We are about $450 deep in the drive and only in Illinois.  I have seen lighting bugs for the first time since I was a kid in Virginia, a dead armadillo, a million and one signs saying God loves me in Kansas and Missouri, and the gateway to the west in St. Louis.  We stayed in a Walmart parking lot in Topeka, Kansas last night where I found out that a generator to run our AC unit is $1,500...That is enough to last us a few months on the road so we opted for a cheap inverter and a 6 inch personal fan.  If we were in a faster car we might have made it to the east coast in time to feel the earthquake.  And if we were in any slower of a car we probably would have felt the freak earthquake in Colorado.  Seems like we are lucking out and the signs all through Kansas and Missouri were right...