08.06.07 - 8:00 pm

houston, texas. land of enchantment.

we stopped for gas some 80 miles outside of houston, after a healthy dose of rain. ben put on his glasses and staggered out of his drivers seat. by the time he had walked around to the pump, his glasses had completely fogged over in condensation. this was the plight of the american southeast, and soon to be shared by us as well. tyler would later describe it as something like a "big warm hug".

trucks. they love them here in texas. pick ups everywhere, with big fucking steel cattle grills. even their license plates explicitly state: TRUCK right under the texas.

in texas, multi-trailer semi trucks will pass you in the left lane if youre only going 80 mph.

our first hotel of the trip was deep within houston, near the bush international airport and coincidentally right next to the halliburton corporate offices. the trip to houston from phoenix had taken some 20 hours. we were both tired. hungry. irritable. i dont think we spoke much the last few hours before we arrived. it was just too taxing of a drive.

and houston isnt exactly a welcoming paradise. the entire city is set up like a cement ant farm. nestled amidst the maze of super freeways was the heart of the city and its citizens, none of which i was able to see or feel. well, until we got lost later that evening.

we showered. we changed clothes. i made some phone calls and after some intense discussions involving severe let downs and disappointments, i was able to pull together two important individuals for some dinner at chilis. tyler and andi both lived nearly forty minutes from our hotel, and neither would come to us. so we navigated down the arteries of pavement to one of houstons many downtown areas. i had never met tyler in person. however, he was a delight to have finally met. it was almost like we had been good friends in oregon. andi was obviously excited to be meeting up with us, and kept the flow of conversation steady and well balanced. i applaud her for being so welcoming to young mr harvey. i dipped into my budget a bit for a hearty meal since i had been subsisting off a bag of fritos and fast food for the last few days. ben got drunk. in texas beer comes in two sizes: regular and gallon sized. their mash potatoes also come with cheese on it. not pleasant.

we said our good byes, and ben and i began our journey back to base camp.

where ever the fuck it was.

twice that evening we came to a road that took us directly to our hotel. and both times we turned the opposite direction thinking we knew what we were doing. we ended up in some seedy, poorly lit neighborhoods. i saw a pack of wild domesticated dogs. we tossed an entirely unnecessary amount of coins into dozens of toll booths. repeatedly. ben became increasingly more frustrated. he was running out of quarters. he also had to pee out the nearly four beers he had consumed a few hours earlier. i pulled into a semi abandoned gas station so ben could pee somewhere in the dark while i spoke with the hotel desk girl for directions. ben refused.

but he was becoming increasingly more desperate.

desperate and yet terrified enough of being caught with public urination, that he was on his knees hiding in between the car and his open door trying to pee into an empty water bottle. i should have filmed this entire episode.

finally his desperation turned to an epiphany of carelessness and he stood up and peed beside the car somewhere. on the ground. thank god. his mood suddenly became more relaxed. our faithful desk girl lead us back to our hotel and finally, an hour later we went to sleep, completely done with texas and driving in it.

with the two worst legs of our journey complete, the mere 7 hours to new orleans was almost laughable. but much anticipated.