Still deciding on a title.
June 17, 2154
So, I got lost. Not the best way to start a survey expedition — or is it? After all, if we knew exactly where everything was, people wouldn’t get lost.
Anyway, I took the wrong fork at the Aylesbury Pike junction, and it took me forever to figure it out. The datanet crapped out just before Dean’s Corners, and that disappeared my rental’s predictive map so hard, I even lost the step-by-step directions. I had to guess which way to turn, and I was halfway around the hills before I realized my mistake. Also, in my defense: there was not even a physical road sign to be seen, the entire way. Apparently they don’t have natural disasters around here.
Anyway, after I realized my mistake I decided I might as well keep going, since the road was going in roughly the right direction, and it had to go somewhere, right? Besides, I wanted to see the countryside. I’d like to say that it was pretty country, but honestly? This part of the state is darn grim. Too much wood, not enough people, and the trees are huge. I’d been briefed that this part of the state hadn’t been properly developed for centuries; looking at the forests around me, I believed them. From the road they were dark and impenetrable, and I didn’t feel like stopping to take a closer look.
Honestly, I didn’t feel like stopping at all, not even for lunch. For the longest time, there wasn’t anywhere to stop, just long stretches of winding road and no amenities. The few houses along I did see were neglected, shouting out their indifference to travelers with every crumbling cinderblock and scuffed window. The styles were archaic, too, all twenty-first and even twentieth century designs; I don’t think I saw a single pre-Reform building outside of the one town that I drove through, and that one looked just as dilapidated as the others.