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2.23.09 Van Alstine, TX
Daren’s Blog:
 Oil Change: Oil change! Bryan and I have been putting off a oil change for about 400 miles too long… I told him to just find a store that does it and drop it off and I will come and get it a few hours later! Perfect! No time lost ! it just cost $42 GEEEZ! I would rather do it myself!
Wallet: I found a wallet today on the side of the road… I picked it up and it was a woman’s wallet and everything was still in it… about 15 different cards, A social security card, Bank card… you name it and it was in there. I snooped around and looked for a business card but couldn’t find one.. .. then I saw a blockbuster card and called it and told them I was trying to track this girl and gave him my number to give to her. About 2 hours later she called and said “Blockbuster called me and said you have found my wallet”? Yes! We talked a little and she asked “where I found it” and all of that jazz…. I also called the bank to try and get a hold of her but. The bank told me the card was deactivated… I really didn’t care about that.. I was just trying to get it back to her and told her the same thing I told Blockbuster. I explained what I was doing and how at the moment I was walking alongside the road.. but the wallet was in the support vehicle… She said that she would come and get it later tonight… Then her boyfriend called and asked if he could come get it for she was pregnant and not feeling good… she sounded fine to me.. but I am sure he was just protecting her… They have no clue who the heck I am … and my story of walking across the United states sounds a little out there… Around that time Nancy Powell drove up for she was dropping off some jerseys that Marks Brother wanted to give us…. They were awesome! I loved it.. Mine is from Honduras… It looks flippen sweet! None the less… I gave the wallet to Nancy for she was heading back toward frisco where she lived and where the owner of the wallet lives…
Back on the road: My body no longer likes me… We bonded this past week when I slept just about every day and sat on couches and rested… but now we are not on speaking terms…..
 17 more walking days! Ohh man.. It just hit me… I will be done with my leg of the expedition in 17 more walking days… that is crazy.. My whole life since 2006 has been eating, drinking, sleeping The Earth Expedition and in 2.5 weeks I will be done walking and Bryan will take over and go to Europe. I am not going to lie… it is difficult handing something over to someone else that you have poured countless hours and years of your life into. I look back and see what I gave up to do this and now I am putting it in the hands of someone else… kind of.. I will still be the expedition leader but there is a lot that I am letting go… and it isn’t an easy thing to do….but it is going to be in good hands with Bryan.
Wind: the wind kind of sucked today.. there was one moment in time where the wind was soo bad and then about 6 semi’s in a row decided to past… it felt like someone hit the slow-motion button…..I screamed out a colorful explicative to no one.. I just wanted to let myself know I was mad… I felt bad afterwards..hey.. just being honest.
Bryan’s Blog
First day back in nine days = horrible. I feel like it’s day one again. I am so sore and stiff, I can’t even walk straight. I got a new pair of shoes today though. They were sent to tonight’s contact’s house. And the lucky winner to take us in for the night was…(drum role)…Bob and Dayna Deprospero!!! Dayna was my boss in high school when I worked at
University of
Gymnastics . Yes, I was a gymnastics coach. No, I was not good at it. It was just recreational though…not competitive. But it was so awesome to see them!!! We spent the whole night just catching up and telling stories. They have some amazing property out in Van Alstyne. They have a beautiful house, barn, four horses, ATV’s, three dogs, you name it. It was very cool. Dayna cooked us a delicious dinner and then just started emptying her kitchen of things she could give us for the road. It was so great. I love her to death. I got to spend some time with Mr. D (Coach Boom) while he fed the horses. He told me stories of how he worked as an arms instructor in the
Middle East . What a baller. Anyway, I can’t say much about the walking day because it kind of stunk, but the night was great with the Deprosperos. I think I can give Dayna the “North Texas Mom” title for me. She was great. We’re headed to
Paris tomorrow. I hope the new shoes will do the trick.
Album the Day “Details” by Frou Frou
2.24.09 Paris, TX
 Long Day: I did not want to walk today! This morning was freezing… I had 3 layers on and a pair of pants and a beanie and I was still cold…. Which is kind of ironic considering the temp hit a high near 80 degrees today!
9 days off: Well…. As much as the 9 days off felt good to take…. We are paying the price right now… it feels like we have started all over again… My lower back is pretty beat up … in fact I feel like garbage right now.. I kind of have that feeling that I may be getting sick… I think I am going to take some zicam to fight it off….. I hope that I bounce out of this funk by tomorrow..
Road condition: Wow… the shoulder today was interesting… imagine gravel… but it doesn’t move when you step on it… Bryan and I both commented at lunch that it feels like the road is stabbing you after spending all day on it.
