weed, whites, and wine

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Winemaker

Sport climber
Yakima, WA
Nov 2, 2015 - 07:27pm PT
Hitch hiking? I was at Michigan State and the family was in Huntsville, Al with Boeing. Christmas was coming. A friend and I got a ride to near Nashville where we split. I decided I would hitch to Nashville and catch a bus. It was about 10:00 at night, so getting a ride was iffy. Some dude in a beat up POS car stops and asks where I’m going. Nashville. Okay, I’ll take you says he. The signals were going off of course, 50 year old redneck, drunk on his ass, but I decided to take the chance. As soon as we drove off I observed a couple of things: he was smashed, really really smashed; the oil pressure light was on; no good vibes here, but what the hell.

We got on the interstate and the first thing he said was “You got real purtty hair” and reached over to touch my hair. I said ‘Maybe you should let me drive”. He agreed and, in the middle of nowhere we switched places; at least I was in control now. At the first exit with a gas station I pulled off, stopped the car and jumped out, grabbing my bag. He was pissed and told me he was going to call the cops. I told him I was going to call the cops. Drunk on his ass, the oil pressure near zero and the engine making odd noises he drove off. F*#king redneck. Shades of Deliverance.
Gary

Social climber
Hell is empty and all the devils are here
Nov 2, 2015 - 07:53pm PT
I've stayed at the clown motel.

Man, you've got nerve.
zBrown

Ice climber
Nov 2, 2015 - 08:11pm PT
Poetic learner's permit
Gnome Ofthe Diabase

climber
Out Of Bed
Nov 2, 2015 - 08:35pm PT
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29-xxM7FrjM&ebc=ANyPxKo_Cv5yQoEGgF7Oznh1KmmYbLVl3Q3Od7x3MWrdiXErN30KwroIq9P-NCi9Gn1_bVaYQZOuRcugkMyhvsFr_CHBk4qI1g

Well that sure did not work! And I did not work much either, I just climbed.
I climbed on the walls of three schools, inside and out . When I climbed in and out of windows, I got tossed from each.

I went on to climb on bridges using that to work out. From having met and watched as gill preformed I started calling the hardest traverse across scabs of failing concrete facing, the ripper treverse.

Then it was that I met some kid who climbed better than me. He was a legacy. His folks did more than climb to ski, they climbed rocks just like me!


It was hard face climbing and made me a very strong kid.
So much so that KB made me an apprentice. Then things fell into place as I learned that neither climber must ever fall from the greatest ole' Dad of all. After fixing that as the mind set
And embracing what is now What jstan taught. I went as far as I could until me feet nearly dropped off.

When I die some will say I wasted a good life. Not because I climbed so much but because I did not climb more, higher farther off more . . .staying close to my routes and roots only making forays out west every other year for twenty felt like enough but it was not.
All of the climbing hiking hitching and bus stop drive by sex, got old as I left my 30s
That was when these confounding climbing gyms came to the US shores. I had climbed indoors in Britain and in France, before there was any more than peg boards in a gym around here.
As I said I climbed very thing I could from the end of the sixties on. But the stench of indoor gym was nauseating to me I had been to France twice and England much more . The score was about to change - I knew it and got married to a wholesome corn fed lass of stature to breed in some height. She had short legs and a long strong back, still does in-fact. . . .

So as the wave of first gen gym climbers looked to go outdoors, I was in a good place to get paid to show some the ropes. Then it started pouring no0bs and holds got greased by the years of chalk, ruining what had been. The old men died off and one or two giants to me too.
I did not join the human race the damn cluster-in-Flux joined me. I went farther into the woods to get away and thought so loudly STAY AWAY, that for the most part all have .
A good thing really as I am happier being sad that no one climbs the old ways any more .
And those that know the old ways see that good or bad things change and youth has no rival.



