07.30.07 - 12:32 pm

12:30 am left phoenix, arizona. sunday the 29th.
7:30 pm arrive in the endless city, houston, texas. monday the 30th.

so no bar fights. houston is a different beast than anticipated. but lets back up...

my delightful sister hosts a social gathering at her house. it would have been particularly enjoyable...had ben and i not been completely ignored the entire evening. jillian continually chastized me for tarnishing the family image, as i was not able to consume the large amounts of alcohol she was so easily ingesting. i also did terrible at flip cup. in addition, during a pivotal moment in kings, instead of the category "ive never..." i inadvertedly changed it to something of an embarrasing confessional. nevermind. ben slept on the cold tile floor of a recently emptied bedroom, jill and i took the bed. while jill and maison left for the river early in the morning, i got up fairly early and sat out in the sun and waited for julie to come pick me up for some breakfast...lunch. mongolian grill. without the seconds.

the rest of the day was spent being lazy and indoors. i went out and got some sun in the afternoon, but beyond that i watched everyone spend most of their time texting on their phones or sleeping. so this is probably what encouraged ben and i to want to leave sunday evening instead of early monday morning.

so we did.

for the most part, new mexico didnt even exist. mostly flat with a poorly maintained highway, not much of it could be seen in the darkness. the highlight of new mexico were the thousands of spadefoot toads running the gauntlet of the I-10 E freeway. dead frogs littered the black asphalt for miles. im positive i killed several hundred. each frog i killed, or feared i had killed was like a punch to the stomach. some were tiny. some were huge. each died instantly or mostly instantly when the rubber wheels of the VW golf mashed them into the pavement at 90 miles per hour. with as many of these toads dead as i saw, i cant imagine this species not going extinct very soon. if not sometime later this week.

i forgot to add that in the dark expanse that is new mexico, occasionally there are a series of signs warning against dust storms. but their existence is still something of myth in new mexico. instead of saying BEWARE OF DUST STORMS, the signs read DUST STORMS MAY EXIST. not so much a warning as a declarative statement. thanks new mexico, ill let you know if i happen to stumble across one.

el paso. the dawning of yet another state border, and the start of the most terrible leg of our journey.

more to come.