Beers at the Shakespeare Inn

[mnaz]

It was 115 degrees in Havasu.... heatwaves melting the bare rhyolite hills again. Rumors of a bar underneath the motel persisted, so I went down a concrete ramp.... subterrainean lair.... no sign of life behind the glass. But the door was unlocked, so I slipped inside.... across a dark 'banquet' room, only to find your garden-variety tavern in back, with draft Bud and signs posting no charge for shirtless women.

Garrett, the thunderous bartender, had wide, white sideburns. Havasu was where his truck broke down. He lived upstairs, saving getaway money to make it to Jackson Hole. His dream was to become a pro golf caddy. He complained that it was hard to find steady bartending because he was 'too old and too male'.

George and AJ showed up around my third beer. George went for the Mark Russell look-- thick glasses, an American flag shirt, with overalls-- while AJ was a Buddy Hackett clone. They were fluent in whorehouse songs of the thirties and demented political satire of the fifties, the latter derived from the records of Tom Lehrer, a one-time Harvard math professor.

George bought me a another beer and launched into song.... "Good bye mommy, I'm off to kill some commies".... A beer later, Garrett cut in with twisted limericks.... "A mathematician named Hall, had a hexahedronical ball. The cube of its weight, times his pecker plus eight, is his phone number, give him a call". What were the odds?

I'm shaking my head.

[stilltrucking]

Quartzite AZ
Funky little town or it used to be, looked like a bunch of desert rats camped out in 1950's travel trallers. Probably a big tourist trap by now.

Not sure if I am thinking about the same Havasu, travelled past that exit so many times. Have you been through Texas Canyon, Geronimo's strong hold, natural fortress bouders the side of 18 wheelers.


Keep on trucking.

[Zlatko Waterman]

Funny story, mnaz.

All that talk about beer makes this old man with diabetes thirsty.

Waves of my misspent youth roll over me like Chevy Chase's lost shot at topping Johnny Carson ( or Jay Leno).

God, what travesties were played out along the Pacific shore over those Dos Equis tall bottles!

Happy Friday. I hope there's no drizzle in Seattle.


--Z (N)

[mnaz]

I keep forgetting about that other Havasu.... up on the Indian Rez.
The one I wrote about is Lake Havasu City, on the Parker Dam reservoir, the place started by the McCulloch chainsaw guy 35 years ago when he built a hotel and imported the London Bridge as a sure-fire gimmick. You can see the re-assembly numbers on the stone blocks....

Quartzsite is a rockhounding mecca, of sorts, but mainly a snowbird resort.... oceans of shimmering R-Vee's....

Texas Canyon.... boulder-strewn, as I recall. Yeah, that's I-10, coming into Benson, or Willcox, isn't it? The only 'stronghold' I recall is Cochise's Stronghold, in the Dragoon Mountains, southeast Arizona. I could see it from Chiricahua Nat. Park, across the basin.... strange place.... spires and hoodoos of gray volcanic tuft.... like a gray-brown Bryce Canyon.....

I miss the Southwest already.


And Z....

Drizzle generally owns much of late-Oct. onward (and onward and onward) in the gray-t Pac. NW. Just a few passing showers so far....

I used to drink those micro-brews, but I swear, some of them are loaded with mind-altering drugs. Now I just pop a Miller Lite once and awhile....

[stilltrucking]

A little brewry in Shiner Texas, Shiner Boc beer the best tasting beer I have ever had. Now it has bought by a big conglomerate, who knows what it taste like now.

miller is good, Budweiser tastes like mouth wash to me. Had a buddy from Wales he used to order a Black and Tan. Guiness stout and a light beer mix them, very good.

Ilwaco the town I miss the most. Worked on a trawler out of there one summer. Seattle only saw the water front and piers. A beat city if I ever saw one. I love rain.

late for work got to run, will edit this later a million typos I know, sorry marc

[Zlatko Waterman]

mnaz:

Isn't there a Texas Canyon on Hwy 2 running from Tucson toward New Mexico? Lots of red rock and fine mesa formations?

There's a souvenir store called "The Thing" ( on this hwy 2-- or is it I-10?) where I bought some Zuni jewelry, with about a dozen billboards on the highway approaching it ( "The Thing") from Tucson.

By the way, you once mentioned the possibility of moving to Tucson. Nice college town, but the place reminded me too much of Reno/Sparks for comfort.

Sparks used to be the cloaca of the universe when I lived there in 1971, but a friend of mine from college, who happens to be a Lutheran minister, has a church there and likes it just fine.

Thatcher, Az is a place I did a poetry reading in 1986-- at Southwest Arizona college, I think.

Some lovely good-sized mountains there, snow-capped, right out in the middle of the desert, and snow even in May-- Mount Griffin? Griffith?


---Z

[mnaz]

Z...

Sorry... late response.

I couldn't locate a 'Hwy 2' on my AZ map.... The 'Texas Canyon' I'm familiar with is between mile markers 312 and 316 on I-10, a stark, boulder-laden otherworld-scape, with perhaps some red rock, though I didn't notice much of it at 65 mph and in the rain... perhaps we're thinking of the same place... not sure.

Tucson is alright... well, at least the areas in close to the U of A. I remember one bumper sticker.... "Born OK the first time" (no need for that born-again racket).

I stayed over in Safford, once. They grow cotton in the fields next to Hwy 70.... If I ever tallied up how many miles I've driven in just the last five years....

[stilltrucking]

Texas Canyon the weather can get so weird there in winter. Very changeable. Ruidoso NM another place of wierd weather.

Wickenberg a strange town. Something weird with the water. I took a shower in the old truck stop there. I glowed in the dark for a week

Those mountains coming into LA, old timers told me they used to be snow capped in winter. Not anymore.

"And I've been from Tucson to Tucumcari
Tehachapi to Tonopah"

Some of us are not so fortunate to be born once
Some of us are being reborn constantly
Every week I have to go down and get a new social security number.