Day fourteen. (95sep08) A quick breakfast and we're walking back to the SUV for the final rental-SUV portion of the trip. We pass a girl sitting on some steps. She's fondling a Cigarillo and holding a teddy bear. Kick me, I don't have my camera. Scott: "What, were you hot for her?" Jeff: "One, she was 18. Two, that was the most disturbing thing I've seen this trip." We get stuck in a traffic jam. This is kind of neat! Haven't seen one of these in awhile. "I hate buses." "Yeah, but lookit the bumper sticker. 'This bus saves 50 cars.'" "I'd rather be 50 cars." "One people united through faith" -- truckside sign We spot the first freeway sign that reads "Detroit." Scott: "Yay." Jeff: "Yippee." We arrive in Lansing, stop at Steve and Suzanne's to empty and clean the SUV. Scott hoses down the whole vehicle, especially the brakes. For some reason, this makes them work as good as new. We take the SUV to get the windshield filled (the crack is still noticeable), and zoom on over to Hertz. "Okay, if they don't say anything about the windshield, we won't say anything about the speedometer." "Roger." They didn't even look outside. We could have placed a smoking, charred steering wheel in the parking lot and left. Yeah, I know, they had my credit card number. But what YOU don't know, YOU, is that I could have just disputed the charges, flown to Europe, gotten plastic surgery, and joined the underground! Ha-HA! We went back to Steve and Suzanne's, our East Lansing pals. Steve cut up the candy cane to fit Scott's lil' Honda Civic. We drive off to my apartment. Upon arrival, we move stuff around the cars, make bids on the survival supplies we didn't use, and relax a bit. Scott leaves. He arrives home some twelve hours later. I'm home. He's home. We are home. Yay. Yippee. Total trip cost: $2100, two people, two weeks, one rental SUV ($880) Total trip mileage: Jeff: 5500 miles Scott: 6800 miles Scott wins! I was walking to my apartment the next day when two five-year olds rode by on bikes, exclaiming to me: "We do drugs." Even the nation's youth know that I can't score any type of hallucinogens. I'm a marked man. Within the week, I went to pick up some of the trip photos. The man behind the counter had a question. "Are those your photos?" "The ones from the desert?" "Yeah." "Yup ..." "What ... was that ... was that for a movie?" "Hahahaa! No, no..." "It looked like Mad Max or something." The end. Please move forward to our gift shoppe.

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