speeding

we left albuquerque early this morning for santa fe. santa fe is much cuter than albuquerque i think - it seems homier, probably because we spent most of our hour and a half there in the main downtown square, where all the buildings, even the starbucks and banana republic, are low and boxy and new mexican. we got breakfast at a french creperie that was decorated all new mexican with a few pictures of patisseries and then after wandering a little more through the area, we left on the long, long drive to texas.

it wasn't long before we had our first event of the day - i got a speeding ticket. to be honest i think dan and i were both shocked that it wasn't him. the cop was kind of seedy and hickish and i couldn't really understand him, but i did understand that i was going 77 in a 65 zone. sufficiently humbled
(i thought) we drove on.

we stopped for lunch in a dairy queen and i started to realize that texas was on its way. i think actually that east new mexico might as well be in west texas. it kind of looks the same only with more rocks. at the dairy queen, when i ordered chicken fingers, i got a side of gravy and "texas toast" - thick fried-looking toast. i mostly just ate my fries and frosty. also in the DQ i saw my first cowboy hats and trucker hats worn completely without irony. it was a little scary and dan and i could not wait to leave little old santa rosa, NM.

barreling on down the highway, we entered texas. west texas looks like the picture i posted of it: there is nothing there. there was an increase in the number of trucks. i saw several W'04 stickers and a confederate flag in the back of someone's car window. they actually have signs posted that say "don't mess with texas - littering fine $1000." also, there are gun shows, cowboy emporiums (emporia?), lots of hooters restaurants (which seems very texas to me for some reason), lots of steakhouses, very cheap gas (by very cheap of course i mean 2.03 which to me seems like god), those billboards that say things like "life is short. eternity lasts forever. - god", lots of churches, lots of trucks, lots of conservatives, lots of ranches, and i could go on. needless to say, i told dan that texas was the first state that was exactly what i expected it to be.

that said i liked it, kind of. all the farmlands were sort of pretty and on a certain level a welcome respite from all the rocks. and there's a certain charm to it all (minus the conservatives, guns, and religion). texans frickin' LOVE texas. that's kind of cool to see. and you can't really mistake it for anywhere else, even the little tiny towns.

of course it wasn't long before we had our second big event of the day. i got aNOTHER speeding ticket, this time for going 79 in a 70 zone. dan started complaining about standing armies and i managed to not break down in tears until after the cop was gone, thereby accomplishing nothing at all.

more driving... when we stopped for gas in plainview, dan bought the local paper for 50 cents to cheer me up. surprisingly it worked. not only were there lots of really bad advice columns, but it had a full two-page spread of devotionals with a local minister writing a guest column (which by the way made NO SENSE WHATSOEVER, not even if you were christian) that was sponsored by local businesses including domino's pizza. kind of hilarious. kind of frightening.

we drove and drove - dan was getting a little feverish and delusional for some reason and started making lots of car dances to go with songs like "regulators" (to get revenge for the two speeding tickets of course). i had a moment in a mcdonalds in the middle of snyder, TX (aka nowhere, USA) when i thought i heard shots being fired and screams outside the bathroom, and hesitated before opening the door, worried that my life would end in the middle of aforementioned nowhere, USA. but i got out of the bathroom, alive, and found not guns and screaming, but only a calm (read: drugged and sick) dan sitting in a booth waiting to get back on the road.

it took us less time than we anticipated, but more time than we really wanted to get to austin. the last part of the road was mostly dan listening to r.kelly to keep him awake while i sort of drifted off, and watching deer eyes glint on the side of the road (just daring us to keep driving). but it was good to get to sara's house, and this couch which will be my bed for the next few days looks really good right now.