There Is No Arizona...

The song lied, there is an Arizona…and it’s fucking BORING!!! Oh my god we drove for hours and saw nothing. At first it was cool, we drove over the Hoover Dam, took the appropriate pictures and made the obligatory “dam” jokes. Homeland Security stopped us before they let us across, apparently trying to drive a pickup truck with a bed full of mystery-tarp covered stuff over a national landmark is suspicious! There were some really pretty rock formations, but after a while it as just as boring as flat country. Then it did get flat, and I missed the rocks.

We had lunch in this little mountain town Williams, AZ. We were driving around looking for cheap gas (and subsequently pissing off Tom Tom who wanted us back on the freeway. That mouthy little thing is starting to get annoying.) We found a nameless mom and pop station with super cheap gas. It was so tiny there weren’t any numbers on the pumps, we didn’t understand how it worked…the mechanic had to come outside and to explain it to us. You pump the gas then go inside to pay for what you took. He looked at us like we were retards, I was just amazed at the naïve system. I was tempted to fill up and take off to teach them a lesson about the world-but Chris pointed out it was a good thing these types of trusting people still exist today.

The gas station guys were nice, all old-timey and helpful. They asked where we were headed and stuff. I told them we were hoping to stay in Albuquerque for the night.

The oldest guy snorted, “Albuquerque? Hell that’s a seven hour trip. You kids would get in too late to make the hotel room worthwhile!” He then suggested we stay in Gallup, NM instead. It was closer so we’d have a better chance of making the most of the hotel apparently.

It got so cold! I didn’t know it got so cold in Arizona. On some parts of the freeway there was snow on the shoulder. Snow! In Arizona! The sunset was gorgeous, but it led to even lower temperatures. By the time we got to Gallup we were exhausted and my cold had gotten worse. We pulled into this place called the Olympic Cafe for dinner-boasting Greek! Italian! Mexican! They were all shitty.

The hotel was fine, just like any other truck stop Travelodge. Our plan was just to go to bed and get up early tomorrow. But after we showered we were both totally re-energized so we drove around for a while trying to find a bar or something. Chris was hell bent on finding a strip club, we even grabbed some local newspapers for help. No stripper ads, but there was an interesting article on whether or not your pets will be allowed into Heaven (apparently the writer has forgotten in 1989 it was determined that all dogs do in fact go to heaven.)

I think the town is just too small for such adult entertainment; we drove through the whole place in like 10 minutes. I did see a building with a sign exclaiming “dancing nightly.” But when we drove closer it looked pretty deserted, plus there were two bullet holes I the glass door. The light was on inside though, so who know what was going on. Probably meth.