There are so few people in Wyoming that the jam at the motel breakfast was stale. But the woman at the desk pretended not to see us carry in a large litterbox rather than charging us a $5 pet fee, so that's okay.

In preparation for actually driving through the Rocky Mountains -- to an East Coaster, this is a crazy thought -- I took a motion sickness pill and we gave Tabitha the biggest safe dose of her kitty downers. I drank extra coffee to battle the drowsiness, but Tabitha thoroughly enjoyed her Rocky Mountain High.

Flowery description isn't my strong point, and I really don't know what to say about the mountains. Surreal. Snow-covered. They looked painted on, like the hand of a giant Bob Ross could come out of the sky at any moment and add some more Titanium White. I can only imagine hiking in this region, though you can keep the skiing. Maybe someday. But carefully, due to signs like "Be Bear Aware -- Food Storage Required." This is grizzly bear country. Fortunately, they didn't hang out in the road like the cows and burros of yesterday.

Wyoming culture. It does exist.

We picked up reservation radio again, this time from the Wind River reservation. "The Cowboy Hour" kept us company for today's first leg of the Tetons. That style of country works well in Wyoming, but usually we can only radio-surf to one song of it before "K-Whatever, Today's Best Country" follows it up with some dreck like Shania Twain. The Indian-DJ'ed cowboy show gave way to National Native News, a syndicated talk show out of Albequerque, New Mexico. Today's topic was the Crazy Horse monument-in-progress we saw a couple of days ago in South Dakota. We listened long enough to get the gist of both Native views on the subject. Pro: it draws people to the Indian museum nearby, which in turn educates people about the disenfranchisement of the Lakota Nation by treaty-breaking white dudes; it evens the score with Mt. Rushmore. Con: Crazy Horse was never photographed so that's not his true face; Crazy Horse was never photographed so he would have hated a giant sculpture of himself; the Black Hills are sacred so blasting a monument into them disrespects Crazy Horse's memory and really pisses off the rock spirits. By the way, the ratio of cranks to rational humans is as high on Indian radio shows as on any other.

We'd been short on stupid Americana since, well, just since yesterday's adventure at Wall Drug. Anyway, we got today's dose from an Exxon station in Dubois, WY -- pronounced doo-BOYS -- advertising a giant jackelope. Jackelopes are one of those part lore/part tourist attraction "legends" like the Loch Ness Monster. And like the Wolpertinger of Bavaria, the jackelope is generally portrayed in sicko taxidermy -- a jackrabbit with horns like an antelope. A big plastic jackelope greeted us outside, and the inside housed a whole room of tourist schwag like wall-mounted jackelope heads and $3 bags of "jackelope poop," really peppermint hand soap. You could also pay $1 to "ride" the 6-foot stuffed jackelope, and Rick did. Ride 'em, cowboy!

Lunch was at a somewhat touristy restaurant, "The Hatchet," with bathrooms labeled "cowboys" and "cowgirls," and a stop sign in the parking lot that read "Whoa." We only had time for Wall Drug (gag) and McDonalds (barf) yesterday, so it was nice to get some real food. Mountainside resorts with captive pricing in Wyoming are still moderately priced for Boston. Our waitress was from Alabama.

We passed through the frightening, tacky ski resort town of Jackson, did one more engine-grinding climb up and 6-10% grade down the Tetons, saw what looked like a vanful of Amish kids and their camera-toting father (are there rebel Amish who drive and take photos?), and then there were two people fewer in Wyoming. I just realized we forgot to turn off the light on our way out ;)

Mr. Potato State

I fell for the first tourist trap in Idaho: the gas station in Victor, ID that sold Krispy Kreme donuts. I'm not cultish about them, but it was only my second one ever...and what's the opposite of a Krispy Kreme in Grand Central Station if not a Krispy Kreme in Victor, ID?

Almost immediately, as if to welcome us to the state, Idaho produced a really freaky looking lightning storm. We drove around it for a while, then past it, and eventually into it. It hadn't rained since day 2 in Ohio, so perhaps we were due.

We didn't get hit by lightning, and we later followed the first sign for "tourist information" and wound up at the Rexburg, ID chamber of commerce. It didn't seem aware of the existence of anything outside eastern Idaho, quite a change from the obsessively helpful tourist info centers we'd encountered so far. Worse yet, we heard an ominous popping sound on the way to the chamber, and Rick opened the trunk to discover that not one, but two bottles of homebrew had burst in the trunk. We blame the combination of altitude changes and overwhelming heat. Annoying, but it could have been worse, since nothing in the trunk was damaged (except the beer), and we cleaned up as best we could with the roll of paper towels we'd had the foresight to stash in the backseat. If our trunk smells like malt for a while, there are worse things, but we think Idaho might have it in for us.

After a while, I began to more fully understand the phrase "living in your own private Idaho." I-84 through Idaho makes I-80 through Iowa look lush, populous, scenic, and urbane. Like that one stretch of South Dakota, the occasional sight of cows was almost exciting -- but South Dakota at least has tourist attractions. I'm not sure what Idaho has. The big crop is potatoes, and those grow underground, so there wasn't much to look at. Supposedly Boise is a hip city, but I'm just going to have to take Lonely Planet's word for it, because I'm not finding out on this trip. Despite my earnest desire to give every state/city/country a fair chance, by the time we rolled into the Motel 6 in Twin Falls, I was thanking everything holy I'd grown up in New Jersey. I bet you never thought you'd hear *that*.

Right now, Tabitha is sober again and Rick is out looking for an oil change, some more supplies to clean up our beery trunk, and fast food dinner. It looks like Idaho is going to rain on him again. Really, though, I'm completely aware that a bad day on the road is better than a good day at work. I'm bummed that we only have four more days.

Tomorrow: Driving like truckers to Portland, OR.