Six Photos from the Road

I've just returned from a couple thousand miles of driving across eight states. It's mostly pretty boring, and designed to be so on the interstate system. So I have just a few photos from along the way.


First: who knew that truckstops move coffee around in the back of a tanker truck? Not me.


Second: One of the famous Beer Caves at a Sheetz store. Sheetz is chain of convenience stores/fast food restaurants/gas stations that are a bit of a cultural phenomenon on much of the East Coast (and maybe in parts of the South?). In one state, I saw a Soda Cave instead of a Beer Cave.


Third: At a rest stop, Booker T. Washington was relegated to speaking from the front of a drink machine.


Fourth: At one run-down gas station bathroom I used, the staff had DIYed a slat of wood to stand in for the sliding latch on the stall door. I appreciated the effort.


Fifth: In a supermarket produce section, I spied this two-color graphic for watermelons on the side of a large corrugated box holding the fruit. I like the abstract design with its swirls.


Sixth and finally: This large entrance sign marks the grounds of the Udvar-Hazy Center, which is part of the Smithsonian's Air and Space Museum. It probably cost tens of thousands of dollars to fabricate, since weather-proof signs are expensive. Unfortunately, the words "Smithsonian Institution" and "National Air and Space Museum" have been rendered by the sign-makers in the Adobe substitute font rather than in Minion, the official font of the Smithsonian... and no one caught it before the sign was produced.

Oops.