I just wrote a long

I just wrote a long post, but fucking Blogger won't publish it. Maybe I can work it out within a few weeks, whenever I find some more free wifi.

Nevermind. I guess it published. I'm still really pissed off and sick of this Blogger shit.

Catching up

I found some free wifi for the first time in three or four weeks. Since no one gave me any shit for my last post, I'll try to catch up on the last week or so. Thanks to fucking Blogger, I lost a whole bunch of stuff I'd written here and now have to rewrite it. I really wish people would stop commenting anonymously, just so I can tell who's writing what.

All right. Here goes...

First, I sat around at a Flying J in Eloy, Arizona for about two days after getting busted on the freight train that I didn't even want to ride. The only reason I rode it is because about 20 people in Tucson told me the Flying J was only about 5 or 10 miles out of town. However, after walking about six miles out of civilization, I saw a billboard for the Flying J, telling me it was still another 32 miles up the road. So I stopped for the night and slept near what seemed to be a busy exit from I-10.

In the morning I went straight to the northbound on-ramp, hoping to get a short ride to the Flying J, but no luck. Nearly out of water but thirsty as hell because I was saving the few remaining ounces, a northbound train soon stopped at the nearby siding. I didn't plan to ride the train at first, but I might have been fucked if I'd kept trying to get a ride, so I walked down the frontage road and found a spot on the front of an empty shipping container car.

About 30 miles up the road, the train stopped. I was going to get off there anyway, but a Union Pacific police officer pulled up just as I stood up to dismount. You already know the rest of that story.

So after two days at the Flying J, some guy offered me a ride. I thought he was a truck driver at first, but he was actually a tramp with a car and a female companion. They were going to California, so they didn't mind taking me to Quartzsite, where I wanted to visit my buddy Otis, who operates a pizza trailer in the swap meet town. Making a pitstop in Phoenix to buy a bag of weed, they were offered a place to stay for the night, so they took me to the nearby Flying J and said they'd stop by to pick me up at about noon the next day. If they did stop by, I never saw them. So I spent two days at the Phoenix Flying J until getting kicked out.

From the Flying J, I walked about five miles to a Pilot station. Intending to eat and immediately find a place to sleep, I bought a couple hot dogs. Before I even finished my hot dogs, though, I had a ride to Quartzsite with a trucker.

Arriving at the Love's truck stop in Quartzsite at about 12:30 Monday night, I quickly recognized an employee in the dining area. It was Jessica Payne, who I'd met almost two years ago while trying to make it home from California for Christmas. (There is a picture of Jessica on the Photos page.) I said hi to Jessica and asked if she remembered me. She didn't remember me, but we began a conversation. I told her I was in town to see a buddy of mine--the guy who operates the pizza trailer. She asked if I meant Otis, and I said yes. So she asked me, "You haven't heard?" Then she told me Otis died of a heart attack a couple weeks earlier.

I was shocked. At age 58, Otis was in very good shape, both physically and mentally. I think he exercised quite a bit, too. So only a few minutes after arriving in Quartzsite, I found out that I had no reason to be there.

I needed to sleep, so I headed out of the truck stop and looked for somewhere to sleep, which is not very difficult in the middle-of-nowhere swap meet town. Still, I didn't get to sleep until about 2:00 am, which means I didn't get much sleep that night.

I spent the next two days sitting around the truck stop, hoping to get a ride to either Phoenix or Tucson. I finally got a ride to Tucson yesterday afternoon. I wanted to get out of the truck a couple miles before reaching the outer edge of Tucson, but my driver wouldn't stop for me. So I ended up having to ride with him all the way through Tucson and a little beyond, where there is a truck stop, leaving me about 25 miles from where I wanted to be.

I have almost no money right now, but I should be able to round some up. I hope I can find somewhere to watch the Penn State/Ohio State game Saturday. But even if I do, I have to start trying to get back to Eloy immediately after the game because I have an appointment with a judge early Monday morning to determine my punishment for Criminal Trespass, 3rd Degree. After that, I should be free to go wherever I want, although I might have to figure out a way to make a quick $175.

I guess that's about it for now. I get so sick of Blogger causing me to lose shit I've already drafted and redrafted.

Rest in peace, Otis Gunn.

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