I Wanna Travel First Class!: August 6, Oz and Jeff

I know that everyone is so used to seeing a lot of really cool pics and a nice narrative on the blog. And, we do have some pics from today. We visited the Oz Museum in Wamego Kansas. More about that in a bit. First, I wanted to post some words from Jeff. Unless you are following us on Facebook, and many of your aren't, you really don't get to see much from him. Well, he had a bad day yesterday, for a number of reasons. Here are a couple things that he posted.

"Today was a tough day. A failure in my book. I am over 2000 miles into this journey and I have a very tight schedule. I did not expect that the days would be so short so early. I figured that I would have to run some darker miles, but never imagined the amount of traffic and how that would negatively impact my ability to use the dark hours. I expected to be running faster in the second half so when the heat and humidity kicked by butt I'd still be making great progress. So far I have totally under estimated the difficulty and especially under estimated the second half issues. I have rolled along with no problem too large to handle except the most important one, generating donations for the charity. People have read about my trip and seen me on tv. My run is not what this struggle is about. It is about firefighters. It is about helping with safety equipment for volunteer firefighters. It is about benefits for the families of firefighters killed in the line of duty. It is about money for research and education on treating burn victims. Not about me seeing mailboxes and getting eaten alive with hundreds of misquito bites and shoes that wear out and getting stone bruises. I do love meeting the people and sharing the sights that I see, but the run is only symbolic. I am just an average guy trying to do something huge to raise awareness and funds. I am hungry, thirsty, miserably hot , tired and sore each and every day truth be known. I take pictures and tell funny stories as my personality is much stronger than physical discomfort. I am TOJ to many of my running friends. Life is easy. Life is fun. Everyday I lace up my shoes, put a smile on my face and go find that fun. The rocks, dogs, heat and humidity are just part of the journey. Do I like trying to sleep in a pool of my own sweat, no. I don't sleep well out here. I am near miserable each day, but I have a job to...cover at least 35 miles and talk to as many people as practical.
Some people wanted to know the truth. I am pretty uncomfortable and it will just get worse. I have just a month to go about 1500 miles.

Today there was no mailbox of the day or flower of the day. Some days there just isn't much to see... But I got to go to the Oz museum and talk to a volunteer firefighter and two new business owners. The weather crushed me, then it stormed. I collected ten dollars for the charity. A failure for a running day... But still a successful day. Tomorrow my schedule will Ali even more as we have a tv interview. The ying and yang. We are getting in serious trouble. Friday I should have dinner with my nephew and may get to run with GTIM this weekend. You can say that my whole world is imploding due to schedule problems. I see that I am getting to see family and friends and spread the word about the charity. I don't have a recovery plan, but I have faith that it will all work out as long as I am turned into a hood ornament on an 18 wheeler."
I'm thinking that is a nice reminder of what we are really doing. This is not a vacation for us. This is really hard work. Over 8 hours a day on the road, trying to find a place to park for the night, and dinner and a blog! We want this to be successful! So, please, remember what this is all about. And, you could pop into Facebook and give Jeff a bit of encouragement.

Since I have my own thoughts and feelings about this issue with the BRAND NEW Forrester by Forest River not having A/C that works, I thought you might want to hear from Jeff. As you can see, this is more than frustrating for both of us! If anyone can help, we are open to suggestions!

"While I still have 4G and I'm ranting let me complain about forest river and their company that provides their air-conditioner equipment. A real pain in the butt they will not work with us. Our dogs have been hot for so many days, panting that one of them started throwing up from the heat. this is miserable not having a a/c, but they refused to do anything out of their standard procedure I am running coast to coast to raise awareness and funds for fire firefighters so they could call this a charity case to grant the exception. Nope."

Now, on to our regularly scheduled blog session!

After heading out from Manhattan, our first major stop was in Wamego. It is a really cute town! Maybe it is larger being on the river, or maybe the towns are just getting a bit larger and more populated as we get closer to Kansas City and Topeka.

They had many Oz themed business names here.

The best part of the town, though, was our visit to the Oz Museum. It was really quite interesting and much bigger than I expected! There was a lot of information about the author, and other things he has written. There was also a lot of movie lore. It is well worth your time if you are ever in the area.

Flying Monkeys!

Jeff is really just a big kid at heart!

More Flying Monkeys!

And Flying Monkey beer! Wonder if that beer is still good?

It was actually a short day, as we were sidelined by some pretty awesome thunder storms!

Actually, after we left the Historical Marker, I pulled into a place that advertised local Kansas beef. You know, we eat a lot of beef! Jeff came along and followed me in. The place is called Fulmer's, and it was really cool. They grow their own beef, and they also feature a bunch of local Kansas products. And, they had pie! They offer lunch, which looked to be pretty good, but it was too late, and we had already had lunch. But, there was nothing to stop Jeff from having some blueberry pie a la mode! I also got some home made chocolate sheet cake along with a scoop of ice cream. They were both amazing! I think that anyone coming through the area needs to stop here to eat! At least some dessert. While we were there, the bottom dropped out of the skies! I mean raining buckets! I ran out to close the windows on the coach, and forgot to close the sky light over the bed! As you might imagine, the bedding was completely soaked. Anyway, there was too much lightning, even if Jeff thought about running in the rain. He does have a nice trash bag to keep off the rain! So we waited. And waited. And it never really quit. The owner, Russ, told us we could park in his back lot for the night if need be. That is exactly where we ended up staying! It was very nice, peaceful, and quiet. Thanks, Russ!