Day 13: Los Angeles, CA

I finally made it to Los Angeles. But there were a few more stops along the way.

I would have had this up sooner, but I forgot my computer charger in Tucson and had to wait a couple days to get a new one.

Joshua Tree National Park was right off the highway, and I'd heard great things about it so I popped in. Apparently there is a lot of wildlife there, but all I saw was a little gecko and some hawks. There were plenty of other things to see, though.

Like my shadow.

The mountains seemed to go on forever. I don't know exactly how far off into the distance you can see, but it's gotta be at least 50 miles and probably more.

Hoping to go out here again for a longer stay. There's lots more to see.

Alright, last one.

Another cool looking windmill farm, this one's out near Palm Springs. All those smudges are bugs splattered on my windshield. By my final count, I destroyed approximately 97,532 insects with my car over 4,077.2 miles. Aside from that Jeep top in Connecticut, I didn't run into anything else along the way.

Got to the new place around 8:30, and caught up with Billy for about 13 seconds before he was on the phone with Time Warner trying to get them to turn our cable on. Which they eventually did. Lazy bastards. It's been weird staying in a place for more than two nights, but it's good to get back into a regular schedule. I don't have a bed yet, though, so I've been sleeping on top of two sleeping bags. Not as bad as you might think, but certainly not ideal.

Apparently Tuesday Morning isn't as unique as Viva and I thought it was.

Friday night I went out to Venice Beach for a clambake on the shore, but it was already breaking up by the time we got there. So we went into this apartment down the street and hung out on a roof deck right by the beach. I think I made the right choice in moving out here, at least from early indications. Thanks for taking me aboard, Los Angeles.

Day Twelve: Tucson & Oro Valley, AZ

The rest of my family always tells me how hot it gets in Tucson. But every time I'm there it's never that hot. Usually, it snows and rains and is like 60 degrees, which only happens when I'm there. I was a little luckier this time; it was 85-90 out with about -42% humidity, so the 85-90 felt pretty good and it wasn't like when it's that temperature in Boston and it feels like you're living inside of a soggy gym sock. I'm sure the second I leave tomorrow, the temperature in Tucson will shoot up to 127 degrees. 

I got to see my grandparents, Dor and Bob, for the first time since my brother graduated college in 2010. My mom was too busy taking pictures of me to bother to let me take a picture of her, too. My grandparents were very pleased to hear that I was moving in with Billy, whom they remembered since he came with me to my brother's graduation in Chicago. Apparently you can still believe he's a pretty decent guy if you only spend an hour and a half with him. After that, watch out.

My parents were in Tucson to buy a new house to live in. I didn't realize my dad was in this picture as I took it, but I should have assumed he was as he has an uncanny ability to sniff out photo ops. The house is in "The Foothills." Seemed like a weird name for a part of Tucson, since the entire city is the foothills, aside from the part that is the hills.

Here's another exterior view, that I guess I took while leaning and/or hopping on one foot.

The property manager happened to be at the house. She kindly pointed out that "everything in Arizona has pointers." Just in case you're wondering, the property manager is not that cactus.

The house also comes with that sweet pool. And that mysterious leg/fist.

There's a pretty solid patio, too.

If the zombie apocalypse comes and I'm in Arizona, I am cutting this cactus out of the ground, tying it to a broom handle, and using it to fight off the undead that are storming toward me because I am leaking blood everywhere from botching the first few steps of this plan.

But I'll be OK thanks to the wonders of Mystical Native American Sadness Dolls. Wait ...

Then we went to a Mexican restaurant called Macayo's for lunch and I got this bitchin' margarita. The waiter even gave me a guarantee with this particular beverage: "If you don't like it, I'll drink it for you." Top-ten waiter I've ever had. Probably top-five. I also ate WAYYY too many tortilla chips, and then some more food. Great Mexican restaurant trip. My grandma bought a novelty margarita glass there five years ago and she still brings it with her whenever she dines there, "even if everyone else is embarrassed." That is true dedication. Later, we went back to my grandparents' house and had a beer outside. My grandparents split one, and my grandma lamented that she'd "been reduced to half a beer." It was genuinely sad to me, as I also love beer and can't imagine how coming to such a point would feel.

Also during this beer, my grandpa told me some stories about his travels to Europe years ago. I'll need to go to Scandinavia to verify his claims that Danish women are incomprehensibly beautiful, and that Sweden is full of drunk businessmen who pass out in the middle of the street while dressed in a nice suit and clutching a briefcase.

Badass looking mountains can only become more badass when there's a Chili's in the foreground, you guys.

