#44 / 2004 Tour 3: Las Cruces

BEATLICK TRAVEL REPORT 16

#44

I can tell that my heart is a little lighter these days. Seems like the jokes been on me more than a few times lately. I almost hate to send this story out because I am telling on myself.

Joe and I finally arrived in Las Cruces. 

We found a great little motel for $25 a night. Have you noticed that all the little motels are now owned by East Indians, usually connected to someone named Patel? I don't know when this change in the industry occurred but it is a firmly established fact now that almost 60 percent of these small hotels are owned by Indians. At least that is what one owner's father told me in Angleton, and I haven't seen anything to dispute this.

Anyway, after setting a personal record for not bathing (eight days) Joe and I finally bathed in Terlingua Creek the day before we left Big Bend. But seeing that I was going to my big appointment with the realtor who has tolerated me online for over six months, I really wanted to make a good impression. I cut Joe's hair in the room. We put on our Sunday best. We've been revving the motor at night when we park, so the 71 started right up and off we went.

Howard Dukes was a great person to meet. He was so knowledgeable and already knew just what I am looking for. I thought the meeting went very well. I had all my paperwork, he felt all was in order and I wouldn't have any trouble with financing. He loaded me down with some locations and properties to look at and out the door I went, feeling like A WINNER!

The van wouldn't start. There we sat in our Sunday best. I looked at Joe and said, "I'll be damned if I am going to push this van out of the parking lot. I'll sit here until dark."

I could just see my realtor for whom I had worked so hard to make a good impression, see us laboring across the parking lot pushing a big old van looking like LOSERS! This truly felt like a stroke of bad luck. Joe insisted on getting out and scouting out the lot, he wanted to check out the level of the ground, but it didn't matter and I didn't care. I was not going to push that van.

Still in shock, I hopped back in the vehicle and just out of idle curiosity tried the starter again. God bless us one and all, it started.  So I got to escape the realty parking lot without being seen.