[Click to View YouTube Video]Too long ? Well then I might find just the right length song
But which one Down On The Farm?- the song or the whole album? Spanish Moon?
Time Loves A Hero?[Click to View YouTube Video] that's still a bit to long a version and besides it is a bit of a stretch anyone up for the Triple Face Boogie? Speak in' of a fitting boogie
 yeah[Click to View YouTube Video]

Thank you for this HDan! I'm sure that we who hid in the dirt and ran from other responsibilities in the now grey days. So black and white, have many of the same regrets .
But as to live music and hard livin' so that we could climb farther, higher, more, to climb rocks was what I feel the songs of Little feat are all about.
Risk

Mountain climber
Olympia, WA
Nov 2, 2015 - 09:23pm PT
Country Joe McDonald - Hold On It's Coming - 10/27/1973 - Winterland (Official)

[Click to View YouTube Video]

In 1972, I hitchhiked down Hwy 1 over Christmas Break from SF; I was 15. Somewhere outside of Monterey, after getting dropped off by some gay/hustler dude who was polite enough to just let us out of his car, it started raining and we were beneath a grove of eucalyptus trees. Even though it was totally dark.some guy in a really old (like 1963) chevy pick-up picked us up. The guy drove Hwy 1 like a horse headed for the barn. Only song remember blaring out of the radio was "rider's on the storm." ended up camping in a gulch, keeping a little dry with a "tube tent." The next morning, some guy in a Porsche picked us up; as I recall, he looked like Dustin Hoffman. (no, it wasn't an Alfa Romeo). A risky trip, no doubt; but over the years it has provided me a realtime playbook of yesteryear. Finally, our last stop was on Hwy 41 where James Dean crashed.
hobo_dan

Social climber
Minnesota
Topic Author's Reply - Jan 10, 2017 - 06:22pm PT
Up in Alaska we pick up a lone lady hitch hiker. She introduces herself as the "bush bunny". Seems she made her living by staying with some man in his cabin for as long as either could stand it- usually about 6 months- and then she moved up or down river to the next vacancy. Hit run repeat and then move down river
A funny aspect of this scene, was that she had these sort of fashionable high heeled shoes on with no socks and her toes were really, really, dirty and in my mid western hopelessness I couldn't help but keep on staring at her grimy feet.
healyje

Trad climber
Portland, Oregon
Jan 11, 2017 - 03:35am PT
While in school in the mid-70s after returning from Vietnam I used to hitchhike across I-70 between Southern Illinois and Eldo a couple of times a year to climb. It was always an adventure. Sometimes the hardest part of the trip was just getting a ride from Carbondale, Ill up to St. Louis to catch I-70 as you had to pass through a stretch where folks weren't overly friendly towards those filthy longhairs. In fact, some trips seemed like I almost walked to St. Louis, but once you did make I-70 it was always 18 hours of clear sailing through the Great Plains to Eldo. Kind of always liked that trip. Except for once...

I was living in Glenwood Springs for the winter at the time and confluence of really bad juju required I hitchhike back to Illinois at the end of January in a brutal storm. After some ado, I made it through the mountains to Denver and was standing on I-70 out just east of the Stapleton and the 270 interchange. I'd been there for what seemed like an eternity, with basically no cars or trucks going by and getting colder with even more snow, when I finally realize through the blinding wind that the oddly shaped snowdrift behind is a frozen cow leaning up against the fence and drifted over. It suddenly dawned on me that I may have underestimated the endeavor and was beginning to wonder why it wasn't named Shackleton Airport.

Maybe another hour or so passed of zero cars. But then I spy one a long way off, or at least as far as I could see, though as it neared I could tell something was off. When it did finally roll up next to me it's Colorado State Police car going the wrong way down the freeway. The trooper rolls down the window and yells, "kid, get in the car, don't you know the interstate is closed?". Well, no sir, I didn't, but I was pretty sure that cow was going to have some company if that trooper hadn't rolled up when he did and taken me back into town.