This has been quite the trip. A little bit of everything. Tomorrow I'm finally going to be in LA. It's gonna be weird to sleep somewhere for more than two nights.

Day Eleven: Albuquerque, NM; Middle of Nowhere; Tucson, AZ

There are probably many interesting, engaging, and possibly enlightening things to do in Albuquerque. 

But fuck that. BREAKING BAD!

I started off the day with a complete breakfast, as is required by Albuquerque law. For those not in the know, the first picture is the house where Walter White, Breaking Bad's main character, lives. In reality, it's just a nice house in a nice little neighborhood on Piermont Street. I felt kind of weird taking a picture of somebody's house, especially since I was driving around this neighborhood for 10 minutes trying to find the place and a decent place to snap the shot. The whole neighborhood must know, right? Every time some car they don't recognize comes by, they know it's some jackass from 2,500 miles away that came to take a picture of a house because it happens to be in a TV show. I'm sure that people have gone up and knocked on the door and shit, too. That must be really annoying. Then again, it sort of comes with the territory of allowing your house to be used for a TV show. Especially when that TV show is the best TV show.

Next, I stalked up to Hank and Marie's house, which is in a planned community that has cops and stuff patrolling. Pretty sure this is the right house, they all kind of looked the same. I saw two old guys a few roads over talking in the middle of the street, and they saw me rolling down with my Massachusetts plates and gave a face like "Jesus, this is only gonna get worse." I did see that companies are giving Breaking Bad tours in Albuquerque, so those old guys are probably right.

Whoever moved into Gus Fring's house after his face exploded has used the notoriety to push political agendas. According to some poorly-written blog I just looked up, Alisa Hadfield has a history of siding with abusers in domestic cases. This might be the election to watch in 2012.

Jesse Pinkman's dwelling looked really nice. I would totally live there, as long as that problem with the ceiling is all sorted out, and I get to keep the Roomba.

By this point I was completely unashamed of taking pictures of strangers' homes. Now, where to eat in Albuquerque?

I don't know why, but this place looked really familiar. I was trying to put my finger on it, when a guy in a van pulling out of the parking lot stuck his head out the window and yelled "Helllll yeah, Breaking Bad, bro! This is the place!" OK, fine, I already knew that the real life Twisters is the fictional Los Pollos Hermanos. But that guy was awesome and made me think that not everybody in Albuquerque hated me for going around taking pictures of buildings from a TV show.

I wish they sold some sort of device that could make your out-of-state license plate appear to look like an in-state license plate. Like that weird camouflage suit deal in A Scanner Darkly.

They had the logo printed on the inside of the restaurant, which is pretty badass. Twisters is actually a TexMex place. I got the enchilada plate, and it was actually pretty good for a place I ate at just because it was a different restaurant on a TV show.

I touched on the pretty major spots from Breaking Bad (didn't feel like driving to the laundromat) and got on my way to Tucson. Being in civilization for a few hours made me forget that most of New Mexico is a deserted wasteland. Ok, "wasteland" might be a little harsh. It's really scenic and stuff. But there are stretches where there's just nothing to look at.

Maybe this place actually gets snakes frequently, but I'm guessing the main purpose this sign serves is to freak out people like me.

I started getting into the more mountainous region of New Mexico, and most of the mountains looked pretty awesome.

No wonder they tested nukes out here.

I went through Hatch, NM, which is famous for its chiles. I thought about stopping at Elephant Butte State Park, but I hear that place stinks.

I was more interested in this giant statue of a man offering me an RV.

I left Hatch following a guy in an old Pathfinder. Then birds started flying out of his car. Like two of them. And one more was still flapping around inside. Pretty sure it wasn't a trick.

... It was his illusion.

Nine billion miles later, the sun started going down and I don't know if I've seen anything more beautiful than the sun setting into the Great Continental Divide.

Still getting the hang of photography at 85 mph.

So I stopped the car for some stationary photography.

Scorpion vs. Rattlesnake, WHO YA GOT?

I got to Tucson and met up with my parents, who were there because they just bought a house. Free meal! Free hotel! It's looking like Tucson is gonna be my last stop before LA. Which is good. This trip has been fun but I've been driving for a long time and it'll be nice to not be homeless anymore.

Day Ten: The Middle of Nowhere; Roswell & Albuquerque, NM

A few days ago I was on the phone with Danny and he asked me if I'd been through the desert yet. He said he'd heard it was spooky out there, but I was inclined not to believe him. Woops.

This was what I saw at a rest stop about 25 miles into New Mexico. I don't think it really does it justice. There is nothing out there.

