Today we packed out of Miles City, MT and drove toward Cody, WY.  We decided to make a straight shot and arrive before the end of the day.  As we traveled, the sky grew darker and the clouds thicker.  It was an ominous sight!  Stopping in Billings for gas we encountered Cowboy Randy who showed us how to use our phone to pick up the weather channel so we could watch for tornado warnings.

We knew his name was Cowboy Randy because we had both ordered sandwiches at the Arby’s in the Quick Stop and he saw our ticket on the counter with the name “Randy” on it.  “Is your name Randy?” he asked my husband.  “Yes,” he replied.  The gentleman, dressed in jeans, cowboy boots and hat, with a plaid Western shirt and a huge belt buckle to match, exclaimed in a soft toned twang that he thought that was coincidental!  He shared that HIS middle name was “Randy.”  He went on to explain that his first name was “Cowboy,” but his middle name was “Randy.”  I guess he’d never met anyone named Randy before!  Funny how grace appears in even the most unlikely places – like the Quick Stop along I-90 in Billings, MT.  He was so concerned that we should not be driving into the severe weather.

And, sure enough, before we got out the door with our sandwiches in hand, it started to pour!  We waited in the quick stop for several minutes as Cowboy Randy’s phone indicated that the weather was moving at a fast rate to the north and east.

We waited several minutes, said our thanks to Cowboy Randy, and then made a mad dash and settled back into the car to continue our journey south and west.  And we soon were driving into the sun with snow-capped mountains rising in front of us.

We arrived in Cody, WY in the early afternoon and decided to just stop and rest, both of us feeling a little road weary.