the id, the ego, & the single misfiring brain cell

it’s 10:50pm

The scenery is breathtaking. Nothing but black as far as the eye can see. The only excitement was a rather sad Christmas light display on a lone house we passed five miles back. Well…that and Childress, the largest town we’ve seen in a couple of hours. Childress boasts several hotels, a Subway restaurant, and a closed Dairy Queen. Oh…there was a McDonald’s, too, but I avoid them for anything after breakfast. In fact, McDonald’s success as a burger joint is one of life’s abiding mysteries to me.

We left the house at 9:30am, and managed to get out of town at 11:30am.

Oh…before we left town, I stumbled across a headline about 20 things that have gone obsolete this decade. Instead of simply reading the article, we enjoyed trying to come up with as many of our own answers as we could. We came up with pay telephones, land lines, newspapers, cash, checks, CDs, handwriting/penmanship, dial-up modems, various European currencies, American military BDUs (I would think of something like that, I know), road maps, movie theatres, cameras with film, video stores, and several other things that escape me. It was such a fun game that we didn’t read the article until a couple of hours later. We got most of the ones they listed, too.

Everything went well until we got to Raton, where we paused for petrol. I’d slept most of the way, so we switched out then, and I pulled back onto I-25 southbound, unaware that Mich had already passed our turnoff. By the time I was completely cognizant that we were well past the intended turn, I’d covered a considerable distance in roughly the right direction (south, right?), and decided to keep going because we’d eventually hit an east-west interstate. Right?

No. It doesn’t work like that. Apparently, you can be on I-25 south in New Mexico and be going due north. I’d blithely say that we were taking the scenic route, but driving through New Mexico is like watching the movie Groundhog Day. By the time I pulled over and woke up Mich, the sun was decidedly on the wrong side of the sky and we were 32 miles north of where we should have left the interstate, which was another 42 miles north of I-40, which would allow us to go east.

Turns out, the entire state of New Mexico doesn’t have a data signal, which makes the GPS function on my android worthless. Maybe a map would have been a good idea after all.

This is a weird thing about I-25 in New Mexico: there are almost no roads whatsoever that offer the opportunity to go east. For several hours, I had the eerie feeling that I was in a Twilight Zone episode.

We finally made it to Amarillo by 7:40. I’m no pro at this, but I doubt we should have taken 8 hours to get there from Colorado Springs. We skipped the hypotenuse and went for the two right angle legs.

On the bright side, we were spared Dalhart of pig farming fame. Not that there haven’t been olfactory assaults. We passed a couple of huge pens full of cows, and the aroma therefrom singed our nostrils. At another point we went through a skunk’s final offering to the world. I turned to Mich and said, “Did you fart?”

MICH: No, but I pulled a dead skunk out of my ass.

ME: I’m surprised there was room for it what with the gerbil.

Looks like we’ll crash in Wichita Falls for the evening. This will be another one of those times that we check in and the clerk advises us that we still have to pay for the whole night even though there’s only 6 hours of the room left. On the bright side, maybe the Air Force base there (Sheppard) will have VOQ (Visiting Officer’s Quarters) available. That would be nice.

Mich just announced that we should have at least one big, juicy steak on this trip. I just hope that she’s watching the road while her mind is wandering like that, because obviously, I’m busy.

Update: We stopped in Wichita Falls, but as I was dozing against the door, Mich drove right past the Sheppard AFB exit. We stopped at the first place that presented itself (Candlewood Suites) and asked for a room with a king-sized bed. The helpful clerk said it was $107 for the night. I asked for the government rate. He said $87 per night. It's good to be king.

Then we hit Texas' contribution to civilization: Whataburger. It's open 24 hours and you can get a handful of jalapenos on the burger.

Now I'm full. Time to brush the fangs and slip into bed.

d