Hey y’all, welcome back to Unfit to Print. 

I mentioned that I was in southeastern Missouri for a hunting trip this past weekend. 

My husband and I co-wrote the following reflection on our drive from Hayti to the Memphis airport on the last day of our trip. 

NATIONAL DECAY OF STANDARDS

There are stretches of America where the road feels less like infrastructure and more like evidence. 

Driving I-55 from Missouri through Arkansas to Memphis, Tennessee, is one of them. 

Nothing dramatic. Just the slow accumulation of things that don’t work. Gas pumps that won’t start. Bathrooms locked or filthy. Lights half on. Card readers broken. Signs faded. Roads patched, then patched again. 

Sometimes you stop at several stations before you can fill up and buy a bottle of water.

Even the places that appear “fine,” according to Google reviews, come with their own warnings: double charges, pumps that run while the tank stays empty, prices that jump for “outsiders.” It isn’t collapse. It’s malfunction as the baseline. After enough miles, you........

© The Daily Caller