That night I found somewhere warmish to crash and checked the freeway report the next afternoon and, finding it open, set out again with a bit better luck this time. Made it to the Topeka Bypass interchange late at night and am freezing my ass off again when after an hour or so a white, ragtop Dodge pulls to a stop. A big, lyrical black guy slides over to unlock the door. I get in, but am so chilled to the bone that I'm a bit disoriented for a few minutes by which time we're back on the road. When I finally come to my senses and can feel again a couple of minutes later I realize my new friend never slid back behind the wheel and has his hand on my thigh. Ok, remain calm, pull my knife and explain I'd really like to get out of the car. After a terse, but brief, negotiation I was deposited back on the road and eventually finished the trip with all my fingers, toes and that certain virginity intact.

The epilog to the tale a year later is I'm back living in SoIll and decide it's Eldo-time again and find myself back out on the road hitting all the good interchanges like the one in Lawrence, Kansas (always a black hole) which I finally escape only to be deposited late at night at - wait for it - the Topeka Bypass interchange. And who rolls up to a stop just like clockwork a year later? You guessed it, my friend in the white Dodge convertible. Talking through the window he doesn't remember me and I explain that, why yes, we'd met before and pull my knife for emphasis which suddenly jogs his memory. So, saying our goodbyes and he departs into the night with a shower of gravel never to be seen again.

Such is the story of how I came to stop hitchhiking...
perswig

climber
Jan 11, 2017 - 05:06am PT
...in my mid western hopelessness I couldn't help but keep on staring at her grimy feet.
I love this line, practically poetry.

Great bump and great stories. Thanks!
Dale
NutAgain!

Trad climber
South Pasadena, CA
Jan 11, 2017 - 05:17am PT
What a trip for this thread to be bumped now. Just tonight (late one for me) I was listening to the song referenced in the title of this thread, for the first time (I was born in 70s so wasn't exposed when it was new), a Linda Ronstadt version. I was thinking how I've been to Tehachapi and Tonopah (home of the Stealth Fighter and a great used book store).
Gary

Social climber
Desolation Basin, Calif.
Jan 11, 2017 - 08:16pm PT
This is a good thread. There's much to be said about lonely basin and range highways.

Any of you boys ever been to Rock Springs?

I woke up as the sun was reddening; and that was the one distinct time in my life, the strangest moment of all, when I didn’t know who I was – I was far away from home, haunted and tired with travel, in a cheap hotel room I’d never seen, hearing the hiss of steam outside, and the creak of the old wood of the hotel, and footsteps upstairs, and all the sad sounds, and I looked at the cracked high ceiling and really didn’t know who I was for about fifteen strange seconds. I wasn’t scared; I was just somebody else, some stranger, and my whole life was a haunted life, the life of a ghost.
hobo_dan

Social climber
Minnesota
Topic Author's Reply - Apr 5, 2019 - 11:33am PT
Bump

Jaybro

Social climber
Wolf City, Wyoming
Apr 5, 2019 - 11:51am PT
It gives you a different perspective on that song, when you hear it on the radio while handcuffed in the back of an NHP cruiser driving 90mph on highway 50 headed toward Austin, when the trooper driving leans back and says, “ I hate this song, gives people bad ideas.”

.... or so, I’m told...



BigB

Trad climber
Red Rock
Apr 5, 2019 - 02:27pm PT
Just got a ticket in Goldfield from the local sheriff....going 90 in a 55....ol' boy(80+yo)knocked it down to a rural speedin violation(speeding on a dirt road basically) for me, its good to be bornin n raised in this stAte.
originalpmac

Mountain climber
Timbers of Fennario
Apr 5, 2019 - 04:56pm PT
There is a freeze-frame moment in time that I will never forget. I just moved to Ouray. I've been there for about 2 days and Christmas Eve came around. I had probably $400 to my name no job, no car and no phone nor did I know anybody in town. I decided to go out and get a beer at the Outlaw. As I'm walking down an empty Main Street with the snow falling and the lights of the bars and liquor store lighting up the street I remember thinking that I found my home. When do the bar, had a few beers and went home. Got up the next morning went climbing all day.

Years later I was in Northern New Mexico late at night why my truck overheated and broke down. The Grateful Dead song Pride of Cucamonga was in my head the whole time.

