Smuggling Bill

Bill. What a nice man. In that weird don’t let your children go near him unattended kind of way. Brian and I sat down to our breakfast this morning when Bill walked up and decided he wanted to sit with us. He was an older gent and definitely fit every preconceived notion that you had about the “average hick”. Not wanting to miss an opportunity to chat this man up I began conversing with him. If I only knew then, what I knew now. As I started to get into the meat of the conversation, Brian had to duck out to speak with Candace. Good thing too.

You see, pretty much everyone we have spoken to about our trip has replied with something like this: “Wow! Cross country driving from Maine to California! Good for you guys! Good luck in California! Safe travels!” Instead this is how it went down:

Bill: “What brings you guys through these parts?”
Me: “My friend Brian is moving to California. We left Maine two days ago and are headed to San Francisco”.
Bill: “Why the hell does he want to go to California? We are moving away from California because it is so terrible”
Me: (five seconds of uncomfortable silence) “Well, Brian’s lady lives in San Fran and he is moving to be with her.”
Bill: “Oh.” (20 seconds of silence) “Do they have kids?”
Me: “No.”
Bill: “Well then he shouldn’t go there. Everyone hates it there”.
Me: “Okay then. I have to leave now. Continued safe travels”

Maybe I need to rethink how cool it will be to meet people on this trip.

On a different note, Brian was Googling things to look at and see along the I-40 Corridor from Oklahoma to Albuquerque and came across a site that says “Along the I-40 corridor east from Albuquerque to Amarillo, Texas, I observed 37 suspected profile loads of human cargo driven by smugglers.”

Most people try and play the “Badiddle” Game or the License Plate Game. I did not realize that Spot the Smuggler was a game too. Apparently you have to do what you have to do when driving through 600 miles of corn field.

We are off to make I-40 our bitch.