County Business

Security seems very lax in South Dakota. When I got to my house, I didn't have a key yet to get in. I unloaded my bike from my car and started to check my voicemail, when one of the maintenance guys across the street asked if I was moving in to that house. He said he hadn't known anyone was moving in there, and then proceeded to open the place up for me. Later he came by to change the locks, and then gave me a copy of the new key. No verification process whatsoever.

I drove up to the Kadoka courthouse a couple of days ago to register my car in South Dakota. When my sistser moved to DC, she got caught in this catch-22 in which she had to be registered in DC to get insurance and she had to be insured to get registered. I was anticipating similar problems. But then the county treasurer told me I didn't need proof of insurance to get registered, and when I called to get insurance the agent didn't ask me a thing about my car's registration. Once again, these things seem lax here. After I got my new plates, I borrowed a screwdriver from the county treasurer to put them on. I was down on my hands and knees in the parking lot, unscrewing the Connecticut license plates when a police car drove by. I would expect them to stop and question me at that point, but they drove by without comment.

It's been pretty Spartan living out here for the past couple days. I don't have a mattress yet--I'm hoping to get one from one of the teachers that left, after I can get into her apartment--so I bought an air mattress in Rapid City the other day. After driving an hour and a half home, I realized I didn't have an air pump to fill it up. So I've just been sleeping on the floor.

I have a couple pictures to go along with this--showing off my new South Dakota license plates, and showing how much of a mess the house is--but I don't have an internet connection yet, and the wireless network at school won't let me put them up. Oh well.