Tulsa to Houston (travel, 494.2 miles)

Quote of the Day: "Please God don't let me die to the tune of Bob Seger's "Shakedown." (Somewhere just outside of Tulsa, Oklahoma)

Having spent a few months home, effectively one day in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and less than a day in Houston, Texas (via Dallas, this is important), I have already come to some conclusions about the citizenry and their local driving norms. Wichitans operate on a faith-based system, wherein the Golden Rule appears to be "You won't hit me." I lost count of the times someone pulled out in front of me requiring me to press or hit the brakes, but always with no room for error or a wandering eye/brain. It should surprise no one that the primary source of non-national television commercials in Wichita is a colorful lot of local lawyers set on "getting you the money you deserve" in all manner of traffic accidents. One even rides a bull and calls himself THE BULL! and likes to break through walls to show just how jacked he is to get you some of that insurance money.

Tulsa was aggressive, but not frighteningly so. Most intown driving on the 18th was even mellow since not many people were out--weird for a Saturday, but maybe not so much on a Saturday after St. Patrick's Day (national "throw up in your purse" holiday celebrated from sea to shining sea, and yes this really happened, my friend's daughter witnessed said yarking first hand, lucky girl). Arriving and leaving were the points when I saw the real jawdroppers, though in both cases it was a truck driver pulling some shenanigans and not really something to blame on the area so much as the circumstance. The Shakedown, Breakdown, You're Busted incident happened when a trucker pulled onto a 65 mph highway (busy, with groups of cars doing their usual ballet tween and twixt to get ahead, pass, move) with minimal room to spare, requiring everyone to hit their breaks and at least two cars to swerve to avoid screeching breaks and spin outs/collisions. A normal highway merging lane is one thing--there's time to see vehicles and move as needed--but this highway went straight through towns and burgs with some slow downs and even stoplights, and at this particular spot people could just pull straight out of parking lots and side streets. The trucker--who is stupid and must be shot, no doubt--wasn't the one who scared me the most, especially since I'd spent so much time in Wichita's "You Won't Hit Me" environment, but having been rear-ended in a completely "safe" situation just two days ago, it's more about the cars around me, trying not to hit each other or run off the road. I had to hit my brakes fairly hard (enough to elicit a "shit" but without the "holy" and follow up "you mothertrucker yadda yadda") but I was clear enough ahead to allow for the cars in real danger to swerve into my lane. What I was really waiting for was the crunch of impact from behind or on my right, which didn't happen thank God. Considering how many accidents there are a day, imagine how many near misses. So, that's Tulsa. Sorry Tulsa!

Okay, so Texas. You know how you are not supposed to mess with it, right? Thank God I have driving skills and manage not to panic too easily when I am in control of a car because while there was some aggression in Tulsa (Wichita has aggressive drivers, but is primarily a moseying town), Texas is next level, especially around Dallas. I have never seen so many aggressively massive truck grilles nearly pressed to the back of my car in all my life. You're thinking, "Speed up, Gramma" but no. This was with me speeding 5-8 miles over the speed limit. And in some places the speed limit is 75 (which is unbelievably awesome--the first time I did it, my Rogue's instrument panel started blinking as if to say ARE YOU SURE) and these monster trucks (toting monsters or men, we'll never know, but manly, big handed men, no doubt) flew past me like rockets. So, 95 or 100 mph? Or more? I'm used to Kansas highways and the speedsters here and there, but we all mostly keep to the 5-10 rule. I'm guessing it's more like 20-30 in Texas. Don't mess with them. They will give you the grille.

The best part, though, is that they can obviously chill and not freak when annoying things happen. Just between Dallas and Houston, there were three traffic delays where we either just rolled at 5 mph or less or stopped dead, rolled, stopped dead, and so on. No one honked, no one screamed. We all just let it happen and moved along eventually. One passenger got out in his flip flops to mosey down the road and see what was up, having a smoke in the meantime. The first incident was due to the loss of a lane (merging because of construction), the second was construction + merging from intown roads, and the third? Fleurs. People pulled over on the 75-mph highway--onto the slight shoulder with no room to spare--so they could get out and take pictures of the wild flowers growing all along the highway. And it is gorgeous...blue, purple, yellow, orange--all in green fields below a blue sky with big, white, bunchy clouds. No one honked, there were no shouts or gestures. No one seemed mad at all. We just passed by all the Ferdinands and their flowers. So, I guess don't mess with Texas or it's pretty, pretty fleurs.

As harrowing as some of the driving was, nothing yanked a sharp fuckword out of me quite like the sight of a giant white man emerging from the forest to I don't know what, stomp the villagers, burn the village? All you see for miles are these fields of lovely color and stark deep green trees and then suddenly this sonofagun appears and nearly drives you off the road because who expects a mountainous statue out in the middle of nowhere? Whenever I see an overgrown manstatue I tend to think of that terrible story by Clive Barker called "Rawhead Rex" which you should never ever read because Forever NightmaresTM I kid you not. Basically, a reanimated giant kills everyone. Sounds like "whatever" but read it and see. Eternal creeps, builds a house in your memory circuits, never leaves. Go ahead. So, giant Sam Houston = Rawhead Rex. 

I'd never actually seen a representation of Sam Houston before and I have to admit I was extremely disappointed. He just looks like Jefferson or Washington...I thought he'd look like Sam Elliott. They should remake the statue in his image instead. I would definitely scream HELL YEAH and hook em horns at it while I shot by at 82 miles an hour. 

Side note: Whoever wrote the Wikipedia page for Sam Elliott has it bad for the man. Like, bad. 

Sam Elliott. Samuel Pack "Sam" Elliott (born August 9, 1944) is an American actor. His lanky physique, thick horseshoe moustache, deep and resonant voice, and Western drawl have led to frequent roles as cowboys and ranchers.

Sam Elliott - Wikipedia

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Elliott

Lanky, thick, deep and resonant, amiriiight. Is it hot in here or is it just Texas.

More on Houston (so far! less than a day!)

1. The AirBNB house is very nice and centrally located. The house itself is a funky 50s-60s design with sloping roofs and windows with angles. The bed is freaking fantastic and I slept like an overfed bear. The host is super nice, retired, and has toilet paper made of Donald Trump's face so we are getting along like gangbusters. Also a native Wichitan!
2. I'm on a budget but needed waffles today so I looked up something local and ended up  having a phenomenal breakfast at Omelette and Waffle Restaurant (8533 Beechnut St, Houston, TX 77036). Good coffee, crispy & soft Belgian waffle, and hot syrup. 
   
3. There is a whimsical bird here and it is noisy and chirpy and apparently owns the zip codes because I am clearly not the only person who has googled "noisy bird in Houston" because it autofilled and said "Grackle, you mean Grackle, and yes they own the area." Look at it, have you ever seen anything so cute in your life? You have not. They have a very distinctive song and I saw one give the boot to a smaller bird by yelling and doing this shimmy shimmy coconut dance at it with those round eyes and beak agape. It made me step back, a little threatened and a lot impressed. I want one. 
4. Library post next...