And so it begins......

Friday, Dec 21 – Day 2.

I leave Eloy, AZ (a little south of Phoenix) at Noon, and arrive in El Paso at about 5:00 pm. That’s 375 miles. It’s rush-hour, so I pull off to assess the situation. I log on to the internet, and find out that I’m reasonably close to the McDonald Observatory. Once a month, the 108 inch telescope is open to the public. This is the largest telescope in the world that is open for public use, and it gathers almost 500 times as much light (which means resolution) as my little scope. It turns out that the only day for public viewing is the Wednesday after the first full moon of the month. I’ve missed this month’s viewing by 2 days. Damn!

Ft. Stockton is 238 miles away, and I figure I can make it in about 3 ½ hours. Having actually been to Ft. Stockton before, I call ahead for a room reservation, only to find out that all four motels are full. Next stop after Ft. Stockton is San Antonio, which is another 319 miles. Yikes!

Pecos, population 12,000, is the only other sizeable town on the map. It’s only 220 miles from El Paso, but it’s 35 miles north of the I-10 Frwy. There’s room available at the Motel 6, and it’s too early to stop at El Paso. So I forge ahead, even though I’ll have to back-track a little the next day.

I get to Pecos and check into the Motel 6 at about 10:30 pm. Still feeling pretty good, I ask “where I can find a cold beer”. The lady behind the counter says “there’s a new sports bar that just opened, but it’s over 3 miles away AND they have a $3.00 cover charge”. Having logged 1,000.7 miles over the past two days, I’m pretty sure I can handle that. The lady said that if I told the bouncer that “I was just there to pick up a friend – can I go in and look for him/her?”, I could probably get in for free. She said she did that the week before, and she didn’t have to pay the $3.00.

Cash’s is a concrete block building with a concrete floor and a plywood bar. The bouncer has a set of handcuffs on his belt, and waives me in without the cover charge. The clientele looks mostly like Mexican gang members, with a sprinkling of oilfield workers and ranch hands. The music is old-school country and traditional Mexican. Clearly, I’m not from around here.

My waitress, Roxy, says they were supposed to have live music tonight, but two of the band members are still in the hospital as a result of a car crash yesterday - that’s why there’s no cover charge. My Budweiser costs me $2.00, and I start to meet a few people. Jake, who always drinks from two beer bottles at the same time, thinks I must be a land man – the guy who structures the leases for mineral rights in the o’l bidness. He’s sure that he’s met my brother. Josh has been to California, but didn’t care much for the people. He introduces me to Stacy, who also thinks I’m a land man. Now we’re cooking.

My watch says 11:00, but the bar clock says midnight. Roxy says that there’s a time change between El Paso and Pecos, and that the bar closes at 2:00. I’m doing pretty well with Stacy, and at about 1:00, three cops show up. They’re very large, and they just stand there in front of the door - which is the only way out. My guess is that this is a pretty effective crowd control measure which is employed at the end of an evening. Jake is only drinking out of one bottle at a time now, and though I've only had two beers, I really don’t feel like I want to walk that gauntlet right now so I’m going to wait a while.

As it turns out, they had come for a guy that was in the middle of a game of pool. They just stood at the door watching him, and waited for about 15 minutes until he finished his game. After the game, as he was shaking hands with his opponent, they moved in and grabbed him. I asked the bartender if he had done something wrong, and he said “not tonight, but he’s an habitual”.

After a few more minutes, I left. My car was easy to find as it was the only Mercedes with California plates in the dirt parking lot full of pick-up trucks. The three police cars, lights flashing, were still blocking the driveway, but they let me through with nothing more than a waive. So I’m feeling pretty good, but when I get back to Motel 6, I seem to have lost my key. At close to 2:00 am, I have to wake up the old lady snoozing in the back office, and get her to make me another one.

Well, so much for getting up at 6:00 am to bust out the remaining 550 miles to Houston. But that’s OK. I’ve got time.