I lost count at some point in February, but I know I've seen at least five of these "On the road like Kerouac" stories from our nation's various and sundry newspapers. This time, it's USA Today's Jerry Shriver, who "reread the book during a 1,727-mile journey trip through America's midsection. His goals: to See What's Out There and give armchair Kerouac fans an update on the state of roadside culture. (Owing to his middle age and hopeless entrenchment in the establishment, pliant bohemian chicks were off-limits.)" It appears that he did so in a rented Mitsubishi Eclipse, which explain why out of everything to see and write about on the open road, he managed around what looks to be about 1,200 words, or at least that's what his editors allowed, and most of it no better than this:
Here in Kansas City come roses, roasted meats, Bass Pro shops, cherished friends, saloons where you can smoke, an underground edginess, plentiful parking spaces and tree blossoms falling onto young women who sport bare midriffs and stoners who brag of skateboarding while drunk.
I could move here.
Brilliant.
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