Barstow
So I just got back from two days in Barstow, Sunny Southern California. I left Saturday night with Cpt. Wu to arrive in between the a patch of city sandwiched between desert and more desert at about 2 am Sunday morning. My brother was driving a car back from Texas when it overheated during a fuel-up in Ludlow, Ca. He had it towed to Ludlow with the help of the greedy, advantageous bastards of Ludlow Auto and Tow where the Captain and I met him with tools ready. Turns out the car was spraying coolant from where the thermostat housing bolted onto the water pump. From the look of the silicone gaskets it had looked like the guy who sold my bro the car failed to mention a problem with the cooling system. During the 10+ hours we spent in front of the engine on Sunday we re-gunked most of the cooling system between the radiator and the engine and got the system burped at a great shop down the block from the hotel. By Monday noon we had that car back on the road.
Barstow was unbelievable. 24 hours a day there was the sound of squealing brakes from the freight trains there were constantly coming and going. I can hardly imagine what it would be like to spend a year trying to get a decent night’s rest with those brakes singing all the time. Tools for that car were nearly impossible to get. You leave the Bay Area and all of a sudden an 8mm crow’s foot is a “specialty tool.” No body had it. If it weren’t for the Captain I don’t think we would have been able to get one of the bolts without a drive to L.A. for the tool. The town was being over saturated with franchise and chain stores targeting people who would have otherwise driven trough without batting an eye. I’m sure the Wal-Mart there was at lest half-staffed with people it had just run out of business. Even the people we talked to said that they couldn’t wait to get out. I’ve got to say though that I was thrilled to find a place that was able to make an awesome vegan nachos for me.
I can’t say how happy I was to be back on 280 where every third car is an SUV with a single occupant cutting through traffic at 80 mph and you can go through a dozen cities without leaving the cityscape. I may hate the gas-guzzlers but I am happy to be back home. I can’t wait to get a few good nights sleep an let my lower back recover after a hay hunched over an engine compartment.
