The Steelhip Diaries: MILE 1,617

Californians sure get the shaft on gas prices. Is it because were such a liberal minded pussy state? I'm going to go with it and say yes. If anyone has a better more researched answer let me know.

Well after leaving Tempe I stopped in Tucson and hit a 16 mile detour in hopes of finding the proper shotgun. I went to a police supply and a nice cross eyed man showed me some 12 gauge pumps but he didn't have any folding wild west two shot ones so I split. I just cant let that go that easy-cross eyed gun salesman? Okay that's worse than the heavy set girl trying to sell a gun to me which she couldn't tell me how to use. I did discover an interesting parallel between San Francisco and Tucson though... and that's that there is probably as many weed dispensaries in San Francisco as there are gun dispensaries in Tucson. To compete with San Francisco, Tucson would need an online site where you can order guns and bullets at a discounted price.

I was chasing a train for awhile and pulled off the freeway to try and flick it.. too late.

About 50 miles later I passed it again and stopped off to snap this and wait.

I was about to leave because I realized there was another track and it was getting dark. Then she showed up...

Here's some martian hunters on the New Mexico side.

So last night I crossed the Arizon/New Mexico state line and when I pulled up the man at the little booth asked-"are you a citizen?" I didn't quite get the question right off the bat so I said "am I a citizen?" Yes, I finally figured out was the answer and rolled down the back window so he could check for martians. Never in my own country have I been asked if I was a citizen except on an application for employment. Interesting experience, I thought- citizen of New Mexico? Citizen of California? USA? What the fuck.

Anyways I pulled into the Holiday Inn and setup in a dark corner of their parking lot where I happily realized I could hack into their free internet-good to know.

This was the view I saw in the morning when I climbed out of my bat mobile...

There was two guys wearing jumpers over by the hotel door, so I figured they worked there and would know how to get to White Sands Monument-my next stop. When the guys turned around and responded to me I was a little shocked that not only were they French but that their jumpers also had missile logos on them. You see white sands is a missile launching site as well as air force base. There's a really great sign on the highway that reads something like this- "during missile launches highway can be closed up to an hour" Ha! That's amazing! I always thought it was pretty cool when they closed the beach in Santa Cruz and people lit off their fireworks but the government gets to shut down highways and blow stuff up. Now that's cool.

Snow? Nope. White Sands, New Mexico.