Sarasota to The Badlands

Below if photographic evidence of our trip from Sarasota, FL to The Badlands. It omits the time we spent with my family, which is really a shame. I don’t take pictures of them because I’m used to their fucking faces, but I should. I will next time.

We went to Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo, which is the best zoo in the world. I don’t normally like zoos. It’s tits. Takes a full day. For real.

We also went to The Corn Palace, which is super American and deeply lame. Sofia loved all that kitsch shit, so there’s a lot of photographs of that biz. We also stopped at Wall Drug. Best donuts on the planet earth. We saw the son of the guy who founded it. He’s still running around, cranking out millions of dollars a month. America is bananas.

Anyhow, more pictures coming soon.

Sofia is obsessed with the ocean, so we went there first.

I stood around like a bizarro Lydia Deetz.

It had been a bit since she'd seen clean water, so she stared and splashed around a little.

New Orleans was cool.

This pay phone is functional. As art, only.

Despite how sweet they are, Sofia was into them.

Went and got some beignets at Cafe Du Monde.

Wild bananas in a downtown park.

The gas lamps that are this city's trademark.

This was a vegan soul-food place called Sweet Soulfood. It was really good.

The coolest cemeteries in New Orleans are pay-to-play. If you want to see where Nic Cage is going to be interred, you gotta hand someone some cheese. This was a free one. It was okay. Not as spooky-scary as I would have liked, but it was all right. Next time I might pay a fee to see some shit.

There's this cool park and art museum. The park has a bunch of reflective sculptures, which are awesome.

I love these. They don't make sense to the brain.

These look digitally altered. I'm sure the artist who made the thing wanted an effect precisely like this. Super cool.

Sofia hiding behind brain noise.

Florida is filled with this shit.

Sofia is society commenting on the art which is commenting on society. She's a snake eating her own doo-doo.

The water was way too shallow to dive. This kid was contemplating suicide.

This was below and off to the side of the diver.

Mark James wrote "Hooked on a Feeling", "Suspicious Minds" and "Moody Blue", to name a few. We just happened on his tomb while walking around a Memphis cemetery.

In a Jesus cave located at that same cemetery. There were tons of mosquitos. It's appropriate, as both mosquitos and Christianity are deadlier than most people understand.

Crystals and Jesus.

Cool, old security camera. Not hooked up to anything, but the light is lit. I felt like I was in a Bond-villain base.

Across from Hayes' grave.

Isaac Hayes! He died in '08; we were just walking around and found his grave. I just read an article this morning about how he didn't quit South Park- his entourage (all Scientologists) did so on his behalf. This sucks because it annihilated his income. Religions never have your best interest mind, only their own…

Snakes always look like they're well-moisturized. Or they've been doing some weird sex shit that you just interrupted. That's why people like snakes.

This beefcake bites.

Gordo, here, got himself into a bit of a tangle.

This aquarium was awesome for Sofia because she was allowed to touch everything. Normally, alarms go off and shit and she has to run away or look nonchalant or point at me, as if I was the one who broke the rules.

This fish was a doofus. His eye was all wonky.

Space crabs.

Wrinkly, ol' uncle Bilbus.

These sexy little fish live in holes. Kind of like the fish that hang out with Ursula in The Little Mermaid.

Jellyfish are magical as fuck.

The one dude is going the wrong way.

Tentacular cups.

We think that manta rays and shit are super cool, but they're total fucking dufuses when you look at them from the underside. Super embarrassing.

Fucking dingus.

These butterflies were doing some sex dance stuff.

The purple on this dude is magnificent.

Zoos are sexy, sexy places.

Flamingos don't look like they should be alive. They look very frail. Like your grandma or whatever.

This dude was chilling on a glass dome, sleeping one off within inches of my face. I took a lot of intrusive pictures that helped him relax. I'm a friend to the animals.

Hands.

Sofia communing with nature, but through glass.

"Orangutan" in Portuguese is very funny.

I wish I could do this while I was taking a shit. I feel like it would really reduce wiping time.

Bob Barker is a cultural item Sofia had neither knowledge of nor interest in. Apparently, he was from Nebraska. Dude loved cutting off dogs' nuts.

The corn palace was everything Sofia imagined and more.

I think the 80' is length. That's how they get you.

Sofia desperately wanted a photo of this sign.

Sofia was horrified at all the dead animals in America. The ones mounted in buildings, I mean. It's not like we have them lying around everywhere.

Sofia riding the tame jackalope they have at Wall Drug.

Me walking the dinosaur.

Sofia's fortune.

My fortune.

Worth every cent.

I've only heard mountain men or found their droppings. I've never seen one, though.

Sofia hugged every wall we found.

The first night we stayed out in the badlands. The wind ripped Jake's tent.

We were right on the precipice of this great crescent cliff. The valley was so massive. I think it blew Sofia away.

This was the view down the side of where we camped.

Super cool. Bop she bop.

We stayed at the campsite where James and I stayed when he was visiting the states in 2017, too. We got the king spot, which was nice. Sofia and I bathed naked out there. It was fucking chilly.