Westward Ho
Morning in New Mexico truck stop. We are ready to embark to Arizona. Had a nice breakfast with Michael, Carla and Lola yesterday at this really hip little restaurant in Albuquerque with incredible sculptures, a fantastic magazine rack, the best coffee, a hamburger the likes of which I will not see again in awhile. But the pickle...it had a funny aftertaste though, formaldahydey, weird, so I set it aside. Put a little damper on my burger but I soon got over it. We all shared stories and for some reason I decided to share the one about me falling in the toilet and getting stuck when I was a wee tot with a desire to crap like a man, looking with childish disdain at the tiny baby pot next to the toilet I climbed up onto the real one and fell in and was stuck for awhile until my mother located my screams and pulled me out like a cork. I think this story segued from Michaels story of their child's traumatic experience with a propane toilet, swirling flames that bespoke the everlasting swirly that await Karl Rove and his ilk.
Then we drove back to the RV to get my van and put it in storage. A mess, as I realized the RV was leaking badly from one of the holding tanks. Not the gray water tank either. Some people were standing around in an RV next to it looking at it. So we hurried to the storage locker and almost couldn't get the van stored as my registration was stuck to my social security card and my insurance was lost somewhere. When we got that settled we headed back to Jodie's Revenge. I insisted to J that we move it since all sorts of scenarios of mega-tickets and losing the RV choked my over-active, over coffee stimulated brain. So J sighed, told me I was being a ninny and suggested we take it to Lola's where we had a date to pick up our trailer hitch and other sundry items Lola had for us. We made it to Bernalillo before I pulled over and told J it was running funny. Jodie's Revenge was eating up the hills this time (before it was a problem going up hills) but going down it whined and bucked and seemed to lose power. So we parked it at Raleys grocery store. J said she was going in for corn dogs while I let the dogs go potty. They were a shakey mess too, all the while driving looking at daddy, sweating and cursing behind the wheel from their perch on the shotgun seat and doghouse. When J came out with her bag of corn dogs we got in her car and headed up to Lola's, another thirty miles away.
We got to Lola's in the dark and she met us outside her RV. There was a pile of useful stuff, like a tiny sewing machine, a little oven stove, a lawn chair, a heater and more...so I lashed that to the top of J's SUV and we talked for awhile. We both felt an ache to leave Lola behind since she is such a rare person and we will miss her. Suggested she come with us but she has to work some things out by herself. She mentioned how one of her dreams is to get a little piece of land where just people of like mind can live there, the same thing J and I have been talking about for years. I hope this can happen someday.
Jodie's Revenge ran like a dream on the way back so hopefully that is a portent to our westward venture. So, I must say goodbye to the Silent Scope video game that blares every minute--amid rifle shots and yells of pain, sexy music, a little virtual TV reporter--"A sniper must be unemotional, extremely patient and judge things correctly...not to mention having an excellent aim. He must finish his job with one shot. You have been selected. Go and complete the mission as a sniper for our special unit." Sexy music up with AVO: "Wow!"
A black woman, truck driver behind me looks over my shoulder and says in Kenyan accent: "Who is the woman who is going to read all that...she must be very important."
I tell her it's a blog detailing my travels around America.
Big smile. "So you are going to write a book about America."
"Yes."
"Just be sure to mention the black woman in the truck stop..."
"I will."
Then we drove back to the RV to get my van and put it in storage. A mess, as I realized the RV was leaking badly from one of the holding tanks. Not the gray water tank either. Some people were standing around in an RV next to it looking at it. So we hurried to the storage locker and almost couldn't get the van stored as my registration was stuck to my social security card and my insurance was lost somewhere. When we got that settled we headed back to Jodie's Revenge. I insisted to J that we move it since all sorts of scenarios of mega-tickets and losing the RV choked my over-active, over coffee stimulated brain. So J sighed, told me I was being a ninny and suggested we take it to Lola's where we had a date to pick up our trailer hitch and other sundry items Lola had for us. We made it to Bernalillo before I pulled over and told J it was running funny. Jodie's Revenge was eating up the hills this time (before it was a problem going up hills) but going down it whined and bucked and seemed to lose power. So we parked it at Raleys grocery store. J said she was going in for corn dogs while I let the dogs go potty. They were a shakey mess too, all the while driving looking at daddy, sweating and cursing behind the wheel from their perch on the shotgun seat and doghouse. When J came out with her bag of corn dogs we got in her car and headed up to Lola's, another thirty miles away.
We got to Lola's in the dark and she met us outside her RV. There was a pile of useful stuff, like a tiny sewing machine, a little oven stove, a lawn chair, a heater and more...so I lashed that to the top of J's SUV and we talked for awhile. We both felt an ache to leave Lola behind since she is such a rare person and we will miss her. Suggested she come with us but she has to work some things out by herself. She mentioned how one of her dreams is to get a little piece of land where just people of like mind can live there, the same thing J and I have been talking about for years. I hope this can happen someday.
Jodie's Revenge ran like a dream on the way back so hopefully that is a portent to our westward venture. So, I must say goodbye to the Silent Scope video game that blares every minute--amid rifle shots and yells of pain, sexy music, a little virtual TV reporter--"A sniper must be unemotional, extremely patient and judge things correctly...not to mention having an excellent aim. He must finish his job with one shot. You have been selected. Go and complete the mission as a sniper for our special unit." Sexy music up with AVO: "Wow!"
A black woman, truck driver behind me looks over my shoulder and says in Kenyan accent: "Who is the woman who is going to read all that...she must be very important."
I tell her it's a blog detailing my travels around America.
Big smile. "So you are going to write a book about America."
"Yes."
"Just be sure to mention the black woman in the truck stop..."
"I will."
posted by Mark S. Weber at 8:39 AM
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