

The Road Well Traveled 2013 : 3.3 Finding Jesus

As we prepared to leave Wisconsin....

Beautiful country!

...we saw a few unexpected treasures we just had to stop to see.

Hi Igor.....I'm Thelma!

Hi Igor...I'm Stella!

Hi Igor.....I don't like spiders....
and my name is Thelma!

 We had one more stop before we crossed the border.  You see, our entire trip, we were searching for Jesus.

I know, I know. We looked for Jesus last year and found him in Sioux City, Iowa.  If you remember, that Jesus was 33 feet tall and we had a terrible time finding him, even with GPS.  You can read about that adventure here .

We tried to find Jesus on our first day, but night came too quickly and we had a few hours to go before a hotel.

On day 2, we concluded Jesus was not in the Northwoods.

We had one, final day.

We were on a mission.

While searching the roadways for our final supply run of

I "spotted" some cows in a field along the road.

Who could ask for anything more?

Oh, yes.....those are "spotted" cows, dinosaurs AND a flying sauce WITH a little green man inside......pay dirt!

We drove on the ROAD for awhile.

 And there....in the distance...

It was hard to imagine that our trip was coming to a close.....and we hadn't found HIM yet.  We had one more clue in our arsenal of the Wonderful World of Web.

According to my sometimes reliable resource, if we just dipped into Dubuque, just a wee bit by the looks of the map, we might be able to find Jesus.

......and there

           ......along the road

                      .......Gas Station Jesus!

Hey, Jesus, it's me....

...you have a little something in your nose....
I can get that for you.

Woot! Your nose is clean now!

High Five, Gas Station Jesus!

Yeah...Louise and I were excited too.

Our mission was complete, and we realized....

An hour left of our trip.
An hour on the road until we hit our own beds once again.
An hour left of side splitting, pee your pants, laughter.

An hour left of what has become my favorite trip of the year.

This was our second annual Roadside America trip.  On Day 2, Stella announced  that she has accepted a call to California.  She would be leaving us for a state that is going to fall into the ocean.

This announcement put a small damper on our spirits, but then the question was asked......

Do you think we need to look for Jesus in California next year??

The Road Well Traveled 2013 : 3.2 Pilgrimage to Mecca (Wisconsin Style)

Wisconsin is so much more than

It is also about

So where better to take a pilgrimiage to than

beautiful LaCrosse, Wisconsin!

Sadly, all of the visitor centers and welcome centers were unwelcoming and closed to visitors.  Is there no call for beer tasting?

Or does the king require all the tasting to himself?

(I must mention, by this point I had "spotted" many "cows" in BOB (big old Buick), so the pilgrimage was not a complete waste!)

The Road Well Traveled 2013: 3.1 Can You See Me?

Southward, ho!

On to Sparta, WI to see.....

The World's Largest Eyeball!
We found out at lunch, that we were lucky to have planned our trip when we did.  The eyeball is being dismantled and is being shipped to it's new owner in Texas.....'cause all things big go to Texas!

The eyeball is at the factory that creates ALL the large fiberglass items we see everyday.  The ones in parks, swimming pools and mascots such as Big Boy.

There was a mass graveyard of molds that stretched forever.  We drove through, but a sign warned weary explorers of wasp and hornet nests.  YIKES!

No thank you!

Is that a Big Boy??

Hey Tall Man! How would this look
mounted on the wall?

Let me help...You have a boog right there.

I caught a fish THIS big!

What?  A Milk Maid?

No!  A Dairy Queen!

 As an added bonus to our adventures here, we saw this on our way out of the parking lot:

Like I said before, this is a working factory.  They were lifting a hat on a very tall figure.  Anyone recognize that hat??

The Road Well Traveled 2013 - 3.0 The Wegner Grotto

We started off our third and final day traveling from Eau Claire.

We stopped in Eau Claire to see Transmission Man along the roadway.

Another prospective, and tall, beau for Stella!

This old firetruck was an added bonus by Transmission Man.

We started south to Cataract to view another grotto.

The Wegner Grotto was built around the same time as the Concrete Garden in Phillips.  This folk artist focused more on flat surface design, rather than the sculptures themselves.

This is a small chapel built on the property.  Each corner is decorated with a different church.  All the decoration is made of small shards of glass.

It would not be recommended to lean on anything in the grotto.  All of the pieces are covered!  Even the tops of the railings!

Doesn't Stella look wonderful, modelling in all of these fabulous roadside areas?

The Road Well Traveled 2013 : Along the 45th Parallel

A large portion of our trip, we traveled along the 45th parallel....

...half way between the equator and the North Pole!

Wait!  Is that a reindeer?  No, we are not quite far enough north, are we?  This was a frequent visitor we saw along the roadway....

Say "Hi" to Rudolph!

 One of our major goals though was.......

We traveled MANY miles (over 400 again on day two) and boy were we tired!  Another long day and late night in the car.  So for today, it is time to STOP.

Louise and her STOP sign.....