Ok, I think my error here has been a complete and utter lack of planning (as usual), not buying a lonely planet (although we have bought a little cactus for the car which is a lonely plant, ahem) and generally sticking to the motorways. Im also extremely annoyed with myself in general for the timing of my whole round the world trip by living out two winters in one year instead of no winters like what I should have done.
The weather out here isn’t bad, but its not sun bathing weather I can tell you. But most annoying is that all the fantastic theme parks and water parks are closed!! One of the main reason for coming on this round the world trip in the first place. CURSES!! Well never mind. America will always be here (well, unless it doesn’t get nuked by Iran or North Korea or Godzilla) so Ill just have to come back another time and do all the theme parks. As Im here cruising across the southern states I might as well try and make the best of it.
“The rooooad is looooong. Very very very very long”
“Shouldn’t you be on the road?”
Entering into Texas you realize this is a BIG state. The road goes on straight for miles and miles and miles with nothing but desert all around you. Not a place you’d want to break down really. Hmmm, why is the engine temperature gauge maxed out and that big red light with an exclamation mark flashing. Oh shit.
Actually it’d been overheating for a while but we managed to cool it down by adding more water. Luckily we managed to finally stop at a petrol station where I looked under the bonnet pretty clueless, hoping the problem would fix itself if I stared at it long enough. No luck. However a German guy did come over and start poking around at it.
He discovered the problem and in the next 2 hours he actually managed to replace one of the hoses from the water pump as it had a hole in it (I hadn’t done that many handbrake turns, honest!). Absolutely amazing bit of luck considering we were in a tiny little town and it was dark and here’s this random German with tools and replacement hoses with the know how on how to fix it all. When I asked him what he wanted for it he just grunted at me. In fact as we thanked him over and over he just seemed to get more grumpy. Very strange but I wasn’t gonna argue with a free roadside repair. Best leave before he decides to eat my head.
Back on the road you discover the joy of American drivers. My god. They really are terrible. Apparently there is lane priority where everyone overtakes on the left but no one takes any notice. And nobody indicates. Its more of a problem in the cities where nobody has any courtesy whatsoever. If your indicating to change lanes and starting to make a maneuver, the guy behind you will try and beat you to it. They swerve in front of you with no indicators, usually with a phone glued to their head and most of them drive cars the size of buses. God help them if they had to deal with manual cars and roundabouts that’s all I can say.
Made a stop in San Antonio where I discovered the wonders of A1 Steak Sauce. I have now succumbed to the evil of American junk food and I am no longer caring about eating healthily. The way I see it is that I can get back in shape when I get home so for now I might as well enjoy it. So now some days I might have pancakes from breakfast and a burger for lunch followed by a burger for dinner. 40% of Americans are obese and it’s so easy to see why.
They say there could be an obesity epidemic on the horizon but I really don’t think its going to effect me do you? So sod those fat bastards give me your burgers baby!! And being fair, they do make the best burgers over here. I plan to make it my mission to have a burger in every burger restaurant. And what choice you have; McDonalds, Dennys, Burger King, Wendys, Shoeies, WhatABurger, InNOut Burger, Carls Jnr, Fuddruckers and White Castle. There may be more and I plan to sample them all.
They also had this building there which I forget the name of now:
“Remember the…errr…remember the ah…err…the…nah, its gone.”
And my personal favourite “Only in America” moment so far:
“That’s right. A Santa Claus doll with army fatigues and a fucking gun”
Another good one I found is whilst driving along the desolate interstate roads you’ll suddenly come across a road sign displaying “DON’T MESS WITH TEXAS”. “Err, ok. I, err, wasn’t planning to”. Silly people.
That night, Teddie had a dream that we got pulled over by the cops for speeding. Of course, next morning what happens? I get pulled over by the cops for speeding. You could say it’s a weird coincidence but I think its more a matter of inevitability when you’re traveling and nothing less than 90mph most of the time. Luckily I gave him a load of “Yes sir. No Sir. Three bags full sir” and he only gave me a warning. Good job he didn’t check up with the San Francisco police department about my $335 in parking fines. Lets get out of here baby.
For a humourous slant on the American culture read this (it’s not written by John Cleese though, contrary to what it says)
http://www.liquidtype.net/node/781
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