FE: Well, we must have had too much fun last night, turning in at around 1 AM. Closed the blackout curtain and fell asleep…..Rae usually is up before me, but I had to wake her up at 10:20 in the morning! Getting ready fast, checking out at 11:00 and off to Kansas. I was so impressed to find pissing instructions for German tourists at a rest stop!

RN: Ever since we hit the midwest, I’ve been on the alert for cicadas. Most of the way, it’s been quiet, but, when we charged our car in Columbia MO, I heard a lot of buzzing so I wandered around until I located the source. I found these trees full of cicadas! They are gorgeous insects! And they have yet to achieve the abundance where they become obnoxious… Interestingly, we didn’t hear or see cicadas in St Louis and Kansas City…

In the evening, we arrived at Ed and Jo’s house in Lawrence KS. I’ve known Ed since 2016 when he came to Woods Hole to teach microscopy at MBL. Ed runs a microscopy facility at Kansas University (KU) and will be moving soon to do the same at Washington University in St Louis. KU will miss him! Ed and Jo have been very generous to put us up for two nights in their lovely house! We were treated to Kansas City barbecue, cheesy corn, coleslaw and beans by Jo’s son John. John also brought his delightful 11 year old daughter Alexandra, who highly recommended we go to the Nelson-Atkins Art Museum. We took her up on that and tomorrow you will see what we saw…