"Out on the edge of an empty highway howling at the blood on the moon. Diesel Mac comes rolling down my way can't hit that border too soon..."
zBrown

Ice climber
Apr 5, 2019 - 07:06pm PT
LA Turnarounds



zBrown

Ice climber
Apr 5, 2019 - 07:36pm PT


https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=keZtRxS2xFM
Fritz

Social climber
Choss Creek, ID
Apr 6, 2019 - 06:51am PT
About 27 years back: I left Reno around 8:00 PM on an August evening, after closing out the Outdoor Retailer Show & buying some food for dinner. I planned to car-camp overnight, then spend the next day hunting minerals & fossils in the Humbolt Range between Lovelock & Winnemucca. I drove NE up I-80 to about 15 miles south of Lovelock, and found an exit with a decent dirt road that climbed up into the hills. There were no mailboxes at the start of the road, and no houses in sight.

I drove up the road just as night was falling, and after 3 or 4 miles, took a little used side road out another mile or so, to a less used road, and drove up it until it ended. I turned my 4-Runner around, parked, and ate my deli-dinner, while enjoying some wine, the warm summer night, and the miles away headlights on I-80.

Unfortunately I kept my cab-light on, while sipping wine, and reading.
After a while, I saw headlights start up toward me from I-80. They were at least 4 miles away, and I knew they could not possibly be heading to me. I turned my cab-light off anyway, grabbed my .357 (being an Idaho boy-I keep it handy while in the desert) and exited the vehicle.

The headlights went past my side road, stopped, backed up and entered my side road.
Same thing happened on the next side road.

By now I was behind my vehicle, sweating in the dark.

I was pretty sure I would take off running, if the vehicle occupants proved hostile.
About 50 ft. away, the intruding vehicle stopped, with my Idaho Plates, and fairly new 4-Runner fully illuminated by its headlights.

I stayed hidden behind my 4-Runner.

The intruder’s engine turned off.

There was about a 10 second pause: then the cop turned on his Twinkies.

I left the pistol on the rear bumper and walked forward with hands fully-extended up, while saying loudly:

“Officer, I’ve never been so happy to see a cop in my whole life!”

It was two good-old boys Sherriff’s Deputies from Lovelock. They had come out to check out an electric transformer that had been hit by lightning & caught on fire. One confessed he was taking a piss in the dark, and just happened to see my far off cab-light. They had a good chuckle with me about keeping me honest, and didn’t even ask for my license.


hobo_dan

Social climber
Minnesota
Topic Author's Reply - Apr 6, 2019 - 07:57am PT
Fritz- well told story--I was definitely tuned in
Toker Villain

Big Wall climber
Toquerville, Utah
Apr 6, 2019 - 11:25am PT
Gnome Ofthe Diabase

climber
Out Of Bed
Apr 8, 2019 - 05:30am PT
Recorded 3/16/19 after a solid month of pickin'' N' Playin' almost a show a night[Click to View YouTube Video]
After an extensive summer tour, the talented picker detailed a batch of dates with the promise of more to come.

Billy Strings kicked off the tour at The Source Public House in Menasha, Wisconsin on September 27. did 5-6 shows and then head west.

A performance at Phoenix’s Musical Instrument Museum on October 19. From there, the tour went to Las Vegas on October 20, San Diego on October 23, Los Angeles on October 24 and Morro Bay on October 25.

The tour continued at Great American Music Hall in San Francisco for a concert presented by Cellarmaker Brewing Company on October 27.

Then Petaluma on October 28 before a Pacific Northwest run that included stops in Seattle, Portland and Boise. Then 2 more shows for Halloween.

Strings played Salt Lake City on November 3, Austin on November 8 and Atlanta on November 15.

A series of Thanksgiving Week performances in Billy’s home state of Michigan came next.
The tour concluded in Colorado with concerts in Manitou Springs on November 29, Boulder on November 30 and Denver on December 1. He played a New Years week mini-tour before this current run that started 2/13/19 & continues with a week off. here and there, till July.

Catch a show if you can.



A full set

https://youtu.be/wJ5GzIqTmSk
Messages 61 - 80 of total 90 in this topic << First  |  < Previous  |  Show All  |  Next >  |  Last >>
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