Complaining: ok.. I am not trying to complain too much… the night has been great.. the family that we spent the night with last night knew some people in Paris, TX which is where we are right now.. they took us out to eat at a place called the “Fish Fry” and I rocked a kabob with salad, corn on the cob and a bunch of rolls…. Soo good. Texas has been really good to The Earth Expedition. Bryan and I haven’t slept in the car since Alamogordo, NM… that is pretty awesome!
Bryan’s Blog:
Today was so much better than yesterday. The new shoes were great. I am so happy that I don’t walk in pain every step of the way anymore. Thank you Merrell! I finally have a new camera now too! My sister paid half of it for me because I couldn’t afford the whole thing. Thanks Rachael! I took some pictures today with it. They look great. I can finally zoom in on pictures more than 30 feet away from me. My old camera couldn’t do that, hahaha. It was old. I’m almost glad I lost it. I was going to buy a new one sooner or later anyway.
So today Dayna, the person we stayed with last night, made some calls and found us a place to stay in
Paris, TX ! We originally didn’t have a place to stay and so we were going to stay in the car for the night but then this happened! Their names are Rick and Debbie Johnson. They took us out to dinner at a nice local restaurant called “Fish Fry” and it was delicious. They were very hospitable. They treated us like we were their own sons! Debbie bought both of us 12 packs of our favorite drinks. Little things like that make me so happy. It’s so awesome to run into so many loving people who want to take care of us. What a blessing! We only have two more days in
Texas ! I can’t believe we are almost done with this massive state! Woo hoo! The people treated us well though. We didn’t have to stay in our car once while we were in
Texas . That’s because
Texas people are the nicest ones! Thanks everybody who helped us along the way!
Album of the Day “Everything in Transit” by Jack’s Mannequin
2.25.09 Avery TX
 Exhausted…… I was thinking about skipping blogging altogether tonight but I decided that I should just play a couple of songs on i-pod and crank it out….. The day….. Over Cast all day! Which I am not complaining about at all because the temp was 76 and if the sun was out I would have been sweating like a pregnant nun sitting next to the pope! There really is not too much that goes on through the day when I am actually walking….. Today a officer of the law pulled behind me to see if I was allright.. they are really nice once they find out what we are doing and why we are doing it. Today was kind of weird… we started in Paris, TX and went through Reno, TX.. then through what was called “little Chicago” and then through Detroit, TX. It was like I was travelling the world all in about 8 hours.
Avery, TX: This is where Bryan and I landed tonight! We actually are staying at a place of a friend of a friend that we met two days ago. Everyone knows someone in the next town 50 miles away! I love it! And I have a couchsurfing friend in Texarkana tomorrow night! Bryan and I haven’t slept in the car since Alamogordo, NM! We got into Avery (Population about 450) and found our contact who is the Methodist minister of the church in town… actually I have seen three churches in this town of about 450….odd… none the less… we got here and they sent us to the only place that was open in town and it was only open for another 30 minutes. The told us to tell the owner to charge it to the church! I was like ok! Will do! The meal tasted even better than usual! But the rest of the night was filled with conversation about what we are doing and some of our past and all that jazz… I usually don’t mind talking about it… but tonight all I wanted to do was rest! I let Bryan do the talking…
Bryan’s Blog
Today we passed through a lot of towns…like
Reno ,
Detroit , Little Chicago. And we started in
Paris . How weird. All in one day. We’re just all over the map!
Nothing a lot happened while I was walking today, other than frustration and hills hahaha. It seems that every time I walk it’s downhill and when I run it’s uphill. I stay on a schedule where I walk for ten minutes then run for ten minutes and I try and stay with that the whole way. But every time I start running there is an uphill! UGH!!!!
