days five and six

what an eventful pair of days it's been. on friday morning, we headed away from dallas, loaded with snacks and dinner from the night before. certainly worth mentioning (and almost worthy of an entire blog post themselves) were rickey smiley and deez nuts. the morning show on 97.9 the beat, dallas/fort worth's interactive hip hop station, featured such gems as a fake interview with dmx ("i was high, and i saw a picture of these dogs playing poker. so i thought, if the dogs are smart enough to play poker, then they're smart enough to feed themselves." also, "yo d, do you have a website?" "yeah, it's w.. no."), and shout outs to ladies with stretch marks and cottage cheese thighs ("she look like somebody hit her in the ass with a bag of nickels"). one irate woman called in to vent about women whose children walk around "all nappy headed" while the women themselves "look like they just came out the shop." she assured us that her children "always be lookin' fresh." needless to say, we were saddened when 97.9 became too fuzzy to understand, although it was never quite... clear enough for us to understand fully anyway.

gabe "merit badge" shaukat, wade "you can die, i just don't want to see it" wisdom and i had decided to head to the grand canyon to camp out friday night and explore on saturday morning. we were in the car for nearly fifteen hours, with gabe and i switching off driving every five hours or so. western texas and eastern arizona were both absolutely beautiful, and the sun set on us as we passed into arizona. there was a short crisis when we realized that my gas light and the distance between gas stations in arizona were just barely synced up, but we hit the hopi travel plaza for fuel and food and we trekked on. gabe's hyperactivity proved useful when my tired eyes failed me and he took over at the wheel. he saw us into kaibob (from the indian word for "mountain laying down") forest and up into the grand canyon park itself. the journey to the campsite was fraught with peril, from mutant deer to low-flying satellites to a pretty hefty dropoff into the gorgeous (even at night) canyon below. we pitched our tent at the south rim of the canyon and passed out.

in the morning, we packed up and headed down to town for breakfast. we decided we'd hike into the canyon, then play things by ear. we hiked the first leg of the bright angel trail, which was a bit difficult, but well worth our effort. pictures are again, forthcoming, and certainly worth the wait. at the conclusion of our brief hike, we encountered two folks in "rim to rim 2008" t-shirts who had spent the morning running between 21 and 23 miles of trails from the north rim. i was very impressed.


after our hike, we headed back down into town to plan the next move. we'd playfully suggested to one another that we somehow end up in vegas, but as young men's whims tend to do, ours became serious. wade and i sought out the nearest wireless internet connection, booked a hotel room, and picked up gabe (who had been guarding wade's charging iphone at wendy's). we were off. a pointless police checkpoint and a drive over the hoover dam deposited us right in vegas, where the air is electric despite our waning exuberance. the boys are asleep right now, probably tired from our walk. that, or the fact that we've traversed three time zones in six days. hopefully they'll wake up and i'll have a fun late-night update.


here's to canyons and casinos, all in one day.