Cars here and there, I guess. These picnic tables? And every once in a while there's a shell of a town with maybe a gas station in it. But there really isn't much. OK, it's kinda spooky. But the spookiness mainly comes from the thought of something happening and getting stuck out there. Obviously, my car breaking down was a large concern. But I had no idea what was out there before I went. And judging by some of the roadkill, it included some serious shit. Namely, the wolf/chupacabra I saw splattered on the side of the highway out in Western Texas.

The other thing Western Texas has are some big ass birds. I thought they were vultures at first, but I think they were just hawks whose wingspans seemed to reach at least my height. And they didn't give a shit. They just hung out in the middle of the highway chowing on whatever poor sucker got flattened, usually a porcupine (I think). And if their bounty was in the way of my car they would begrudgingly flap away, but I swear I could feel their annoyance as they looked back out of the corner of their beady, round bird eyes. I hope they weren't taking notes.

On the way to Sweetwater, Texas there was a gigantic windmill farm along the road, and stretching much further back. At first, I saw a couple of them along the road and thought it looked cool. But since there's no one else on the roads out there it's pretty easy for your eyes to stray, and these things looked like they went on forever. I was listening to King Crimson's Starless and Bible Black at the time and it just went together so well, for me at least. I'm guessing most of you wouldn't like that album, so I won't tell you to listen to it. I also heard this song on some random station in Texas and I don't think I'd ever heard it before but thought it was really awesome. Again, though, it's probably weird or whatever.

I stopped in Lubbock, where Texas Tech is, for lunch. I didn't take any pictures there because I was too busy trying to figure out why the whole place (and the 75 mile radius surrounding it) smelled like a hangover fart.

It's really weird how the highways work out there. They're also the main roads through town. But they're only the main roads through town when there happens to be a town. But I finally got through Texas (unscathed and without incident; take that, Aimee's dreams) and entered Mountain Time, and also I guess New Mexico. There wasn't even a welcome to New Mexico sign or a now leaving Texas sign or anything. I suppose both states felt they didn't need to impress the 417 or so people who have ever driven through there. At one point on 125, the first road in New Mexico, I saw what I thought were the makings of a dust storm and freaked out a little. But it wasn't one, so that's good.

Roswell was on my way, and I had to stop there. But goddamnit, it was Sunday! and these damn religious (or lazy) Southwestern folk don't open (or keep open) their crazy alien shit on goddamn Sunday! It was pretty disappointing, until I thought about it and realized I was better off not getting gouged to see a bunch of (what I assume was) complete crap. Lolly summed it up best, and she wasn't even there: "I picture it's kind of like Salem, alien-style, but with twice as many paranoid freaks." She left out the gangbanger drug dealers rolling around in Monte Carlos, but essentially nailed it down pat. Hmmm, unless Salem has that, too ...?

The Roswell city hall has a green dome, I'm assuming because of the extraterrestrial influence, which was rather dope. It was kinda funny since the rest of the building looked like a well thought out, detailed, expertly built, Southwestern-style building that looked extremely nice. But I guess someone was like "Dude, green dome. Come on." And he or she was totally right.

It was too bad that there wasn't some crazy guy in a tinfoil beanie trying to shoot down UFOs with this war memorial. The cannon was pointing at a Bank of America building. Trying to send a message, Roswell?

Sorry for the links to youtube, but I think it's necessary for this. Please feel free to not click on them.

This R2D2 mailbox was far and away the coolest space-related thing in Roswell.

They should localize mailboxes for other cities. Like in Boston, they could make it look like some drunk dude telling you how he's "totally not a racist, but there's sawmthin I don't like about that punk Rajon Rahhndo." I just realized I should have opened the lid to the fucking R2 mailbox and saw if it Beep-boo-dweeped. Damnit!

 
I saw some things in Roswell that were non-sci-fi related, and they seemed genuinely cool and not "haha aliens" cool.

This is a statue of John Simpson Chisum, the "Cattle King of the Pecos." 

Here it is from the front, but the lighting didn't really cooperate. Looks kind of sweet and silhouette-y now that I think about it, though.

There appears to be legitimate artists in Roswell who get no cred because they are from Roswell.

My advice to them: GET THE FUCK OUT OF ROSWELL NOBODY TAKES IT SERIOUSLY BECAUSE OF THE ALIEN LUNATICS!

So I got the hell out of there and drove a few more hours to my hotel in Albuquerque, which is way too nice for what I paid for it. It's not even a room. It's a suite I think. Here, look:

That's not the bed on the right of the picture.

Either Albuquerque is really cheap, or Bill Shatner knows how to hook it up.

... Goddamn Patriots. Oh, and the scab refs need to go.