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.
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