So it's been a couple months since the last episode and for this I sincerely apologize. I'm in the process of getting a computer that can actually handle the output these episodes require, one that isn't a laptop designed for the average consumer. From this point forward, stay tuned for more episodes published more frequently and with better software. With that said, on with the show!...

So it's been a couple months since the last episode and for this I sincerely apologize. I'm in the process of getting a computer that can actually handle the output these episodes require, one that isn't a laptop designed for the average consumer. From this point forward, stay tuned for more episodes published more frequently and with better software. With that said, on with the show!

The state of South Dakota anchored the path I took on this road trip. One of my criteria for choosing destinations was to visit places I may never again have a solid reason or chance to visit. As it turns out, this formed the basis of a solid reason to visit these places again if ever I get the chance.

The landscape of South Dakota is beautiful, especially for a kid from Los Angeles, and beyond the landscape, not enough can be said about the graciousness of the people who live there. While visiting the small town of Winner, I learned from a bartender that the easiest way to spot outsiders is if they don't make a concerted effort to say hi to you before you offer your own greeting, and this would turn out to be true: Every day was welcomed with a dozen bright, giant Midwestern smiles. I pulled out a five note when I asked him how much I owed for the pint, only to be told that my pint of Wisconsin's Lienenkugel Lager cost two dollars. I considered this price so low I hardly knew whether it was ethical to tip him the usual dollar per drink - 50% seemed like a stuffy statement. Suddenly my own big city ethics were questionable.

The price of a pint, however, is a reflection of the fact that South Dakota is the poorest state in the union. The unemployment rate in some counties is 70%. Despite this, the people of South Dakota never failed to lend a hand when I needed it.

Hello, this is Marlin again. In episode 11, we begin to meet some of these people, like Kara Hagen, a real estate developer from Mitchell, South Dakota, who reminded me that architecture is more than the sum of its tectonic parts; and her co-worker Georgia, who would ultimately introduce me to South Dakota and why this state has the reputation as "the nicest place in the West."

I also visited Badlands National Park, about which Frank Lloyd Wright wrote, "What I saw gave me an indescribable sense of a mysterious otherwise, a distant architecture, ethereal, touched, only touched with a sense of Egyptian, Mayan drift and silhouette... an endless supernatural world more spiritual than the Earth but created out of it." He was on a road trip at the time, heading toward the Southwest, and given I was following his tire tracks in the opposite direction, I couldn't wait to reach the state where his trip - and his career - began: Wisconsin. But in the meantime, I was content to let the enchantment of South Dakota and its people occupy my days. Plus, the beer was cheap.

To my sponsors, a special thank you, and to everyone who's stayed tuned, I hope you enjoy.

Marlin