We have a great story though when we finished for the day. Rick and Debbie from last night found us a place to stay with a Methodist minister in
Avery, TX which is where we happened to stop for the day. So it worked out great. So Rick gave me his number to call him when we were done and I tried to call him but he wouldn’t answer his phone. Well it is a Wednesday and so I thought he was probably in church. So for ten minutes we were thinking about what we could do to try and found out where he is. I got the great idea of simply going into the town and finding the church since the town literally had 462 people. It was extremely small. So we drove into town and in about four minutes, we found the church. No joke, four minutes. So we parked the car and saw people going inside so I thought, “Oh we can go in real fast and see if he is there.” So we went in, dressed in running shorts, chacos, sweaty running shirts, smelling like dead animal carcus and got the expected reaction. EVERYONE turned around and just stared at us. Gary McCain, the minister, was already in the pulpit ready to preach and then saw us. So he hopped down from the pulpit and ran back to say hi to us. We felt so awkward to be in there with everyone staring at us like we were prostitutes or something. We almost got stoned. Just kidding…
 He apologized for not answering the phone. He said that the reason he couldn’t answer it was because he was in middle of baptizing three kids and his hands were wet. He also said that his phone wasn’t on silent and while he was trying to confirm the kids’ belief in Christ it was just ringing away. I felt so bad. Hahaha. So he said we could either stay and sit through the service or go get a quick bite to eat down at the local diner. We did the latter…haha. I know I’m a sinner that I didn’t go to church, BUT I WAS HUNGRY!!! It was such a small town that he told us to just tell the waitress to put it on his tab. What a sweet deal! So we went and ate a nice dinner in a diner that could seat only 22 people. It was really small. We sat next to this group of elderly people. The woman right next to Daren had to have been at least 90 and she would not stop looking at me. Her daughter, who now takes care of her told her, “Mom, stop looking at him. And don’t just move those tomatoes around. You better eat those.” It was kind of funny how the daughter and mother were in completely different positions of authority now. I can’t wait for that to happen to me. Hahaha. The man sitting next to me was wearing a long sleeved, button down shirt with different breeds of dogs all over it. I don’t know how I held in my laughter. But it was awesome. I wanted that shirt.
So after dinner we went and met up with Gary and his wife at their house. They were very hospitable and gracious. I love it how we just keep getting pushed along to the next by the people we meet. Everyone knows someone in the next town. This is our last night in
Texas and we successfully made it through the whole state without sleeping in the car. We stayed at someone’s house every single night except for the two nights that random people bought us a motel room. Woo hoo! I hope it stays that way through the rest of the trip. So it was a good night. But I am still ridiculously sore so I’m going to get some shut eye. Good night all.
Album of the Day “Wish You Were Here” By Pink Floyd
1.26.09 Texarkana, TX
Daren’s Blog:
5 dogs: This morning was interesting… I don’t know what it is about eastern Texas but I pulled my knife 3 separate times today on dogs. 5 dogs total came at me today. I texted Bryan today and told him….. his response was “what kind of dogs were they” I replied with “ The kind that looked like they wanted to eat me” I wear my headphones the majority of the day so sometime I barely hear the bark until they are up on me!
 Ghetto: I also received a text from Bryan today for his section was walking through Texarkana…. What we didn’t realize is that the section that he had to walk through was the ghetto…. He told me that he didn’t even take the time to take a picture of the “Welcome to Arkansas” sign because he didn’t feel safe …lol
CouchSurfing: Last night we met up with our couchsurfing friend in Texarkana! We are his first couchsurfing experience and Andrew is a pretty awesome guy. He took us out to eat last night and we just chilled last night on the porch with another one of his friends “Tim” who came over and jammed on the porch. We had a couple of guitars going as well as my “harp” … the weather was perfect… and the night consisted of stories of the trail as well as ridiculous video from hulu and SNL…before I knew it the time was 1:00 am!
Day Off: I am soooo excited for a day off tomorrow… Bryan and I each have done 100 miles each in the past 4 days!
Bryan’s Blog:
Alright, I’m going to complain a little bit. Today STUNK!!! My feet are killing me and now I have random pains in my right knee. I don’t even know what’s wrong with it and I can’t get it checked out. It better not give me trouble. I have to finish this.
Nothing happened again during the walk itself again except for danger of walking through the ghetto part of
Texarkana . I felt like I was going to get shot. I mostly ran through the whole town. The border of
Texas and
Arkansas actually went through the middle of the ghetto but I kept going and didn’t take a picture because I thought it wasn’t safe to stop, hahaha. Seriously…But I made it through. There was no room to run though. I had to run on the road with no shoulders against traffic and every piece of cement was unlevel from neglected road maintenance. Yeah, it hurt my feet.
We have a contact here in
Texarkana through Couch Surfer! Woohoo! His name is Andrew Spillers and he is really cool. He has a super nice apartment and he took us out to dinner tonight which was extremely kind of him. I never expect this much out of people when I stay with them. This is just such a treat! For about three hours we hung out on his third floor balcony with one of his friends Tim Paschal and played guitar, conversed through movie quotes (you know how guys are), talked about music, made jokes, relaxed, and watched an incredible lightning storm roll in. It was glorious. Tim also brought some of his camera equipment over and took some pics of us. It was great.
 We are taking a day off tomorrow. This pleases me. I am in pain and I need rest. Thank you Lord.
Album of the Day “3 Sides to Every Story” By Extreme
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