I was surprised to see the light peeking around the curtain, having passed the age a decade ago when a biochemical change makes you pop awake at 5 AM. Every day. Then a whiff of chlorine reminded me it was just the light from the swimming pool that our room overlooked, and it was still 5 AM, dark, and a very cold 32 degrees. But Day 6 of the 2018 Prefrontal Tour was a day to make up for lost time, and there was no more to lose. A Canadian invasion was underway to the north, a mass of frigid air 5 states wide with temps well below freezing. As that air mixed with the moist air to the south it would create high winds and torrential rains, and we intended to thread the needle and beat those conditions by skirting to the west just in time to miss the worst of it. Thanks to the support crew in the US and Europe who track our progress and run the weather models, we were able to stop briefly in St. Louis and then turn southwest toward Oklahoma City instead of continuing westward to Kansas. And a brief stop in St. Louis was more than enough time to witness the best and the worst that city has to offer. Did you know for instance that St. Louis installed half of a giant McDonald's logo next to the river, several hundred feet high? We wondered when they'll finish it... Illinois had little to offer in the way of scenery, aside from a few oil wells, and it marked a curious increase in the number of cow sightings and a near total decline in the number of birds. Conclusion, birds do not like cows. We stopped for dinner at the Hog Eye Smoke Pit, and decided to keep riding, extending the day by one time zone to a record 13 hours and about 575 miles of riding. Jim's first choice of motel, the "Tara", was straight out of Bates Motel, and the only thing missing from the carpet was a chalk outline. I especially liked the tattered dishtowel, ragged beyond use, that was lovingly repurposed as a bathroom window curtain. Within 5 minutes we exhausted the number of places to put our stuff that were "not the floor", and got a rapid refund. These Winchesters have higher standards. Somewhere during the day, while peering at the list of "to dos" on my phone, I came across dozens of work-related goals and tasks, and the delete button has never felt so damn good. Onward and upward!