Middle of the desert, NV – afternoon

I was hoping to be in Tonopah by now.  Never heard of Tonopah?  Me too, but it’s right about halfway on the road between Las Vegas and Reno.  Unfortunately, a late start (I stayed up _way_ too late last night typing in that last update.  The things I do for pseudo-journalism) and the desert heat conspired against me.  Roberta Verona couldn’t stand it and I spent about two hours on the side of the road letting her cool down.  I had been watching the temperature gauge, it was hanging around just above the halfway point.  Actually, I’d been driving not at a certain speed, but to try to keep the temp in that middle range.  All of a sudden, when I looked down, it was red-lining, and I pulled right over.  The coolant tank was up to the top, but hadn’t overflowed.  As I stood there, wondering about how much time I was going to have to kill to be safe to run it again, it started bubbling.  Boiled with the engine off.  Yeesh.  So I just waited until the coolant went back down to a normal, non-running level.  I’m not precisely sure how long I was out there, but I was expecting to pass through this alledged “town” at noon, but I ended up stopping at two.  Might as well get some lunch and let Roberta rest more.  This is right about the midpoint of the driving I intended to do today.

Can you tell I’ll be glad to be out of the desert?  I’ll drive home through Canada if I have too, but Roberta and I just can’t take the heat.  Perhaps I should just sleep in the daytime and drive at night.  Actually, there is an RV park here…

No.  I don’t want to leave that big a chunk of land between me and Reno.  Perhaps I’ll try an early dinner (assuming there’s someplace to eat in Tonopah) and bed, and get up at like five in the morning to drive tomorrow.  Not quite as bad as it sounds, it’s eight to me, really.  Although I really think my body would prefer about a thirty hour day.  My sleeping patterns are kind of weird even out here.

Hey, so what if I’m babbling?  It’s either this or go throw money into the slot machines to kill time.  Yes, I’m in the middle of nowhere, but the truck stop/hotel/restaurant that, as far as I can tell, makes up the entirety of this town (whose name completely escapes me at the moment) has row after row of slot machines.  I guess it’s smarter to be in playing the slots rather than out driving in the heat.

Arrgh.  I don’t know what I’m going to do now, but my brain is fried and I have nothing more to write.  So there.