Well, I was filmed from the back of the van, delivering my well rehearsed monologue. I was filmed from the side as my monologue continued, occasionally answering questions shouted from the passenger seat. We filmed in a leap-frog fashion over several miles of highway, In an interview within an interview, we filmed a local newspaper person asking me a few background questions. In all I spent nearly 4 hours in front of the camera, and although it was not grueling work (I was on my bike for most of the time) it was more than a little distracting. On balance, though, it worked out well. The story was just broadcast on the 10:00 news and it came out looking pretty good. There were no errors or misstatements and the only gripe I have is that there was an awful lot of tape left on the cutting room floor. Four hours of shooting yielded a three minute segment. Ah, well. Such is the reality of the life of a celebrity. I'm pretty confident that once I leave North Dakota things will settle down and I can resume normal life on the road.
From the Elliott Hotel in Fargo, Babcock wrote a quick letter to his brother, Charles, describing the problems he had recently experienced with his tires:
Last night about 12 miles east of Jamestown I tore off my front tire and had to stop at the next house, as it was dark. Turner went on 12 miles to the next town, as he did not know I was dismounted. This morning I failed to get my tire on in good shape, and when out about 6 miles it came uncemented, owing partly to the rain and mud. I camped at a ranch for an hour and got it fixed thoroughly and reached Sanborn, where Turner had staid for 30 minutes before he had pulled out. I pushed on to Valley City and came into town just in time to see his rear wheel disappearing toward the suburbs. Right there I had a puncture and spent 30 minutes mending it. Reached Tower City 10 minutes behind him and stopped and ate dinner -- we simply ate some bananas.
Ah, bananas, the perfect nutrition. This is one of the very few references made to what kind of food they were eating.
After re-reading this letter, I took it upon myself to switch my tires front to back. The back one is looking decidedly thin and this swap should get me to Chicago.
I made it to Gwinner for my last night in North Dakota, 64 easy miles, and tomorrow I press on to the lakes of Minnesota.
On the road,
Dennis