Welcome to episode of episode 96 of the Charles C.W. Cook podcast.

Wow, just four to go till we hit the century.

I was this week once again traveling.

Well, last week, I suppose. Not this week. It all blows into one. I went to Grand Rapids,

Michigan. I hadn't been to for 18 years. I really like it. I've said before, perhaps I should

write about this, that in addition to all of its other attributes,

America has more excellent second tier, that is smaller cities, than any other country.

After my event, I ended up in a teaky bar called Max's South Seas Hideaway.

It was really well done.

Disney level theming, good music, and a truly delicious drink called the Atomic Swizzle.

I had three atomic swizzles and did not regret it.

From the outside, all of the focus on American cities is on the famous ones.

It's New York and Los Angeles and San Francisco and Chicago and Chicago.

And I love all of those places. Don't get me wrong.

I truly do.

But there's never any discussion of smaller cities. And insofar as there is, they're assumed to be backwards or provincial. But I have, in my trekking across the US, found that I've had just as much fun in the Grand Rapids

type city, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Austin, Denver, Tacoma, even Jacksonville, which of course

I live in. This was a good reminder of just how big

the country is. I saw some tweet the other day that a team in English soccer had traveled 916 miles

for a game. That was the longest that anyone

had ever traveled for a game in English soccer in the history of the sport. 916 miles

is, that's a division game in the NFL.

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