That title is not an homage to Kerouac, but to Cormac McCarthy and to John Buass, who I finally met on Friday and who tried hard to convince me, Mike Silverman, and anyone else in earshot, that The Road is not that dark.

The title is also an accurate description. By the time this post publishes, I should be somewhere past Topeka, following roughly the route shown in the new temporary banner. I’ll only have intermittent ‘net access, so may or may not check the comments to get your advice, but feel free to suggest brief diversions the parents and I might encounter as we wend our way westward over the next few days.

The Garden of Eden, in Lucas, KS, is on the agenda, and if you ever drive through Kansas on I-70, you’d be a fool not to visit that extraordinary testament to human strangeness. Beyond that, our agenda is fairly loose, other than hours and hours of driving in an overstuffed car. Any readers along the route who’d like to meet are encouraged to leave a comment and we’ll see what we can do.